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GAF Indie Game Development Thread 2: High Res Work for Low Res Pay
- Thread starter Jacksinthe
- Start date
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shysaursoft
Member
Much thanks to the mod(s) for the username change!
It looks like Rex: Another Island is just about to wrap up! The game ended up having three endings and seven music tracks. Getting 100% on all collectibles takes on average about 20 minutes, which is pretty much what the target time was (though it'll likely take an hour or so for new players).
Some zoomed out screenshots of the final layouts of a few areas:
It's amazing how a "let's make a game in two weeks" can turn into "three months later..."
Bonus: Rex with its little bouncy vest.
Glorious giant brick sized pixels!
All that's left is to decide what to do with its launch on itch.io - the current plan is to have it be free (pay what you want) for the first month, after which set its price to a dollar or two, not sure yet.
The goal is, hopefully, to earn enough to be able to afford a Game Maker Studio 2 license. Construct2 is phenomenal, but also limiting in many respects (mostly sound and its dependence on a browser). The direction the company went with Construct3, was the opposite of what I had hoped.
It looks like Rex: Another Island is just about to wrap up! The game ended up having three endings and seven music tracks. Getting 100% on all collectibles takes on average about 20 minutes, which is pretty much what the target time was (though it'll likely take an hour or so for new players).
Some zoomed out screenshots of the final layouts of a few areas:
It's amazing how a "let's make a game in two weeks" can turn into "three months later..."
Bonus: Rex with its little bouncy vest.
Glorious giant brick sized pixels!
All that's left is to decide what to do with its launch on itch.io - the current plan is to have it be free (pay what you want) for the first month, after which set its price to a dollar or two, not sure yet.
The goal is, hopefully, to earn enough to be able to afford a Game Maker Studio 2 license. Construct2 is phenomenal, but also limiting in many respects (mostly sound and its dependence on a browser). The direction the company went with Construct3, was the opposite of what I had hoped.
So with my game still being super early and with only the gameplay systems really given much thought into I've been going over the story and the world the game takes place in.
Originally my idea was that the story would evolve something called a Galactic Enclave which is basically a vessel for the player to explore interesting places. Yet at the same
time these places would become so disconnected that I feel like I'm not interesting in the world as a whole.
So unrelated to the game I've been making a world for a story and quickly become sort of attached to the world. Now with that world in mind which still has the cool locales, I'm wondering if I should do that.
At the same time though it's not that simple as to switch it over. The world I've been planning has multiple races and while the original idea did too, they were simpler and mostly human.
So I took my Human main character and began to meld them to see how the other races would (roughly) look. You got the Myrithan, a fox-like race. The Engran which is a
four-armed race which has a lowerlands and upperlands variant (this one being a lowerlands), where the upperlands are far buffer and taller. Then you have the Nulis
which are an all-female elf-like race that is meant to be noticably slimmer than the other races.
These aren't all the races but just a few and how they look above may not be final as I literally made all of them in like ~15 or so min just to get an idea.
Sorry if it just seems I'm rambling at this point!
Originally my idea was that the story would evolve something called a Galactic Enclave which is basically a vessel for the player to explore interesting places. Yet at the same
time these places would become so disconnected that I feel like I'm not interesting in the world as a whole.
So unrelated to the game I've been making a world for a story and quickly become sort of attached to the world. Now with that world in mind which still has the cool locales, I'm wondering if I should do that.
At the same time though it's not that simple as to switch it over. The world I've been planning has multiple races and while the original idea did too, they were simpler and mostly human.
So I took my Human main character and began to meld them to see how the other races would (roughly) look. You got the Myrithan, a fox-like race. The Engran which is a
four-armed race which has a lowerlands and upperlands variant (this one being a lowerlands), where the upperlands are far buffer and taller. Then you have the Nulis
which are an all-female elf-like race that is meant to be noticably slimmer than the other races.
These aren't all the races but just a few and how they look above may not be final as I literally made all of them in like ~15 or so min just to get an idea.
Sorry if it just seems I'm rambling at this point!
weaponofchoice
Neo Member
Hello everyone! First time poster here.
I'm working on a "Papers Please" type game. I'm hoping to release a public playtest to GameJolt.com later this month. Would love to get any feedback for this screenshot I released on Twitter not too long ago.
I'm working on a "Papers Please" type game. I'm hoping to release a public playtest to GameJolt.com later this month. Would love to get any feedback for this screenshot I released on Twitter not too long ago.
