Shining flash game 'booms' onto scene
By Jen Pontzer, Staff Writer
January 9, 2008 | 4:24 p.m.
“Boomshine,” a point-and-click Flash game, exploded onto the scene with bright colors and serene music. OK, it doesn’t exactly explode but beautifully expands. It is at once addicting, fun, relaxing and completely frustrating. It is also perfect for procrastination.
This is quite fitting because Danny Miller, an undergraduate student at the Georgia Institute of Technology, created the game in his dorm room. "I really like chain reaction games and just started making a simulation, and it turned out to be really fun and successful," Miller said.
Make that wildly successful. According to Miller's Web site, "Since the game was released in March 2007, 20,000,000 levels have been played by hundreds of thousands of players," proving just how addicting the game is.
The game uses the idea of chain reactions to make goals that the player has to achieve to move to the next level. If a player doesn't complete a level, he or she starts over with that level and not from the beginning of the game.
There are a certain number of colored dots moving about randomly on the screen in each level. The higher the level, the more dots there are, and the more dots the player has to "explode." The player can click once anywhere on the screen to start the chain reaction. The spot where the player clicks expands in diameter to enclose other dots and cause them to expand.
This is easier said than done.
The game is mostly luck. The dots have to be in the exact, correct location to get the number that you need, especially in the higher levels. Miller saves every game ever played and ran a query discovering that it takes the average player 25 tries to beat level 12, and less than 4 percent of level 12 games are winners. This makes many players feel frustrated.
However, Miller doesn't want the game to be frustrating. "That’s one of the problems of Boomshine,” he said. “I want it to be encouraging. I’m against the idea of losing. Gamers shouldn’t have to achieve something you’ve already achieved. That’s why you replay the level and don’t start over. If you had to start over, some people would only see half of the game, half of the content created."
It's also helpful that the music for the game, created by Tim Halbert, is meant to be relaxing. It's intended to help calm players down after they've attempted to beat level 12 for the 26th time.
Miller hardly ever plays "Boomshine" anymore because when he does, he just sees what's wrong with it. "Whenever I play games in general, I find things I want to change about them," he said. This is why he's working on "Boomshine 2." The new version is very close to completion and will have two-player and random modes. Miller is putting a lot of emphasis on color theory applications to make it more aesthetically pleasing. He is also working on a screensaver.
Miller is only 20 and already has an entire Web site devoted to flash games called K2xL, which stands for "keys to excel." It began as a place for his portfolio and has become a community. He thinks the best part about designing games is coming up with something no one has ever seen before. "I like when I feel I’ve done something no one else has done, that changes the way people think,” he said. “A lot of people have never played a game like 'Boomshine.'"
Miller advises to remain dedicated while gaming. “The best advice I could give people is it takes a lot of work,” he said. “If you’re really active in something, you can complete it.”
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