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[matwek]

Cannons and Cargo

Artist/Game designer – Matwek
Programmer – Okoz

A Bomberman/Pacman inspired Pirate game.
Play as one of 4 ships as you try to score points by collecting fish, selling sunken treasure and destroying other pirates.

Controlling the ship is very similar to Pacman in that you continuously move until you decide to move off onto an alternative path.
Whilst you can destroy other pirate ships it isn't the main focus of the game, collecting points is. Grabbing more fish that your opponent’s earns you a higher score but once in a while a treasure chest will appear. If collected you can then return to your team port and exchange it for even more points, although if you get taken down on the way your treasure becomes up for grabs once again.

The playing arena is designed to allow you to get clear shots off at each other from the other side of the map. In true pirate ship fashion the cannons fire from your broadsides, which makes aiming harder, but because you fire from both sides at once things will quickly become a frantic effort to dodge cannon fire whilst collecting fish.

We’re currently working on a playable build at the moment but neither of us has the equipment to get a decent gameplay video for people to see. If anyone can help us out that would be great.

[geepit]

Sounds really fun! Will the multiplayer be local or will there be online?
As for recording gameplay, are you not able to use something like fraps or camstudio?

[Cathay]

There shouldn't be an apostrophe in Cannons!... punctuation aside, it looks real nice. I like the art style very much. Would you guys be needing any music/ sound at all?

[matwek]

Sounds really fun! Will the multiplayer be local or will there be online?
As for recording gameplay, are you not able to use something like fraps or camstudio?

To be honest I just assumed my computer wouldn't be able to handle something like that, I have tried it in the past but it never turns out right.
I might take another crack at it though and see if those programs you mentioned work out better (thanks.)
As for multiplayer. We aren't sure yet, obviously online would much better but then it would also create a lot more work for something that is essentially a simple arcade style game.

There shouldn't be an apostrophe in Cannons!... punctuation aside, it looks real nice. I like the art style very much. Would you guys be needing any music/ sound at all?

Whoops, good start.
We've just started looking into music and sound fairly recently. I think we have someone lined up so I'll be waiting to see how that pans out.

[Nicholas Lives]

I'm always up for Pirate-themed games, and even more so when they're arcadey and local multiplayer!  The world needs more frantic local multiplayer games, and this one seems to be shapin' up to be a fun one. I'll be keepin' my eye on this 'n. 

[matwek]

I'm always up for Pirate-themed games, and even more so when they're arcadey and local multiplayer!  The world needs more frantic local multiplayer games, and this one seems to be shapin' up to be a fun one. I'll be keepin' my eye on this 'n. 

Thanks.

I had a go at uploading a video but everything got a bit jerky when I used CamStudio, and then it got blury when I used Youtube. I'll have another go later to see if I can get something better.



(Also I'm not sure how to embed a video. The Link Youtube gave me doesn't work)

I'm controling the Red ship (badly) and the rest are computer controled

[Nicholas Lives]

Thanks.

I had a go at uploading a video but everything got a bit jerky when I used CamStudio, and then it got blury when I used Youtube. I'll have another go later to see if I can get something better.



(Also I'm not sure how to embed a video. The Link Youtube gave me doesn't work)

I'm controling the Red ship (badly) and the rest are computer controled

Game is lookin' fun!  Although after seeing it in action, I noticed that my eyes kept wanting to go to the movement of the dolphins jumping in and out of the water, rather than to the boats themselves. In a frantic multiplayer game, it seems like you would want your focus to be on the ships and the cannon balls they are firing, but since the cannon balls seem have a similar color to the dolphins, and since the dolphins tend to move more, my eyes tend to go to them instead every time a cannon is fired (or just in general, really).

[matwek]

Thats something I'll have to take a look at. The focus is more on collecting the fish rather than shooting opponents but its still crucial the player knows were everything is.

Maybe I could make the cannon balls a bit bigger or maybe have the ships leave a trail in the water to make them stand out a bit more.

[Seiseki]

Love the art and arcade feel!
The water does look a bit cluttered though, have you considered having clean skyblue water with a more subtle pattern and then use cloud shadows on top of everything to make it look more lively.

Would also be interesting with deep and shallow water, with reefs appearing in shallow water and sea monsters in deep water.

[matwek]

Love the art and arcade feel!
The water does look a bit cluttered though, have you considered having clean skyblue water with a more subtle pattern and then use cloud shadows on top of everything to make it look more lively.

We did originally have the water as just a flat blue colour but it didn't look right with no animation at all. Maybe we need something in the middle.

[Pemanent]

This looks really fun. I love the suspense when two ships are facing each other, just waiting for a turn so they can get a shot off.
Seems like some really solid game design here.

[matwek]

This looks really fun. I love the suspense when two ships are facing each other, just waiting for a turn so they can get a shot off.
Seems like some really solid game design here.

Thanks.
Quite a lot of work went into the level layout to take advantage of the way the ships shoot. Creating more maps is only going to get harder as I use up my ideas

[eyeliner]

Did my eyes deceive me?
When two bullets collide they kill each other?

[Charybdis]

It's going to be a really great game.
Lots still unimplemented or rough, but it's already super fun to play, even single player.
And the firing from the sides mechanic is genius, really adds a strategic element.
Cool beans

[Games Inquirer]

Wow, this is great.

[matwek]

Been making some slow progress on the menu screen.

No fonts yet, only one map type to pick from, lots more detail to add and I'm still unsure about the map texture... but I'm getting there...

[okoz]

Hello everyone!

Looks like I'll be taking over the programming side of this project.  With a new programmer comes a completely new code base.  We will be using Unity as the engine and Tiled for level creation.  Most of the original features have already been implemented in the new version.

The scope of the project has also been changed somewhat.  We are now aiming at a mobile game where you try to collect points in randomized levels of increasing difficulty to get a high score.

I'll be updating coding side progress here from now on.

Signing off,

[mickmaus]

yes ships

[okoz]

Got the first serious enemy implemented: