pituicat/gdd/10pager.tex

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\author{Amedeo Molnár}
\title{\vfill Pituicat}
\date{\today}

\begin{document}
\pagenumbering{gobble}
\maketitle
\begin{center}
	Target Platform: PC(Linux/Win) \quad Target audience: Ages 15 - 35
\end{center}
\vfill

\newpage
\tableofcontents

\newpage
\pagenumbering{arabic}
\setcounter{page}{1}

\vfill

\section{Game story}

You are a cat. or at least you used to be one, until you accidentally fell into
a vat with the latest failed biochem experiment of your owner as the military,
your owners employers, sack him and clean the lab in a hurry. You get poured down
the drain by an assistant while your owner gets escorted away in handcuffs.

When you wake up again in the sewer you have solidified again to a small meowing
gelatinous blob. You are hungry and you yearn for your owner's affection. But
where has he been taken to?

You set out to find him, but have to fend off enemies and withstand dangerous
environments while you make your journey through multiple locations finding clues
about your owner's whereabouts.

Powerups and DNA-Fragments for unlocking new
abilities help you on your way through increasingly dangerous stages full of
different levels.

\vfill

\section{Game play}

In \enquote{Pituicat} You play as slime cat in search of its owner.

The Levels of the game as well as its story are divided into six stages,
each ending with a boss fight.

\vfill

\nbreak

\vfill

\section{Player character}

In the beginning the player character is about the size of a pea, has low health and
can barely lift off the ground when jumping. But as the player advances he will be
awarded DNA-Fragments for defeating bosses and will be able to find powerups and
hidden DNA-Fragments.
Powerups grant some temporary boni whereas DNA-Fragments are used to activate
permanent abilities or increase your health.
With every stage also the size of the character increases. Starting at pea size, you
grow to grape size to golf ball size to tennis ball size to rugby size until you
reach the size of a large cat.

\vfill

\subsection{Abilities}

The activatable abilities, all having three levels, include:

\begin{itemize}
	\item Health up (Adds 50\% of your start health to your max health per level)
	\item Congeal (reduces damage by 25\% of remaining damage per level)
	\item Vacuole (store one collected powerup per level)
	\item Spit (shoot acidic projectiles with ranges from 2 over 4 to 8 tiles)
	\item Harden (become invulnerable but almost immobile for 1 second. Cooldown starts at 4
		seconds and can be reduced to two and finally to 1 second)
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\subsection{Powerups}

Powerups appear on the map as floating droplets and can also be occasionally dropped by
enemies or during boss fights. Droplets spawning on the map do respawn, others not.

These are the available powerups, which will be gradually introduced into the game with
every new stage:

\begin{itemize}
	\item Peptide (replenishes 5\% of start health)
	\item Oily Emulsion (Increase speed by 25\% for 5 seconds)
	\item Latex (Increase jump height by 100\% for 5 seconds)
	\item Organic Lead (decrease damage by 50\% but disable jumping for 5 seconds)
	\item Antidote (Heal poisoning immediately)
	\item Purified Caffeine (Stop surrounding time for 2 seconds)
	\item Agent X (Become almost invisible for 5 seconds)
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\section{Player Controls}

The controls described here take a QWERTZ-keyboard as reference.

\begin{tabular}{ll}

\keys{A} & Slither left\\

\keys{D} & Slither right\\

\keys{W} & Jump\\

\keys{S} & Jump down through Platform\\

\keys{F} & Interact\\

\keys{1}, \keys{2}, \keys{3} & Release powerup from specified vacuole\\

\keys{E} & Harden\\

\keys{\space} & Spit\\

\keys{Esc} & Enter/Exit Menu\\

\end{tabular}

\vfill

\nbreak

\vfill

\section{Game world}

The game world is a mostly urbanized landscape with some elements
from cyberpunk.

