Getting back into development! & Rhythm ​Heaven​ Breakdown (RC Devlog 1)

Peaceful Illumination has finally decided to revisit Rhythm Cataclysm! We plan on adding more music you can play along with, and some redesign of certain elements in the original. This post is tagged as a long-form so I have to keep updates short and discuss game design. I am going to discuss on how to design a good rhythm game with reacting visuals and a great user experience!
To start lets go over how the game played in the original Rhythm Cataclysm.

In the original game you press keys along with the beat. They consist of Z and X that slide across the top of the screen. Now there is nothing inherently wrong with that, but when we bring in the fascinating changing background that will change how we perceive the game. If we only have the keys that move, all of our focused attention would be on them. There are many games that are just like that and play greatly (Guitar hero, Super Crazy Guitar Maniac Deluxe, DDR, Deemo, and other musical arcade games). Yet, our objective is to have the background and scenery react to the music and how you play. So each beat the scene changes slightly, and changes depending on whether you hit it or not. The dilemma is the fact that we need to focus on the sliding bar on the top or we might miss a key. If you take a glance at the bottom you will most likely lose sight of the next key to press. You could just suggest to never look down, but that takes away from the beautiful art we took time to design, animate, and program into the game. The solution to this would be to combine both elements. As a quick reference, "Rhythm Heaven" implements this idea perfectly! In this snap shot of one of the levels, you press the "A" button as soon as the peg reaches the piston that you control. All the visuals you see react to the beat and move with it. If you successfully hit it you get a specific animation for that; where as when you fail you get another animation slightly different as well. You might not know, but Rhythm Heaven was our inspiration when making this game. 

Another thing we would have to do to make the game flow better, would be to add windups to the beat. Referring back to Rhythm Heaven, that game gives you a few beats to get the speed and rhythm before you must press a button. "Da da da Dum" and you would press "A" on the Dum. Without this you are then using your reaction to press a button instead of learning the cadence and rhythm of the music. In Rhythm Cataclysmic we had keys assigned to specific interments and had you play them along to the beat that interment was going at. That approach works for the most part, but beat can change and key patters can deviate from what is being played. This way players would then be expected to memorize how the keys will come up and timing for them. Now that isn't all bad, many rhythm games are based off that. They expect players to get better each time they play to get that perfect score. Yet, like I have stated before we want to copy, I mean base our game off of Rhythm Heaven. Let's list out the key points of a level in Rhythm Heaven.

1. No floating notes moving across the screen
2. Visuals react to the beat
3. Beat build up to button press
4. Visuals for each beat build up

Wow, I thought that list would have been bigger. 

Okay now lets come up with some ideas for a Rhythm Heaven-esk level we could make.
Number one is easy, just don't do it. Now number two; What if we had a hacky sack that you hit on each beat? Then the sack moves up and back down for the next beat. Great, okay two down. For number three we need some build up. What if we had the crow do some chanting a few times before you need to hit the sack. Oh, and they could do some hand gestures too, maybe they throw them up in the air? We could also have the sack do some kind of stretch and squash on the build up beats. Whoops, we just finished point four early. Now just throw in some music and sound effects and your done! 

If you would like to see that final idea come to life, please follow this project for more devlogs and the future release of Rhythm Cataclysm!

Now for my end catch phrase that I just now made up. Remember to always check for negatives and stay fresh!