BIRDIE HUNTER prototype. Advise please!

[Holmqvist]

I've gotten to a point in this game "Birdie Hunter" that I'm working on, when I will either slap on 3-4 levels and let it be freeware or continue to develope it for 3-4 months more and make it commercial..

So far it's taken about a month to develope this (this is my first game). I've got a lot of ideas and it's not a huge projekt so I'm thinking it could be good as a first try.

Here comes a couple of worries though..
It's made in Flash, which has some limitations, both in speed and sound and saving and so on.. So if I'm going on with this I'm thinking of porting it to director and continue there.. I don't know how much work that would be, so if you have experience with doing that, I'd like to know.
The second thing is the type of the game. While I have seen many freeware games in the category point-to-shoot, I have not seen any commercial games like that as I recall.. So the question is, is it a good idea? Will people pay money for it, if it's well done?

I've got a couple ideas for more "modes" and I intend to make environments that are nicer and less static than what you will see here, and more birds :)

Ok, I've held you back long enough.. Try it!
http://193.15.111.35/mpro04/jacob.holmqvist/mysite/game/birdiehunter.html

/ Jacob

[Mark Sheeky]

I have not seen any commercial games like that as I recall

Operation Wolf? Time crisis? Terminator 3? OP Wolf was mouse controlled even on my C64 :)

Still, there aren't -that- many indie games like it but you'll probably have to add a lot (scrolling?) to make it exciting enough to be commercial in my opinion. There was a game on Amiga called Zombie Apocalypse 2 that was a manic one screen point and shooter.

It's your call. You never know what will succeed until you try.

Mark
Cornutopia Games
http://www.cornutopia.net

[GBGames]

Does anyone remember the game Gotcha! for the NES? It scrolled to the sides and you shot at the enemy as you saw them. Something like that would make it more interesting. I've seen games similar to this, but they are usually more frantic (I only played for a little bit as I am at work).

It could be fun if the birds were quicker and if the birds flew in random directions when you fire your first shot.

How about if you shoot a bird that is higher than the others, and as it falls it actually can collide with the other birds, resulting in bonus points?

The mere Duck Hunt clone has plenty of potential. B-)

[Holmqvist]

It could be fun if the birds were quicker and if the birds flew in random directions when you fire your first shot.

The speed is easy to adjust, and they do actually fly in random direction at each shot! :D

I've thought about scrolling to.. and that might be a good idea.

[Dominique Biesmans]

You really should take a look at the 'moorhuhn' series,
which is/was a very popular series of the SCOOTS (Shoot Chickens Out Of The Sky) genre in Europe.

The official German site :
http://www.moorhuhn.de/

An site in English :
http://members.shaw.ca/moorhuhn/

[Holmqvist]

@Dominique
Moorhuhn was a good thing! I can learn a lot from it, and I also feel that some things could be done better in that game.. And the fact that it was successful does answer one of my questions. Thanks :)