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[Raonak]

So, my biggest problem with my game (Super Pokemon Eevee Edition) was the battle speed, they can take really long because the speed calculations RPGmaker uses, it can make some battles take forever. This is a problem because it makes battles seem boring. And it's at odds with the otherwise fast nature of the game (walking/biking speeds are much faster than normal pokemon games, for example)

With no way to change the battle speed in engine, I left it as it was.

But recently i've come across this thing called DynaRPG, a rm2k3 modification that allows you to patch the engine. It's given me a lot more flexability. Its now allowed me to use a patch which i can use to change the battle speed. I've created an ingame option that allows you to change from 4 speed settings (slow- being the old speed, normal, fast, very fast)

Very excited about how the game plays now

 

[Jobbs]

thanks guys for all your feedback and suggestions -- I have taken notes.

a few misc. gifs for the hell of it.

• if a tunnel is long it may as well be full of arbitary colorful shapes
• this guy gets around
• see the moving laser? it fades in and out, anything that contacts it can set off the gun mount.
• if you like balls coming at you from the darkness, I've got you covered there too

 

[Jacksinthe]

I'm pretty impressed with the reception of our mobile SHMUP - especially on iOS. Our first 24 hours of sales on iOS surpassed an entire week's worth of Android sales.

Looking at dailies - right now with the info we have our iOS version sells about 5:1 against its Android counterpart. Hell, even within the first 24 hours of our iOS release we had about 2k more views hit our trailer than the entire time it's been up and today alone has seen about 400 more.

We still haven't been reviewed yet by ... anyone and we are working on that but we did find some chatter on a few iOS forums. No, we don't stealth post, I'm not that concerned about this release but the feedback I'm reading is really great. I am pleasantly surprised so many peeps like something so incredibly simple and true to its roots.

My first ever release of anything in a fairly saturated environment like mobile and I'm satisfied with how smooth the process has been for a first release. I wasn't expecting the process to work the way it has and the reception to be as good.

 

[The Quadsphere]

our iOS version sells about 5:1 against its Android counterpart.

I can confirm this ratio over 4 years of sales on both platforms.
And then we get stats like this, I don't know what to think of android anymore...

I am pleasantly surprised so many peeps like something so incredibly simple and true to its roots.

I picked it up this morning, it's a great little retro shmup really, good work

@Jobbs: Love the depth of field on those.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

I can confirm this ratio over 4 years of sales on both platforms.
And then we get stats like this, I don't know what to think of android anymore...

Hasn't this been the case for at least a few years now though? Devs target IOS first because thats where the revenue is to be made, and if you're not ad-supported you're basically not going to make anything on Android.
The reasons for this are relatively diverse, but it definitely seems like thats the way the market settled a few years back.

 

[Dascu]

1 incredibly small paragraph and a link to your website press kit. Many journos will simply delete your email if it contains anything more without reading it.

At least I'm assuming it was more than a simple paragraph with the mention of embedding.

Make 1 small but explosive paragraph and that's it and include only 1 link.

Sounds counter productive to tell as little as possible about your game but that's the point. You need to convey the hook as quickly as possible. If they want to know more they can follow your press-friendly link.

The greatest mystery of all when making an indie game is how to get the press to respond to emails, thus far I have failed miserably at this.

Some stuff did improve my chances though like keeping emails very brief and focused, 1 paragraph that covers who you are what the game is and why the game is actually amazing (preferably with an angle the person you're emailing can run with, as opposed to it just being 'really really good' which has often been my problem).

Then provide them with resources they need, a video link to see the game for themselves (YouTube is best), a link to a presskit or asset pack where they can find additional information and artwork for an article/video, and if possible a preview key (this is especially important for YouTubers, do not bother emailing them with 'hey if you'd like a key hit me back' as it wastes everyone's time).

If you can work something personal about their site or that person and why you specifically emailed them about your game that's a bonus and well worth doing, I sort of doubt you're picking people or sites at random so getting that across to the person you're emailing can be important.

Good luck! I kind of wish giving them an angle wasn't so important when contacting the press but the world is what it is.

Good advice, thanks.

I'll have to think about condensing the email and making every word count.

 

[The Quadsphere]

Hasn't this been the case for at least a few years now though? Devs target IOS first because thats where the revenue is to be made, and if you're not ad-supported you're basically not going to make anything on Android.
The reasons for this are relatively diverse, but it definitely seems like thats the way the market settled a few years back.

Absolutely, but 2 years ago I was hoping things would turn around, not settle.

 

[Skab]

thanks guys for all your feedback and suggestions -- I have taken notes.

a few misc. gifs for the hell of it.

