Bad Fur Day: The Board Game

It's the final post, so I'm going to talk about turning Bad Fur Day into a board game.  For Bad Fur Day to be a board game, I would have to change the game considerably.  The rules of the game would be simple.

(2-6 players)

Objective:  To move your Conker token all the way to the end of the board where Berri is so that Conker can save her.

Set up/Board:  The Board being played on would have graphic depictions of many of the obstacles that Conker's faces.  There would be two separate dice for the players to roll.  One would be a standard number die, The other would have six different enemies on it.  Each different enemy would have specific spaces on the board that they have power over, so when their sign is rolled all those who are standing on their space would get punished.  This punishment may be to go back to the start, or lose a turn.  There would be other spaces on the board that would benefit Conker.  These spaces would be taking the place of the context sensitive buttons in the video game.  In the board game, these areas would allow Conker to roll again to get closer to his ultimate goal of saving Berri.

The Panther King:  This rule is designed to make the game even more difficult to win.  At the end of each cycle of rolling the dice, the dice is rolled as many times as there are players playing the game.  The Panther King piece is placed at the very end of the board, and travels the opposite direction as the player.  If the Panther King piece lands on the same space as any Conker, than that piece can either go back ten spaces or hide.  The player can hide if s/he rolls a a three or under, if not the player has to go back to the beginning of the board. 

Win Condition:  The player who reaches the end of the board first wins.  The winner of the game will officially have bragging rights over all others. 

Well, that's it for this blog

it's been fun

~Garrett

The Bad Things

The things that make Bad Fur Day not so great.  well...

1.  One of the things that makes the game less fun for me is trying to figure out where I am supposed to go.  This might not be a problem for many gamers, but for me it can be an issue.  I play my video games in streaks, so sometimes it can be a few days in between plays, which translates to a few days of forgetting where in the world I am.  For example, I have been drowning over and over again in a frustrating attempt to make my way through underwater tunnels.  I give up, and try again in a couple of days and I'm stuck in the same position.  I'm not sure if this particular example is a reflection of the level design's flow, but if not there have been other circumstances where I have to waste some time running all over the country side to figure out what to do.  This is only a minor hassle though.  For more serious gamers, if you were to play the story mode straight through, it probably wouldn't be much of an issue.

2.  Another problem, this one is only based on hearsay though, is that the frame rate slows way down in some parts of the game.  Bad Fur Day was compared to Jet Force Gemini in that its frame rates slowed down in some more complex levels of the game.  Perhaps if the game designers didn't put such an emphasis on the lights and audio this wouldn't be as much of an issue.  These are the only major flaws i see in the game.  As a developer, looking back on the game I would feel pretty content that I had utilized the Nintendo 64's potential to the fullest.

(NOTE:  I published this last night, but apparently my 'request could not be processed.")  

The Good Things

What makes Bad Fur Day great?  Well, just read the rest of this blog.  To cap things off, i'll give you the top three things that Nintendo and Rare did right when they made this game.

 (note:  these are not in order)

1.  They surprised me, and the rest of the world by coming out with a game that featured a cute squirrel that turned out to be a badass.  Going against the precedent that Nintendo had set for itself is a major contributing factor as to why this game is special.  Although I don't think the mature style of the game is enough to make it a good game, I believe that it was a very smart move on the part of the developers.  Doing something different like this definitely created a buzz for this game and got people talking about it.

2.  Maxing out the Nintendo 64 Console.  This game uses every bit of power the 64 has.  With almost two hours of cut scenes and very impressive lighting and textures the people at Rare should be commended for squeezing so much out of a console that was soon to be replaced.  One of the best part of the excellent graphics is the detail on Conker's face.  Each emotion he has, whether it be sad, terrified, angry, or happy, you will know.  His emotions are made very clear.

3. Audio.  What more can I say?  The audio is fantastic.  The voice actors do an excellent job of defining their characters.  The gamer can immerse in the game because of the detailed environmental sound effects.  The music is also top notch.  It sets the mood and changes with your environment.  From the death sounds to the sound of the Game Boy that Conker plays when he is bored from you neglecting to give him anything to do for a period of time, the sounds are masterful.

4.  Showing teddy bears getting sniped and having their heads blown off.

I know I said top three, but... 

