The design principle of iOS double rocker shooter game

Today I would like to introduce you to an article on the development of iOS games. The original author, director of the User Experience Studio vertical slice, Regham Mccarrist Graham McAllister, takes a few of the two-pole shooter games as an example, detailing the things developers should be aware of when creating such games for iOS touch-screen mobile devices.

What is a double rocker shooter game?

Figure: Left VJR control movement mode, right VJR to perform shooting task

Double rocker shooter is a type of game that needs to be manipulated by two control methods, one of which is responsible for controlling the movement of the role of the game, and the other is to perform the shooting task.

The camera view of such a game is generally directly down, or from a slightly tilted angle down. They are basically 2D games with no movement forward (or Z axes).

Layout of control mode

Motion control rocker is generally distributed on the left side, but some games take into account the needs of left-handed players, but also support the player to adjust the settings. This layout is the same as the two-rocker shooter game on the Xbox 360 and PS3 platforms.

The following image is the control setting for the iphone game mini Gore (Minigore).

Figure: Minigore

Different game settings differ

Although there are only two control systems on the touchscreen, not all of the twin-rocker shooter games run in exactly the same way, and the nuances in the game design can greatly affect the user experience.

Special terminology

There is no standard term to define this type of touch control, so we try to describe the operation in a descriptive language.

The four components described below have a common function, that is, the virtual joystick area (game State Note: The fictitious joystick region, hereinafter referred to as VJR).

As long as the finger touches the area, even if a control action is entered, if the finger touches the screen outside the area, it is not a control operation.

Figure: The red core represents the contact point of the finger on the screen, and the outer circle represents the limited control area of the VJR.

Four components

Before developing the iOS twin-rocker shooter game, there are four main control system designs to choose from:

1. Static or dynamic control mode

2. Always visible VJR

Active control mode outside of 3.VJR

4. Control way near the edge of the screen

These four components can be mixed to form different control settings, before introducing their various blending effects, we should first describe the characteristics of these four respectively.

First of all, this paper mainly takes action control system as an example to explain, but the operation of the shooting control system is also the same reason. Each component is a comprehensive design for both the action and shooting options, which are described in the following sections.

Component 1: Dynamic or Static control mode

Static control: The touchscreen control system will be set in a fixed corner of the iOS device (shown below), and then we will explain how the third component "active control outside VJR" extends the usability of the static control approach.

Figure: Static control: VJR only displayed on the screen in a fixed position