• if a tunnel is long it may as well be full of arbitary colorful shapes
• this guy gets around
• see the moving laser? it fades in and out, anything that contacts it can set off the gun mount.
• if you like balls coming at you from the darkness, I've got you covered there too

It all looks so good! Can't wait to play through the full thing.

 

[Jacksinthe]

I can confirm this ratio over 4 years of sales on both platforms.
And then we get stats like this, I don't know what to think of android anymore...

I picked it up this morning, it's a great little retro shmup really, good work

That is crazy :O

I had no idea the slant was that large. I did some digging on my own for sales and piracy on both platforms and recent numbers (from 2014 on) for both sales across platforms and piracy are pretty much spot on from what we are seeing on our back end. Android is the more volatile landscape for devs. I can see why many choose IAP or Ads for Android but don't do this for iOS. Found several articles where the sales gap was 140k iOS to 5k for Android during the same time frame. That's crazy.

Hasn't this been the case for at least a few years now though? Devs target IOS first because thats where the revenue is to be made, and if you're not ad-supported you're basically not going to make anything on Android.
The reasons for this are relatively diverse, but it definitely seems like thats the way the market settled a few years back.

I was clueless to any kind of figures and probably should have done more research on getting things up and moving on both platforms. Or just support 1 platform and that's it. I may just do that from here on out if Android sales won't keep.

Absolutely, but 2 years ago I was hoping things would turn around, not settle.

This sucks

I can say that the Android version still hasn't made enough money to even pay for my UPS address from launch until this morning (since Android requires all paid apps to display an address) and iOS version blew that away in it's first 24 hours.

I don't want to keep it up on Android as paid if I can't even cover the cost of having a mailbox. I may end up using ADS and giving it for free on Android and just keeping it paid on iOS with no ADS.

I'm not sure how that would be perceived by peeps between the two stores. I don't want to piss off iOS users who have to pay 99c to play while Android gets the free AD version.

Something I must decide on tho if Android sales aren't viable.

 

[ThePhotoshop]

I'm working on a game called Wildfire. It's a stealth platformer inspired by the fire propagation mechanic from Far Cry 2, with a dash of Mark of the Ninja and Abe's Oddysee.

I've got a playable Windows build here I'd love to get your feedback on! It's 22mb.

Link: http://sneakybastards.net/wildfire_alpha3.zip
Alternate link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/lijrhwdrjynpjvx/wildfire_alpha3.zip?dl=0

 

[bkw]

This is looking great! Liking the art style. Can't check out the gameplay since I'm on mac right now, maybe later when I get a chance on the PC.

(I really should switch back to PC someday...)

 

[liliththepale]

.

I'm really enjoying your game but a couple of small things detract from my experience. Firstly, I know you want it to get to the game as quickly as possible, so it kind of bothers me that it takes fifteen seconds to boot up and run through the the barrage of logos. Shortening those or being able to skip them would be great!

The other thing is that the pause button is too hard to hit. When you're playing in a casual environment (such as me at lunch with friends today) and you need to quickly pause (such as when I was directly asked a question) then hitting a tiny corner of the screen becomes much harder to do. I don't think ambiguity should be an issue because the player basically never has her finger up in that corner of the screen except to pause, so more leniency would be great!

I'm working on a game called Wildfire. It's a stealth platformer inspired by the fire propagation mechanic from Far Cry 2, with a dash of Mark of the Ninja and Abe's Oddysee.

I've got a playable Windows build here I'd love to get your feedback on! It's 22mb.

This is really great!

I kind of wish W and space were conflated into the same command. They're semantically the same thing and I can't think of any cases where it's ambiguous whether I'd rather jump or mount. There's a bug (which I encountered in this room) where the fire sound is still playing even when there's no fire. When it turns to night, I really can't see anything. I don't know if GameMaker has built-in support for gamma adjustment, it might be necessary. I think you mean for it to be slightly visible, so I would increase the brightness just a bit.

Other than those gripes, I really really like what you have going on so far.

 

[Jobbs]

It all looks so good! Can't wait to play through the full thing.

thanks

this gif shows how these eggs can be used for the player's benefit if interacted with, but too much commotion and they hatch.

http://www.gfycat.com/BelovedSolidFoxterrier

 

[ThePhotoshop]

I kind of wish W and space were conflated into the same command. They're semantically the same thing and I can't think of any cases where it's ambiguous whether I'd rather jump or mount. There's a bug (which I encountered in this room) where the fire sound is still playing even when there's no fire. When it turns to night, I really can't see anything. I don't know if GameMaker has built-in support for gamma adjustment, it might be necessary. I think you mean for it to be slightly visible, so I would increase the brightness just a bit.

