Maximus Jones

In a world of usually tiny problems, disaster has struck! The guinea pigs’ hoard of delicious peaflakes has dwindled to a pitiful amount! But the box holding the beloved food is standing locked on a shelf, mocking the herd's need for tasty treats. There is only one way to solve the problem – some brave guinea pig will have to venture out and get their owner! This is the story of Maximus Jones! With the name of a hero and the heart of a guinea pig, he is an adventurer extraordinaire.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the fluffy potatoes, their owner has been inadvertently trapped in an ancient Egyptian tomb. Will Maximus save the day? Will the guinea pigs get their peaflakes? Find out in Maximus Jones!

[ Completion time: 20-30 minutes ]

Controls: Keyboard WASD and mouse or Gamepad left stick and right button (B on an XBox controller).

In Maximus Jones, you set out as the titular hero to solve a dungeon room by room to reach your owner to get access to the fabled peaflake box. You will have to fight stupid beetles, evil spiders and bothersome mosquitos on your way. Not enough, you'll also have to survive deep pits, rolling stoneblocks, spear traps, moving platforms and jars full of spiders! All you - and Maximus - are set up with are quick reflexes and his mighty voice - hear him squeak!

There are a couple of accessability options, too - you can turn off the attacks of enemies or change how fast Maximus will fall into pits, for example. The dungeon itself is randomly generated from a list of rooms, so no two playthroughs should be the same.

There are of course still a couple bugs in there, including one that happens very rarely where the dungeon only gets one room or no end. Please restart in that case, I'll be working on it ❤️

Hi there, I'm Christina 👋

I've been developing games as a hobby for about two or three years now, depending on how you count. I'm a designer by trade and I love learning.

Maximus Jones has been developed as part of the PitiIT Community Game Jam over the course of the month of July in 2022. I plan to extend its content over the coming months - though I'll have to see how I can fit it into my schedule.

Four screenshots: First shows the rudimentary Dungeon creation, second shows the first lightning test, third shows the final lightning and fourth shows part of a complete room with the new Maximus character

Why egypt as a setting? I'm currently reading an amazing kind-of adventure book about the beginnings of archaeology and egyptology and I tend to get influenced easily by good literature ❤️ I researched drawings and paintings of ancient egyptian monuments and art in general and the wealth of ressources and images I found was astounding. Had my nose deep into books and scans of art for most of the days of development. I hope I was able to catch at least a little bit of ancient egypt's inherent magic in the artstyle of Maximus Jones.

First is a mural painting, second the pylon Maximus needs to shove on floor plates. Third was meant as a wall painting, but found its new purpose in a rug, fourth is one of the graphics for the movable platforms.

Music and Sound was handled by the awesome John Bolle, who did an outstanding job of making the game come to live through audio. The first time he send me the main theme, I was over the moon and I'll be humming it for quite some time longer. He's doing contract work, too, so if you like what you hear? Send him a message!

Game & Art          Christina Vennegerts (Naya#0001 on Discord)

Sound & Music    John Bolle    https://johnbolle0824.wixsite.com/sounddesign

Proofreading        Othinsson

Created during the month long, 1st PitiIT Community Game Jam in July 2022 with the topic of "Help me!". As an extra challenge, I chose "at least 5 shaders", and "procedual generation". 

Special thanks to the PitiIT community, especially to Vicot, Piti and Othinsson. This project would not have been possible without you guys❤️Thank you so much for all the help and feedback ❤️

Sources
(generally no language skills needed, as those are picture books, digitized by the New York public library)

Histoire de l'art égyptien d'après les monuments https://on.nypl.org/3zCvtAz

Monuments de l'Égypte et de la Nubie https://on.nypl.org/3ox2gQX

Décoration Égyptienne https://on.nypl.org/3J9oTEA

The book I'm currently reading is "Götter, Gräber und Gelehrte" / "Gods, graves and scholars" by C. W. Ceram and I highly recommend it if you enjoy archaeology ❤️