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[missile]

Pixelized Glossy Reflection xD Yeah!

Not finished, yet. Can still be improved for the same resolution.

Seems like I have all major effects on a pixelized level now. Nice. But there
are some cool ones missing and these are volume effects/rendering. So I may
try some volume stuff further down like pixelized shadow volumes and stuff.
Don't know if that makes any sense, but it sounds cool to say the least!

 

[LordRaptor]

I'll be working on a web version soon. It's not too much work. It was more that I wanted the iOS release to at least pay for the Apple yearly fee - currently it is not.

I've never owned an apple device so never released anything on IOS, but - anecdotal is not the plural of evidence alert - everyone I know who has has basically given up on it and turned their apps free + unsupported and cancelled their developer subscriptions due to the winning combo of zero exposure + low low sales + regular requirements to completely rewrite for a new version of IOS

(e: and I'm not saying Android is waaaaaaaay better for that, but you don't have to pay an annual fee)

 

[DemonNite]

I'll be working on a web version soon. It's not too much work. It was more that I wanted the iOS release to at least pay for the Apple yearly fee - currently it is not.

One of my older games came first on iOS/Android (paid for) and once sales dried up I made another build that was free with ads. If placed well, you can easily get that fee back.

That being said, it also helped that I released the game on GameJolt for free which was a massive driving factor and gave a boost in downloads for iOS/Android.

I have promised myself that I will never make another paid for game on iOS/Android.

Pixelized Glossy Reflection xD Yeah!

Not finished, yet. Can still be improved for the same resolution.

Seems like I have all major effects on a pixelized level now. Nice. But there
are some cool ones missing and these are volume effects/rendering. So I may
try some volume stuff further down like pixelized shadow volumes and stuff.
Don't know if that makes any sense, but it sounds cool to say the least!

That looks great! can't wait for the volume effects like god rays

 

[VisceralBowl]

Pixelized Glossy Reflection xD Yeah!

Not finished, yet. Can still be improved for the same resolution.

Seems like I have all major effects on a pixelized level now. Nice. But there
are some cool ones missing and these are volume effects/rendering. So I may
try some volume stuff further down like pixelized shadow volumes and stuff.
Don't know if that makes any sense, but it sounds cool to say the least!

Nice. Are those screenspace or planar or cubemaps?

 

[Chronospherics]

Sorry I haven't been able to give more feedback since Yoshi's. Work has been busy and if I leave late then I don't get chance to do more UX work at home.

 

[shysaursoft]

And it's finally launched. The OST has also launched on bandcamp.

Massive thanks to all the people who helped me playtest, and provided feedback.

Here's to hoping people out there enjoy the experience I was trying to create.

 

[Pehesse]

And it's finally launched. The OST has also launched on bandcamp.

Massive thanks to all the people who helped me playtest, and provided feedback.

Here's to hoping people out there enjoy the experience I was trying to create.

Congrats for the launch, and making it all the way!

Regarding what happens next, I'd recommend to set your expectations as low as possible, and then lower them even further. I believe many of us tend to pretend we don't have any, but still hold on to some form of hope... but really, I'm not convinced anymore than launches bring any form of closure (financial, emotional, critical, or any other). So my advice would be to rest, be available in the coming days in case of emergency fixes, take pride in what you made no matter the critical reception and mostly see what comes - I don't know what you've decided you're going to do next, but I found diving into another new project was a bit liberating, in a sense

As for people liking the experience, I hope they do; at the very least and for what it's worth, I did, and I reiterate my thoughts from PM's: I think it's an excellently crafted platformer, and I'm eager to see what you'll work on next!

 

[shysaursoft]

Regarding what happens next, I'd recommend to set your expectations as low as possible, and then lower them even further. I believe many of us tend to pretend we don't have any, but still hold on to some form of hope... but really, I'm not convinced anymore than launches bring any form of closure (financial, emotional, critical, or any other). So my advice would be to rest, be available in the coming days in case of emergency fixes, take pride in what you made no matter the critical reception and mostly see what comes - I don't know what you've decided you're going to do next, but I found diving into another new project was a bit liberating, in a sense

Pretty sage advice. I went into this project entirely for myself, to make the kind of game I wanted to play. And in that, I succeeded - so I consider the project a win. Anything past that, is purely a bonus. If just one person gets the kind of tingle from it I was trying for, I'll be happy with that. I never once thought this would be a 'big break' or a way to earn a living, I'm a far, far ways away from anything like that. If it can bring in enough for a GMS2 license, then I'll take that as a sign that I might be on to something. If not, there's still plenty of years ahead in which to try.

I'd released one game before, a freebie on Newgrounds, and I already learned back then that releasing the game is the worst part - all the best bits are behind you, the creative pursuit, the crafting of something - and all the bad bits are to come, like negative reviews, people being personally offended that it was too hard, or too easy. So I'm a little wiser going in this time.

Still, at least it's done. That's the best I could hope for in any project I begin.

 

[timetokill]

A lil blurry but otherwise pretty sweet! How does it look in-game?

Not sure yet, I haven't really T-posed her or anything, and I need to see if I can do the glass type of voxels or not, otherwise I'll have to paint the eyes onto the glasses lenses themselves.

she looks better than 100% of the voxel art I do. I like it. The only comment I have is that every part has a lot of detail (considering being made of voxels) except the legs/feet. As far as I can tell she doesn't even have feet unless they're black and blend in perfectly with the black background.

There's lots of little things you can do to add just that little bit of detail that can add up to a lot. Maybe add a band of slightly darker grey at the top of her socks to signify the elastic band there, (assuming there are currently no developed feet) giving her some nice shoes that compliments her outfit.

Spoiler

maybe some crazy colored panties in case any weirdos position the camera for a panties shot? I dunno, lol.

Just to reiterate, I like her as is, but some of that might make her better. Also, if you plan on animating her in your game you'll probably want to modify her into T pose, otherwise I don't see how moving her arms is going to work out.

Not a bad idea for the stripe for the top of the socks. I'm putting an example of her on a pink background so you can see that she does have "feet" but they're just black shoes that are one voxel tall and don't really have any extra definition. I'm not sure if I want to add that or not, I'm open to suggestions (I'll probably do a version with and without just to see). But like I said I'm probably going to have to simplify the hair a bit.

Spoiler

She doesn't have any panties actually lol I should probably add some

And yeah, I'll T-Pose her for sure, which will actually end up making the arms look like the legs, simplifying them. I'm trying to just maximize voxel detail in the places where it will add the most character, so I'm reserving them mostly for the head area.

 

[Yoshi]

And it's finally launched. The OST has also launched on bandcamp.

Massive thanks to all the people who helped me playtest, and provided feedback.

Here's to hoping people out there enjoy the experience I was trying to create.

It looks super lovely. Very likable art as well. I only play consoles, so I won't play it, but still, I wish you all the best luck with the game .

What I've found out is that talking with people about gamedev is way different
if you do it just as a hobby vs. try to make a living out of it. From my
experience the hobby dude basically also wants to make a living out of it but
does not believe (s)he could. Thing is, you eventually come to a point in a,
for example, technical discussion where you (as the one who wants to make a
living out of it) try to tell the other one how to fix a certain problem or
what's needed to make it work to just see how (s)he is bailing out saying the
game is just a hobby, but with you seeing that even that hobby never leads to
anything due to that attitude.

I mean, there are people doing gamedev as a hobby for real, no problem. But
I'm talking about those sitting on the fence climbing down whenever it becomes
a bit more difficult. Drawing from this experience, today, I refrain from
talking to people who do gamedev just as a "hobby", for they will never get
anything done and there is nothing coming back with my time totally wasted.

For the sake of completeness; It's fine to make games as a hobby. That's not
the point. It's about those doing it as a hobby in disguise, i.e. sitting on
the fence not wanting to take any risk but want to have all the benefits.
Anyone?

I feel this is quite the drastic view. Projects can fail for a variety of reasons, both, professional projects and hobby projects. Of course, the pressure to endure hard times is higher if you are doing it to make a living out of it, but neither guarantees success nor failure.

Of course, advice you give should always consider the kind of person you are talking to. When you are talking to someone who wants to make a living out of the game, small improvements on areas the developer may not personally care much about can still be fruitful, because the developer must really be concerned with not only appealing to his personal player type, but all kinds of players. The same advice might not be fruitful when given to a hobbyist because he'd much rather focus on something he considers important.

By the way, wrt finishing projects: Though I might have been faster had I done this as my job instead of my hobby, my current game projects would probably be dead if it was for commercial goals. Both games, an SRPG an a 3D platformer, are currently in development for Wii U only (the SRPG half finished in terms of level and graphics, fully finished in terms of programming; the platformer at 2/9 with regard to level design and maybe half finished in terms of programming). The SRPG is completely based around the Wii U and cannot easily be ported. At least the SRPG would be dead if I were not a hobbyist who is happy to have a game that some people may enjoy and that is made exactly as I want it.

And yes, I would be glad if my three Wii U projects (one is released already) sold enough to offset the cost of the dev kit, but by no means would I like to make this my job. I love my actual job way too much for this and I also know that what I value in games is a niche taste anyway, so to make games for a living, I'd not only have to give up the job I love, but also make games that are much less my dream projects.

 

[RelentlessRolento]

I'm a shitty-ish programmer in Unity (I use PlayMaker at best) and am finally getting a basic virtual dog park ball thing setup.

Nothing impressive, but was having a ton of problems with the ball today, but finally got it fixed. I'll have a proto version of this done by Friday for a kids school art event I was asked to participate in.

 

[embalm]

I'm a bit surprised at people declaring entire genres of games to be too hard for solo development. Almost everyone here has worked on professional projects of some kind, so we all should have the very basic understanding that any project of any type can suffer scope creep. It's not a genre that makes any game impossible to finish. It's you and your requirements.

You can over engineer any project. The tropes of a genre are not the cause of this, it's a lack of understanding of what you want to create and understanding what should change to match your goals.



