jQuery Mobile

[oyog]

I started playing this to give you some feedback, but then I realised it was so awesome that I'd rather not play the unfinished version. So, I'm not being very helpful, but I can definitely say that this looks really amazing and I can't wait until its released.

Same here, don't want to spoil myself the awesome feeling of playing the finished version 

That's a wise choice it seems, see below ...

That's weird. I tried it again, and now it works. However, if I change the resolution and then immediately change it back to 800x600, the game consistently crashes when I select New Game. It also did that the first time I tried it, so maybe that crash caused issues when I played the second time and couldn't click on anything? I'm on Windows XP, by the way.

EDIT: Actually, the game crashes even if I just change the resolution once to whatever before selecting New Game.

Thanks. That gives me something to go on from, though I can't exactly re-produce it. Oh well, looking into it! I might annoy you with a new exe file at one point

looks great,will play more later

maybe this has been asked, but What language do you program this in?

Thank you. I'm writing this in C++ with a dash of Objective-C for creating directories, finding save files and opening the website on OS X. That reminds me I need to take a little time to clean up the existing codebase. It's a mess in some places.



oyog, sweet mother of baby Jebus! That's one buggy game. I wouldn't want to be the one who wrote that. Oh, wait ...

I think it'd make a lot of sense to make 'buy brig' the first objective or 'harbor' the first button. A harbor with a brig works as a makeshift inventory while purchasing supplies.  Also, on my first playthrough, before reading the objectives tab, I hired explorers and bought equipment first (since the tabs are in that order). By the time I realized I could buy a ship at the harbor I had run out of cash and started a new game, though it occurred to me later I could have sold stuff again.

Yeah, someone else also mentioned that and I see what you mean. I'll be sure to clarify that. And you can't actually sell stuff yet, it's just a button. Sorry.

On the character sheets initially I thought there was something strange going on with the skills text but I just realized occasionally skills get struck out on re-rolling.

That strike-trough font doesn't quite work. I meant to fix that but never got around to it. Some skills are in fact disabled when a certain attribute value is too small. Not that it matters because skills don't actually do anything yet.

I purchased flask(s), tent, sword, axe, bow and flint but the task isn't checked in objectives. Only thought it was strange since the rest of the tasks check off.

That's strange. Are you sure you had as many flasks as you had men? If you have the save file for that, maybe you could zip it up and send it to me? It's in the data/savegames folder.

Would it be possible to remap keys? Ending turn with 'enter' is automatic for me from playing Civilization. Not an issue, just personal preference.

No, it's impossible Sure, I'll see what I can do.

It'd be nice to have a 'go to home port' for the brig.

True but my idea was that the sail home is as important as everything else because realistically you could die one the way back because you don't have food or water. Yeah, you completed the quest but if you never make it back home it's all in vain. Automating takes that away. But I've been thinking about adding difficulty modes. On Easy it could easily be like that.

Leaving two explorers in the new world I sent the third home. Upon arriving the two that didn't sail home have teleported to the dock. One of them even seems to be attempting to disassemble the dock using only his axe. (He had been clearing a forest in the new world.)

Whoops The game should probably kill of the guys who are left behind or add them to the nearest native village and let the computer control them from there on. It'd be funny if you ever go back you could run into them.

Choosing from this point to immediately sail out the game crashes. Would the log Windows offers when suggesting checking online for a solution be useful?

No, I think I know where the problem is. Thanks.

A crash I can't seem to reproduce - 1 member in camp, 2nd member, not in camp selects leave camp - not sure about this one.

Okay, that was actually easy to reproduce. Enter camp with one guy. Right-click an empty tile but don't choose Leave camp. Press TAB to switch to another character. Choose Leave camp = crash. Thanks for finding it! The contextual actions menu should be closed on character switch most likely.


Thanks again. These are all excellent findings! You are a true explorer

I like the sound of that.

I'm not familiar with your level format or anything but if everything was this huge block/voxel, then it would be no problem making levels with arbitrary shapes and overhangs.  Like Minecraft but with 4-5 times larger blocks. It could look like it does currently but with more available options for level building.

Maybe I'm an idiot, but I can't figure out how to do anything. My little dude is standing on the pier, and when I click on anything besides World Map and Quests, nothing happens.

That's very odd. The camera/viewport should move to the location in hand and the window should appear. Not that it makes any difference but what if you choose Tavern or other location from the Town menu in the menubar. I don't see how such a basic thing could not work

But the button click registers, right? You should hear a sound.

Also, Win or Mac?

Man, this looks good. I wanna play it! I wanna, I wanna. Wanna.

Sweet! Thanks guys.