Win Conditions

Winning in Bad Fur Day can sometimes be a long process with many obstacles, so achieving victory has to be satisfying otherwise I would have to stop playing.  What makes winning so awesome in Bad Fur Day is that you will usually be shown a sweet cut scene to reward you.  For example, after completing a long mission that is partly based on the film Saving Private Ryan, you escape to a boat that carries you away from the war zone.  You then get to listen to Conker and his Sergeant have a conversation about how terrible war is, and how the 'bigwigs' just send off the young to die.  The best part is when the Sergeant repeats "the horror, the horror." Winning in Bad Fur Day can be difficult but it is harder to lose  (unless that is your goal, in which case it is easy.  There are squirrel tails all over the game that give you either one more life, or ten more lives.  Also, if you fail a mission the first time, don't worry, you will always be able to just try it again.  

Throughout the game there different levels of satisfaction gained by completing tasks.  For a minor thing such as finding money, a cut scene will show conker saying something clever about money, or he will have his eyes turn into the spinning wheel with dollar signs on them like a slot machine.

When you beat the entire game, Conker becomes king.  I know this because the game starts by telling you this.  In my replaying of the game, I have been extremely unsuccessful at achieving the ultimate victory thus far.

The Audio of Bad Fur Day

The subject of today's blog is audio.  Audio is a key feature in all video games.  It can drive the plot narration as well as give the character guidance throughout the story.  In short, the better the audio, the more immersive the game is.  In the case of Bad Fur Day, the audio is spectacular in many ways.  For those who are hearing impaired however, the cut scenes will be explained through subtitles. 

Game Audio Formats

The Nintendo 64 used the USF (Nintendo Ultra 64 Sound Format) for their video games.  

USF.  The vast quantity of audio that is in Bad Fur Day is impressive for the technology available during the 64 days.

Sound Effects

To get some inspiration to write this blog, I attempted to advance in my game a bit farther.  One of the things that stuck out in terms of the audio was the sounds made when I failed to give Conker a breath of air when he was under water.  His chocolate life bars made crunching sounds as they were taken away because of the lack of oxygen.  Conker makes disturbing noises as his body goes limp as well.

Some other sound effects I experienced while playing were the sound of Conkers hands splashing as he was swimming.  Also the sound of a waterfall became the only sound being played as i went underneath it.  All other sounds, including the background music faded away.  These are only a couple of examples that show how immersive the audio makes this game.  I can't stand drowning, mainly because of the sound it makes.  I actually dread hearing the sound.

Most of the sounds in the game are very realistic.  The developers did not try to make the sounds themselves comical throughout the game.  If they were comical it was because the visual that accompanied them was comical as well. 

Music

One of the most impressive aspects of Bad Fur Day is its sound design.  It is so cool because depending on what kind of atmosphere you are in the audio adapts.  For example in one scene the theme song will be played by strings, but when you go into a more country atmosphere, the theme song is played by banjos.  In 2001, Bad Fur Day actually won the best sound award at the BAFTA awards.  

Voiceover

Bad Fur Day contains a lot of characters.  Each character has its own distinct voice that adds to who they are as a character.  A few examples of this are the grim reaper, who starts off with a deep booming voice, but then you find out he is really short and has a scratchy small voice.  The catfish that appear in the game, who are snobby rich fish have voices that reflect this.  The Panther king has a deep voice that is smooth and similar to the low purr sound a cat makes. 

Looping

Just like many similar games for the Nintendo 64, Bad Fur Day uses a lot of looping.  This may get repetitive after playing for a long time.  It is especially frustrating when I get stuck at a certain portion of a level but for the most part Bad Fur Day keeps the sound fresh.  As i mentioned before the loop will change to fit the atmosphere.  When the situation is suspenseful the loop and/or song will change to accent it.

Gameplay

Rules

The rules of play linked to gameplay, specifically victory conditions and loss conditions.   In Bad Fur Day the character wins by completing all of the challenges in the game.  Winning is bitter sweet however because of the death of Berri, our main characters girlfriend along the way.  The Loss conditions are explicit in the story mode of Bad Fur Day because it is single player.  In the multiplayer modes however, there are implicit loss conditions.  Characters lose because of competition between players and NPC's.