@Lautaro
Instead of laughing at other devs, it sounds like you should ask for some help. If you are actually struggling with writing quests and dialog there was another poster in this very thread who had experience writing, send them a PM and ask if they might want to help.

 

[oxrock]

I'm a shitty-ish programmer in Unity (I use PlayMaker at best) and am finally getting a basic virtual dog park ball thing setup.

Nothing impressive, but was having a ton of problems with the ball today, but finally got it fixed. I'll have a proto version of this done by Friday for a kids school art event I was asked to participate in.

kinda looks like you're just pelting the cubes with the ball, hopefully that changes a bit as it gets further along ;p

I'm a bit surprised at people declaring entire genres of games to be too hard for solo development. Almost everyone here has worked on professional projects of some kind, so we all should have the very basic understanding that any project of any type can suffer scope creep. It's not a genre that makes any game impossible to finish. It's you and your requirements.

You can over engineer any project. The tropes of a genre are not the cause of this, it's a lack of understanding of what you want to create and understanding what should change to match your goals.



@Lautaro
Instead of laughing at other devs, it sounds like you should ask for some help. If you are actually struggling with writing quests and dialog there was another poster in this very thread who had experience writing, send them a PM and ask if they might want to help.

I think you're misreading it a bit. RPG's are just inherently prone to being complicated and droning on forever making them a really poor choice for a first project. I might have missed something, but I don't think anyone dismissed them outright as something a solo dev should attempt at all. It's hard starting out knowing when to start hacking away at your game to actually complete it. That was my take on it at least.

 

[_Rob_]

I'm a bit surprised at people declaring entire genres of games to be too hard for solo development. Almost everyone here has worked on professional projects of some kind, so we all should have the very basic understanding that any project of any type can suffer scope creep. It's not a genre that makes any game impossible to finish. It's you and your requirements.

This very much hits home, I've been (mostly) solo on a 3D platformer for years now. I've lost count the amount of times I've been told to "scale back" or "try something smaller". The whole point is that I'm making the game I want to make, and 6 years later it's going better than ever!

 

[LordRaptor]

I'm a bit surprised at people declaring entire genres of games to be too hard for solo development.

Making any sort of game is like a 2D iceberg; the things a player sees is the tip, and the vast majority is just hard invisible work.

RPGs are like a 3D iceberg; the amount of additional work required is a geometric increase, not a linear one.

That's not to say if that's what you want to make you shouldn't make what you want to make - because making what you want to make is sort of the entire point of being an indie in the first place.
Just words to the wise.

 

[embalm]

I don't see how the genre determines the amount of hidden work. It's very much a project by project circumstance. No project is immune to it either.

Many platformer devs spend months tweaking levels and movement mechanics. This is hundreds of hours of work on some games, but almost none on others. Depending on how accurate you want your mechanics this is a lot of hidden work.

An RPG can have hundreds of enemies all with unique animations or it can have 5 enemies with pallet swaps and no animations.

A game by missle could end up spending months researching graphics. Trying to get just the right pixelated 3D look for a high speed racer.


All genres, projects, and games have time pits that could spring up under foot. Maybe people are saying they are harder to spot for an rpg, but I don't think that's true. I think any project that is properly planned can have it's work load accurately predicted.
It's not any harder for a platformer than it is for an rpg. Maybe projects of other genres just get planned out better.



Edit:
I want to add that I understand that when taken to their extremes an RPG will have more mechanics which requires more code and more assets than an infinite runner. My point was that a project should not be dismissed out of hand because of genre.

A game project is nothing more than just a miserable pile of features.

 

[Blizzard]

Many types of genres and projects can be taken to an extreme.

RPGs are perhaps the easiest trap for a new developer to fall into and one of the most likely to have massive amounts of unexpected scope, which is why it's reasonable to warn people of this. Of course, that person is free to ignore the warning.

 

[shysaursoft]

Many platformer devs spend months tweaking levels

I can attest to that. Rex is a simple game by any measure, but I spent literally four months just tweaking the level layout, iterating, refining. Not adding any new features or major setpieces, just doing things like moving tiles and enemies 8px left, or 8px right, for every tile the player can touch, or every enemy the player might interact with, and then playtesting that screen over and over until satisfied.

The amount of work that goes into a project, is completely removed from what that project is about, or the genre it's in. But in the end, it shows when a dev has put in the elbow grease, or not, I feel. Even if all the work is entirely just into some backend system, like saving/loading, or lighting, etc.

 

[JulianImp]

Many types of genres and projects can be taken to an extreme.

RPGs are perhaps the easiest trap for a new developer to fall into and one of the most likely to have massive amounts of unexpected scope, which is why it's reasonable to warn people of this. Of course, that person is free to ignore the warning.

This. It isn't as much as "never ever do any kind of RPG as your first game project", but rather warning people that RPGs tend to have lots of moving parts from a design, programming, art and writing perspective as opposed to, say, a breakout-style game. I'd also say platformers can be quite hard to get right depending on the engine and how much you want to use physics to create game dynamics. Plus, level design is something that most people take for granted but which is vital that you get just right for platformers, and that usually isn't something you get on the first try.

