Flux is an award-winning music based strategy-puzzle game developed for Dare to be Digital (Dare) in 2006, using the Instinct Engine.  It was developed by team Log2n, which I was a member of.  Dare to be Digital is a game design compeition that runs for ten weeks each summer.  Teams of five, six when I was involved, are paid to develop a proof of concept that can be professionally judged at the end of the competition.  There are three main game awards and Flux won the award for Creativity and Innovation.  It also won People’s Choice Award and the Game Technology and Design Award at Futureplay 2006.

Dare to be Digital game design competition

The Game

Flux is a difficult game to describe, but music based strategy-puzzle game may be the closest approximation I can come up with.  To start, you play the game for the duration of a song selected from your music library.  During this time the player needs to connect “nodes” to form a network, the larger the network, the more points awarded.  The strategy develops because of the three different types of nodes and the way that power transfers between them.  This transfer of power can make nodes in the network unstable, which will destroy them if left unattended.  As a result the player must pay attention to how nodes are connected and move power manually where extra attention is needed.

The three types of nodes: Sink, Power, and Catalyst

The game is played entirely through the use of two gestures.  The first is the infinity sign, with each end drawn around the two nodes that the player wants to connect.  The second is a circle, which is drawn around a node in order to draw power to it from the nodes connected to it.  Using two simple gestures means that they player is able to spend more time concentrating on their network rather than a complex control scheme.

Building a network in Flux

The final feature of Flux involves the music.  The power transfer, or flux, between nodes is dependent on the music the player has chosen.  During intense periods of music the transfer will happen much quicker, making the game more difficult.  This variable difficulty means that the player can start with slower paced and fairly consistent songs that allow them to get used to the gameplay.  During the competition Flux was pitched as a possible plugin for a media player allowing the player to play any song in their library and the plugin would keep track of high scores.

My Role

My role during the development of Flux was mainly an artistic one.  All five of the Canadian members had completed or were completing their Bachelor of Computer Science degrees, so we were in need of artistic content.  Two of us took on the role of artist in addition to small programming tasks.  I was the primary 2D artist, from concept art through to our final documentation.

Creating particle systems for Flux

My first task was the preliminary concept work done for our application interview for Dare.  I also created the team and game logos before heading to Scotland.  Once there I started with more specific concept art before moving to the in-game particle systems.  Almost everything in Flux uses particle systems, even the menu system, so there was plenty of work to be done.  My final task was creating the companion document we handed out at the final presentation.  A low quality version of that document is available for download.  After the competition I also wrote a postmortem for GameCareerGuide.com.

For more information about Flux visit the other pages for screenshots and videos.  You can also see Flux on the team Log2n website and at the Dare to be Digital showcase page.