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Indie Game Development Discussion Thread | Of Being Professionally Poor

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So here's something I recently started working on. It's going to be a point n click style adventure game. I don't have much beyond this first room yet, and it's not quite done either, but here's what it's looking like so far. Any feedback is appreciated. I'm still pretty new to all of this.

NlqEswr.gif
 

razu

Member
Tonight I implemented a paragliding prototype to Captain Jatobe. It'll be a mini game to earn some cash to upgrade stuff and buy new boats...


Not sure what to do next. Maybe speedboats jumping over ramps! :D

Probably more game structure actually. Will feel a lot more like a game with a main menu, a pause screen, and results. NGUI is speeding this up as compared to the native Unity GUI approach I took with Chopper Mike.
 
What is a good site to contract/outsource some graphical and music work?

Edit - I need a pixel artist as well as a general artist for websites and what not.
 

JulianImp

Member
What is a good site to contract/outsource some graphical and music work?

Edit - I need a pixel artist as well as a general artist for websites and what not.

I think you should try asking around here. After all, that's how I found the awesome artist and musician I'm currently working with (even though our game's more like something we all wanted to make, so it's more of a joint production than any of us contracting the others), and I'd wager contract work would make it that much more appealing for artists to approach you.
 

Jobbs

Banned
I think you should try asking around here. After all, that's how I found the awesome artist and musician I'm currently working with (even though our game's more like something we all wanted to make, so it's more of a joint production than any of us contracting the others), and I'd wager contract work would make it that much more appealing for artists to approach you.

Good idea. As I mentioned in my update, I'm considering seeing if I can't outsource some art assets to help make my life a bit easier.

At the moment I'm primarily interested in spritework -- characters/monsters/enemies/whatever. I need someone who can do work that would blend well with my own work -- You'd need to have the experience and ability level to emulate my style and implementation, such as it is. Study what assets are available (The kickstarter update I linked is a good start) and if you think you can do work that would blend with my own, PM me or email me.
 

Anustart

Member
Started working on the graphics for my game. Still a good bit to go and much to improve, but you can kinda see what I have in mind for the game. The tv resolution is actually 1080p/etc, but I reduced the image in half as well as compressed it a little so that it wouldn't be 4 MB. All drawn in crayons! :lol

Looking better than the pc version Gulatica! Keep it up my man! Game was decent fun before but had little replay, I think if you add some small things you'll have a great game on your hands!
 

fin

Member
Today I uploaded a 20 level demo for a bunch of friends to try out. Here are some stats from one buddy:


That's after 12 levels he's a pretty avid gamer too. Playtime is looking good, probably a 8-10 hour game first time through. Not digging such a low grade though, think I can loosen up on that a bit. At least for the first 20 or so levels :)
 
Called NoA this morning and they called back within about 30 mins and got approved.
Goddamn that was fast.
Ordered my kit pretty quickly after, so freaking excited to dig into it!
 

Dynamite Shikoku

Congratulations, you really deserve it!
Tonight I implemented a paragliding prototype to Captain Jatobe. It'll be a mini game to earn some cash to upgrade stuff and buy new boats...


Not sure what to do next. Maybe speedboats jumping over ramps! :D

Probably more game structure actually. Will feel a lot more like a game with a main menu, a pause screen, and results. NGUI is speeding this up as compared to the native Unity GUI approach I took with Chopper Mike.

How about waves? I need to scratch that wave race itch.
 

Blizzard

Banned
Called NoA this morning and they called back within about 30 mins and got approved.
Goddamn that was fast.
Ordered my kit pretty quickly after, so freaking excited to dig into it!
Congratulations -- I'm still hoping I get shipped a devkit soon. :)

For my own project that I pulled back up on Windows and was working on cleaning up: As predicted, tons of nasty linker errors. In particular, SFML apparently comes baked with some static libraries for its own freetype/jpeg/glew stuff, and at best this causes warnings when I try to do debug builds, since apparently those libraries use libcmt, but debug builds link to SFML and use libcmtd. It's messy. I'm hoping just ignoring that library in the overall project build is reliable and doesn't cause anything to break.
 