But most of all, the biggest issue with first games is how wannabe developers are unlikely to understand the scope of what they're setting out to do. Of course a simple Dragon Quest-style RPG with enemy recolors, no puzzles and only two towns is doable, but more likely than not newbie developers are likely to compare their projects to other games they've played, turning that simple RPG into a twenty-hour epic with real-time batles that is just impossibly hard to finish with no experience under your belt.

Large projects that I ended up abandoning were indeed good stepping stones to get more accustomed to GameMaker and Unity back in the day, but I probably could've actually finished something while still honing my skills at a similar rate if I only knew someone with more experience who could've oriented me towards simpler projects.

Edit: On a completely unrelated note, does anyone happen to have any experience getting voice acting done for a game? It's one of those things I've never done, and I'd be really interested in hearing the basics regarding planning, production, how VAs usually get paid and so on, since I bet I'll be tackling a project that's going to be needing voiceovers sooner or later, and it isn't something I've been able to read about in game design sites such as Gamasutra.

 

[LordRaptor]

I don't see how the genre determines the amount of hidden work. It's very much a project by project circumstance. No project is immune to it either.

Many platformer devs spend months tweaking levels and movement mechanics. This is hundreds of hours of work on some games, but almost none on others. Depending on how accurate you want your mechanics this is a lot of hidden work.

not all systems are interconnected in a manner most RPGs are; to use your example of a platform game, much of the invisible time on player movement is front-loaded; you do that first, and when you have established those constraints then you build the levels, and your game is 'done' when you get bored making levels.
You can drop levels that aren't working, and nobody will notice it.
You can add one off mechanics to a specific level, and you do not have to refactor how that mechanic affects every existing level, because its a one off mechanic.

What do you do if magic seems weak to a player in this RPG? Rebalance all progression curves and enemies? What if its boring? Add new elemental magics, and rework all existing content to accomodate that? What if certain builds are unviable and players hit a brick wall to progression? Remove that build option? Change how levelling works so that players cannot hit that brick wall at all? Change enemies to be dynamically scaling, so that brick wall actually becomes a superpower by artificially lowering enemy difficulty due to min-maxing?

Of course you can say "Oh, but that will never happen if you correctly plan and pre-balance the entire game before touching any code or assets" but realistically... the traps that get you are the ones you don't know about until you encounter them.

 

[Minamu]

Apparently Holy Sheep has an entirely new player class.. again..

He even apologized for having spent dev time on it on his own, so he clearly knows we/I don't like it, and yet he has done it anyway, and tried pitching his idea to me, even though part of the code is already written.

Great.

 

[OricWindstar]

I need your help Indie GAF!

Based on some previous advice you guys gave me, I've been working on learning animation in the past year. My current situation is I'm an animator/composer with a game idea and no programming skills, so I'd like to find a programmer to team up with to try and make this game happen. I was wondering what your opinions were on the best way to go about this.

My current plan is to make as many assets as possible, including all the basic player character animation and some stages (it's a fighting game) so that I can pitch it easier and have everything ready to go on my end if a programmer is interested. What would you guys, as programmer, be hoping to see if someone approached you for this kind of thing?

I don't want to post too much on here (and, honestly, most of it is still a work in progress), but I've got the basic design for the player character:

Along with a few stage designs:

Along with game design plans, some music, control layouts, and all that jazz.

But yeah, any advice would be much appreciated! There's a monthly meet up of indie game devs near me and I'd love to be as prepared as possible when talking to any of them about this. I'm sure since I'm not looking at this from the eyes of a programmer, I'm overlooking a bunch of obvious stuff.

 

[oxrock]

I need your help Indie GAF!

Based on some previous advice you guys gave me, I've been working on learning animation in the past year. My current situation is I'm an animator/composer with a game idea and no programming skills, so I'd like to find a programmer to team up with to try and make this game happen. I was wondering what your opinions were on the best way to go about this.

My current plan is to make as many assets as possible, including all the basic player character animation and some stages (it's a fighting game) so that I can pitch it easier and have everything ready to go on my end if a programmer is interested. What would you guys, as programmer, be hoping to see if someone approached you for this kind of thing?

I don't want to post too much on here (and, honestly, most of it is still a work in progress), but I've got the basic design for the player character:

Along with a few stage designs:

Along with, of course, game design plans, some music, control layouts, and all that jazz.

But yeah, any advice would be much appreciated! There's a monthly meet up of indie game devs near me and I'd love to be as prepared as possible when talking to any of them about this. I'm sure since I'm not looking at this from the eyes of a programmer, I'm overlooking a bunch of obvious stuff.

I think it depends on if you plan on hiring a programmer or working collaboratively with a partner. If you're hiring, I think making the assets ahead of time is totally fine and will give someone the idea of what they're getting into. For working with a partner, I would think the project would be a collaboration so you having it set in stone what you're working on and what everything will look like, etc may not fly. For a collaboration having some ideas in mind and some portfolio examples on hand to showoff would suffice I would think. I'm a hermit who never works with anyone else however, so those are my thoughts based on no experience at all. Hopefully others with more experience can chime in.

