GlitchHiker (Winner 1st Place + Crowd Pleaser) Global Game Jam 2011 Netherlands

A glimpse of Glitchhiker, just after winning the Jury + Audience Awards at the Global Game Jam 2011 (2 day game development) Netherlands. Organized by Dutch Game Garden at the Utrecht School of The Arts.

Working from the GGJ11 theme 'extinction' we designed a game that runs on a system that can go extinct. By playing well you can save the system, by playing badly you take life from the system. When the system loses a life the game becomes more glitchy.

The music reacts to the visual glitches and to the player's skills. Our system of adaptive music does not work with queueing loops. Instead it works with three independent layers of music playing simultaneously, while their volumes are glitching responding to the gameplay. This results in direct musical feedback. It eliminated the need for traditional sound effects in most situations.

"GlitchHiker was a game that existed of two parts. The first part was the game itself, which you can see on the video. The second part was an online internet server that we called the SYSTEM.

In the GAME, players collected coins with the GLITCHHIKER to score points in a single screen arena. They could dash by pressing 'X', but wouldn't be able to stop dashing until they hit a solid object. Non-solid grey blocks would be introduced frequently, and if a player collected a coin near those, the grey blocks would turn into coins to score chains or combos of coins. However, if a grey block remained for a short while, it would turn black and solid.

The black blocks would frequently turn into red blocks that would introduce a vertical or horizontal disturbance in the game. After a short period, the disturbance would execute and kill anything within it - including the GLITCHHIKER if it happened to stand there.

The SYSTEM was the second part. When the SYSTEM started at 15:00, it had a hundred lives. Every time a player played GlitchHiker and died, a life was deducted from the system. For every hundred points a player scored in GlitchHiker, a life was added. Summarized, everyone who did not score at least a hundred lives was decreasing the amounts of lives available to the SYSTEM.

The more lives were deducted from the pool, the less healthy the game became. Graphical glitches were introduced, the audio started glitching and black blocks started shifting around, introducing distraction in the game.

When the SYSTEM would reach zero lives, the game would shut down and go extinct. The game would no longer be playable.

Despite the valiant attempts by some players at saving the SYSTEM, which had already taken quite a hit during the GGJ event, at 21:41PM the SYSTEM executed its inevitable task and GlitchHiker shut down.

This means GlitchHiker can be downloaded but not executed anymore. Luckily, we still have a video of the game at work."
http://globalgamejam.org/2011/glitchhiker

Download the game (Windows only) and check out the system at: http://www.ramiismail.com/extinction/

Read more at Vlambeer: http://www.vlambeer.com/2011/01/31/r-i-p-glitchhiker/ (including the beautiful review from Control magazine)

GLITCHHIKER was made by a TEAM of six PEOPLE:

- LAURENS DE GIER _ GAME DESIGN _ VISUALISATION DESIGN _ VISUALISATION DEVELOPMENT

- RAMI ISMAIL _ PROJECT LEAD _ BACKEND DEVELOPMENT _ WEBSITE DEVELOPMENT

- JAN WILLEM NIJMAN _ GAME DESIGN LEAD _ GAME DEVELOPMENT _ VFX DESIGN

- JONATHAN BARBOSA DIJKSTRA _ GAME DESIGN _ GAME ART

- RUTGER MULLER _ GAME MUSIC _ GAME SFX

- PAUL VEER _ LEAD GAME ART _ WEBSITE ART

Global Game Jam 2011 Netherlands was made possible by

- International Game Developers Association

- Dutch Game Garden

- Microsoft

- Taskforce Innovation Utrecht Region

- Wacom

Category:

Gaming

Tags:

• GGJNL
• GGJ11
• Global Game Jam
• Game Design
• Game Development
• Rapid Prototyping
• Pixel Art
• Chiptune
• 8-Bit
• Glitchhiker
• Glitch Hiker
• Video Game
• Adaptive Music
• Interactive Music
• Game Audio
• SQL
• Database
• Co-Operative
• Dutch Game Garden
• Wacom
• Microsoft
• Vlambeer
• Aardbever
• HKU
• Utrecht School of the Arts
• Indie Game
• Award Winning
• Arcade Game
• Game Innovation
• Plogue Chipsounds
• Game Maker

[shiftlock]

Awesome concept but the manufactured "glitches" let it down.

[rutgermuller]

@shiftlock what kind of glitches would you like to have seen?

[shiftlock]

@rutgermuller I followed the link from the GSW article. The way they described it led me to believe the game generated actual glitches as you lost lives. Of course that isn't really feasible at all :)

[rutgermuller]

@shiftlock true, the gameplay elements are strongly connected to the glitches, so they have be kept under control :).

[srredfire]

Give me the music.

[rutgermuller]

@srredfire it's on diskette deluxe . com without spaces

[soulripper030792]

how the fuck do you play this?

[Kairia626]

This is really badass, and seems like an original idea. I'm glad you won awards for this game. You definitely deserve it.

[xenocore01]

Are there plans to reset the SYSTEM for another shot in the future?

[SamsonGuest]

love the concept!