Felsparrow

Neo Member
What is a good site to contract/outsource some graphical and music work?

Edit - I need a pixel artist as well as a general artist for websites and what not.

You can also try artist forums like Polycount, CGHUB, and CGTalk. They all have forums for posting freelance jobs.

There is also a subreddit dedicated to finding game developers for all sorts of work. I forget the link though.

Just be up front about the pay.

Which, by the way, I am looking for an illustrator to do a high quality full page illustration of a scifi scene, paid $1000 or higher. I figured I'd let some NeoGAF artists in on it since I've posted the job elsewhere. Please send portfolio links to anthony@rockettortoise.com

I am also looking for someone experienced with the unity engine to work with on a separate project. I'm fully into preproduction for an indie JRPG-like project.
 

Blizzard

Banned
i don't think it will be too long until we single handedly own the vast majority of wii-u development kits!
And then in an ironic turn of events, when someone asks why Wii-U third-party support is so poor, it will turn out that we're to blame for being too slow releasing awesome indie games. :p

I just fixed all my linker problems and got my test project building again.

What promptly popped out at me was something else I forgot...fonts aren't rendering because I was in the middle of trying to implement font supersampling, and got it PARTLY working, but it doesn't draw to the screen properly! So now, do I work on a game, or do I finish that feature...
 

missile

Member
Tonight I implemented a paragliding prototype to Captain Jatobe. It'll be a mini game to earn some cash to upgrade stuff and buy new boats ...
Cool stuff with the paraglider. :+

...

Not sure what to do next. Maybe speedboats jumping over ramps! :D ...
What about doing barrel rolls from ramps gaining some energy being released
upon hitting the water giving the boat a boost making it possible to dive into
the water passing gates beneath? Could be pretty cool doing so in sequence.
While being under water, the buoyancy force would propel the boat up again
such that it may also jump out of the water a bit allowing for another
possible barrel roll while passing a gate in mid-air.
 

razu

Member
How about waves? I need to scratch that wave race itch.

I'm thinking about waves... It's going to have racing, with AI boats. But it'll be more charming than challenging.


Cool stuff with the paraglider. :+

What about doing barrel rolls from ramps gaining some energy being released
upon hitting the water giving the boat a boost making it possible to dive into
the water passing gates beneath? Could be pretty cool doing so in sequence.
While being under water, the buoyancy force would propel the boat up again
such that it may also jump out of the water a bit allowing for another
possible barrel roll while passing a gate in mid-air.

Thanks :D

I can guarantee, that's way too complicated and hardcore than this game is aiming for. Chopper Mike was well received, but was 100 times too difficult to control for the audience. The fact a boat just sits there if no controls are applied is a great leap towards inclusive gaming.

Sounds really cool though :D
 

missile

Member
^ That's a good point, also considering that the game will be played on a
mobile device. A heli is usually an unstable hell of a something, difficult to
control and to move, yet very interesting. Am facing a kinda similar problem
with my aircrafts. With an unstable one, one may fly more risky maneuvers,
gaining more points in the process, yet the plane becomes more difficult to
control. A more stable one will be easier to control, but one might not be
able to fly such risky maneuvers or perform specific recovery procedures as
with a more unstable one. However. I guess, I will make this stability /
instability thing a part of the game either by having different airplanes to
fly with or having just one plane which you can tune to your liking. As I once
said, the game (Superstall) is a game about balance, risk, and reward. And as
such, the most risky/unstable aircraft won't necessarily be the best over all.
So I hope this makes up for a smooth entry into the game, i.e. the player can
make a choice according to his skills.
 

GulAtiCa

Member
Looking better than the pc version Gulatica! Keep it up my man! Game was decent fun before but had little replay, I think if you add some small things you'll have a great game on your hands!

Thanks! I hope some recent changes and additions to the game, such as drones and shields to prolong the gameplay (you can even control the drones with extra controls resulting in a small co-op fashion.) as well as multiple maps will help give the game extra replay value. Leaderboard should help in a way too.