I fixed a couple of issues:
* Made inventory item selection cyclic
* Added a few more help text windows
* Changed the word day/days to turn/turns - makes more sense
* Pressing ESC now skips the intro to the character creation section
* Slightly increased nutritious value of food items
* One new background music

I also had a sort of funny bug. I made it so that when thirst or hunger levels are very low, the character drinks and eats automatically, if he has anything. Basically it picks a random food item from the inventory. You first quest is to collect some spices. Spices are classified as edible in the game since they are herbs by basic type. So I was going around collecting the spices when I noticed that I'm losing my valuable stuff. It turned out my dudes were eating it whenever hunger kicked in. I literally laughed out loud.

Anyway, if any of these changes seem important to you, downloading it again would be good idea. Also, Mac OS X version is now up. See the first post.

[Download for Windows]

After fixing a few things I now consider it stable enough to be released. So, get it, try it out (but don't break it) and have fun! If you find any issues, please be so kind and let me know.

Download for Windows
Download for OS X

OH my, how did you get soo good at pixelart?

Heh, I can somewhat handle it but honestly I'm not good at it. You've got to practice it, just like everything else. My father had an exceptional eye for drawing and so did her mother, so part of it comes from that I guess.

Thanks, guys! I appreciate the good word.

1500 is pretty meh though, 1512 would be better

Why is that? Columbus died in 1506 and that's the sort of time-frame I was going for. Plus, it's a beginning of a new century, what better time to start an epic voyage.

That latest video is looking so polished. Really coming along well. The text you've written seems to also fit nicely. Great job  .

Thanks. I have a (bad) habit to spend time tinkering with details and that usually slows down progress. Things work, but it definitely has its kinks. I don't have time right now to fix everything. I say, it works as long as it works.

You might want to add some kind of disadvantage-vs-melee mechanic for ranged attacks.

Early gunpowder weapons also had a fair chance of blowing off their carriers hand instead of hitting the adversary.

Musket is listed in the weapons category in the supply store but it's not implemented yet.


I'll playtest it some more and then start zipping it up and whatnot. I wish I had time to add in some native warriors and archers that pop out of the village when you go near but oh well. That's quite a bit of development.

[gameplay video]

You might want to add some kind of disadvantage-vs-melee mechanic for ranged attacks.

Sure thing. Obviously, ranged weapons do less damage and there's a chance of missing the target altogether but they use up less energy than melee weapons, so it's balanced out.


Anyway, I got a new gameplay video uploaded. It's nothing special but shows the new developments. I hope you like it!

That's the trouble with first person shooters. While easy to appreciate by the user, it's really difficult to find a motivation or drive to develop it. If the game's about some levels and shooting at nondescript enemies, then I would not go any further with it. But here's an idea (one I worked on myself a few years ago before giving up because I spent all my time working on the engine instead of the game).

Have you played Command & Conquer: Renegade? The single-player campaign was crap but where it shined was the multi-player mode. It was awesome! You could upgrade your character and buy vehicles and go and destroy the enemy base or defend your own one. So much team work and so much fun. So, my idea was to make a similar game but in single-player, with AI taking over rest of the players. I restarted the project a couple of times but you can have a look at some of the acient gameplay videos here, here or the newer stuff here and here.

This is just an idea.

If you're not sure about the combat system, keep it simple. I like the 1 guy = 1 attack idea. If you are not happy with this system, you can improve it later.

...
Stamina would still act as a limit to "how many swings a character can strike per turn", and you can also implement something like that for enemies too (say, a bear can land 4 attacks a turn, a wild dog only 2 or whatever you see fit etc.).
...

I'd like to keep combat and game turns separated since game turns advance time by one whole day. Currently what I have is when you attack, the enemy hits back. Then it's your turn again. But when you move or do anything else but attack then that also constitutes as your 'move', so the enemy gets to hit again. Tonight I also wrote simple projectiles for ranged weapons so you can actually see the arrow (more like a dot) flying. Tomorrow I'd like to complete the combat system and start wrapping things up and maybe be done with it on Sunday

I really like the town! It feels ... cozy, inviting, some place I'd like to be. Don't know how to describe it but it feels good. And whenever I see lights in windows (both in games and real life) I start wondering what goes on behind them.

Chad, Delver is great! Keep it up

I also prefer the previous one. This new motion looks strange, almost mechanic. If you want to keep it, you should repeat the shake effect at least 3 times, decereasing the tilt each time (the last one should be barely noticable), so it would look like it's shaking into place. It would look more natural, I think.

Movember is coming up. Anyone going for Mario mustache?

Great idea! It almost looks like a page of an game e-zine/magazine of sorts. This topic should be stickied for it to be really useful.

Fair enough. I was just reasoning my opinion as requested by Capntastic, though he was speaking to Chris Pavia at that point. If this is not what was wanted after all, never mind. And you're right, I don't get them. But I don't think that is fair or gives reason enough to classify me as "people like you", as if I was anything less because I don't get the games. If this is what you meant, then that hurt a little. We are all game enthusiasts here with slight differences in taste, that's all. My first reply was rude, I admit, but I reasoned my opinion now. Anyway, moving on.

