Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length

 
Advanced search

1411196 Posts in 69314 Topics- by 58380 Members - Latest Member: feakk

March 18, 2024, 08:20:51 PM

Need hosting? Check out Digital Ocean
(more details in this thread)
TIGSource ForumsCommunityDevLogsThe Vac - It's About Space - (Action/Exploration Platformer RPG)
Pages: [1]
Print
Author Topic: The Vac - It's About Space - (Action/Exploration Platformer RPG)  (Read 2621 times)
amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« on: June 24, 2015, 09:15:15 AM »

THE VAC

It's about space...


This is the official start for the devlog of my first (hopefully) commercial game, The Vac. It's set far into the future at a time when Humanity, no longer able to survive the harsh climates of Earth and who's population now just a fraction of what it once was, fled to the stars on seven massive world ships dubbed The Seven Wonders in an effort to find their new place in the universe. The Vac is an action rpg platformer with a heavy choices based dialogue engine and large exploration elements. It will also feature several mini game aspects, such as a horizontal shooter style of gameplay when traveling through the universe aboard the crew's ship. It's being developed by me (hi!) in GameMaker: Studio

But enough of that, let's meet the cast!



from right to left

Warren Jones (Earthling - Captain - The Rhino)

R.A.R.E. (Artificial Intelligence - Support - The Rhino)

Fysp (Donau - Freelancer - The Rhino)

Karah Genevieve (Earthling - Professional Stowaway - The Rhino)

BEEF (Shran Jau - Mechanic - The Rhino)


Here's a closer look at the American world ship that made it off of Earth many centuries ago, the Vanishing Point



Here's a look at the base movement mechanics, largely inspired by resources and tutorials from Zack Bell. I've got wall jumps/slides, slope movement, and a personal addition, the GRAPPLING HOOK! (which, after E3, is apparently the new hotness)



And just to prove how cool he is, here's the move cycle for Warren. He doesn't run into danger, he straight up strolls like a boss...




I hope to update this devlog weekly and I'm going to add more about the universe of The Vac as well as character back stories, and of course more actual gameplay footage. I hope you all like it! This is my first full game and my first devlog so hopefully I'm doing it right.

If you want to keep up with this development or other projects, you can follow me on twitter or check out my studio site Fortune Pancakes where you can sign up for my newsletter which will start going out soon.

Thanks again for checking out my game!


« Last Edit: July 28, 2015, 08:32:30 AM by amateurhour » Logged

Voltz.Supreme
Level 3
***


Iron Synth Chef & Voltage Architect


View Profile WWW
« Reply #1 on: June 29, 2015, 06:05:28 PM »

Great theme with endless creative possibilities. Stay smart and try to meet you goals/aims in a creative way that wont leave you with an outer space sized work load!

I'm able to compose music that helps create a sense of "vastness" or "outer-space-ness". If the music alone can create the desired atmosphere, that takes a bit of the weight off your shoulders when writing dialogue and designing art styles, environments etc... You need to be clever when taking on such huge themes!

All the best!
Logged

amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #2 on: July 07, 2015, 07:28:36 AM »

Thanks!

I'm working on some new animations today so I'll have those up within the next day or two. I checked out your music page and it's good stuff! Did you do music for There was a Caveman?
Logged

amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #3 on: July 07, 2015, 11:38:35 AM »

Not much of an update today, but here's the shooting animation for Fysp. He'll be more of a ranged attack character in battle.


Later this week I'll have the melee attack for Beef done and the grappling hook animation for Warren.

Thanks for checking this out.
« Last Edit: October 08, 2015, 07:14:43 AM by amateurhour » Logged

Voltz.Supreme
Level 3
***


Iron Synth Chef & Voltage Architect


View Profile WWW
« Reply #4 on: July 07, 2015, 12:48:39 PM »

Thanks!

I'm working on some new animations today so I'll have those up within the next day or two. I checked out your music page and it's good stuff! Did you do music for There was a Caveman?

Hey thanks a lot. No that was just a rough demo that came out of some discussions I had with the developer. Not sure who's doing music.
Logged

amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #5 on: July 28, 2015, 08:32:12 AM »

UPDATES!

So I've spent the last week or so getting a feel for state mechanics in GameMaker: Studio thanks to some good tutorials.

