Transcript
Jason has created ‘Spaceslinger’: a convergent media product (comic and digital game) that follows superhero, Elias, “venturing through various stages to ultimately take down the final boss”. The 2-dimensional, brightly coloured ‘minimalist toon’ graphics are consistent through both comic and game. Elias is clad in the traditional superhero tight-fitting onesie in navy blue with a white star on his chest and white and gold detailing. He has a pointed chin, a shock of black hair and beetling eyebrows. The game’s home page shows Elias in a dynamic pose against a turquoise and lilac ombre-grid, with the title ‘Spaceslinger’ over two lines in lilac block shadow lettering (a single ‘S’ suffices to start both halves of the word ‘Spaceslinger’). Lilac boxes beneath the title present two clickable options: ‘Play’ and ‘Credits’.
Hitting play activates the comic component: a series of storyboxes that situate the game play in Timor Leste, and introduce us to Elias Novem (“aka the cosmic hero”), and a baddie, whose name (‘Magha’) is set between two devils horns. Wearing a tattered top and short cape, Magha punches his fists in the air as he cackles. As Elias tries to handcuff Magha, he is punched. Elements (earth, wind, fire and water) appear as wide-eyed icons, announcing they are “fragments of [Elias’s] power!”. While they change form in movement, they remain recognisable by consistency of colour (purple for water, brown for earth, red for fire, and pale blue for wind). The four elements cluster around Elias’s clenched raised fist as he faces off with a skeleton. Words read ‘So the journey begins…”.
The game kicks off with a birds’ eye view of a landscape. A red circle labelled tutorial is situated beside a house. Beside and beyond are *clusters* of houses, a pyramid and a sand-circled lake labelled ‘boss’. Each area of the map represents another level of gameplay, with padlocks indicating they need to be unlocked. Icons on the bottom right-hand area of the screen offer gamers the option to ‘reset levels’, ‘[re]play comic’, or return to ‘home’. The tutorial plays out through a series of dialogue boxes, as Elias reveals “we have to clear the skeletons! We need to defeat the necromancer, Magha!” He explains we do this by hurling elements at the series of increasingly large skeletons that appear on the opposite side of the screen to Elias. By selecting an element (earth, wind, fire or water), drawing its trajectory, then hitting the ‘shoot’ button, we can deplete the skeleton’s power with an onslaught of elemental power until the skeleton dies. Elias warns we “have a limited amount of turns per stage, and a fixed length on how long you can draw for”. Both turns and length left are indicated in the user interface bar at the bottom of the screen. A clock centre top of the screen counts down beneath a pause icon to add a time-component to the game play. Objects such as boulders or a fire may block the path between Elias and the skeleton, requiring us to select the appropriate element to clear the blockage. If the clock reaches zero or our turns run out before the skeleton is defeated a box pops up announcing ‘you lost’ – with the options to restart or go back to the home screen.
