JDog053 DevBlog

[JDog053]

Thanks!

Yeah, i've cooked up a few different enemy types

Hazards
Stalactite/mites (tites will drop and reform after a few seconds, only drop when under them) mites are just static spikes..
Geysers - fire upwards every so often
Water/Lava - wounds on contact

Enemies
Frog - walks across a surface and jumps up and down every so often (basically a bouncing goomba)
Moth - fly's back and forth (tracks player if close)
Rat - walks along every surface regardless of orientation
Spider - hangs from web, fires web at player if close...

and then 'bosses' would be bigger versions of these creatures (if I get around to it)

I've added a particle sysem into this project again as i'm working on the dumping of the fruit end of level sequence improved the fruit basket aswell, but as ever, everything is placeholder currently.

[fog]

Some good ideas there.  More games should feature fruity explosions. 

[JDog053]

Some good ideas there.  More games should feature fruity explosions. 

Heh, that was just a test, will probably have fruit fireworks when you finish a level

[JDog053]

I'm now working on making the levels procedurally, given a size it will populate the grid with tiles, then using something called 'cellular automata' carve a level from the data given a series of rules...

This tutorial I found sums it up

http://www.emanueleferonato.com/2011/05/17/using-cellular-automata-to-generate-random-land-and-water-maps-with-flash/

I'm tweaking it at the moment to produce suitable caves, then i'll worry about it picking a start and end point and making sure the level is solveable! All this because i'm too lazy to make levels myself.

EDIT: Though i'm using cellular automata, i'm not using it the way that tutorial describes as obviously those levels generated don't suit my needs entirely... at the moment I have the solid cave and the nodes/points start to bore into it a number of times to taste... I'm currently missing a start and exit, the aim is to have the start and exit connected by tunnels from node to node (which i'll fiddle with tomorrow evening)

Anyhoo a couple of random screenshots (zoomed out x0.5). Still have my debug text, added the screen raster lines effect of old

[fog]

That looks like a really cool cave generating routine.  How do you plan on making sure all there are no inaccessible areas like in the first screenie? (it's probably easy to do, I've just never given it any thought )

[JDog053]

That looks like a really cool cave generating routine.  How do you plan on making sure all there are no inaccessible areas like in the first screenie? (it's probably easy to do, I've just never given it any thought )

Probably going to calculate the start to exit route, calculate a cavern, then combine the two to form the level that way you can get evrywhere with the level having some interesting geometry... then i'll do a few additional passes to place the enemies and the fruit (in theory!)

Going more down this sort of route (will be working on implimenting it tonight!)

http://roguebasin.roguelikedevelopment.org/index.php?title=Cellular_Automata_Method_for_Generating_Random_Cave-Like_Levels

[fog]

Thanks for the links JDog.  I've a couple of ideas that would need procedurally generated levels so I'll store those for reference.  (OK, I could use hand designed levels, but that's not going to happen )

[JDog053]

Thanks for the links JDog.  I've a couple of ideas that would need procedurally generated levels so I'll store those for reference.  (OK, I could use hand designed levels, but that's not going to happen )

My thoughts exactly! As much as I love the idea of making tons of levels, my laziness far outweighs my ability... so i'll just let the computer make and populate them!

[Prime_8]

wow love that .

& the way of 'sorting ' nois images into landmass is very cool.

i could see how that woudl relate to your caves.. very cool man .

[JDog053]

In the meantime while I work out a decent way of doing caves that suit the game, i'm returning to enemies and alloing the player to die. Since I can still make and load levels in paint i'll be using this to make a series of 'test caves' before the procedural ones takeover.

Then it will be a case of distributing the enemies over a generated level...

[fog]

In the meantime while I work out a decent way of doing caves that suit the game, i'm returning to enemies and alloing the player to die. Since I can still make and load levels in paint i'll be using this to make a series of 'test caves' before the procedural ones takeover.

Then it will be a case of distributing the enemies over a generated level...

Have you thought about doing what I mentioned in a different thread?  Get your procedural routine to generate a whole load of levels and then selecting the ones to use in game?

That way you get the rapid level design of a procedural routine along with manually weeding out any unsuitable levels.

[JDog053]

Thats actually a great idea, generate 100+ levels, save them to files, then weed out the good ones by making them game ready, thats a good thought!

[Prime_8]

lol and leave a feature for play to try a pure random possibly un sovable leve if they feeling lucky .. LOL

[JDog053]

Started to implement enemies properly now.

I'm cloning all the basic Mario enemies at the moment. And intend to write modified versions of these if needbe.
You still can't die yet though

The enemies in the screenshot walk back and forth on whatever platform they're on and are smart enough not to drop off.
I have a variation which when its at an edge it jumps off. I intend to make the properties toggleable so you can have an enemy that does everything!

And i've decided for this project to go down the lines of procedural generation to create a rough cavern, manual cavern manipulation in paint to create the final level as its just easier.

Been finalising the UI (not the graphics, all of it is placeholder currenty!) so I can continue with working on the game again.

[T_M_C]

Hey Jdog.

Looks like you've made a lot of progress since i was last here.

Love your procedural caverns.

Great to see you're still coding.

TMC