I've got the animation states loaded now so that it changes direction and knows when to load idle, run, jump (up, mid, and fall), hovering (grappling hook), rolling left or right (dodge), and sliding.

You can see it in action here:


Next up is room transitions (metroidvania style) and a map system. I hope to have gifs of those up later this week and once I can fully explore an environment and go room to room and track it on map, then comes the fun part. ATTACKING!

Thanks for following so far.
Logged

amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #6 on: September 11, 2015, 10:36:24 AM »

Still working on my room transitions and a basic menu system so I decided to animate the crew to take a break from code and work on art.

Logged

sidbarnhoorn
Level 3
***


View Profile WWW
« Reply #7 on: September 11, 2015, 11:45:14 AM »

This looks awesome, Johnathon! Looking forward to seeing more. :-)
Logged

Siddhartha Barnhoorn
--------------------
Award winning composer

Composed music for the games Antichamber, Out There, The Stanley Parable, Planet Alpha...

Website:
http://www.sidbarnhoorn.com
Bandcamp:
https://siddharthabarnhoorn.bandcamp.com
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/SidBarnhoorn
amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #8 on: September 11, 2015, 12:26:20 PM »

Thanks man!
Logged

Alex Higgins
Level 2
**


@alchiggins on Twitter


View Profile WWW
« Reply #9 on: September 11, 2015, 01:11:37 PM »

Looking good so far! Curious to hear more about the story and gameplay aspects.
Logged

My Dev Blog! >  Sassy Echidna Software
WIP >  Monsterpunk
Latest Game >  Bloodjak
amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #10 on: September 11, 2015, 01:47:57 PM »

Totally!

As far as the story goes it takes place hundreds of years in the future when Earth is long forgotten. Basically we used up most of the resources (it's a trope, I know, but I dig some hard sci-fi) and started to explore and colonize. Earthlings are by no means the dominant force in the galaxy. Their numbers are actually pretty low, clocking in around 1 billion rather than the 10 billion or so that were on Earth when it ran out of gas.

Most of the countries banded together and created seven world ships called the Seven Wonders. These are comprised of the European Union ships the Santa Maria (named after Columbus' ship) and the Fierté des Rois (the "Pride of Kings"), the Japanese ship Mika ("New Moon") and the Chinese ship Wei Zhou (loosely translated as "Mighty Boat"), the African ship Khwezi ("Bright Morning Star"), the South American ship Miranda ("The Admired Place"), and lastly the United States ship Vanishing Point. (Vanishing Point can be seen in the background on the promo image.)

You play one of the four (five counting R.A.R.E.) crew members listed above. You run an operations ship out of the Interstellar Fleet Command called The Rhino. Gameplay will mostly start off in The Rhino as you select missions and outfit your gear or select your playable character. I want it to have that Mass Effect feel where even though this ship is MUCH smaller than the Normandy, it's got character, and stuff to explore. From The Rhino you'll transport to either the Vanishing Point, or one of the nearby planetary systems where the IFC has made contact with foreign life over the centuries.

Notable planets will be the Donau and Shran Jau homeworlds, PC Ward-8 (Prison Colony) on Neptune (it's the ice level!) The Vanishing Point (which is HUGE, so you're mostly exploring one of the sub cities near the dock) as well as some barren planets with outposts. There's a few surprises as well which I don't want to reveal yet, most notably the villain, and the mission where you acquire one of the characters. (you don't start out with all five)

While there is a big exploration factor, It's not really a huge sandbox game or anything. It's more of a combination of Metroid/Castlevania and DuckTales, where you can select a level and go back to it later to pick up things you've missed or explore new routes. I had originally envisioned a 2D Mass Effect but honestly this is my first commercial game so I'm hoping for a Metroid or Environmental Station: Alpha if I'm REALLY lucky. (that's a great game if you haven't played it)

As far as gameplay mechanics goes, you can mostly switch between characters at any point in the game during a level as long as you're near a teleport safe zone. (I.E. Once you're in some cave or mid battle, you're on your own)

R.A.R.E. has a higher jump due to his anti-grav and is more of a ranged fighter (weak) but he can scan the environment for threats and set traps. He's the Mega Man style platformer and can fit into small spaces.