But of course, even with all that, will still be a small game, so I'm likely to only charge like $2.99 for it.

Anyways, this weekend I'll have more graphics in place. I like what I have so far, been adding in, changing, and redesigning what I have and what I need.
 

jrDev

Member
Let me bounce this problem off someone and see if you guys can help me:

So I am trying to figure out the number of possible combinations based on certain criteria.
Say I have 4 different Fruits: Apple Pear Banana and Grape. Each fruit are friends with certain other fruits like so: Apple>Pear,Grape; Pear>Banana,Grape; Banana>Grape; and Grape has no other friends :-(

Now with this setup will create links in relationships, and I would like to have a calculation that will work out the number of friendship links. So from these friendships, we can theoretically create these links:

Apple-Pear-Banana-Grape
Apple-Pear-Grape
Apple-Grape
Pear-Banana-Grape
Pear-Grape
Banana-Grape

So out of this criteria, I got 6 relationship links. Anyone that was able to follow this can help me figure out a formula to use?

Thanks.
 

razu

Member
^ That's a good point, also considering that the game will be played on a
mobile device. A heli is usually an unstable hell of a something, difficult to
control and to move, yet very interesting. Am facing a kinda similar problem
with my aircrafts. With an unstable one, one may fly more risky maneuvers,
gaining more points in the process, yet the plane becomes more difficult to
control. A more stable one will be easier to control, but one might not be
able to fly such risky maneuvers or perform specific recovery procedures as
with a more unstable one. However. I guess, I will make this stability /
instability thing a part of the game either by having different airplanes to
fly with or having just one plane which you can tune to your liking. As I once
said, the game (Superstall) is a game about balance, risk, and reward. And as
such, the most risky/unstable aircraft won't necessarily be the best over all.
So I hope this makes up for a smooth entry into the game, i.e. the player can
make a choice according to his skills.

I think whatever you make should come with a 500 page PDF explaining how it all works :D
 

Ashodin

Member
Alright today should be more work on the Character Creation, finishing that up, and then World map implementation in the PC version, with some more battle tweaks happening. Fun!

Also ramping up to the Kickstarter launch on Nov 1.
 

Mikado

Member
Damn, walking animations are tough. This is definitely not finished, but I think I'm on the right track. Any tips would be welcome.

You probably know about / have it, but the best tip I can suggest is pick up Richard William'sAnimator's Survival Kit book (ISBN 0-571-20228-4). It's like 20-30 bucks on Amazon I think.
 

Feep

Banned
Let me bounce this problem off someone and see if you guys can help me:

So I am trying to figure out the number of possible combinations based on certain criteria.
Say I have 4 different Fruits: Apple Pear Banana and Grape. Each fruit are friends with certain other fruits like so: Apple>Pear,Grape; Pear>Banana,Grape; Banana>Grape; and Grape has no other friends :-(

Now with this setup will create links in relationships, and I would like to have a calculation that will work out the number of friendship links. So from these friendships, we can theoretically create these links:

Apple-Pear-Banana-Grape
Apple-Pear-Grape
Apple-Grape
Pear-Banana-Grape
Pear-Grape
Banana-Grape

So out of this criteria, I got 6 relationship links. Anyone that was able to follow this can help me figure out a formula to use?

Thanks.
Looks like a nice application for recursion to me.

Code:
public int recursiveLink(Fruit f)
{
    int total = 0;

    foreach (Fruit f in f.links)
        total += 1 + recursiveLink(f);

    return total;    
}

public int countRelationshipLinks()
{
    int total = 0;

    foreach (Fruit f in fruits)
        total += recursiveLink(f);

    return total;
}

I needed to make an outer shell function because 1) There is no base fruit linking to all the other fruits, and 2) One fruit alone does not count as a friend link.

But it should work.

I think.
 

razu

Member
You probably know about / have it, but the best tip I can suggest is pick up Richard William'sAnimator's Survival Kit book (ISBN 0-571-20228-4). It's like 20-30 bucks on Amazon I think.