Did some work on another character over the weekend that I had no time to work on for ages. Hes a slow moving giant that pretty much destroys anything in his path (I want to have destructible scenery in this "arena"). Right now he can only fit in the outdoor scenes or larger arena type levels as I wanted him to be pretty big lol
https://youtu.be/nZ-EGV3mMe8
I might have one of the later procedural dungeons to be up scaled for him to roam around.. lets see how it goes
https://youtu.be/nZ-EGV3mMe8
I might have one of the later procedural dungeons to be up scaled for him to roam around.. lets see how it goes
Whitebison
Member
Hello everyone! First time poster here.
I'm working on a "Papers Please" type game. I'm hoping to release a public playtest to GameJolt.com later this month. Would love to get any feedback for this screenshot I released on Twitter not too long ago.
Love it!
Much thanks to the mod(s) for the username change!
It looks like Rex: Another Island is just about to wrap up! The game ended up having three endings and seven music tracks. Getting 100% on all collectibles takes on average about 20 minutes, which is pretty much what the target time was (though it'll likely take an hour or so for new players).
Some zoomed out screenshots of the final layouts of a few areas:
It's amazing how a "let's make a game in two weeks" can turn into "three months later..."
Bonus: Rex with its little bouncy vest.
Glorious giant brick sized pixels!
All that's left is to decide what to do with its launch on itch.io - the current plan is to have it be free (pay what you want) for the first month, after which set its price to a dollar or two, not sure yet.
The goal is, hopefully, to earn enough to be able to afford a Game Maker Studio 2 license. Construct2 is phenomenal, but also limiting in many respects (mostly sound and its dependence on a browser). The direction the company went with Construct3, was the opposite of what I had hoped.
Is that you levels that are like "double themed" or its some Metroidvania-ish design?
Thanks!
I'm thinking of using him through-out the dungeons but in places where the player can't get to (see him through the floor grills and gates). Later on he will feature as a mid-tier boss like this "arena" test I did to see how it looks.
Was also thinking about some levels that are a mix of dungeon crawling and open areas like a courtyard. If I go with this route, he can roam in the courtyard where you need to pass to get around the dungeon hallways... sort of like the central piece of that level.
shysaursoft
Member
Neither. It's a very straightforward platformer (my inspirations were Sonic and Mario Bros), but set in one big open world instead of discrete levels. Certain areas of the overworld are themed, because of how the island progresses.
So in summary: the game only has one big map (and a whole lot of checkpoints, and five fast-travel shrines so you can warp around to backtrack for coins or gems you might have missed).
Certain areas flow more like a traditional platformer level (I call them 'dungeons' internally). There are five "dungeons", each with a Gem inside, that are a little more challenging than just going straight to the end, and each tends to introduce a unique element (usually a hazard).
There's no Metroidvania elements, no abilities to find or anything. You can go straight from the start of the game to the end in like five minutes if you know the way (I call this the "Normal Speedrun").
A friend calls the game's genre 'hop n bop', which is pretty much spot on. My favorite kinds of platformers are where you can get into a 'groove' and just flow through areas once you know where things are, and the timing of things, bouncing off enemies without losing momentum. I didn't want it to be too hard, so the "main route" to the end is pretty easy I think. The dungeons are a bit harder, and finding all 777 coins is tricky but entirely optional.
The only wrinkle in the game that adds complexity is you don't 'keep' coins until you touch a checkpoint. If you die before touching one, any coins you had collected since the last checkpoint reset.
Some gifs that I hope give a better feel for what I'm trying to explain:
Hope that answered your question!
shotgun
Just randomly popped into the thread and saw this at the top - your game looks awesome!
TheHollowNight
Member
Storm's brewing!
(Flashing lights warning)
(Flashing lights warning)
Scripted up a new lightning storm weather variant! Eventually there will be very rare lightning bolts striking the playing area (similar to BOTW)
maaan. You guys are throwing some nice gifs left and right.
Nice!
So eager to start a new project. Don't know if I start my "big" one or do something "short" in between.
Just got a kid and don't know how my daily routine is going to be. And I need to apply for some client work as my released VR game won't pay the bills.
Nice!
So eager to start a new project. Don't know if I start my "big" one or do something "short" in between.
Just got a kid and don't know how my daily routine is going to be. And I need to apply for some client work as my released VR game won't pay the bills.
Uploaded new versions of the alpha demo of Beastmancer (including osx and Linux versions) in case someone wants to check them and give me some feedback: http://www.indiedb.com/games/beastmancer/downloads
Just don't visit the Alchemist in the town of Nusquam because I messed up that specific area
One thing that annoys me is how much time it takes to make a build with a few scenarios that have baked shadows, I didn't have this problem with Nomad Fleet because well the scenes were mostly empty space. You learn something new every day :/
Just don't visit the Alchemist in the town of Nusquam because I messed up that specific area
One thing that annoys me is how much time it takes to make a build with a few scenarios that have baked shadows, I didn't have this problem with Nomad Fleet because well the scenes were mostly empty space. You learn something new every day :/
I haven't posted an update here in a while but I keep trucking along.
