Game idea help

[Yy29]

Hi my teenage son has been set a task by his school to come up with a game idea for 10-14 year olds. It must be a new game that he has thought of. He will then have to use Gamemaker to create it. He has never used it before and has no ideas of a game idea. I know he needs to come up with something simple. Any ideas? Ps I am new to this forum so any help is appreciated........from a stressed mother lol

 

[RefresherTowel]

Hmm, this is a little complicated. Someone who hasn't used GMS or (I assume) programmed before is going to have a hard time completing even a simple game. Some very simple ideas are clicker games, where the goal is to click on something (for instance, a character moves around the screen and you have to click on them to earn points), games like pong where there is a ball of some sort and a goal (whether it is an actual "goal" like soccer, or simply a goal like preventing the ball from passing a certain point), timing games where you must press a button at a certain time (perhaps gear changes in a car, going back to the original Dragster). Very simple input and mechanics like that.

Then it's just window dressing. Try to think of an activity your son likes (maybe running, maybe cars, whatever) and try to mold one of these simple ideas to fit the theme of that activity.

 

[Yy29]

Thank you for your reply. Earlier I had accidentally private messaged someone who was very unkind and extremely rude. I really appreciate your help. My son had asked me to post on his behalf as his school has been closed for 6 weeks and gave his class one week to come up with an idea to use on gamemaker, which he has never used before. I showed him your comment and he passes on his thanks.

 

[MiketheScrivener]

YoYo games has a plethora of free beginner oriented tutorials for games like Asteroids and Pong that can be easily followed, just put a little creative spin into it and you'll have something original in no time

 

[Niels]

I would like to add that if he has no experience making game, it might be better if he focused on completing anything over making something original(which adds another layer of difficulty).
There are plenty of tutorials on youtube that will walk him though creating a game.
Just look up heartbeast or Shaun Spalding to get him started.

 

[Toque]

So there is a pretty good space rock tutorial.

but you could make it covid destroyer. Shoot virus with your ship.

Cactus jumper. You could run and jump over cactus. If you miss you get prickles in your ......

rain catcher. Move a bucket left and right on bottom to catch falling rain drops.

Alien shooter. Fly around and shoot aliens.

water bomber. Fly across top and drop water balloons on your teachers.