Force Bot - A brand new game for the NES [homebrew]

[Erockbrox]

Hi everyone, this is a very special project of mine as I've been wanting to make a NES game for a long time now and finally this dream has come true as the game is now 100% finished.

The name of the game is Force Bot and you play as a small robot who pushes crates.

Here is the title screen.



The game features a total of 128 levels. The game was made possible due to a collaboration with cppchriscpp, who created the Retro Puzzle Maker game engine. It's basically a full blown game built upon that game engine.

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=18235

Here are some screenshots:







Here is an image of the character for sticker/box art:





I demoed the game at the Retropalooza video game convention in Texas and the result was overwhelming positive. There were people who beat the entire game and then asked for more. There was a diverse range of age groups who enjoyed the game from kids to adults.



I would like to do a physical release and a kickstarter. This would be my first kickstarter that I would put on, so I would need some help from the NES community on how to make this happen and/or advice. For instance:

- Where to get the plastic shells, PCB's, sticker labels from?
- All of the details of the box artwork, the dimensions of the artwork, if I should do cardboard boxes or plastic bit box cases
- I saw someone in another kickstarter who let another group take over European orders so that the shipping wasn't so much, how would I do international shipping
- Mass e-mail programs and such or send out the digital version

The game is definitely worth checking out and I had a blast working with Chris in making it.

[Erockbrox]

I created a Twitter account for the game. Follow me on Twitter for all the latest news and such regarding the game.

https://twitter.com/ForceBot3

Currently I'm working on the rest of the artwork for the box and sticker label. I would like to do a kickstarter for the game possibly this year and am working out all the details for the release.

I'm wanting to create a website as well, but I've never had/ran a website before so if anyone has any experience in that and wants to help then it would be much appreciated.

If you want to be on the mailing list just send me a PM with your e-mail and I will send out a mass e-mail on major updates. Thanks.

[lancuster]

Erockbrox, you should do an account on the itch.io site.

[Erockbrox]

The box and sticker artwork is coming along.

Also let me know if you want to see me stream some NES games on Twitch. I don't have the best setup, but it might be fun anyway.

[Erockbrox]

So after working on this thing a ton, I think I finally got the sticker label done. The neon lines are the bleed lines that extend the artwork a little and the fold at the top of the sticker for the end label.

[Erockbrox]

Hopefully I will have a box made so show off.

[Erockbrox]

So far these are the colors that I'm planning on having for the full and final game.



The plan is to have around 200 levels. I'm currently at around 150 levels done, so that means I only have around 50 more levels to make and then this aspect of the game is more of less done.

Hopefully the game will be finished around spring 2021 or summer 2021.

It's like a sokoban game, but with new and/or different game play mechanics.

https://twitter.com/ForceBot3

[tepples]

On the title screen, the mouth being on the tangent of the shading boundary makes the head look more angular and less of the Sans-from-Undertale roundness that the other angles are obviously going for. Has this been fixed in the past year?

[Erockbrox]

yes the mouth is right on the boundary of the light and shaded part of his head. I don't know if there will be any changes to this. I could remove the shading but then that might look strange too.

The original title screen looked like this, but it was too complicated to insert.

[frantik]

that looks way better with more shading. Use sprites or something for the eyes if you can't get them to work otherwise

[dink]

Maybe you could put some more simplistic brick-tiles (like on the box) in place of the flames, to give the title screen a bit more flare

[Erockbrox]

That's a good idea. I might be able to make like an outline of a brick and put a few on the title screen as a simplistic background. I'll think about it. The flames were considered at one point but I thought it looked better without them.

[gorghAgenda]

looks great, I would appreciate youtube footage so I can promote it on my site

[Erockbrox]

As of this moment I have 41 levels left to make for Force Bot.

This means out of 192 total levels for the game, I only have 41 left to make. It has taken me around 2 years to create the finished levels in the game. When I started working the levels for Force Bot, I had no idea what type of game this was going to turn out to be. But now that I'm seeing it, this game is freaking awesome!

A good game typically has good game design and that is where my expertise comes in. I'm trying to make each level different and unique.

The ironic thing, about this game is that I'm usually not the biggest fan of traditional Sokoban games. I usually just mess around with them for a bit until I get frustrated. But Force Bot is different, its a "Sokoban variant". The rules are just not the same.

Because of these different rules, Force Bot is actually fun to play. It's not tedious like traditional Sokoban.

All I know is that, this is a really cool game with tons of content in it.

Follow the official Twitter for the remaining countdown to 0 levels left.

https://twitter.com/ForceBot3

[bhall408]

Did the project stop? The twitter link says

"@ForceBot3
This account doesn’t exist"