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TIGSource ForumsDeveloperPlaytestingFaster Blaster - Metroid Blaster Master mash-up with physics
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Author Topic: Faster Blaster - Metroid Blaster Master mash-up with physics  (Read 9959 times)
FrankForce
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« on: October 25, 2012, 11:22:39 AM »

Hi, I'm an indie developer and I've been working on an opensource 2D game engine for a few years now called The Frank Engine.  After working on so many "triple a" games with crippling iteration times and garbage code I decided to build my own dream engine from scratch in C++.  One of the biggest problems with mainstream games is they focus too much on the final result and not enough on whether development process itself is fun.  I wrote my engine so I could have more fun developing games in my spare time while also making faster progress.

Faster Blaster has been kind of the main test case for my engine for a while.  After being laid off recently from an industry job I have had plenty of time to finish this up and work on some other ideas that I've been itching to get to.  I'm posting here to hopefully get some insight from players and feedback so I can wrap up this game and move on to more ambitious and original projects using the same engine.

There is more info and videos here: http://frankforce.com/?page_id=2003
Direct download link: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/42191645/FasterBlaster.zip

Some specific things I'd like to know from players are...
+ How is the difficulty?  Is it too easy or hard and are there any spikes?
+ How often did you die?  If you finish the game how long did it take?
+ Is there anything distracting or annoying?
+ Is there anything that was hard to figure out at first?  Did you get stuck?
+ If anyone has a monitor not running at 60 Hz does it still look smooth?
+ Any other feedback or suggestions are also appreciated.

« Last Edit: October 26, 2012, 08:36:30 AM by FrankForce » Logged
crazysam
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« Reply #1 on: October 26, 2012, 08:21:28 AM »

Hi!

I had the opportunity to try out the game, and I'm very impressed by the way you've achieved an interesting tiled map look using polygons for your terrain. The game looks beautiful in motion and that's saying a lot.

I had the chance to checkout your engine source, and would like to give you some feedback (only relevant if you care about other people using your engine, but I'm a critic so bear with me). First the good things:

  • C++!
  • Crazy GameObject class (has everything you could ever need).
  • GameObject parenting.
  • Good object management - gameObjectGroup is a super sweet class. Well implemented.
  • Great integration with Box2D.
  • Physics streaming (only objects close to player are "active", very cool).
  • Your terrain system + editor is super powerful, this is a huge plus.
  • Awesome built in effects - the ribbon trail is awesome, and as far as I'm concerned, the staple feature of your engine.
  • Separation of GUI drawing and Game logic handling - very wise sir.
  • The in-game console is amazing. Very well done.

Now the bad:

  • NOT MULTI PLATFORM - The biggest issue is the fact that you chose DirectX over OpenGL. I've heard from several friends that DirectX is much nicer to work with, but you're locking yourself to Microsoft platforms exclusively. As a game developer, my primary goal is to get my game into the hands of as many people as possible, so for me, using your engine is already out of the question.
  • No support for dynamic lights, or any other kind of lighting for that matter. A bit of a missed opportunity here (wish list perhaps).
  • Registry settings, kind of ugly syntax.
  • No object pooling (dead objects just get deleted, very minor issue).

I know you were asking for feedback on the game (sorry, I'm a code junkie), I need to play it some more before I can give you good feedback. Thanks for sharing your code man, it really looks like a well put together engine, I'm sad it's locked into Microsoft platforms only.