Fysp is quick and dangerous at long ranges but useless up close so you want him on planets with a wide open area surrounding him.

Warren, the Captain, is more of a Simon Belmont. He's got a grapple beam that can be used to swing around to reach interesting areas, a small force field generator and short and mid range taser all on his wrist guard. (the little orange thing by his belt) so he's good in a brawl and for boss fights.

BEEF! (yes, with the exclamation point) is just delightful. He's a straight up short range brawler with his knives and a huge mechanics wrench. One thing I want to incorporate with him is that his knives can be thrown, but if they're not recovered they're lost until the end of the stage or until he teleports back to the drop ship to get more. They're an independent object in the game. He's got a ton of HP, but he's extremely slow too, so he'll have trouble with faster bosses.

I've got something really cool planned for Karah. She's really fast, but not much for fighting as her profession of choice is con artist/theif. She'll be good with bypassing electrical systems, taking alternate routes R.A.R.E. finds, and I think she's going to have a mimic ability that will allow her to pass by enemies unnoticed. She'll be there for pacifist runs and support.

Each level will be set up so that certain characters will be needed for certain points. I'd like somewhere around 8-10 levels with maybe 30 minutes of gameplay in each, bringing the total game time to no more than 5 hours, but honestly that's wishful thinking for a platformer. It'll probably come in around 2-3 when I actually start working on the maps.

If there's anything else you're curious about, feel free to ask. I'm doing all of the art and coding. I suck at music but I'm okay with bfxr and sfxr so I've been making some halfway decent sound effects. When I get to the need for music I'll either just work on upping my game or hire out a musician. (chiptune style)

Thanks for looking! I'm going to hopefully have a gif of the room transition, menu system, and map system this weekend. I've got them broken out into three parts and just haven't merged them with the gameplay engine yet.
Logged

sidbarnhoorn
Level 3
***


View Profile WWW
« Reply #11 on: September 11, 2015, 02:05:29 PM »

I love the background / story and your characters. It feels like it has/can have a lot of depth and development. I'm a composer myself and if you need any music for this, I'd love to collab with you. Some of the games I've composed music for are Antichamber, Out There (Omega Edition) and also a track for The Stanley Parable. I'm very keen on doing some chiptune, and if it works some more deep, perhaps ambient music, but definitely chiptune. If you're interested, here's my website with some of my work:
http://www.sidbarnhoorn.com

Here are a few tracks I selected that are more electronic:
https://soundcloud.com/sidbarnhoorn/dont-kill-her-game-preliminary

https://soundcloud.com/sidbarnhoorn/glimmer-of-light

https://soundcloud.com/sidbarnhoorn/walking-mars

Hope you enjoy! :-)

All the best with The Vac and your future projects! :-D

Best regards,
Sid
Logged

Siddhartha Barnhoorn
--------------------
Award winning composer

Composed music for the games Antichamber, Out There, The Stanley Parable, Planet Alpha...

Website:
http://www.sidbarnhoorn.com
Bandcamp:
https://siddharthabarnhoorn.bandcamp.com
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/SidBarnhoorn
amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #12 on: September 11, 2015, 04:35:28 PM »

Dude that music is fantastic. Yeah I'm not going to be able to make anything close to that. If you want, PM me your rates. It'll be a while before I get to music but I definitely want to make sure I don't lose your info.
Logged

Alex Higgins
Level 2
**


@alchiggins on Twitter


View Profile WWW
« Reply #13 on: September 12, 2015, 07:48:04 AM »

Oh, that sounds pretty cool! I think you'll still be able to capture the feel of Mass Effect that way while still keeping the project reasonably small.
Logged

My Dev Blog! >  Sassy Echidna Software
WIP >  Monsterpunk
Latest Game >  Bloodjak
amateurhour
Level 0
**



View Profile WWW
« Reply #14 on: October 08, 2015, 07:16:41 AM »

Had some time over the last couple of days do work on a few more animation cycles. Here is Warren in idle, move, idle (again), shooting a laser (powerful ranged attack), and then putting up his forward facing shield. Note that everything is originated from the gauntlet.







Next I'm going to work on his punch (shield assisted), tractor beam (grappling hook), and his taser (mid range attack)
Logged

Pages: [1]
Print
Jump to:  

Theme orange-lt created by panic