Okay. Here's why I said it was shit:

The website looks awful. The colors are literally blinding and the text is very hard to read. In fact, I'd have to turn down the screen brightness just to stand looking at it. That is a serious violation of web usability. Apart from the colors, the structure of the site is very confusing. Links don't appear as links. I did not realize for a while that clicking on the pyramid would take me to the games page. I see there are undelined links in the bottom of the page but by that time I'm no longer able to see anything. The only way it could be worse is if the background colors flashed randomly 10 times a second. I randomly click on the Other link. I see a page with no use or content whatsoever. What is the point of it? Evetually I get to the games page. So far I do not have my hopes up. I pick a random game in the list because all of these are unknown to me. Ghost Voyage. Looking at the screenshot I gather this is a joke game because obviously no effort whatsoever has gone into the graphics. This gives me reason to believe the same lack of effort dominates in other aspects of the game. Or other games for that matter. I have no interest in downloading this. I close the browser tab and go rest my eyes.

I gather this tries to be profound and, well, 'indie' in its cheesiest form. But tere's nothing speacial about it. It's just plain horrible. It's not deep and don't say 'You're too stupid to understand this because this is pure genius'. By all means conceivable, it is terrible. But to be more constructive, here are some pointers: re-design the website to be acutally usable with humans with eyes. That is, lose the awful colors and pack up the content so there would not be so much scrolling and empty areas. Since the games are what this site is supposed to be about, perhaps move the game listing or some sort of indication of these to the front page. Also, pages with no or little content should either be removed or merged into one. And the games. If you have no artistic talent, you should find someone who does, because while programmer art at times has its appeal and uniqueness about it, it just doesn't work in this case. The games may even be good but since they are presented in such a terrible way, I have no interest in trying them out.


Is this better? Have I explained troughly enough what and why I don't like about it? Are we allowed to have our opinons or is this still being rude without any substantial backing?

This is shaping up nicely!

Cheers, mate!

nice progress

I would love to see those weather effects in action... Maybe you could make a small gif animation? (or should I just wait for the next build? )

Thanks! I tried recording a video and turning that into a gif but the quality wasn't very good. I'm at work and the screen capture thingy in QuickTime player is all I could use. I'll try to make a new gameplay video soon. But if you want, you can take a look at the latest development session video. The rain is starts at 0:15:35 and the snow is at around 0:20:08. Pop out the player for larger image.


On development side of things: I'm thinking about / working on a simple combat system at the moment. It's way trickier than I expected. This system will not be the final thing but since I wanted combat in the new build and I don't want to take another month developing it, it's very basic. You click on an enemy to 'engage combat mode'. You can then perform an attack a certain number of times (based on the stamina attribute) before the counter reaches zero and the enemy strikes back. All combat is many-to-one. That is your character can only attack one enemy at a time but you can use several men to attack one enemy. For now at least. I'm still wondering if there should be a similar attack counter on enemies. I mean, if you fight a bear with three men and each have 3 shots but you only use 2 for all, the enemy does not get a change strike back. I think it'd be fair if after a certain number of attacks the bear strikes the nearest/weakest man. Otherwise you can easily overpower the enemy. Which is realistic of course, 3 vs. 1 would be quite a one-sided match in reality but that way things could be more interesting.

Aaah, I don't know! This system sucks ...

Any ideas, guys? Lose the 'engaged in combat' mode? Go for simple 'One man attacks with a sword' > 'enemy strikes back' > 'I fire a couple of arrows with another man futher away' > 'the enemy strikes the swordsman because he's the closest' > 'repeat' ? The upside is, the player could be attacked by two or more enemies at a time. You just click on the one you want to hit. I'm thinking the attack counter could work here as well, the only difference is you're not tied to just one enemy. But what if I can attack 2 times but hit just once and then walk away? Should that constitute as my second move to allow the enemy to attack me? And again, if you fight a bear with three men and each have 3 shots but you only use 2 for all, the enemy does not get a change strike back. One hit could solve this because the response is immediate but I really liked the idea that higher the stamina attribute, the more hits you could do. Otherwise I only have strength paramter to adjust the hit damage for melee weapons and perception for better aiming of ranged weapons. Of course you can fire several arrows before the enemy reaches you so that helps a little ... maybe that's it? Melee wepons do more damage but ranged weapons allow you to hit several times before getting hit back.

Sorry for rambling, I was just thinking out loud. All ideas are very much welcome.


This is the last hurdle before the release.

Thecoolestnerdguy, now you know. You learn something new every day. Oh, related to Estonia and game development: GameFounders (gaming startup accelerator). I'm actually taking part but not with my own project. I'll be writing an iOS port of a social board game. Too bad I couldn't be there this morning, I would've really liked to meet Ian Livingstone. Oh well. And finally, to be done with de-railing this nice topic, here's something in Estonian: Tere! Üks õlu, palun. Kuhu poole jääb tualett? (Hi. One beer, please. Which way is the toilet?)