The Binary Zoo Bog

[T_M_C]

After your previous troubles it's nice to hear about something thats going well.   

I see that one of the advantages of using scripts is portability.

Nice to see a screenshot too.

A picture says a thousand words.   

You have a lot of variety there considering how lo res the images are.

Reminds me a lot of C64 sprites.

Bright and colorful.


The only issues i think you're likely to come up against will be performance.

Since you're targetting multiple platforms, from what i've read from other developers, rendering performance differs quite a lot from system to system.

Makes for interesting reading.   

TMC

[fog]

You have a lot of variety there considering how lo res the images are.

Reminds me a lot of C64 sprites.

Bright and colorful.

Well as that's what I'm aiming for I'll take that as a compliment

The only issues i think you're likely to come up against will be performance.

Since you're targetting multiple platforms, from what i've read from other developers, rendering performance differs quite a lot from system to system.

Yup.  I'm up for the challenge though.  I have a few things coded in the ending to hopefully help out so hopefully I wont need to change much code wise between versions.

My worst nightmare would be finding that it wont run on a certain platform and the only fix being to redesign the levels.  I hate doing that even once *shudders*

[T_M_C]

Well as that's what I'm aiming for I'll take that as a compliment

Incidentally, what's the target screen resolution you're working too.

I would imagine theres quite a wide variety of screen resolutions, from tablets, to phones, browsers and PC's.

My worst nightmare would be finding that it wont run on a certain platform and the only fix being to redesign the levels.  I hate doing that even once *shudders*

Lol.

It's a pity you don't have a collegue that does the level design.

Being a one man outfit like me means those areas you hate doing invariably suffer.

I wouldn't have thought designing levels would be a major problem for you though, especially with games like Echoes as thats really a procedural system.

Yup.  I'm up for the challenge though.  I have a few things coded in the ending to hopefully help out so hopefully I wont need to change much code wise between versions.

Thats wise.

I basically do the same with my PC stuff.

Variable detail levels and graphics res stuff for the wide range of PC configurations out there.

It can save you a lot of work in the long run.

Any news on your Nexus yet ?

TMC

[fog]

Yeah the Google rep all but admitted it was a common problem so I'm getting a replacement.  A mate is on his 4th so fingers crossed this one is ok. 

Incidentally, what's the target screen resolution you're working too.

Right now because I'm porting the 1982 code which was designed for XBox it's 720 pix high (the width is kinda irrelevant as it doesn't impact on gameplay so could be anything.)

There are so many wildly different resolutions that whatever you pick it's always a bit of a compromise.  AGK scales whatever I do to match the device res so, as I'm using chunky pixelated graphics in 1982, it should scale ok.

Once I've done this I'll have a bit more experience of how the various platforms look and perform so on the next project I'll make a more educated decision.

I wouldn't have thought designing levels would be a major problem for you though, especially with games like Echoes as thats really a procedural system.

Funny you should mention Echoes system as I'm probably going to modify that for 1982.  I have a load of attack waves designed already but TBH it was less fun than my test version which just threw up random enemies.  My levels weren't necessarily badly designed, I just feel the chaotic gameplay needs a similarly chaotic mish-mash of enemy types.

It means I can't have the tutorially bit that I had in my pre-designed levels, but really discovering how a shmup works, the different enemies and powerups is kinda half the fun for me.

(I actually came to this conclusion playing Zen Pinball yesterday when I realised that finding out how the various tables work and their scoring system is a major part of the appeal.)

[T_M_C]

AGK scales whatever I do to match the device res so, as I'm using chunky pixelated graphics in 1982, it should scale ok.

Ahh, that sounds great.

I've recently discovered Blitzmax has a virtual resolution system.  Just one resolution the game is designed for and that gets scaled and copied to whatever the physical resolution is.

That would have saved me a shed load of work if i had kown about it at the time.   

I suppose for you, theres no reason why you can't tweak each version to suit the various platforms.

But like you say, that will come with experience.

Yeah the Google rep all but admitted it was a common problem so I'm getting a replacement.  A mate is on his 4th so fingers crossed this one is ok

What a nightmare.

The least you can expect from a product when you buy it, is that it works.   

I remember when the IPhone had problems with it's arial when held at a certain position.  It's amazing what problems do slip through even after immense QA.

Funny you should mention Echoes system as I'm probably going to modify that for 1982.  I have a load of attack waves designed already but TBH it was less fun than my test version which just threw up random enemies.  My levels weren't necessarily badly designed, I just feel the chaotic gameplay needs a similarly chaotic mish-mash of enemy types.

