I need your thoughts on this, guys….
What kind of gameplay makes you feel like:
“Damn. I need one more run.”
We’re scouting for short, punchy games to feature on an arcade cabinet.
Drop links. Drop genres. Drop your own builds.
The game doesn’t need to be famous.
It just needs to go hard in 5 minutes or less
I'd say you want as little luck as possible. Maybe a shoot-em-up or Street Fighter type? You could also try emulating simple games like Just Shapes and Beats, Pong (Check out my Pong-based game here https://lowkeydev.itch.io/3d-pong), or 2d top-down driving games. Many Galaga clones have kept old-school gamers coming back for years, but are a bit cliched in my opinion. Didn't stop me from making one (https://lowkeydev.itch.io/gradius-plus), but still.
Personally I like the retro art and gameplay style a lot, but that doesn't work for everything. Overall tips for short games:
Think about past-present-future. Play on something your audience already knows is a good idea and will click on when they see it in the search results, make the player feedback and pacing of the game satisfying, and think about replayability features that will get your audience coming back for more, for example a high-score mode or a speedrun timer.
I have this game. i tried to make an concept i though as a child.
'https://dream-search-repeat.itch.io/orgrav'
But it's too hard (at least for my taste, i'm not fan of hard games). Perhaps you can get an inspiration or an idea from it.
Basically the character moves automatically and what you do is redirect in what direction it has to go. Avoiding the level's walls and colecting orbs to unlock the exit.
