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[pfaulty]

Subsistence
Platform: HTML5 | Engine: Game Maker

Features

• 2D pixel based game
• Science fiction based story where humanity is being attacked by aliens. Original idea this is not.
• Level overview map where you can choose to redo missions (upgrade your ship to reach further planets).
• Full character creator so you can choose your sex, hair style, hair color and skin color. With currently over 7500 combinations to make your character unique.
• Upgrade your characters stats, weapons and ship
• Find NPCs to join your crew or hire them at a hub. NPCs will be generated using a modified character generator so NPCs should be unique as well.  If a NPC crew member dies, they are gone for ever losing any upgrades you have purchased for them.
• Entire levels dedicated to non combat, commerce areas.
• Character classes allowing for a variety of play. Soldiers use guns. Perhaps others could have psionic abilities or a combination.
• Considering turn based battle (like an RPG) in segmented “zones” (eg Castle Crashers, Double Dragon, Golden Axe)

Design
Subsistence will be a 2D sidescrolling platformer 2D brawler with guns (think Dead Pixel) set in a science fiction world.
I plan on having the game take place on multiple worlds / ships to give some variety. Potentially I could play with things like gravity, oxygen levels, etc.
The setting, features and even some game play has a lot in common with Mass Effect.

Development
Subsistence will be made using Game Maker Professional targeting modern browsers via HTML5.

Game Play
Move to the right and don’t die.

One major thing I want to work on is scripting NPCs. I want my world to seem more alive than most 2D games. That is to say when you go into battle there are other sprites going in with you..fighting…dying. A comparison I usually use is if you recall Medal of Honor back when the IP was new.  You were a single guy killing everything, like most platformers.  I wanted to go the Call of Duty way (I’m talking about the first in the series).  There you were part of something bigger.  NPCs ran in with you and the whole scale felt bigger because of it.

Mock Up
Initial mock up. It is missing platforms, environmental objects [power ups, gun racks, etc], and a foreground layer.



Sprites
The following is a preview of my work in progress sprites. I would love if someone had some thoughts on them. They do have a significant issue though.  Since they lack the black outline of traditional sprites, if you overlay them you have issues (think mob).
 


Environments
I contracted out the initial background ideas to Black Moon Dev in Poland. From these 240x160 concepts I will expand/modify/create new elements myself. I just needed the initial kick in the right direction. Some of these are initial concept and some are revision.



Inspiration
I'm looking at games like Shadow Complex (by Epic) or Cave Story (by Studio Pixel) as well as Mass Effect (by Bioware) and Dead Space (by EA) for inspiration.  Maybe throw some Battlestar Galactica in there to.  That is not to say I will make something as epic as any of those, just the whole platformer/scifi vibe I'm going for.

Team
My name is Craig Pfau. I am one guy who programs all day for a software firm in Alberta, Canada. I plan on doing the art, animation and programming on Subsistence. I do not have a timeline for how soon I want to be done and I don't intend on making any money off this game (at its worst it will be ad supported but free to play). Because I'm only one person that means any suggestions or comments you make have a good chance of affecting the final game.



If anyone would like to comment on the idea or the pixel art I would very much appreciate it.  Thanks for reading.

[Udderdude]

Nice art, but I don't see anything about the gameplay.  Any details on that?  Platformers are a dime a dozen, so having something cool and unique is almost a must.

[pfaulty]

Thanks Udderdude.  I wrote up a section on gameplay.  I fear you will be disappointed though.

[RyanHuggins]

Definitely love the art, dude. I'm cool for playing any visually appealing platformers. Haha!

[W3REWOLF]

If you havent played castle crashers, you should look into it. It does a decent job of making you feel a bit more like you are part of an larger army (mostly in the castle themed levels). It might give you some inspiration.

[pfaulty]

Feb 22, 2013 Update
Okay so I finally have some movement on this game. I abandoned Unity3D and moved to something I used to program in 5+ years ago. GameMaker. To get re-acquainted with GML I created a character creator. The GUI is a little rough but it works. So people will be able to create characters but I will also be able to generate NPCs with this (as planned).

It's HTML5
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/34100180/character_creator/index.html

[W3REWOLF]

Looking good man. Smooth animations, and great work with colors.

If you need any help with gamemaker/gml hit me up. I've been using it for a few years now and would be happy to lend a hand.

[ShinnyMetal]

Who's doing the music?

[pfaulty]

Thanks W3REWOLF. I"ll keep your offer in mind. I'm expecting to go up against a lot of limitations with GML.

ShinnyMetal, currently no one. I was hoping to contract out that task to someone once I was further along. If I can't find anyone I imagine the sound effects will be me saying "Pew! Pew!" and humming random tunes for music.