Interactivity Modes

Bad Fur day is a game that has an intense level of Player-to-Game interactivity.  The player is constantly interacting with the environment as Conker.  In multiplayer, the developers created a great possibility of Player-to-Player interactivity.  In one particularly fun multiplayer game, players work together on teams to be a squirrel and storm the beach or to be a teddy and prevent the squirrel from storming the beach.  The player must communicate with his or her partner to effectively work together to win..

Challenges

Implicit/Explicit

Two types of challenges that are in the game are implicit and explicit challenges.  There are many explicit challenges in the game such as outsmarting and riding a mean bull to help complete a challenge. Implicit challenges that arise in the game are maintaining a good sense of direction.  The levels can get a little jumbled in ones memory and can make completing challenges even harder. 

Perfect/Imperfect Information

In Bad Fur Day the character is given imperfect information the majority of the time.  The boss's in the game all have weaknesses that are somewhat logical but the player must figure out what they are by trial and error.  This method that the game uses can be frustrating if the player can't figure out what the game wants the player to do.

Intrinsic/Extrinsic Knowledge

One of the main sources of Intrinsic knowledge are the games many cut scenes that give the player a look into the life of Conker.  As far as Extrinsic knowledge goes, it will help if the player has knowledge of things like the ability to drown if the character does not breathe fresh air.  The player will also benefit from having knowledge of many of the other stories or movies that the game satires, such as The Matrix.  I'm not sure if previous knowledge of The Matrix would help the character be better at the bullet time action but it would certainly make the sequence more entertaining for the player.

Spatial Awareness

As I said, the player must maintain a good sense of his or her environment otherwise s/he will get lost and frustrated.

Micromanagement

Micromanagement occurs throughout the game in challenges that are harmful to the health of Conker.  The player must maintain a focus on the number of lives Conker has left, as well as the amount of health Conker has left.  The player must manage his or her lives and take risks accordingly.

Reaction Time

It almost seems silly to mention how the game relates to Reaction Time because it is so obvious.  Throughout the game, the player better be awake otherwise Conker will be maimed by the many hostile characters in the game.  The player has to react very quickly to complete all of the challenges that arise throughout the game.

Balance

The game has a prevalent style of balance.  There aren't many random events in the game that are disappointing set backs that frustrate the player.  For the most part the challenges are consistent, fair, and fun.  My only complaint some of the time is that it can be a little hard at times to figure out the weaknesses of some of the bosses.  This can create a lot of frustration of the player gets stuck at a certain point in the game and can't figure out how to get past the specific point in the game.

Strategy

The game doesn't necessarily contain multiple strategies.  The main strategy is to complete the challenges efficiently and as quickly as possible so as not to waste time. 

Levels

Goal

The player is usually given the goal in cut scenes in Bad Fur Day.  It is very seldom that Conker is thrown immediately into harsh situations without a cut scene to explain the circumstances.

Flow

The developers made sure that Conker only has access to certain areas of the game by creating barriers such as guards that need to be bribed or seemingly invincible characters that get in the way of your path.  The player may not always know what challenge s/he needs to complete, but s/he will always understand if s/he can't get past a certain area as a result of a blockade.

Duration

The only issue relating to duration is that the more novice player may not have the patience to complete the many challenges that make up the vast levels of Conkers Bad Fur Day.  There are some levels in the game that may take much longer than 45 minutes to complete.

Availability

There are multiple levels available on occasion.  This may be confusing to some characters who aren't sure which tasks to complete first, but it enables the gamer to have more freedom to choose in what order tasks are completed.

Progression

This ones pretty simple.  The games challenges get harder as the player advances in an s-curve.  Not all of the challenges may be the most difficult at the end of the game but towards the end of the game the average challenge is going to be much more difficult than at the very beginning of the game.  

Time

Time is Limited.  It is just a part of the setting.  Time does not pass in the game at the same rate as real life.  When playing the game at night, or for hours at a time, the game remains in daylight.

Space

Bad Fur Day takes place in many environments.  These range from outside in a nice rural area to inside a dung beetle mountain, to the lobby scene of The Matrix.