The levels are themed after the stages they are in and vary slightly
in size, but aim to be rather big and not monolinear. Players can collect
powerups and rarely even DNA-Fragments, which at the end of the Level can
be traded in for new or improved abilities.

Hand crafted carefully composed assets paired with thoughtful level
design aim for an immersable game with a strong retro feel.


\vfill

\section{Game experience}

The game is divided into the following six stages:

\begin{itemize}
	\item The Sewer
	\item Back Alley
	\item Abandoned Lab
	\item The Highway
	\item Military-industrial complex
	\item Secret base
\end{itemize}

Every stage has its distinct design and set of enemies, puzzles and obstacles as
well as a final Boss to be overcome to succeed.

\vfill

\nbreak

\vfill

\subsection{The Sewer}

The Sewer is a dark and wet place full of dangerous waste and different vermin.

Your main enemies are giant woodlice, mice, rats and goldfish. Contact with
water or other fluids pooling, flowing or driping down there is harmful to the
character.

Puzzles include opening valve systems or restoring lighting to pitch
dark areas.

The Boss at the end of this stage is \enquote{King Rat}.

\vfill

\subsection{Back Alley}

The back alley is a dim place heaping with garbage of various kinds and access
point to many different kinds of infrastructure mostly fallen into disrepair.

Fluids pooling in dumpsters or the street as well as ill maintained electrical
wiring are the environmental dangers accompanied by rats, spiders, robotic
cleaners and various birds as enemies.

You will have to shut down electricity to progress or carefully time runs
between active garbage chutes and trick birds.

The boss at the end of this stage is \enquote{The Raven}.

\vfill

\subsection{Abandoned Lab}

The abandoned lab is the place you used to live with your owner while he was
tinkering on various projects from varying fields of science and engineering.
Now this place is deserted, stripped of all usable equipment and left to rot.

Unfortunately for you this place is far from empty. Semi conscious AI robots
cybernetically or genetically enhanced hamsters which all managed to escape
the sudden purge of the lab as well es still present malfunctioning equipment
and custom or even selfmade security measures are blocking your way.

As you might expect, the puzzles in an former lab of an almost mad scientist
are hard, include teleporting or even manipulation of space and time and force
you to be present at multiple locations simultaneously.

The boss at the end of this stage is \enquote{CyberPsy}

\vfill

\nbreak

\vfill

\subsection{The Highway}

The hot and dusty highway is not a good place for a small lonely little slime
cat.

These surroundings are only scarcely populated, but some snakelings and
lizards thrive here. In addition the scorching sun heating up the asphalt and
lizard traps pose dangers in this environment.

The main Puzzle here will be how to stay outside the sun most of the time or
how to change the environment to create shade.

The boss at the end of this stage is \enquote{Mother Snake}

\vfill

\subsection{Military-Industrial Complex}

This compound of barracks, factories, workshops and traininig grounds is off
limits to the general public and is surrounded by a heavily guarded death strip. 

You will have to deal with automated turrets, electric fences, ground spikes in
addition to guard dogs, mobile defense bots and flying surveillance or attack
drones.

You will have to figure out how to enter the seemingly impenetrable fortress
of the secret base without arising too much suspicion on your way in.

The boss at the end of this stage is \enquote{M30w}.

\vfill

\subsection{Secret Base}

Under the Complex it lies, the secret base and only few know of its existence.
Here lies the heart of most secret military research and surveillance.

Enemies include military personel and special operatives and even experimental
cyborgs or armed killer robots. There is a lot of lethal security measures
installed to prevent unauthorized entering.

Trick your way in through mazes of deadly laser arrays, confuse enemies so they
turn on each other and deactivate complex defense mechanisms to path your way
to the heart of the base.

The Boss at the end of this stage is \enquote{Node Kroenen}.

\vfill

\subsection{How to win}

clear all levels and stages and defeat all bosses.

\vfill

\subsection{How to lose}

Your health drops to zero.