Cheers!
« Last Edit: October 26, 2012, 09:08:50 AM by crazysam » Logged

crazysam
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« Reply #2 on: October 26, 2012, 08:53:27 AM »

Gameplay feedback:

  • Weapon overheating is super lame, why would you want to put a limitation on something that is fun and enjoyable for the player to do? Find ways to balance the weapon without limiting the player, in my opinion you should ditch automatic weapon charging, and just allow for unlimited shooting.
  • Recharge rooms where you have to dodge projectiles to recharge isn't fun, those rooms make me waste time recharging instead of exploring. Save rooms should just replenish everything and be gone with these.
  • Opening red doors with 5 missiles seems wasteful and arbitrary. Use 1 missile and reduce the frequency of missile drops.
  • Controlling missiles while holding the right mouse button is super difficult because they move too fast. I think you should slow down missile while player is holding RMB, and speed it up when they're not. When in doubt, copy Metal Gear.
  • I wish I could look a bit further down before I jump down, there were too many times where I fell right into an enemy and lost previous energy. Some kind of scanner where you can't move while checking your surroundings might be a cool feature.
  • Using the middle mouse button for the mining laser isn't a good idea. It's a bit awkard to use, and some people might not have middle mouse buttons. Shouldn't be too hard to implement some form of weapon selection (for secondary slot only).
  • Jumping and platforming in general is super fun. I wish we could have more control in the air so I could do flips and feel like a badass. Maybe Q and E could engage thrusters on each end of the rover?
  • The arched shots are fantastic. I love that you have to aim a bit to land tricky shots. Also helps differentiate from Metroid a bit.
  • Accessing the full map (ESC) is awesome. I love it.

Difficulty Feedback:

  • When I got to the blue zone, and got past the Big Metroid looking boss thingy (that guy is pretty hard, maybe he could "lay down" enemies, instead of throwing them at you), the game got a little unfair. There are lots of enemies, lava all over the floor, and platforms are too far off to see, making it difficult to land without hitting the floor. It seems like too much at once. I died 3 times trying to reach the save room on the right, and once I got there, heading back was even harder.
  • Update: I see that there was a "shaft" to do down lower once I reached that save point. It was pretty tricky to get the lander to go into it though.

Interestingly enough, the difficulty feels pretty darn good right now. There are some  annoyances, but the game isn't too easy or too hard. I've been able to make progress consistently by being careful and methodical (which is what you're supposed to do in this type of game). Really enjoyable game man, great job!

More feedback to come... have to get back to work now.
« Last Edit: October 26, 2012, 09:23:44 AM by crazysam » Logged

FrankForce
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« Reply #3 on: October 26, 2012, 10:19:15 AM »

crazysam - Thanks for your feedback!

Regarding your comments about my engine...
  • It is closer to being multi platform then it looks, there just hasn't been a need.  There is definitely some directX stuff mixed in here and there but the rendering code is mostly wrapped up so that switching to open gl is not out of the question.
  • I completely agree about dynamic lights, I am actually getting started on this now, it will add so much.
  • The object pooling thing is really a big issue, my memory management solution just sucks right now.  On a PC with a ton of memory it's fine but it would never work in a more constrained environment.  I really need to fix this because it's embarrassing.
  • The registry stuff is kind of placeholder, I don't even use it for this game, but yeah.

Your gameplay feedback really helped and confirmed some of my suspicions and I will be making some changes.
  • The overheating mechanic is avoidable by using burst fire. Maybe I just need to push it out a bit farther? I hear what you are saying but I think breaks in the action can actually add fun sometimes, it's kind of like reloading. (done, increased overheat time by about a second)
  • Maybe you are right and I should get rid of the enemies in the recharge rooms, I'm on the fence.
  • I actually keep going back and forth between red doors being 1 or 5 missiles. I had it at 1 but changed to 5 becuase in my playthroughs I felt like I always had way too many missiles. Also in metroid it takes 5 missiles to open a red door, not that I'm locked into following their lead.
  • That is an interesting idea about slowing the missiles down.  I will give that a try. (done, reduce speed to 2/3)
  • I have it so the screen pans based on the mouse position, I will extend that range a bit so players can see farther below them.(done, increase look down range by 50%)
  • You can also hold control to fire the mining laser.  I didn't mention it in the help for simplicity sake but it says it in the instructions.
  • I will make that shaft going down a bit more obvious.(done, changed layout)
« Last Edit: October 27, 2012, 03:10:36 PM by FrankForce » Logged
ithamore
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« Reply #4 on: October 27, 2012, 09:14:56 AM »

This is the most fun I've had in a while: even with the frustration of adapting to how the physics complicate the platforming. In a way, it was like being a kid again and getting angry while Samus fell down a shaft I had just been trying to climb up during my first rounds of playing Metroid at a Walmart display. We bought it for our NES the next Christmas.