Perspective

The games perspective is third-person.  The player may also press a button and move the view from 3rd person to first-person to get a better view of the surrounding environment.  The only set back to having a 3rd person POV is that it may be difficult at times to judge the distance between platforms such as ropes that Conker must leap to and from. 

Terrain, Materials, Radiosity, and Effects

Bad Fur Day is one of the last games that came out for the N64 console.  It was made by the company Rare who is famous for squeezing out all of the possible fruits of a console.  Bad Fur Day is a game that looks good.  The people at Rare made a lot of progress in this particular area in this game.  The use of lighting in Bad Fur Day is impressive for the game being on the Nintendo 64.

Scale

The main character in the game is a squirrel.  This squirrel is about the height of a bull that is fought in one challenge.  This is an example of how size was distorted to accommodate the player.  The developers wanted the player to play as a squirrel but knew that if the squirrel was the size of an actual squirrel this would limit gameplay options or at least change them.

Boundaries

In terms of boundaries, it is worth it to mention that Bad Fur Day is one of the few games that doesn't consistently use fog to create boundaries.  When Conker is on a tall structure, he can look around and see the entire world.  This means he can see the castle of the Panther King as well as the beach where the war is going on as long as they each are in realistic sight.

Realism

Bad Fur Day isn't a game that looks real in terms of todays standards.  Looking back on it however, for its time, it is semi-realistic game in terms of how it looks.  As I said before, the lighting is magnificent.  The movement of the characters are also very smooth.  In terms of the level of realism in the story, Bad Fur Day is not realistic at all.  The story is completely ridiculous and hardly seems practical. 

Interface

The interface in Bad Fur Day is incredibly simple. Compared to the games of today, playing as Conker is an easy task.  The player doesn't have to be a very experienced gamer to pick up the controller and start playing.

Since Bad Fur Day was released on the Nintendo 64, a controller is used to control Conker.  This is a manual interface.  The buttons used to control Conker don't really change throughout the story mode, but there are a little variations when playing 

multiplayer.  During the story mode the buttons are 

as follows:

a: jump

a while in the air:  tail spin hover

b: hit with frying pan

bottom c:  changes the camera view to behind Conker

right and left c:  spins the camera to the right or left

top c: nothing

r: view from perspective of Conker

z: crouch

l: skip cut scene

start: pause the game

joystick: moving the character

note: While Conker has a weapon however, which is mainly in multiplayer games, b is used to take it out, z is used to use it, and r is used to aim.  

All of these buttons seem pretty straight forward to me, they seem like the typical buttons for a Nintendo game, just like Mario, a is jump, and b is attack.  I think if I were to hand a young kid a controller and asked them to try to jump and attack their instinct would be to press these buttons almost immediately.

The active and passive interfaces in the game are also incredibly simple.  During most of the story the only thing on the screen that isn't part of the game's world is your health bar, which is made up of six floating pieces of chocolate.  Also in the passive interface is a lightbulb which appears every time you are able to press b to initiate a context sensitive ability.  As for the active interface, when you press start, your health is shown, as well as the number of lives you have left, and the amount of money you have.  This is the screen also allows you to choose to continue the game or to quit, which automatically saves your progress up to a fairly close checkpoint you have passed through. 

note:  when Conker has a weapon, and during certain multiplayer games a radar is put in the top right of the screen, and the weapon that you

 have is shown on screen as well.

One of the things that makes this game so great is it's unexpected maturity level coming from a Nintendo game.  This game breaks the console specific rule because Microsoft and Sony are both companies that seem more likely to have a game with adult humor like Bad Fur Day does, but as far as the interface goes, this game could be on any console.

There are a couple more things about the interface that I would lik

e to mention.  One is that there are talk bubbles during cut scenes so that the gamer can read the things that s/he couldn't hear.   Another aspect is the active interface that appears when the console is started.  The gamer is in a center of a bar.  The joystic

k is used to rotate the camera to different areas of the bar to choose which saved game to continue, multiplayer, options, or which chapter of the game to skip to.

There you have it, the interface of Bad Fur Day.  It is successful because of its simplicity.  The gamer doesn't have to worry about a plethora of menus or items.  He or she just has to worry about money, number of lives left, and health.   There is no possible way for the gamer to be confused by any clutter on the screen because of how straightforward the game is.