\vfill

\nbreak

\vfill

\section{Game mechanics}

\enquote{Pituicat} takes place in a two-dimensional world viewed from the side, the typical
platformer view. The camera is usually centered on the player and follows his character thus
scrolling horizontally and vertically, depending on level size in the direction of movement.
The player moves around the map in real time as do the enemies. A HUD on screen schows
remaining health in from of a bar the active powerup if any and the stored up to three
powerups if any.

\hspace{.5cm}

A player in game can move around, jump and interact with certain objects in the game like
valves or switches. The number of active control buttons on the keyboard rises as the player
progresses and activates new abilities, but are mapped out to be easily reachable with one
hand. Powerups and DNA-Fragments laying around on the map or dropped by enemies are collected
actively by the player through direct contact. After clearing each level the player can spend
newly gained DNA-Fragments on abilities on a static screen also showing some statistics on
the player's progress before advancing to the next level.

\hspace{.5cm}

In \enquote{Pituicat} there is a number of active and passive abilities a player can invest
DNA-Fragments in, enabling new actions or simply aiding the player's survival.
Every ability has three levels of power, which can be activated coonsuming a DNA-Fragment,
but only when the previous power level has been already activated. Unlocking an ability,
also raising the power level to one, does not require any previous level of any other
ability, but also consumes a DNA-Fragment.

\hspace{.5cm}

An example for a passive ability would be \enquote{Congeal}, which reduces received damage
by 25\% per power level.

\hspace{.5cm}

Another example, this time for an active ability, is \enquote{Spit}, which enables the
player to shoot a projectile with increasing range for each power level starting with
two tile lengths over four to eight before dissolving into thin air.

\vfill

\nbreak

\vfill

\section{Enemies}

Every stage of the game has it's own set of enemies with varying sets of abilities. Below
is a sample of enemies ordered by stage and a short description of the stage's boss.

\vfill

\subsection{The Sewer}

\begin{itemize}
	\item Woodlice eat everything looking edible and can roll up to a ball if threatened.
	\item Goldfish jump out of water to catch prey.
	\item \enquote{King Rat} is accompanied by his large and eveer hungry court of rat minions
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\subsection{Back alley}

\begin{itemize}
	\item Rats mourn their lost king and are furious
	\item Spiders can shoot webs slowing you down
	\item \enquote{The Raven} drops heavy pieces of garbage onto its prey and deflects
		projectiles with mighty gusts of wind.
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\subsection{Abandoned Lab}

\begin{itemize}
	\item Cyberhamsters ccan dash forward very quickly with their cybernetic limbs
	\item Axolotls spit acidic drops and can return from the dead.
	\item \enquote{CyberPsy} is a genetically altered cybernetically enhanced capuchin monkey
		with psionic abilities.
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\nbreak

\vfill

\subsection{The Highway}

\begin{itemize}
	\item Lizards can be particularly tough and fast, it is very hot there.
	\item Bigger snakescan spit venom at the player.
	\item \enquote{Mother Snake} has a lot of hungry babies and has powerful venom dealing
		damage over a prolonged period of time.
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\subsection{Military-Industrial Complex}

\begin{itemize}
	\item Flying drones use the blades of their rotors as weapons
	\item Guard dogs can alert other guard dogs
	\item \enquote{M30w}, a cybernetically enhanced bobcat, has a powerful jaw and can eject
		its claws attached with dangerous microfilament
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\subsection{Secret Base}

\begin{itemize}
	\item Military personel is armed and shoots on sight
	\item Operatives can turn invisible for a period of time
	\item \enquote{Node Kroenen} is your owner, stripped of his personality and attached as
		central command and control unit to a giant Mech
\end{itemize}

\vfill

\section{Cutscenes}

Narrative cutscenes will take place at the beginning of the game and et the end of each stage.

\section{Bonus Materials}

Bonus levels might be possible.

\hspace*{0pt}

\end{document}