I was just about to recommend this. I have it on my shelf, I don't even animate, (yet). But it's a great book just to read and appreciate animation. I do intend to animate things for my next game and in the future, so it's not going to waste! :D
 
You probably know about / have it, but the best tip I can suggest is pick up Richard William'sAnimator's Survival Kit book (ISBN 0-571-20228-4). It's like 20-30 bucks on Amazon I think.

I was just about to recommend this. I have it on my shelf, I don't even animate, (yet). But it's a great book just to read and appreciate animation. I do intend to animate things for my next game and in the future, so it's not going to waste! :D

Never heard of it before, but there's an iPad app for it now, so I'll check that out.
 
I think you should try asking around here. After all, that's how I found the awesome artist and musician I'm currently working with (even though our game's more like something we all wanted to make, so it's more of a joint production than any of us contracting the others), and I'd wager contract work would make it that much more appealing for artists to approach you.

Great idea!

Alright, I'm hiring contractors for graphics and music. I need website graphics, concept art, as well as pixel artists. Terms are negotiable.

If you're interested, contact me at:
brian_karcher@yahoo.com

or my Twitter at:
https://twitter.com/BrianKarcher1

or PM me.

The website for our game is at http://rolansquest.jokarmedia.com/index.html. That will give you the jist of what we are creating. It is a 2D top-down action adventure RPG. The Legend of Zelda and Illusion of Gaia are used as inspiration. We are in the beginning stages, and are targeting WiiU, PS4, XBox One, PC, iOS, and Android using Unity.

An example concept image of our main character:
rolanstarts_s.jpg
 

razu

Member
Last post of the night, but I just amazed myself with Unity.

I'm using Unity and NGUI and wanted to create a TweenPosition that had a concept of tweening in and out, with an initial position, an active position, and a destination position. I derived a new class called TweenPositionInOut from the normal TweenPosition and added an In From vector3 and an Out To one too. What surprised me was that the inspector showed all the stuff for the base tween as well... I just totally didn't expect it! :D

It's wicked. I no longer have to piss about setting the to and from in code, I just do it in the editor..

khyj71G.jpg


Code:

Code:
using UnityEngine;
using System.Collections;

public class TweenPositionInOut : TweenPosition
{
	public Vector3 m_InFrom;
	public Vector3 m_OutTo;
	Vector3 m_activePosition;
	
	
	
	public void initialise()
	{
		// grab initial position, used as default position to tween to, and from.
		m_activePosition = gameObject.transform.localPosition;
	}
	
	
	
	public void PlayIn()
	{
		enabled = true;
		
		from = m_InFrom;
		to = m_activePosition;
		
		playTween();
	}
	
	
	
	public void PlayOut()
	{
		enabled = true;
	
		from = m_activePosition;
		to = m_OutTo;
		
		playTween();
	}
	
	
	
	void playTween()
	{
		delay = 0;
		Reset();
		Play( true );
	}
}

I attach one of these to each animated element of a menu. On Awake of the menu I find all TweenPositionInOut components in the children, then on enter or exit call PlayIn or PlayOut on each tween. Works nice!
 

Feep

Banned
Is there a difference between "tweening" and lerping? I hear that term a lot, but I can't seem to find a clear definition.
 

razu

Member
Is there a difference between "tweening" and lerping? I hear that term a lot, but I can't seem to find a clear definition.

Lerp is a linear interpolation. So tween is more general I guess, (as you can do all sorts of easing in and out). But both move something from point A to point B over time T.
 

Blizzard

Banned
Is there a difference between "tweening" and lerping? I hear that term a lot, but I can't seem to find a clear definition.
They're probably used pretty interchangeably, though as razu mentioned, describing something as "linear" restricts it.

Personally, I think of tweening as more used with morphing one animation frame into another. I think this term particularly is/was used with Flash animations.

I think of lerping as something done with objects/cameras/whatever when the position and possibly rotation of something is all you are concerned about.
 

razu

Member
They're probably used pretty interchangeably, though as razu mentioned, describing something as "linear" restricts it.

