Sky High

Sky High is a short platformer built in the Game Maker Studio 1 Engine. As the second project built in Game Maker Studio - Sky High was built with the purpose of learning and experimenting in mind. Assets were all created personally, and using a tutorial as a rough guide allowed the opportunity to experiment, but also in the end, create a small game.

Game-PLay

The game plays as traditionally expected within the platformer genre; an avatar that you use to platform your way from the start of a level to the exit. Obstacles such as enemies do attempt to prevent you from progressing - something you can deal with using a basic ranged attack, or by simply jumping on top of the enemy. 

Gems can be collected throughout the levels that add to your score count - and the score is saved and can be viewed in the game options menu. Ledges can be grappled onto, allowing you to climb and make certain acrobatic moves, such as jumping from wall to wall until you reach the area you wish to reach. The game itself plays with both keyboard or an Xbox 360 Controller.

Abilities

As the game progresses - you are able to collect abilities that will remain unlocked moving forward from that point. The abilities help add an element to game-play that will differentiate the beginning levels from the later ones. This adds a small layer of complexity, and in certain levels, a choice on how you proceed. 

The abilities are activated via hot-keys and also have a cool down as can be seen in the below image. They range from increasing the jump-height of the player, the movement speed, the firing rate of their attack, and a temporary invincibility shield.

Music By Kevin Macleod

The soundtracks used are "Spellbound" and "Rhinoceros"  by Kevin MacLeod. The tracks are available on www.incompetech.com - and are used in this project under the Creative Commons License: By Attribution 3.0 License.

Moving On

The project served as a very good way to delve into the workings of Game Maker Studio 1. It helped provide a solid foundation to begin exploring projects that did not use a tutorial as a rough guideline when progress stalled, with experimentation acting as the principle way of learning outside the general technical skills from the tutorial. 

Whilst a lot could have been done to improve the project at the end - as well as creating new levels, improving the game-play, graphics, and a number of other aspects. Much of what the project provided in learning opportunities were taken, and a lot of the struggles came from the way the project was built due to inexperience. The project was considered to be finished, and a new project taken up - with the aim of the new project allowing for new learning opportunities that Sky High had paved the road towards.

The final build can be found below - please keep in mind that the project has a number of bugs and issues, as the project was built primarily as a learning and experimentation opportunity.