It means I can't have the tutorially bit that I had in my pre-designed levels, but really discovering how a shmup works, the different enemies and powerups is kinda half the fun for me.

(I actually came to this conclusion playing Zen Pinball yesterday when I realised that finding out how the various tables work and their scoring system is a major part of the appeal.)

Thats cool.

Fun is the most important factor, so whether thats achieved via randomness or scripts isn't that important.

Although, whatever reduces the workload can't be bad.   

In my Zytron II, i had a bit of both worlds.

Scripted attack waves, but thrown at the player in a random way.

Theres no reason why you can't use both scripts and randomness.

TMC

[fog]

I've recently discovered Blitzmax has a virtual resolution system.  Just one resolution the game is designed for and that gets scaled and copied to whatever the physical resolution is.

That would have saved me a shed load of work if i had kown about it at the time.   

Ouch.  Yeah in theory the virtual resolution it saves a lot of work.  I'll wait and see what it looks like on various devices at various resolutions before I get too excited

In my Zytron II, i had a bit of both worlds.

Scripted attack waves, but thrown at the player in a random way.

Yeah that's pretty much what I'm doing with scripted attack formations in a semi-random order.


Right now I'm running each Generator in turn and fixing anything that looks wrong.  I've come across a few errors so far, but I kinda expected that as it's only when actually writing a game that the new game engine gets a proper testing.  Biggest issue so far was forgetting that XNA used Rads & AGK uses Degs leading to some super sloooooooooooow rotations. 

[T_M_C]

Thats great.

Now that summer is over it looks like you, me and Jdog are all coding again.   

TMC

[fog]

Now that summer is over it looks like you, me and Jdog are all coding again.   

It's a lot easier without the distraction of the Euros, the Olympics and the cycling too. 

[fog]

Been doing a bit of pruning as I rebuild 1982 in the new game engine.  A few minor things have been cut and a few added.  I've added 2 new enemies & attack waves (one a Gridrunner  style zapper and the other a Pacman ghost) so I now have 64 different enemy attack waves.  A whole bunch of those are just different Invader formations, the cannon fodder in 1982, so not as many as it sounds.

A couple of tweaks to the powerup system too.  Now caught powerups last twice as long as powerups simply collected after they land.

I'm toying with a couple of scoring tweaks too, but I need to have something playable before I can test those out.


The biggest decision I still have to make is on the graphics.  In the XNA version I used a shader to add a shadow to everything and I liked that.  Shaders aren't an option in AGK yet though and using another sprite for the shadow will be too stressful for some platforms.  Hmm.  Decisions...

[T_M_C]

Sounds good.

You could always include the shadow with the sprite image.

Would probably mean messing around with photoshop though.

And if your images support alpha layers you could even make the shadows semi transparent.

Thats something i've done in the past.  But i usually like to just use 2 images overlaid.  It's not such a big issue on the PC.

TMC

[fog]

You could always include the shadow with the sprite image.

Unfortunately the images rotate freely so adding the shadow to the image isn't an option.

I could make it platform specific and only draw the shadow where it wont effect performance, but it makes such a difference to the appearance of the graphics that I may just rather drop it.  I'd rather have a consistent look across all versions of the game.


Anyway I've added another enemy, a huge Invader, and I swear that's definitely the last one. 

Time to work on the routine to procedurally generate the attack waves....

[T_M_C]

Unfortunately the images rotate freely so adding the shadow to the image isn't an option.

Ahh.  I hadn't thought about that.   

What a pity.

Anyway I've added another enemy, a huge Invader, and I swear that's definitely the last one. 

'Feature Creep' makes another appearance.   

TMC

[TheKhakinator]

Canabalt on Android has a toggleswitch for high/low graphics but I think you'd probably want to avoid it?

[fog]

Canabalt on Android has a toggleswitch for high/low graphics but I think you'd probably want to avoid it?

I want to avoid it, it's just that mobile devices, Android in particular, are now becoming as diverse as PC's with so many different resolutions and performance specs that it's becoming almost unavoidable.

There's probably no harm in putting the option in there if I'm having to do it for the PC version anyway.  The only difference is PC users are familiar with performance options whereby mobile device users just expect it to work.  In which case I'll probably have it default to a conservative option that I know will work and let users crank the fx up if they want.

[TheKhakinator]

Keep in mind Fruit Ninja ran badly on my old phone. And ran badly on my new phone (SII) if I didn't make sure my phone wasn't in battery save mode.  Fruit Ninja probably slowly ramps up its GFX as phones improve though. Probably looked uglier a while back.