Submitted by twovests in killallgames

I think I posted about this before. I'm really involved with this idea and have mulled on it for years but I don't know how much sense it makes. So tell me if these following bullet points make sense:

How games are with one dimension of time:

  • Almost every videogame involves one time dimension, usually measured in a discrete quantity of frames, cycles, turns, or steps. We'll use the term "step."

  • Most games (like first person shooters, action games, or real-time strategies) have a lot of steps per second, so movement looks continuous. But it's really in steps. 60 steps per second is a good amount.

  • Some videogames make mechanics by speeding up or slowing down the action per step. These are "bullet time" mechanics, speed up / slow down seen in tower defense and RTS games, and, famously, in SuperHot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrS86l_CtAY

  • The state of these videogames advance as the internal "step" clock advances. Everything is tied to this one step clock, and the step clock can advance at a rate independent of our real-world clock.

My idea:

  • We can have multiple step clocks. For simplicity, let's say there is red time and blue time.

  • Red elements can advance only when the red step clock advances. Blue elements advance only when the blue step clock advances.

  • Like normal step clocks, these can be scaled independently of the real world time clock. They also act independent of one another.

A platforming game idea I have that would exemplify this:

  • Gravity that acts in different directions in red and blue time, enemies that act in different ways in red and blue time

  • The player would be able to traverse a time-plane, adding a (literal) new dimension of decision making in platforming

  • The player would retain red and blue velocity vectors, which could make for a whole bunch of cool tricks.

This would definitely make more sense with infographics, but I honestly have no idea if this all sounds sensible, or if I sound like a rambling and inarticulate artist.

Side note: they say the idea is 1% and the execution is 99%. So if I make this I'm going to call my game 1/100, because I just want to showcase the mechanic and see real indie studios make good use of it.

7

Comments

You must log in or register to comment.

toasthaste wrote

I think i get it but this feels like the type of thing that would be more grokkable with a prototype 👀 do it do it do it

5

twovests OP wrote

gonna wait for godot 3.0 to come out, and then do that over spring break ;0

4

musou wrote

this is a cool idea. would both time streams tick at different (adjustable) rates continuously or would you be able to switch back and forth?

4

twovests OP wrote

Ugh I had a comment mostly written and then I replied to toasthaste and it got deleted ;v;

Basically, yeah there has to be some mechanic to adjust or change the rates, else it's logically equivalent to one clock. They can take on any real value >= 0 (and, tbh they could go backwards too just as easily). In my platforming idea you'd probably just switch between the two clocks.

4

voxpoplar wrote

There's no reason you couldn't do this. It would really only be marginal more complicated than programming a normal game I think. Designing levels that make good use of it would be hard though.

2

twovests OP wrote

Oh yeah, I know exactly how I'd do these! The only problem is free time (plus my excuse of "I'm waiting for Godot 3.0 to come out!").

I've also got some levels in mind :D

2