I've was playing around with animation blending the other day and figured out how to get some decent head-tracking working. It's amazing how much more it feels like your player character is in the world when she's looking at things in it, not just staring blankly.
Also I figured out that putting floaty particles in the sky is a cheap and easy way to add motion to the scene so it doesn't feel so still. Awesome! ♥
I've was playing around with animation blending the other day and figured out how to get some decent head-tracking working. It's amazing how much more it feels like your player character is in the world when she's looking at things in it, not just staring blankly.
Also I figured out that putting floaty particles in the sky is a cheap and easy way to add motion to the scene so it doesn't feel so still. Awesome! ♥
Maybe he is in love with that psyched dungeon girl. As more the player fightsThanks!
I'm thinking of using him through-out the dungeons but in places where the player can't get to (see him through the floor grills and gates). Later on he will feature as a mid-tier boss like this "arena" test I did to see how it looks.
Was also thinking about some levels that are a mix of dungeon crawling and open areas like a courtyard. If I go with this route, he can roam in the courtyard where you need to pass to get around the dungeon hallways... sort of like the central piece of that level.
her, as more his rage builds up.
Hey congrats, man! I'm quite on a similar path as you needing to reallocated
stuff for the kid to come!
Oh ... looks pretty cool that way!... Some gifs that I hope give a better feel for what I'm trying to explain:
...
Looks good, very stylish. Perhaps adding a small amount of ambient motion to the trees in the background would help bring the world to life a little more too, especially as your foreground grass already moves?
TheHollowNight
Member
Yup yup! It has delayed thunder claps working
In other news, we're going to be demoing Beacon at EGX Rezzed!!
We just finished our promotional art, which was a scene built in Unity by my colleague Kiefen, with myself working on numerous art passes, composition changes and lighting tweaks.
The first iteration as you can see in the gif below was pretty dark and we wanted to make it better match our creative director's original concept.
And the final scene running in editor
Can anyone please help me with this as I've been battling this all day. I want to be able to generate an object in all directions like an infinite runner but instead of only going in 1 direction, you can go in all directions.
This is my code:
It only goes in 1 direction but I need it to respawn in all directions. I honestly have no idea what to do next. Can anyone please help?
This is my code:
It only goes in 1 direction but I need it to respawn in all directions. I honestly have no idea what to do next. Can anyone please help?
LordRaptor
Member
You'll probably get more helpful answers if you ask about ways to achieve the end goal you want, rather than a code snippet which already presupposes the method you want to achieve to get that result - from skimming the code, it looks like you want to spawn a new gameobject along the z-axis whenever an existing gameobject is a specified distance away from the player?
I mean... if you want a tilable background that scrolls when a player moves in any direction, and that's it, I would offer you a completely different solution for doing that, because continuous instantiate / destroy is going to generate a shit ton of garbage that needs collecting
Code:
using UnityEngine;
using System.Collections;
public class ParallaxBackground : MonoBehaviour
{
public float parallaxFactor = 2f;
public float XOffset = 0f;
public float YOffset = 0f;
void Update ()
{
MeshRenderer mr = GetComponent<MeshRenderer>();
Material mat = mr.material;
Vector2 offset = mat.mainTextureOffset;
offset.x = transform.position.x / transform.localScale.x / parallaxFactor;
offset.y = transform.position.y / transform.localScale.y / parallaxFactor;
offset.x = offset.x + XOffset;
offset.y = offset.y + YOffset;
mat.mainTextureOffset = offset;
}
}If you attach a quad with a tilable texture as the child of the player, this will scroll the texture based on the players X/Y pos (and you can adjust the scroll factor to layer quads like this for a parallax effect, hence the script name).
This is a 2D script, so if you are using a 3D setup, change the Y references to be Z references
Why is your code wrapped in spoiler tags? If someone wanted to help they may skip over it in fear of Zelda spoilers. Try wrapping it in the [ CODE ] tag, it looks like a # sign.
Can you write out clear requirements for exactly what you want to accomplish? Everything below is me just kind of guessing at what you are trying to accomplish.
You mention a runner, but those games push you in one direction and always spawn in front of you, which is much easier than 8 directional tile spawning. Maybe start with one direction, then do two directions, then add more to simplify your approach.