Other than those gripes, I really really like what you have going on so far.

Cheers! Just so I understand, are you saying you'd like the W key to also jump, in addition to mounting?

Cheers for finding the bug, that's an easy fix.

The brightness is a funny one - I've only got one screen to test on and there's some slight visibility which is what I'm going for. But always good to hear if it's too dark on other screens, so I'll add an option for it.

 

[liliththepale]

Cheers! Just so I understand, are you saying you'd like the W key to also jump, in addition to mounting?

Cheers for finding the bug, that's an easy fix.

The brightness is a funny one - I've only got one screen to test on and there's some slight visibility which is what I'm going for. But always good to hear if it's too dark on other screens, so I'll add an option for it.

Right. I don't care if it's W or Space or both, but I don't feel like jump and mount should be separate commands.

if (jumpKeyPressed) {
  if (meetsMountingParameters) {
    // mount
  } else if (meetsJumpingParameters) {
    // jump
  }
}

For brightness and colors, you really should test on a few different screens if you can. This is especially important for cases where the differences are intentionally subtle or you rely on something that wouldn't pass a colorblindness test.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

I may end up using ADS and giving it for free on Android and just keeping it paid on iOS with no ADS.

I'm not sure how that would be perceived by peeps between the two stores. I don't want to piss off iOS users who have to pay 99c to play while Android gets the free AD version.

Something I must decide on tho if Android sales aren't viable.

It might be worth considering making the paid version for IOS a 'timed exclusive', then releasing the ad-supported android version a few months later; this is actually pretty common for people to do and hasn't seemed to alienate either userbase.

 

[timetokill]

I'm working on a game called Wildfire. It's a stealth platformer inspired by the fire propagation mechanic from Far Cry 2, with a dash of Mark of the Ninja and Abe's Oddysee.

Very cool! I'm also working on a game where fire propagation is key to the experience, but mine's not a stealth platformer I'll be sure to check out your game when I get a chance!

 

[Kritz]

what the fuck guys

http://www.vg247.com/2015/03/01/first-steamvr-game-reveal-is-job-simulator/

did steam just fuck me

 

[Violet_0]

what the fuck guys

http://www.vg247.com/2015/03/01/firs...job-simulator/

did steam just fuck me

I'd like to believe that's just a coincidence but it really does look awfully similar to your game, damn

 

[cbox]

Pretty happy with my progress today, only took a few hours! I really, really, really like working in 3d. Can't wait to rig this puppy and start playing around in unreal.

what the fuck guys

What the fuck indeed!

 

[Blizzard]

what the fuck guys


http://www.vg247.com/2015/03/01/first-steamvr-game-reveal-is-job-simulator/

did steam just fuck me

The worst part is, you didn't even make a mean Twitter post about Gabe Newell. I guess it's time to apply to Valve!

 

[Kritz]

The worst part is, you didn't even make a mean Twitter post about Gabe Newell. I guess it's time to apply to Valve!

someone hook me up with adam boyes and I'll start burning bridges before you can say "what's a morpheus?"

Pretty happy with my progress today, only took a few hours! I really, really, really like working in 3d. Can't wait to rig this puppy and start playing around in unreal.

man that's one hell of an aesthetic you got there

 

[MrHoot]

Hey there people

So never posted my project so far, but i'd like to present something i'm making with 3 other people called "Otherworld" (temporary name, we're gonna change it soon). Been working on it for about a year at a varying degree

Basically a sci-fi action adventure game where you find yourself stranded on an alien planet and while trying to find a way to escape, you get pulled into a weird alien conspiracy and ancient civilization (it's 4 am and I don't have strength to be a marketer right now )

But hey, an alpha trailer we did a few months ago !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rpZgk2RgCg

 

[Jacksinthe]

what the fuck guys


http://www.vg247.com/2015/03/01/first-steamvr-game-reveal-is-job-simulator/

did steam just fuck me

Well that's... I don't want to jump the gun and say its not a coincidence but that is unrealistically too similar, IMO.

Possible? Sure. Plausible? No. Not in that realm.

Although to do some real VR work like this you would need a great deal of object interaction and food is a particularly good choice since it places the user in a surrounding they may be comfortable with like making food, a burger, pouring a drink, etc. Menial everyday tasks. Probably something I would have chosen vs something like building a small-block which not many have experience with.

I'd have to look into this a bit more. We know you've been working this a long time so its possible Owlchemy Labs or whatever have seen your work.

