ID:88605
 
Keywords: forum_account, spies
A user named Forum_account (who is most likely an experienced BYOND developer under an alias, if you ask me) has created a game called Spies!. Although the hub entry claims in jest that this game is not related to Skysaw's My Life As A Spy, there are some obvious similarities. This game, however, takes a much more simplistic approach to the idea. In reality, its somewhat of a glorified capture the flag wrapped around a spy theme, and with a lot more violence.

I did find the gameplay and especially the effects to be very smooth and attractive. Although the hub entry says that the game is both single and multiplayer, with the frame rate that the game is running at, I don't know how well multiplayer would fare.

I'm not going to write an elaborate review for this game since I haven't played it enough to do it justice, but I would like to quote the comments from his blog:

Initially the game had no purpose, I just started adding some effects: dust, muddy footprints, broken glass, and bleeding. You know, the things that are common elements of all good games.

My first idea for a direction to take it in was murder mystery. By following footprints and blood trails you'd have to track down (and avoid!) the killer (or killers). I figured it wouldn't turn out as interesting as real murder mysteries (I consider the movie Clue to be "real"), it would just be a game of "kill everyone before they kill you.

I decided to take the game in a direction that's more accommodating to the "kill before you're killed" lifestyle: espionage!

I added guns to get the game to a somewhat playable state. It wouldn't be much fun if the only way to die was from wounds related to stepping in broken glass. In this state, the game is quite fast-paced and frantic (the insanely frantic AI players don't help). I'd like to find some ways to slow the gameplay down.



You can visit Forum_account's blog to read the full post. Obviously this is still a work in progress, and I noticed that since this blog post, some of the features suggested there have already been implemented.