Ghouls n Wheels

Not my game.

So, here's my game idea. I've had this idea for maybe a year, springing from thinking about what kind of game would really take advantage of, for instance, being able to measure which way is up on a phone or tablet. A number of possibilities come to mind, of course, but I started thinking about an old, fun, acrobatic/physics game for DOS, called Action SuperCross (or Across, as we called it). The game is about making all kind of insane stunts and tricks navigating near-impossible platform levels, while collecting apples and escaping by picking up a flower (yes, really). Lot's of fun and a good challenge!

Maybe you could control the vehicle by tilting your device instead of using keys? But using a motorcycle or bike like that didn't really make any sense, insomuch as a game has to, but what about if it's a skateboard instead? And also, how about instead of controlling the character, how about you control gravity, so that whichever way the device is held, gravity is always down, and the player uses this to control acceleration and deceleration, as well as which way is currently the floor or ceiling of a level, making it an action puzzler?

Made of AWESOME.

Here's how, as it often is, inspiration strikes in combining more than one idea. A friend of mine, Markus Toivonen, told me about  an idea he had for a movie script some years ago, and he even painted a nice poster of it - he called it Ghouls n Wheels and it's a mixture of... maybe Back to the Future and Army of Darkness? It's about this boy who finds a skateboard, presumably in the same store that sells the mogwais, and told not to ride it after midnight. I don't know. Either way, the skateboard is magic, and takes him straight into HELL! And now, obviously, he needs to escape.

Sounds like a perfect backstory and setting for my game, right? Here's this boy, on his skateboard, and he's in hell and needs to escape. Hell is one weird place, where natural laws don't really apply, but on the other hand, our hero has a magical, inter-dimensional-travelling vehicle at his hands, and can therefore to some extent bend the laws of hell to his will - in this case, apparently decide what is up and down, or depending on how you look at it, ignore any such stupid law and skate on, Escher style.

So anyway, that's my basic premise: action puzzler, set in hell and controlled by rotating the whole world around the player, using a physics simulation to get a good nice feeling from the skateboarding experience. If the simulation is tweaked enough and there's some good level design for the puzzles, I think it could be a fun experience and a good game.

Sounds easy, right? Now on to figure out exactly how this is even possible. Not really taking the easy way out, am I...?

Next up, more about the how, I guess. If I have some how to share. Until then, have a picture of me on an analog skateboard, doing wicked shit apparently.

"Hang what? Lose? Ah, loose! Is this the sign?"