 

[OricWindstar]

I think it depends on if you plan on hiring a programmer or working collaboratively with a partner. If you're hiring, I think making the assets ahead of time is totally fine and will give someone the idea of what they're getting into. For working with a partner, I would think the project would be a collaboration so you having it set in stone what you're working on and what everything will look like, etc may not fly. For a collaboration having some ideas in mind and some portfolio examples on hand to showoff would suffice I would think. I'm a hermit who never works with anyone else however, so those are my thoughts based on no experience at all. Hopefully others with more experience can chime in.

It would definitely be more a collaborative effort. The idea would be to make all this, with the idea that any of it could change. It's more to help prove concept overall and also prove that I'm not just spouting lip service and I can actually get what needs to be done done. But you bring up a good point, that it may come across as more of power move than intended and maybe is putting in more work than necessary.

 

[Yoshi]

I need your help Indie GAF!

Based on some previous advice you guys gave me, I've been working on learning animation in the past year. My current situation is I'm an animator/composer with a game idea and no programming skills, so I'd like to find a programmer to team up with to try and make this game happen. I was wondering what your opinions were on the best way to go about this.

My current plan is to make as many assets as possible, including all the basic player character animation and some stages (it's a fighting game) so that I can pitch it easier and have everything ready to go on my end if a programmer is interested. What would you guys, as programmer, be hoping to see if someone approached you for this kind of thing?

I don't want to post too much on here (and, honestly, most of it is still a work in progress), but I've got the basic design for the player character:

Along with a few stage designs:

Along with game design plans, some music, control layouts, and all that jazz.

But yeah, any advice would be much appreciated! There's a monthly meet up of indie game devs near me and I'd love to be as prepared as possible when talking to any of them about this. I'm sure since I'm not looking at this from the eyes of a programmer, I'm overlooking a bunch of obvious stuff.

As a programmer myself, I think the most interesting thing about programming a game is fine tuning the mechanical side. So I think for me as a programmer, it would be totally fine if you had a lot of the art design ready from the start, but I would probably not be so happy if you are not giving me a good amount of freedom for the design of the mechanical side of things. Of course this is difficult with a fighter, which typically lack the distinction of having a mechanical side of gameplay and a level design side of gameplay, so it could be something that clashes with your wishes maybe too heavily.

 

[RelentlessRolento]

Edit: On a completely unrelated note, does anyone happen to have any experience getting voice acting done for a game? It's one of those things I've never done, and I'd be really interested in hearing the basics regarding planning, production, how VAs usually get paid and so on, since I bet I'll be tackling a project that's going to be needing voiceovers sooner or later, and it isn't something I've been able to read about in game design sites such as Gamasutra.

Depending on the project needs, sometimes Fiverr works.

 

[OricWindstar]

As a programmer myself, I think the most interesting thing about programming a game is fine tuning the mechanical side. So I think for me as a programmer, it would be totally fine if you had a lot of the art design ready from the start, but I would probably not be so happy if you are not giving me a good amount of freedom for the design of the mechanical side of things. Of course this is difficult with a fighter, which typically lack the distinction of having a mechanical side of gameplay and a level design side of gameplay, so it could be something that clashes with your wishes maybe too heavily.

Good point and I'd imagine most programmers would feel this way. As the game isn't story based and is more or less a pure gameplay hook, I'm actually hoping they do bring something to the table in terms of changing it. I have a pretty good foundation I think, but honestly, if they came up with something else and it felt better to play? I'm all for it. This is all mainly to show I can put my money where my mouth is. If we use it all, that's great because less work for me, but I'm open to changing quite a bit of it.

I have other ideas I want to do that I'd be a lot more adamant on not changing, but I purposefully chose this as it's something that has a lot of wiggle room in terms of how one could implement it. I've even purposefully not planned it all out too detailed so that there is room for a creative partnership. So, hopefully, I can avoid boring any potential partners.

 

[JulianImp]

I agree with oxrock and Yoshi in that it's a better idea to not come to prospective programmers with a full game that just needs code, since most people want to have some kind of agency when it comes to a game's development rather than just following orders (even more so if you plan it on being a collaboration).

You might get lucky and find someone who'll code whatever for you no questions asked, but it'd probably be better for you to present the game more as a rough outline than a ready-made project that just needs code to work, since that sounds more like a freelance job than a collaborative effort between an artist and a programmer, IMO.

Quick edit: Oh, looks like you addressed all this in your post above. Honestly, I'd say it sounds fine, but be prepared for the added "cost" that comes from the game being made as a side project compared to something both of you can devote most/all of your time and resources on.

 

[OricWindstar]

I agree with oxrock and Yoshi in that it's a better idea to not come to prospective programmers with a full game that just needs code, since most people want to have some kind of agency when it comes to a game's development rather than just following orders (even more so if you plan it on being a collaboration).