 

[Labadal]

Hey there people

So never posted my project so far, but i'd like to present something i'm making with 3 other people called "Otherworld" (temporary name, we're gonna change it soon). Been working on it for about a year at a varying degree

Basically a sci-fi action adventure game where you find yourself stranded on an alien planet and while trying to find a way to escape, you get pulled into a weird alien conspiracy and ancient civilization (it's 4 am and I don't have strength to be a marketer right now )

But hey, an alpha trailer we did a few months ago !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rpZgk2RgCg

That does look intriguing.

 

[udivision]

I'm working on a game called Wildfire. It's a stealth platformer inspired by the fire propagation mechanic from Far Cry 2, with a dash of Mark of the Ninja and Abe's Oddysee.

I've got a playable Windows build here I'd love to get your feedback on! It's 22mb.

Really cool idea. I haven't gotten very far yet. I finally got to the first fire part after the tutorial, and I spent 5 minutes putting out and starting fires... and then I missed a jump.

 

[MrHoot]

That does look intriguing.

Cheers !

There are a few key stuff we want to get going with the game so far:
We had a lot of comparisons with don't starve (mostly due with how we handle our overworld, which isn't infinite but is randomly generated. Other areas are fixed though) We want to focus way less on survival though, and more on a sense of adventuring and discovery, similar to an old zelda or baldur's gate title.

Plus people seem to really be digging the artstyle (There's two artists, i'm one of them, so we're always happy to hear that)

Although right now we're mostly working on redesigning stuff and improving based on feedback. That little trailer was made for a little first public showing we did back in november. Based on that, i'm personally reworking animations right now as well as design for the overworld and the first boss to make it less...well less boring to be fair

 

[Kritz]

Well that's... I don't want to jump the gun and say its not a coincidence but that is unrealistically too similar, IMO.

Possible? Sure. Plausible? No. Not in that realm.

Although to do some real VR work like this you would need a great deal of object interaction and food is a particularly good choice since it places the user in a surrounding they may be comfortable with like making food, a burger, pouring a drink, etc. Menial everyday tasks. Probably something I would have chosen vs something like building a small-block which not many have experience with.

I'd have to look into this a bit more. We know you've been working this a long time so its possible Owlchemy Labs or whatever have seen your work.

realistically it's just some competition. I don't really believe that they copied the game, even if there are a lot of similarities. And even if they did, sincerest form of flattery and all that.Not sure if customers will appreciate the difference, so all the same it's going to come down to making the best game while still hopefully getting out there first. I imagine I probably have until October until SteamVR releases into the wild.

Ultimately it just means I have a fire under my ass now. And honestly, that's the best thing I could have asked for.

 

[udivision]

Plus people seem to really be digging the artstyle (There's two artists, i'm one of them, so we're always happy to hear that)

Add me into that camp. I thought it was neat, but then the trailer got to the cave with the red crevices... that looked really good.

 

[MrHoot]

Add me into that camp. I thought it was neat, but then the trailer got to the cave with the red crevices... that looked really good.

Yep, by far it's our best visual setpiece. We're reworking the overworld stuff to make them look less bland (the green pastures are kinda...meh. But we already have something good to replace 'em)

Lot's of effects missing too that we want to put in

 

[Jobbs]

once you get the charge blast, it shoves you in the opposite direction as you release it. therefore you can use it to shoot downward for an extra mid-air hop.

the first three jumps are the three jumps you're allowed to make in the air by your standard multijump ability. the charge blast gives you a fourth, effectively.

http://www.gfycat.com/WelcomeLittleAmazonparrot

 

[cbox]

realistically it's just some competition. I don't really believe that they copied the game, even if there are a lot of similarities. And even if they did, sincerest form of flattery and all that.Not sure if customers will appreciate the difference, so all the same it's going to come down to making the best game while still hopefully getting out there first. I imagine I probably have until October until SteamVR releases into the wild.

Ultimately it just means I have a fire under my ass now. And honestly, that's the best thing I could have asked for.

I wouldn't worry, every time I think about your game I remember the GIF you posted of the rats stealing money and it makes me laugh. Even if someone creates something that looks like what you made, it'll never take away from the work you did.

Fire under the ass helps!

 

[Blizzard]

I wouldn't worry, every time I think about your game I remember the GIF you posted of the rats stealing money and it makes me laugh. Even if someone creates something that looks like what you made, it'll never take away from the work you did.

Fire under the ass helps!

I think this would be my main association with Citizen Burger Disorder -- crazy mishaps.

Rats, or the kitchen catching on fire, or customers getting sick on food, or whatever. People on YouTube will get a kick out of it too, and the name is way more creative than something like "Job Simulator".

