Action Games - iPhone Game Blueprints - page 273

Another dynamic and inanimate enemy is a comet. This is a massive body that
moves much faster than other obstacles, and it has a long tail. If the player collides
with the protagonist, it pushes him hard backwards, and takes a larger portion of his
health. Therefore, the player should avoid such a collision at any cost. Optionally, the
comet's tail may have some effects on the Unit, either negative or positive.
Illustrating collisions
It might sound amusing, but collisions are a very important part of the game because
they demonstrate the advantages of the 3D engine. Being crashed into an edge of
a massive obstacle, the protagonist begins to rotate in space at different angles. For
a few moments, the AMU becomes uncontrollable. A special alert appears signal-
ing that space orientation is lost. Virtual control turns into disable state, but a special
large button called Align is displayed. The player should click on it quickly to get the
control back. This is not an easy task, especially if the Unit, being in an improvised
spin, has touched other objects. In a bad scenario, there can be a chain of collisions,
causing a pretty long and spectacular tumbling of the character.
To add some humor to the situation, the game may utilize a special soundtrack for
such moments. Some allusions on The Blue Danube by Johann Strauss recall the
famous film by Stanley Kubrick , 2001, A Space Odyssey (1968), ornamenting with
that beautiful piece of music. While rotating, the astronaut dances a waltz. The char-
acter can also complain aloud about the situation making some funny commentaries
or noises.
By colliding into a central part of a massive obstacle, the Unit simply stops. For a
few moments, the protagonist is stunned, and the virtual controls do not function. If
the obstacle has its own speed, it begins to push the Unit like a bulldozer, carrying it
backward. The player should unstick from the surface of the object and fly over it.
Medium objects such as satellites do not cause the protagonist to tumble, but shift
his trajectory a little bit, change his speed dramatically, and fly off sideways. Tiny
particles have no effect on the Unit as they are too small to have enough energy;