Do you want the game to remember tiles that you've previously explored, so if I turn around is it a new tile or the old one? Do you only want a single active tile at a time? Is this a 2D or a 3D game? How is your player moving?
My first thought was that you are trying to do a Zelda/Binding of Isaac type of scrolling screen. Where you hit an edge and then you scroll to a new tile. Yet that doesn't seem to be the case in your code. It looks like you want to spawn in a tile when the player is x distance away from the center of a tile. Depending on how your player moves, you probably want to check more than just playerTransform.position.z and add more comparisons to their location on the current tile to figure out where they are in relation to the safe zone.
I recommend you add some Debugging to your update. Start with these to see what values you are working with.
Code:
Debug.Log("Player: " + playerTransform.position.ToString());
Debug.Log("Check: " + (spawnZ - amofTiles * tileLength).ToString());This is so good!
CertifiedFP
Member
Whipped this up in a few hours with GMS2 as the first steps of my current project that will hopefully resemble more of an Immersive-Sim type game once a decent vertical slice is complete rather than a janky barebones 3/4th-view shooter. Quick test of moving and shooting as they stand right now with my abominable programmer art. Pardon the GIF coming out in a lower quality than I would have liked.
https://youtu.be/TZZMz4OxqKo
Honestly I feel like I may have screwed myself in a way choosing to go with a 3/4 Castle-Wolfenstein perspective instead of just going top-down *shrug*
https://youtu.be/TZZMz4OxqKo
Honestly I feel like I may have screwed myself in a way choosing to go with a 3/4 Castle-Wolfenstein perspective instead of just going top-down *shrug*
NipplesAndToes23
Member
Some gifs that I hope give a better feel for what I'm trying to explain:
Is this being developed in Pico-8?
shysaursoft
Member
It was made in Construct2. The gifs are just small because that's the native res the game runs at (256x224 - the resolution of the NES). When actually playing, it scales up to the screen size but stays blocky.
I've seen Pico-8 before, and it looks pretty awesome. I'm a big fan of developing things within limits. If they ever gave it the ability to compile to standalone, I'd seriously consider making games in it. Some of the stuff people have made with it is incredible.
Showed my friend some of my OpenGL progress which was basically just some 2D texturing, collisions, level loading and menus. More of a demonstration than an actual game if anything. I mentioned that it's not much and I have a long way to go, he says "No worries. There are all these kids out there making crazy looking games, I'm sure it can't be that hard in the end."
I died a little
on the inside.
I died a little
a lot
shysaursoft
Member
Saw this go by, felt it relevant:
"You don't always see every step & setback someone goes through before they succeed - keep that in mind when you compare yourself."
I prevented myself from making games for the longest time, because I see so many indie developers making such amazing things, that I felt "what's the point, I'd just be adding noise" or "nothing I make would be half as good as even the worst stuff I see out there".
After a while I realized I was just being silly, and that if I made something I enjoyed playing, that would be enough. And even if what one makes isn't all that good - it doesn't have to be. Amateur works can inspire others, and show them that you don't need to be a "professional" to enjoy what you're doing. And no matter what - you're gaining experience doing it.
As for your friend - people who never try to do something like this themselves, always think it's easy.
lol
Should be put in the OPSaw this go by, felt it relevant:
"You don't always see every step & setback someone goes through before they succeed - keep that in mind when you compare yourself."
first
Hey congrats, man! I'm quite on a similar path as you needing to reallocated
stuff for the kid to come!
thanks mate.
Enjoy the time when he/ she arrives. It's just great and those cuddly naps are amazing.
haha
Just makes me sad to think that I may have to leave my home office for consulting again.
Sorry for derailing the thread.
But hey, Diesel Power is on the Giant Bomb wiki now. I guess that makes it a real game now!
Spent the afternoon determined to finally figure out this weird once per second stutter I was getting. I could have something going literally 1000 fps1ms per frame, but around once per second I would get a huge spike. A frame that would take tens of milliseconds.
Turns out f.lux polls the system gamma ramp once a second even in the middle of the afternoon when it's not actually affecting anything. *shakes fist*.
Turns out f.lux polls the system gamma ramp once a second even in the middle of the afternoon when it's not actually affecting anything. *shakes fist*.
electroflame
Member
It's not quite as slick, but I really like SunsetScreen. It works as a portable app as well, so that's sweet.
Overall I kind of prefer it to f.lux, as it also lets you change screen brightness during the day to night transition.
As a bonus, it probably doesn't poll everything once a second, either.
oohHello everyone! First time poster here.
I'm working on a "Papers Please" type game. I'm hoping to release a public playtest to GameJolt.com later this month. Would love to get any feedback for this screenshot I released on Twitter not too long ago.
only problem is if you reject someone they can't leave and there's a traffic jam
f.lux has a "safe mode" on Windows which makes it less intrusive. With that on (now that I know what it is) it doesn't cause stutter.
I will take a look at SunsetScreen however, as the Windows port of f.lux has always seemed like something of an afterthought compared to the macOS version. Thanks!
shysaursoft
Member
I use f.lux as well! I thought for a second that perhaps this might also be causing the weird little judder I get in my game, but sadly, it seems unrelated. I'm just putting it down to a problem with Construct2 for now, and hoping most people won't notice it when playing.
electroflame
Member
Interesting -- didn't know about the "safe mode" thing. FWIW, I use f.lux on OSX as well (for the few times I actually use OSX) but I feel that SunsetScreen is better for Windows. I really like it. The quick toggle of CTRL + / is great for color-sensitive dev work (i.e. editing images, checking lighting, etc.) so that's a bonus. (I mean, I know that f.lux has a hotkey, too, but CTRL + / is a handy and accessible combo)
HP_Wuvcraft
Banned
The recent Jon Jafari shit made me realize that the current quest I'm writing for my next game is gonna go all in on gamer culture. Whereas before it just was gonna be funny-duddy Marauder Shields, now I'm just fucking going all in.
See it as an additional motivation making you more efficient/productive.
Strange. What's the transition speed?
I dig the art style. But the promotion pictures feel a bit uneasy on the eyes.Yup yup! It has delayed thunder claps working
In other news, we're going to be demoing Beacon at EGX Rezzed!!
We just finished our promotional art, which was a scene built in Unity by my colleague Kiefen, with myself working on numerous art passes, composition changes and lighting tweaks.
The first iteration as you can see in the gif below was pretty dark and we wanted to make it better match our creative director's original concept.
And the final scene running in editor
There is a lot of detail in there and at times I don't know what I'm looking
at because everything is so, say, tangled together. I think you had better
pictures, more clean and stylish ones, to look at.
One thing that always bothered me about ragdoll effects is that suddenly enemies seem to not weigh anything, they fly and bounce around like they were baloons, is this merely settings you can tweak?
thank you! appreciate that
yeah, it's definitely possible to change how fast they fall. Their gravity is actually being disabled for a fraction of a second when they spawn so that they have a very slight hangtime so we can see them better. If everything is left totally default they tend to drop like rocks which didn't feel as satisfying to me. IIRC there's also a very slight amount of upward force making them fall a bit slower (Though I forget if I disabled that at some point).
Anyone know why this is happening? For some reason picpar, imgur, and hell, even Discord. Will change the color? I kept making comparison shots of how it looked each time it uploaded which would make it even worse!
Flicker is the only one that shows the original colors (first row) correctly!
Edit: Someone I talked to said it might be related to a browser? So odd. Never had this happen before. Didn't even realize that might be a thing.
yeah I was shocked at how easy it was to implement when I was messing around with some SFML thing that wasn't reading my inputs right (I think it was SFML, this was years ago)
Dlink16
Member
Really like this. Adds to the atmosphere quite a bit.
Cute Dragon Here
Member
I suppose at some point you have to learn about your own limits...
I scrapped my personal RPG project.
On the other hand, now that I know what I can and I cannot do, and also having some foresight this time around, I've begun to plan for a kind of 2D platforming game. Written a few preliminary documents, tiled essential pieces for the first level and mapped out a physics test level, and got enough sprite work done for the player character. Just need to decide if I should still employ Unity 5.4...
Looking forward to actually having something to show in a week...
I scrapped my personal RPG project.
On the other hand, now that I know what I can and I cannot do, and also having some foresight this time around, I've begun to plan for a kind of 2D platforming game. Written a few preliminary documents, tiled essential pieces for the first level and mapped out a physics test level, and got enough sprite work done for the player character. Just need to decide if I should still employ Unity 5.4...
Looking forward to actually having something to show in a week...
neko.works
Member
Thanks guys :3
Here's a few new work-in-progress screenshots:
I made a small playpen for my new pet so he can let out his rage a bit.
Added destructible objects and finished his move set (3 moves plus a 3 way combo).
This scene won't be in the game but I do like the idea of being enclosed in a arena type level with him
https://youtu.be/PJanTG5iOjo
Added destructible objects and finished his move set (3 moves plus a 3 way combo).
This scene won't be in the game but I do like the idea of being enclosed in a arena type level with him
https://youtu.be/PJanTG5iOjo
Short (20s)
I don't think it makes any difference tho. f.lux constantly resets the gamma ramp just in case something else has changed it unless you use safe mode.
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