I really have been enjoying the mash-up, challenge, and reinvigorated nostalgia.

However, where as in most platforms there is a sense of a freedom of movement at most or all times, the "S" key is now my new friend in Faster Blaster: sometimes in good ways and sometimes from a necessity to augment a plethora of momentum.

I'll provide more feedback after I play some more (I have the digger and 1 bounce shot so far). However, I would like to know if the map gets its background glitched when you switch to windowed mode like it does for me. Much of the background in the windowed map turns white.
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FrankForce
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« Reply #5 on: October 27, 2012, 11:09:10 AM »

ithamore - Thanks, it sounds like you are making good progress!  Can you take a screenshot of the glitched map so I can see what you are talking about?  The easiest way is to press F5 which will save a screenshot in the snapshots folder.
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« Reply #6 on: October 28, 2012, 05:08:40 PM »

Do you have an updated exe that I could plop into the folder and still be able to continue my game? I saw the game creates a .sav file in the same directory as the exe, very clean solution.
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« Reply #7 on: October 28, 2012, 06:14:46 PM »

On my machine, a lot of object flicker in and out of existence in a manner that makes it pretty much unplayable. I'm not sure if you're working on portability yet, do you want my specs?
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FrankForce
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« Reply #8 on: October 29, 2012, 06:49:17 AM »

crazysam - I am continuing to update the link with a new build every day.  You should be able to extract the new version on top of your old install and the save file will remain untouched.

spolvid - I would very much like to know what is causing this.  Can you tell me your specs as well as a more detailed description, this is the first I've ever heard of my engine freaking out like that and it has been used for many projects.  Updating DirectX may fix it, can you give that a try?
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FrankForce
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« Reply #9 on: November 01, 2012, 01:37:19 AM »

I have a fairly major update!  In addition to responding to some feedback from players I have also implemented a muli-pass lighting system.  It supports dynamic lights, realtime shadows, background illumination, colored lights, emissive objects, and additive particles.  I'm really happy with how it turned out.  Obviously this game was not originally intended to make use of dynamic lighting but I think its a good tech demo.  This technique is not completely new but I've never really seen it used to the extent that I have available now.  On top of that, my game engine is open source and I will make a blog post a little about how the lighting system works soon.  Thanks for checking out my game!

Video of dynamic lighting with shadows:


Download of latest version on my website: http://frankforce.com/?page_id=2003





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« Reply #10 on: November 05, 2012, 06:24:04 PM »

Played up to the first save point I found. Will be coming back for more later. My only complaint so far is that the tank can feel spongy in the way it moves.
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« Reply #11 on: November 08, 2012, 01:40:43 PM »

I actually liked it better without the lighting. Weird, huh?
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FrankForce
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« Reply #12 on: November 08, 2012, 02:45:10 PM »

I wasn't so happy with it at first either, but I think I have it looking much better now.  It is taking some time to get the lighting well integrated.  There was also a bug causing the gama ramp to be really screwed up making everything too dark.  There is a new version up for anyone interested in checking it out.  In future projects I will be able to plan ahead more so the lighting is more organic to gameplay. 



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« Reply #13 on: November 08, 2012, 02:49:13 PM »

I would also be curious how it looks with a certain amount of unexplainable ambient light [essentially] always present, everywhere. It just seems like the dynamic lights shouldn't be the only source. Maybe I am in the minority on this though!
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« Reply #14 on: November 08, 2012, 03:42:02 PM »

Getting some really wierd control issues with this game.  I think it's trying to use the gamepad I have plugged in despite it not being a Xbox 360 pad, and there's no option to disable it.

