I gave a talk at the PRACTICE game design conference at the NYU Game Center a couple months ago:
I had meant to update the talk I gave at Indiecade in 2011, and talk more in depth about how I used these ideas for Miegakure, but in the end because of the half hour format I do not cover the first half (designing mechanics to generate an interesting possibility space) and only cover the second half (how to explore the space the mechanics create). I also talk about a bunch of game design problems that are especially interesting in the case of Miegakure. I also cut the intro a bit, but posted it Here.
Great talk. I was delighted to hear that the stack of different-looking slices will fade into a more consistent-looking 4D space as the game progresses.
Do you have your slides posted anywhere? some of them are a little hard to see.
Ah, ok, sorry. I won’t be able to post them for a few days.
Brilliant idea and great effort!
This concept is too difficult to express. Since the presentation method is still 3D, the transition between two spaces is limited with this appear-disappear visualisation. Character also has to move in 3D, and a special movement is defined to be the switch to enter another shared space. It’s basically a challenge of memory.
BTW, just a thinking: what if there is one puzzle using 4 juxtaposed spaces on the same screen, then the character has different projections in the 4 spaces, player has to somehow try to unify the movement to pass through…
A level editor would be amazing! I do wonder what a 4D racing game would be like. I’m sure there can be a sort of hide-and-seek game like this–especially if it were first-person. An FPS? Certainly interesting…