You might get lucky and find someone who'll code whatever for you no questions asked, but it'd probably be better for you to present the game more as a rough outline than a ready-made project that just needs code to work, since that sounds more like a freelance job than a collaborative effort between an artist and a programmer, IMO.

Hey, this is all good news for me! Haha, I'm glad I'm asking about it, as that's less unneeded work.

 

[shysaursoft]

Just watched a Twitch streamer play through Rex, and comment on it. It was wonderful hearing such positive comments, and seeing them enjoy playing it. Seems the game might have a small speedrunner following growing too, thanks to its design. That's really amazing.

 

[CertifiedFP]

Well, finally came up with a decent UI layout that scales well between multiple resolutions I've tested.

Any opinions before I move to properly designing it? Any readability-issues anyone might note? (Nevermind any exposed debug functions I've yet to hide)

 

[missile]

... That looks great! can't wait for the volume effects like god rays

Yeah thx! The volume stuff will get a bit harder computational-wise and
also technically, for, currently, I'm very shy of calling out any light
sources (for a reason). That's something I want to do later when I know how
much light I really need after which I can prioritize the lights (directions).
However, without knowing any (main) direction the volume is lit by, it seems
utterly hard to compute volume lighting reps. shadowing, because that simple
trick of checking against a 2d shadows mask while marching along a ray won't
work because light can come from all direction, i.e. one would need to
integrate over the full sphere along each step of the ray which is impossible
to compute for anything even remotely related to realtime. So I'm a bit
puzzled how to crack that problem. If I won't find anything solution I will
have to call out some light sources (point light say) to get at least some
pixelized god rays in the end. So I may set one point light source as the sun
and compute the shadow volumes behind objects which should already yield some
cool effects while racing towards the sun.

Nice. Are those screenspace or planar or cubemaps?

Screenspace plus a couple of expensive fixes if there is no information, sort
of a hybrid model. Further down I will do some more optimization using local
cubemaps and global ones to better scale the effect over the environment like
they did in Killzone Shadow Fall. I want to have dynamic reflection in the
game to give a better sense of depth and orientation producing a larger
virtual FOV, and also to display (animated) billboards etc. reflecting in the
ground making the world feel more grounded. There are also a couple of cool
effects/animation possible with reflections. Well, that's at least the idea.
Don't know how much I can realize it, for the effect isn't cheap. But I
somehow love Fresnel reflection. It's not seen as good in the animation above
because the craft is near the ground and as such the surface reflects much
more, but you can see that the ground texture disappears in the distance.
That's an effect I wanted to have for ages in a racing game of my vision where
the far field is wholy reflecting with near field much less. Guess you run
down a tunnel where you see just reflections while looking from grazing
(distant part of the tunnel) but with the near part showing texture +
reflections.

It looks super lovely. Very likable art as well. I only play consoles, so I won't play it, but still, I wish you all the best luck with the game .

I feel this is quite the drastic view. Projects can fail for a variety of reasons, both, professional projects and hobby projects. Of course, the pressure to endure hard times is higher if you are doing it to make a living out of it, but neither guarantees success nor failure.

Of course, advice you give should always consider the kind of person you are talking to. When you are talking to someone who wants to make a living out of the game, small improvements on areas the developer may not personally care much about can still be fruitful, because the developer must really be concerned with not only appealing to his personal player type, but all kinds of players. The same advice might not be fruitful when given to a hobbyist because he'd much rather focus on something he considers important.

By the way, wrt finishing projects: Though I might have been faster had I done this as my job instead of my hobby, my current game projects would probably be dead if it was for commercial goals. Both games, an SRPG an a 3D platformer, are currently in development for Wii U only (the SRPG half finished in terms of level and graphics, fully finished in terms of programming; the platformer at 2/9 with regard to level design and maybe half finished in terms of programming). The SRPG is completely based around the Wii U and cannot easily be ported. At least the SRPG would be dead if I were not a hobbyist who is happy to have a game that some people may enjoy and that is made exactly as I want it.

And yes, I would be glad if my three Wii U projects (one is released already) sold enough to offset the cost of the dev kit, but by no means would I like to make this my job. I love my actual job way too much for this and I also know that what I value in games is a niche taste anyway, so to make games for a living, I'd not only have to give up the job I love, but also make games that are much less my dream projects.

Thx for sharing your experience!

... A game by missle could end up spending months researching graphics. Trying to get just the right pixelated 3D look for a high speed racer. ...

 

[SixMachine]

So, I've been working on the multiplayer component of my game, which is a twinstick shooter except different modes like a vs. mode or a tetris attack mode. I basically tell the other player the commands that you are inputting, so the simulated you on their screen carries out the action. Problem is it looks fine initially, but due to various reasons I assume which might be due to latency due to connection and computer speeds etc. The simulation becomes out of sync with what is happening on your own screen, ex. bullets are not being destroyed at the same time, which leads interactions with other objects which may not occur in the original.

