Puzzle Game Idea: Town Shift
It’s time for a new game idea! Today we’re looking at a puzzle game I came up with called Town Shift. I’d like to think I’ll get around to using the idea myself, but more than likely I won’t. So if you like it and you want to use elements of the idea or make the entire game yourself, feel free to do so.
Game Play
In Town Shift, players would be presented with a board of jumbled up tiles. The tiles would contain the building blocks of a town such as trees, houses and roads.
On the screen, there would be goals to meet to complete the level. These would be the goals of the residents in the local area, and probably you would have them presented to you by some helpful assistant character.
Goals would be simple asks about how the town should look such as “All houses must be near a forest tile” or “All roads must connect to make one big road”.
The player has to move the jumbled tiles around the screen until all of the goals are met, at which point they complete the level.
Controls
I’ve thought of two possibilities for the controls. In the easier version of the game, players would simply click and hold on a tile to pick it up and swap it with another tile. Dropping the tile on another tile would make the two swap places entirely.
The easy version of the game would give it more of a sandbox feel, allowing players to finish the same puzzle with multiple different solutions. This would help them feel like they’re actually designing a town.
The harder control scheme would be similar to the one I came up with for Metromino. Players would shift each row and column on the grid in a fixed pattern like a sliding picture puzzle or a 2D Rubik’s Cube.
This second method would make the game harder, with fewer valid solutions per level. Players who prefer challenging puzzles over town planning would probably prefer this control scheme.
Playing out the example level
As you can see in the screenshot, the tiles have now been jumbled around by the player. Notice that the targets for having all the forest areas joined together, and each house touching a forest tile, have been met.
But the roads are not connected properly, and there’s no way they can be without the player moving some of the valid tiles and breaking up their pattern! They’ll have to find another solution…
Ta da! Finally, the player has moved the tiles into the correct spaces and they have satisfied all of the conditions. Here the level complete screen will pop up and the story will progress.
Adding some flavour
What you’ve just read was the idea for the game in its entirety. I think it would do well in the wholesome games / puzzle games niche, giving the player the ability to create cute little towns with no violence in the game play or story.
That said the idea as presented is quite shallow, so here are a few things you might add to spice it up a bit:
- Characters. The game would have a story mode where residents ask you for specific things to be added to the town. There could even be some kind of secretary character who guides you through each level.
- More tile types. The list of possible tile types and their interactions are basically infinite. Anything you can think of that goes in a town could also be a tile and have its own associated goals. Train stations, rivers, museums, commercial buildings, street lamps. Whatever you like!
- Build-your-own Town Hub. Why is the player completing levels? Maybe they’re earning money to build their own town. Each puzzle they solve could give them in-game currency to customise their own little town in a kind of “free play” mode separate to the story.
If some of these ideas were coupled with the graphical style of something like Animal Crossing, it could be a huge wholesome game hit. Heck, I’ll be honest, I am imagining this as an entry in the Animal Crossing series, like Happy Home Designer. Imagine Isabelle as the secretary guiding you through each animal character’s wants and needs. I’m getting way ahead of myself.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this puzzle game idea! Be on the lookout for more in the new year.