Personally, I think of tweening as more used with morphing one animation frame into another. I think this term particularly is/was used with Flash animations.

I think of lerping as something done with objects/cameras/whatever when the position and possibly rotation of something is all you are concerned about.


Is it just me... or does anyone else hear missile's keyboard tapping away on this one... :D
 

Feep

Banned
Is it just me... or does anyone else hear missile's keyboard tapping away on this one... :D
Missile scares me because he might be Skynet attempting to interact with and learn from humans

MISSILE I AM ONE OF THE GOOD HUMANS DO NOT HURT ME

I'm j/k you're cool I'm just jelly of your math
 

Ashodin

Member
Missile scares me because he might be Skynet attempting to interact with and learn from humans

MISSILE I AM ONE OF THE GOOD HUMANS DO NOT HURT ME

I'm j/k you're cool I'm just jelly of your math

This made me laugh more than I'd like to admit
 

Turfster

Member
Yo,

I just tweeted that MS do make a lot of stuff free for small businesses, (like indie devs). Just go to http://www.microsoft.com/bizspark/ and sign up! So I thought I'd add it in here too.
Damn it, my company's existed longer than that, but we haven't been development-oriented for that long.
(Windows 8.1 broke the workaround for VC# Express, so if for nothing else, it would have been nice to have a VC# that worked out of the box with Unity. Ah well.)
 

missile

Member
LOL at posts above!
Arrggghhhhh!!

Well, speaking about tweening, lets have look at a homotopy first... xD Na!

I hope my aircraft will behave a lil more dynamic than DCS's. ;)
 

Hazaro

relies on auto-aim
So here's something I recently started working on. It's going to be a point n click style adventure game. I don't have much beyond this first room yet, and it's not quite done either, but here's what it's looking like so far. Any feedback is appreciated. I'm still pretty new to all of this.
It looks like you are moving a stationary body bit by bit rather than having a person fall forward and catch themselves with their legs (aka walking).
 

Fox1304

Member
Damn, walking animations are tough. This is definitely not finished, but I think I'm on the right track. Any tips would be welcome.

Looks like he has a dead right leg and does a Michael Jackson-like dance move :D
Make the left leg go back further back, our legs cross when we walk.
 
Let me bounce this problem off someone and see if you guys can help me:

So I am trying to figure out the number of possible combinations based on certain criteria.
Say I have 4 different Fruits: Apple Pear Banana and Grape. Each fruit are friends with certain other fruits like so: Apple>Pear,Grape; Pear>Banana,Grape; Banana>Grape; and Grape has no other friends :-(

Now with this setup will create links in relationships, and I would like to have a calculation that will work out the number of friendship links. So from these friendships, we can theoretically create these links:

Apple-Pear-Banana-Grape
Apple-Pear-Grape
Apple-Grape
Pear-Banana-Grape
Pear-Grape
Banana-Grape

So out of this criteria, I got 6 relationship links. Anyone that was able to follow this can help me figure out a formula to use?

Thanks.
Why is Apple-Pear not valid?
 

missile

Member
Need some little help: ...
6PzbTWB.png
...
Does your character now slides down the slope? Sliding formula implemented?
Well, wouldn't it also be cool if your character turns over if the plane gets
far too steep for your character to remain stable on the slope? I don't want
to exert any pressure, just saying.
Keep pushing! :D
 
More experimenting with doors. I'm going for a clean, minimalistic look. Mostly to get things done, but also because I think it looks nice. When it's done, the player will be able to see the door because its glowing in a specific color, with sharp edges.
What game is this? Love the visual style and effect. And I vote for 1 as well, just cleaner and less busy than the other doors
 

Ashodin

Member
Much more focused today than I was yesterday (my mental state was all over the place)

As a result, I'm nearly done with the character creator!

choosingaclasssikhq.gif


Hair colors will come later. Now my main deal is getting the info to keep during the game so you character stays the same, lol. Which is easy to set up. Then I'm working on the World map!
 
@ashodin. the "a" looks weird. in the character description box it looks like it was cut off a bit. look at "around" and "as". maybe it's just me.
 
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