Bond Breaker, then and now

September 8, 2014

With Bond breaker released (ahem, read about it here… never mind the Shocktopus screenshot… or here, or just go and play it here), I’ve gotten a chance to look back through some of my old files – and I came across this, the first prototype of Bond Breaker:

Catchy title, no?

Ah, the unnamed game.  (I will say, I still love that subtitle.) Looks a little different from the current version, I’d say:

Needless to say, when you stumble across a digital time-capsule like this, it’s amazing to see how much has changed during the development of the game.  The easiest thing to notice is the art style.  So let’s take a little walk down screenshot lane.  Can you tell the ‘old’ from the ‘new’??

The Repulsion Level

Prototypes are amazing things — they are the first rough draft of your game.  You’re testing out ideas, and you use ‘programmer art,’ quick images that just make the game playable.  So one of the big things you’ll notice is how basic all the art is in the prototype.  Yellow squares instead of stars for goals, very basic walls, etc.  You’ll also notice that the atoms were absolutely tiny on the screen, something I fixed in later versions.

Molecules

Molecules were the core of the game right from the beginning.  I really enjoyed the feeling of tugging another atom around, with just a molecular bond tying you two together.  If you go slow, you stick together, but if you go too fast, zooming around corners, you can split apart.  With a little bit of practice, you could control your molecule pretty well — picking up protons, and depositing them elsewhere in the level.

Of course, in the original version, while the *physics* worked, the picture of the molecule was a little strange.  Notice how it’s wider than it is long, making a strange oval around the two atoms.  When you’re trying to make a quick draft, you need to ignore those little things.  But in the final version, the molecule is shaped just as it should be.  (Not to mention, you get a picture of a little electron zooming around you.)

The Menus

Unsung heroes of the game, menus are one of the last things I really care about when making a game. After all — nobody says “I wasn’t sure whether I liked the game or not… until I saw those amazing menus!”  But as I’m sure you can see from the pictures below… the prototype menu needed some improvement.

-Andy