[ShinnyMetal]

Well this seems to be, thus far, something I'd be interested in musicking for haha.

[W3REWOLF]

After reading your gameplay summary I've got some questions. Are you planning on having enemies spawned at random or are you going to have hand placed spawn points. I only ask because if you want to the npcs to help you out at times you might want the game to scale accordingly so its not to difficult/easy depending on how many people you have with you.

[pfaulty]

That's a good question.  I honestly hadn't given it a lot of thought.  I had played a game called Commando by Fallen Angels Industries way back in 2004 which was a 2D sidescroller that for brief periods had NPCs that would run to certain areas to create an illusion as though they were doing things. I guess I was just trying to do something similar. 
As for enemy spawn points I was intending on them being hand placed.
I currently have no design document and am really just adding things as I go.  For better or for worse.  Any suggest you have W3REWOLF would be appreciated. Feel free to email me.

[pfaulty]

03-10-2013
- Added some extra GUI labels in lieu of instructions
- Added shadows
- Added enemy that follows you, does damage if you collide
- Blocked left horizontal movement (intentional only, unintended still not addressed)
- Modified health pickup and half wall (hurts you for no good reason)

03-09-2013
- Changed resolution of game to fit new background tiles
- Prettified HUD
- Added jumping
- Segmented base sprite head
- Segmented base sprite arms
- Added bullets

03-01-2013
- Fixed vertical movement due to floating points
- Added complete HUD with functional health and two additonal container bars

02-28-2013
- Added custom font
- Added start of HUD

Current build http://dl.dropbox.com/u/34100180/Subsistence0310/index.html

This is about as basic and broken as you can get, but it is progressing.

[pfaulty]

Updated the initial post description. I am no longer using Unity3D and have switched to Game Maker.

- In the last week I added the ability to shoot enemies based on a depth range (which means in the future with my shotgun I could increase the range or "spread").
- I spent some time making new platforms which you can stand behind, in front of or on depending on your depth. Still a few kinks to work out.
- Currently reworking the HUD
- You can now jump while on a platform (this was a no brainer)
- Levels scroll now
- Working on indicating enemy health (currently have a percentage over their head, but might just do minus damage indicator when they are hit)
- Arms move back when shooting (kickback)

[pfaulty]

I have been working on my HUD a bit.


At the current time I have to make it functional for 21 different hairstyles (the heads are all identical). This will reflect your created character. I haven't really figured out what exactly I want to do with the blue bar but so far I'm limiting it to 10 units. The numbered field I'm also torn on: Points? XP? Currency? I'll figure it out though.

I gave my male soldiers an etiquette lesson in standing up straight. +1 for posture.


Last night was mostly reworking character walk animations now that arms have been separated from the body. Also have all the art so the characters can carry handgun, shotgun, assault rifle, missile launcher and sub machine gun.

This weekend I will implement these into code.

[pfaulty]

Completely redid the HUD so it is reliant on who you are playing as and allows for components like hearts/energy to grow or shrink. Reason for this is I have a character creator at the start of the game so I will need to make sure in game they will play fine.  This was a simple way to test that feature.

If you want to see it in action go here http://dl.dropbox.com/u/34100180/Subsistence0323/index.html

0 (zero) to toggle a random player look. I realize so far this is the worst button configuration ever but this was all just randomly chosen while developing.

Hope someone finds this neat.

[pfaulty]

Today I'm working on adding weapons and therefore require a weapon HUD element.

This is what I've create so far

- The numbers at the bottom of each is the maximum clip size.
- Each is separated into 5 groups which means you will start with a single group but will be able to upgrade to a maximum of 5. eg. 12 shots to a clip initially for a assault rifle but can upgrade up to 60.

Will appear in the top left corner and bullets slots will turn charcoal as they are fired off. Once all available spaces are shot off you will need to reload.

The weapons are all charcoal and the HUD elements are charcoal, kind of all gets washed out but I'm not going to worry about the color palette until the game is further along.

[pfaulty]

Spent most of the day adding in weapons and their associated HUD elements.
Bullets haven't been addressed, so everything fires like a handgun.

If you are interested in trying it out http://dl.dropbox.com/u/34100180/Subsistence0324/index.html

Press 1-5 number keys to switch weapons. Switch who you are by pressing 0 (zero). Getting psyched for the coming months.

[pfaulty]

After a week off I finally listened to some feedback and have begun changing Subsistence to a Match 3 game.

[dancinLion]

Hey! Unfortunately the most recent link of your build doesn't seem to work for me, so I tried an older one. Movement speed feels a little bit too slow for me, but thats all I can really say at that stage in terms of actual gameplay. Certainly looks cool. I'm not yet sure if I like the box heads, but thats personal taste :D. Apart from that, I like the direction you are going.