Build-a-Song is a game which allows you to build the sound track as you play. Sounds were created using Reason.
I wanted to create a game that allowed for mini-games, which are based on the different parts of the sound track, to be used to have the player create a sound track.
I first decided on the sound track and the different parts. I decided on a bass line, an synthetic organ sound, and a weird synth sound. I made parts for each of these instruments and a "game version" for each one which would have to be used to "unlock" those parts of the sound track. The beginning of the game has you in a "home" screen where you can pick which instrument you want to unlock, the three choices are blue (the bass line), red (the synth line), and green (the organ line).
For a mini-game, I decided on a "simon-says" kind of play where you have to recreate the beat of the particular patch to unlock that sound. For the synth (red) and the organ (green) games, I made it a simple following song where you can hear the song by pressing the right button and you can start the game by pressing on the left button, and then following the beat with the left button of the mouse. For the bass line, I made it a bit different by making it so that you had to press the space bar for the higher notes and the left mouse for the regular notes, though you can only use your ear to tell the difference, I think this makes for more interesting game play. (The pattern is MOUSE, SPACE, MOUSE, SPACE, MOUSE, MOUSE, SPACE, MOUSE, SPACE if it alludes you ).
As you play, more sounds are brought to the song on the home screen. You can even change it between the normal sound track and the sounds which are used for the mini-games by pressing on the right mouse button in the home screen.
The idea here was to allow the player to get a better sound track by playing more of the game. I wanted to have it be a bit easier to go from level to level by providing beat patterns for each level that you have unlocked but it actually turned out to be harder to play with these beat patterns.
I think the game works well. I would have liked to have some good audio or visual feed back for errors, but could not think of anything which would have been appropriate for the time allotted. I think the different components each work well with each other and that its a valuable accomplishment to get each part. I also think it works well that some parts sound incomplete without the other pieces, alluding to an order in which you should unlock the pieces.
If I were to have more time, I'd like to have more mini-games for each component. Possible ideas for this would be a game where you press up and down depending on how the pitch went or a game where you have to follow the flow of the notes with your mouse.