The gun on the tank constantly fires and i can't aim it with the mouse.

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lukke
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« Reply #15 on: November 08, 2012, 04:13:07 PM »

Really enjoyed your game !
I agree with achild about the ambient lightning, especially on the surface of the planet. It works quite well with a narrow sight while exploring the small tunnels which are located underground.
Regarding the mood/visual narration, it would be nice to have a bright diffuse lightning when surfacing Smiley
Also a minor thing but I think the tank should emit light too (a subtle halo), not only a cone through the canon. It would help keeping the focus on the tank and locating it in the darker areas.
After browsing your website, I wished that you had used your abstract style in this game.
Could be fantastic.
By the way are you planning the possibility of modding the graphics ? Please do Smiley
Thanks for sharing, I'm so tempted to try your engine now !
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« Reply #16 on: November 09, 2012, 07:00:04 PM »

Cool game! Dug into it about 20 minutes, headed out for the evening but hoping to explore further.

A few notes I took while playing:

- I like the dynamic driving sound - bass sounds really nice on my studio monitors
- Overall free-rotating pixel art style is really cool
- Might be some copyright issues with some art assets (like the Metroid) - Nintendo isn't very litigious though so probably not a problem
- Lighting seemed a bit high contrast / confusing in places, like others have mentioned - I had trouble distinguishing the background from foreground sometimes, and felt confused by blind spots as areas darkened and lightened from all the particles and whatnot. It adds to a nice mood though, I like the graphical style - so might just need some refinement.
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« Reply #17 on: November 11, 2012, 02:49:41 AM »

I've been having a fair bit of fun with this. The biggest issue for me is the difficulty of distinguishing different elements (foreground, background, different kinds of rock). I think the lighting is great. It adds to the difficulty in places.
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« Reply #18 on: November 11, 2012, 08:20:51 AM »

I've been playing it and I must say that the dynamic lighting is very nice and the environment inside the game is very unique, well done! However, the dynamic was overkill for my poopy computer but that's because it's old  Outraged
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« Reply #19 on: November 12, 2012, 05:10:45 PM »

achild - I added support for ambient light but I have it turned off.  I like how the dark areas are kind of like blind spots like you would have in a real cave.  In the latest version you can open the debug console and try something like "ambientLightColor .2 .2 .2".  I may try doing the fog of war thing in a different way so I can still have ambient light.

Udderdude - What kind of controller is it?  It should automatically and detect and switch between gamepad or mouse.  I put up a new version where you can disable gamepad support with the console command "gamepadEnable 0".  I also added basic support for right stick emulation on snes style game pads if anyone wants to give that a try, this game isn't very suited to it though.

lukke - Thanks!  I will experiment more with the ambient setting.  I do have a faint light on the tank, perhaps it was not bright enough, I just doubled it for you.  There will be many more games, abstract style would look sweet with this lighting, kind of like Thomas Was Alone.  Modding the graphics is easy, if you press F3 it checks for any assets in that folder with a matching file name and overrides the default.  I updated the readme with an asset list, I can also put up a zip with all the assets if anyone is really interested.  You can also mod the level by pressing F4 to toggle edit mode, the editor controls are not very user friendly right now but there is a help display that will at least show you the controls.

LukeR - The art assets are all original creations inspired by metroid.  I'm still working on getting the lighting right.  I uploaded a new build where I am desaturating a lot of the background objects to hopefully make them easier to distinguish.

tmgs - Creating the sense of depth between foreground and background is one of the biggest things I am struggling with.  I redid a lot of the layout to read better and also desaturated background textures in most areas.

Joey Clever - Sorry man, I have a lot of optimizations to do, possibly a several fold speed increase on systems with slower gpus.  I don't want my engine to be something that only high end computers can run.

Update: I put up a new build with .1 ambient light.  This is not what I thought I wanted but I'm interested to see if this fixes peoples problems with the darkness.
« Last Edit: November 12, 2012, 08:16:35 PM by FrankForce » Logged
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