Now I read up a lot on this subject and this kind of issue was a problem back when Age of Empires was first being made. They basically made "turns" which are a couple frames grouped together where they can calculate and keep things in sync. But that game is more "turn based" than a shooter. I don't think this would work with my game, since I set it to target 60fps and since everything is in real time. Thinking of solutions and how many mainstream games work but a lot of it is honestly out of my expertise. At the moment I just want it to have the players not experience any interruptions, because it looks and plays smoothly enough, even though it may be inaccurate. Though thinking about it the 2 players would be unaware of inaccuracies unless they were directly communicating with each other, though the simulation may show the other player being hit by "phantom" lasers, which may exist due to the desync. Luckily the player position is always accurate because I have it constantly being updated whenever there are changes, it's all the random lasers that are being told to be shot out that I don't have the server checking every single one on every frame, since it does seem pretty intensive to do that.

Gotta hand it to the Cannon brothers for making GGPO and rollback netcode. I wish I had the know how to implement something like that.

 

[HP_Wuvcraft]

And it's finally launched. The OST has also launched on bandcamp.

Massive thanks to all the people who helped me playtest, and provided feedback.

Here's to hoping people out there enjoy the experience I was trying to create.

I may check this out.

And congrats! We're two point three weeks out from launch ourselves.

 

[Staccat0]

And it's finally launched. The OST has also launched on bandcamp.

Massive thanks to all the people who helped me playtest, and provided feedback.

Here's to hoping people out there enjoy the experience I was trying to create.

CONGRATS!

 

[missile]

Show some Fresnel love!

 

[bad guy]

Shysaursoft I strongly recommend you test Rex on a low end system. A i5 geforce970 system as min requirement could scare away many customers. Maybe you are lucky and someone with such a system will report back to you, but I wouldn't count on it.

 

[Minamu]

Apparently Holy Sheep has an entirely new player class.. again..

He even apologized for having spent dev time on it on his own, so he clearly knows we/I don't like it, and yet he has done it anyway, and tried pitching his idea to me, even though part of the code is already written.

Great.

Well, in case anyone cares, heh, I've decided to act upon this. I put my foot down hard today, and decided that from now on, the end on July, our 18 month "milestone", is my deadline. Whatever the shape the game is in on that date, I'm done. We need a specific goal to reach for, and whatever can be accomplished until then, that's it. This feature creep and one man army behaviour must be culled. It seems my point came across correctly, so we'll see how things progress from now on.

 

[shysaursoft]

Shysaursoft I strongly recommend you test Rex on a low end system. A i5 geforce970 system as min requirement could scare away many customers. Maybe you are lucky and someone with such a system will report back to you, but I wouldn't count on it.

The most recent patch added in a 'low spec' mode toggle which removes all particles and some effects, but unfortunately that's as much as I can do for now. I only have access to my own PC to test on, and nobody I personally know has anything lesser specced than my own.

I'd love to find the lowest-end system the game runs smoothly on, and update the minimum specs accordingly. Sadly, Construct2 is also very persnickety when it comes to how well it runs - it's very sensitive to background processes (since it's just and HTML5 game running in a NW.js wrapper). So for now, the low spec toggle is the best I can do.

But we're gonna keep an eye on it for the future, and hopefully get some benchmarks as more people play it.

 

[Ferulci]

Show some Fresnel love!

Man that's awesome !


On my side, I'm testing different elevator pitchs for my chess puzzle game. I'd like to get some feedbacks on which one you like the best
Here is the survey (it takes less than a minute)

 

[oxrock]

So, I've been working on the multiplayer component of my game, which is a twinstick shooter except different modes like a vs. mode or a tetris attack mode. I basically tell the other player the commands that you are inputting, so the simulated you on their screen carries out the action. Problem is it looks fine initially, but due to various reasons I assume which might be due to latency due to connection and computer speeds etc. The simulation becomes out of sync with what is happening on your own screen, ex. bullets are not being destroyed at the same time, which leads interactions with other objects which may not occur in the original.

Now I read up a lot on this subject and this kind of issue was a problem back when Age of Empires was first being made. They basically made "turns" which are a couple frames grouped together where they can calculate and keep things in sync. But that game is more "turn based" than a shooter. I don't think this would work with my game, since I set it to target 60fps and since everything is in real time. Thinking of solutions and how many mainstream games work but a lot of it is honestly out of my expertise. At the moment I just want it to have the players not experience any interruptions, because it looks and plays smoothly enough, even though it may be inaccurate. Though thinking about it the 2 players would be unaware of inaccuracies unless they were directly communicating with each other, though the simulation may show the other player being hit by "phantom" lasers, which may exist due to the desync. Luckily the player position is always accurate because I have it constantly being updated whenever there are changes, it's all the random lasers that are being told to be shot out that I don't have the server checking every single one on every frame, since it does seem pretty intensive to do that.

Gotta hand it to the Cannon brothers for making GGPO and rollback netcode. I wish I had the know how to implement something like that.

Getting the simulations to run perfectly on both ends is just damn near impossible, especially if you're using floating point numbers in anything at all. What most games do afaik is just update the clients with the latest info and have them lerp from their current positions to the new one. This keeps things mostly in sync while keeping gameplay looking smooth.