Now if the Valve-associated game ends up having procedural kitchen fires and the same sort of mishaps, that will be VERY suspicious.

 

[Turfster]

Unreal Engine 4 is now free, paid subscription costs turned into account balance it seems?

 

[MattyG]

I kinda gave up on making that 2D game I was working on due to having a lot of school work and stuff lately, but this UE3 thing is making me want to give a 3D game a go. One of my friends who's used it said it's really simple to use. Is it?

 

[Dead Prince]

Unreal Engine 4 is now free, paid subscription costs turned into account balance it seems?

i think sub you get paid back. but they are adding $30 to your account to use in the marketplace.

 

[Turfster]

i think sub you get paid back. but they are adding $30 to your account to use in the marketplace.

Oh, also a possibility.

 

[Dead Prince]

here's the email i got.

It's been an amazing year for Unreal Engine 4. We've grown a lot, we've learned a lot, and with your help and feedback, made the engine easier to use and more powerful than ever. Now we're making Unreal Engine 4 freely available to developers everywhere.

Before we do, we wanted to say a sincere thanks to those of you who've been with us all along the way. We're humbled by your energy, enthusiasm, and the incredible stuff you're doing with the engine. And because of you, we're motivated to work even harder so that together, we can all create great things that inspire and shape the future of the medium that we love.

If you have paid for a subscription on or after January 30th, you will receive a pro-rated refund for your latest month's payment after March 12th. You'll continue to receive all future updates for free.

And, because you were a paying subscriber, we're also giving you a gift of $30 that you can spend in the Marketplace now or save for a future use.

 

[Blizzard]

For anyone with Unity who might want to check out UE4: https://docs.unrealengine.com/lates...her&utm_medium=software&utm_campaign=learntab

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

Am I right in thinking that UE4 is a bad fit for procedurally generated levels / worlds due to using a global illumination lighting model? (Unity 5 has the same issue)

 

[Lautaro]

Oh man, Epic is so hungry for that Unity market share.

Well, it benefits consumers, I'll probably give it a try after finishing my current project.

 

[Blizzard]

Am I right in thinking that UE4 is a bad fit for procedurally generated levels / worlds due to using a global illumination lighting model? (Unity 5 has the same issue)

I'm not sure, but I ran across this example on YouTube of some procedural stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6MLnZn00H0

 

[_machine]

Well they sure are using that Tencent money for a good cause. Hopefully we'll see some great games happening because of this.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

I'm not sure, but I ran across this example on YouTube of some procedural stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6MLnZn00H0

That looks more like procedurally adding things to a level / world, rather than creating the world itself on the fly. AFAIK, you still need to create a fixed size 'level' to put everything into in UE (and always have done). In Unity4 though I have a testcode game where there's nothing at all in the scene except a Player object - everything is procedurally added, and you can literally fly forever and never hit a 'worlds end' (probably not strictly true, there's probably a var overflow in your transform.position at some point, but realisitically nobody is going to reach it)

Unity 5 has the same requirements of a static 'base world' when using global illumination, which is one of the reasons I suspect they are also keeping their previous lighting model too, as well as for support on lower end / older devices.

 

[Jacksinthe]

Unreal Engine 4 is now free, paid subscription costs turned into account balance it seems?

Reading now. Will update OP tonight.

 

[DinkyDev]

Unity are hinting on their forums that people should watch their special event tomorrow. Major news in response to this UE4 announcement.

Unity hints: http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/unreal-engine-4-free.305902/

Special event link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8Ao5oyflik

 

[HelloMeow]

Unreal Engine 4 is now free, paid subscription costs turned into account balance it seems?

Interesting. I might try it.

Does anyone know how the audio system works? Is it easy to access the audio samples directly?

 

[_machine]

Interesting. I might try it.

Does anyone know how the audio system works? Is it easy to access the audio samples directly?

Not sure about how the default stuff works, but we're using FMOD with UE4 which is working really well (especially now that they shipped the 32bit plugin for release). I can ask our sound designer more if you have any specific questions.

 

[bkw]

I know neither is probably ideal, but anyone know if UE4's 2D support is any better than Unity's?

 

[HelloMeow]

Not sure about how the default stuff works, but we're using FMOD with UE4 which is working really well (especially now that they shipped the 32bit plugin for release). I can ask our sound designer more if you have any specific questions.

I'm interested in porting my music analysis stuff from Unity to UE4.

In Unity you can access the samples directly trough AudioClip. This makes it easy to analyze them, or to import any audio file with an external library. So what I'd like to know is if you can access the audio samples in a similar way. Samples meaning the data contained in an audio file, not audio files themselves.