 

[ElFly]

Show some Fresnel love!

jesus

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

And it's finally launched. The OST has also launched on bandcamp.

Massive thanks to all the people who helped me playtest, and provided feedback.

Here's to hoping people out there enjoy the experience I was trying to create.

A little bit late but congrat shysaursoft! Hope your game does great.
But as pehesse says:

Congrats for the launch, and making it all the way!

Regarding what happens next, I'd recommend to set your expectations as low as possible, and then lower them even further. I believe many of us tend to pretend we don't have any, but still hold on to some form of hope... but really, I'm not convinced anymore than launches bring any form of closure (financial, emotional, critical, or any other). So my advice would be to rest, be available in the coming days in case of emergency fixes, take pride in what you made no matter the critical reception and mostly see what comes - I don't know what you've decided you're going to do next, but I found diving into another new project was a bit liberating, in a sense

As for people liking the experience, I hope they do; at the very least and for what it's worth, I did, and I reiterate my thoughts from PM's: I think it's an excellently crafted platformer, and I'm eager to see what you'll work on next!

Truth is being told here

 

[shysaursoft]

A little bit late but congrat shysaursoft! Hope your game does great.

Thanks. So far, the response has been very positive, even without any advertisement. My goal in terms of sales is *very* low, so if it hits that I'd be very chuffed. My only real goal when I started the game was to make something I wanted to play, and finish it. It was originally going to be free too, but friends suggested I ask at least for a few dollars, and I was convinced.

 

[killradius]

Working on a Goblin Game

You can read a bit more at: doomlaser.com/blog

I also post stuff to Twitter
and Tumblr
If you would like to read a humorous old GAF thread about a game of mine, here you go: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=329822

 

[Anustart]

Working on a Goblin Game

You can read a bit more at: doomlaser.com/blog

I also post stuff to Twitter
and Tumblr
If you would like to read a humorous old GAF thread about a game of mine, here you go: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=329822

I really like the look of that.

 

[JP_]

Show some Fresnel love!

Looking sweet. The rendering style is reminding me of Eskil Steenberg's Love.

The rendering style had a similar atomic feel to it where matter seemed to be kinetic. I remember really loving the trailer though admittedly it felt weird to play it for prolonged periods of time like it messed with your head or something.

 

[missile]

Man that's awesome !


On my side, I'm testing different elevator pitchs for my chess puzzle game. I'd like to get some feedbacks on which one you like the best
Here is the survey (it takes less than a minute)

Thx, mate! Well, option three sounds good to me. It contains "fun" "gameplay"
which basically is what counts for any game, I would say.

jesus

And jesus was a good man, no?

Looking sweet. The rendering style is reminding me of Eskil Steenberg's Love.



The rendering style had a similar atomic feel to it where matter seemed to be kinetic. I remember really loving the trailer though admittedly it felt weird to play it for prolonged periods of time like it messed with your head or something.

Good point. Thx for bringing that up and draw some comparisons! Yeah I have
to keep note that the game won't be so hard on the eyes.


In general;
The current resolution isn't anything near final. Part of the reason the
resolution is so low is because of a new concept I'm working on, I call camera
textures, to be able to control the camera via a texture, which would allow me
to implement eons of effects on top of it. But the primary reason for doing so
is that an artist would be able to design the camera(s) with a paint program,
which would be pretty awesome if this is going to work out. But currently this
textures are somewhat lowres in dynamic range. I need to switch to 16-bit
textures at least (or need to build a bracket system), but this would make
using it with any paint program much harder because only a few are able to
deal with 16-bit images.

Which begs the question, what programs are good for manipulating 16-bit .pngs
or any other high-dynamic range images?

Another thing why the graphics is so rough is that the my shading algorithm
is spread over multiple pixels which actually allows me to compute a couple of
complex effects at the fraction of the cost, and later rely on the eye to
integrate them together. Lazy me! xD But because there are only so many pixel
in a lowres image it looks rather rough here. Sounds daunting, but isn't,
because I can control the spread of the shading from many pixel down to
subpixels if needed (not implemented yet). That way I can also control the
load of the whole graphics later on. And I haven't done any interpolation yet.
One idea this could be used is to compute the shades first as good as possible
(depending on the performance of the system), interpolating them together,
and than quantize them to get the specific look needed. Don't know how it will
turn out for the game of mine, yet.

But I have to say that this is all software rendering, still, which
essentially gives me the freedom to try new stuff an build a completely
different rendering system which may not work 1:1 on graphics hardware.
However, I will later lift the engine with whatever the graphics hardware is
able to chew.


Edit: Here is a comparison of how the game looks at native resolution;

low res

native res

Yet native res doesn't work with my camera textures.

 

[Feep]

I see we're almost at the end, here.

I wonder what the OT 3 will be called?

 

[missile]

^ I think Pe nailed the subtitle already, like "Targeting 4K ($/y)". xD

Edit: Btw; How are things, Mr. Feep?