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[Zorg]

Hey,

i'd be nice if you could briefly test out this small prototype directly and tell me:

a) Do you 'get' why the character is jumping the way it does?
b) Do you have the feeling to have control over the movement or is it way to imprecise?
c) Do you think a game based on these controls could be fun?


http://zachau.info/krams/unity/normal/normal-v01/

Thank you very much in advance!

[michaelplzno]

I think this works as a control system. It was pretty easy to figure out. Jump moves you up on the current plane's normal, you could make that a bit more clear by adding some kind of arrow on top of the ball pointing where jump goes, kind of like the new droid in star wars:

[Zorg]

Thanks for testing, msilver! I am drawing the normal in the editor, but i hoped to get away without an indication for the direction. The star wars droid is a nice association. :D

Do you think it's precise enough so you know where the character will jump before pressing the button?

[ProgramGamer]

Not only should you add a pointer, but you should make it move when a jump occurs to make it more than obvious that that is going to be the direction in which you'll jump. I found the demo pretty entertaining btw :3

[Zorg]

Thanks for the feedback. I added an arrow which indicates the normal. Currently i'm applying an impulse for the jump, so i would have to figure out how to calculate the resulting velocity from the impulse or set the velocity directly to be able to add an arrow which shows the real jump direction (forward speed + jump speed).

@ProgramGamer: Currently i removed the arrow in air, so the arrow shows if you are on the ground and able to jump. You wanted the character to follow the animated arrow while jumping, right? So you had the 'real' arrow in mind?


http://zachau.info/krams/unity/normal/normal-v02/

[Zorg]

A script which triangulates a mesh from the polygonCollider2D points has been readded. Because rectangles are boring.


http://zachau.info/krams/unity/normal/normal-v03/

[ProgramGamer]

Cool! it's a bit better now that you always know the direction of your jump. I also like how you're able to jump off of ceilings XD

[yokcos700]

It's good. Fun t play around with, but I will raise one thing: On landing, it seems that all 'horizontal' momentum is lost. I can be falling to the left, and I have little to no control in the air. The moment I land, however, I can be moving in the opposite direction, to the right, at a decent speed. Given that I'm a ball, this seems wrong to me.

Also, you can climb near vertical walls as fast as you can roll along the ground. It's obvious and you clearly already know this, but it's so bizarre that I should mention it. Not good or bad really, just noteworthy to me.

[Zorg]

@ProgramGamer: Currently the character is able to jump while grounded and grounded means any collision happened in this frame.

@yokcos700: Thank you for the feedback. Every feedback is appreciated. The momentum is lost because of high friction and high angular drag. I did not want the ball to roll away uncontrolled when landing on a slope. I don't know if the vertical wall climbing (caused by high friction, too) is a problem, but i want to achieve rather direct controls. When rotated anti-clockwise, the character should move to the left almost instantly, no spinning while not moving forward for a moment.
There is no air control. Maybe i'll add some force in addition to the rotation (which may cause climbing even 90° walls, d'oh). Everybody expects air control in Jump and Run games, but it's not very realistic, either. I guess non-realistic behaviour is accepted if the game is fun.


http://zachau.info/krams/unity/normal/normal-v04/

Added some random sausage platforms, testing ugly textures (the mesh seems to be created correctly, yay) and a simple camera follow script.

[Quicksand-S]

Well, it's not as impressive or unique as your old, mouse-controlled prototype, but it does feel pretty good to play. My only minor issue is that the jumping feels like it's very, very slightly delayed for some reason.

[Zorg]

I felt like the old mouse controls were indeed to indirect, slingshot would have been a possibility but that's not impressive or unique either.

The jump could be delayed if you are not on ground when you hit the button and reach ground while the button is still pressed. The conditions for jump are: jump button is currently pressed, jump button has been relesed since the last jump and player is on ground (some collision happened in the last physics cycle and the arrow is shown). Maybe i have to use overlapcircle for groundcheck again? Thanks for the feedback!

[Quicksand-S]

I felt like the old mouse controls were indeed to indirect, slingshot would have been a possibility but that's not impressive or unique either.

Indirect, maybe, but they worked great for me and I was looking forward to seeing a game with that control style. Oh well. Maybe you'll come up with a good use for those controls in a future game.

The jump could be delayed if you are not on ground when you hit the button and reach ground while the button is still pressed...

I don't think it's a matter of it not knowing if I'm on the ground. When I say it feels delayed, I mean maybe a 10th of a second or something, and it's not right after landing or anything. The arrow is shown and my frame-rate is hovering around 60fps.

[Zorg]

@Quicksand-S:
http://zachau.info/krams/unity/delay/ (Keys: A and B)
Can you spot a difference in the delay between A and B?

[Quicksand-S]

Not really. I get the feeling that any slight difference I'm noticing here is my imagination. The main thing I'm noticing in this delay test is that B often fails to respond at all.

I don't know. Maybe the delay "issue" is just my brain being weird. It just seems like in other games, if I quickly tap the Jump key and then take my hand away, I'm probably halfway to my max height (or higher) by the time I've released the key. If I do the same thing with this game/test, I find that the ball isn't even close to being that high yet. Some games do this on purpose, to give the feeling of "powering up" for the jump, but that doesn't seem to be the case here.

[Zorg]

For B i used FixedUpdate, which is called directly before each physics simulation, A uses Update. Unity documentation recommends using Update for player input, but Update is called after the physics simulation. So the input is registered, the Force is applied, but postponed to the next physics simulation. I cannot use FixedUpdate if it fails.

I think you are talking about reaching the jump height faster which could be achieved by a higher gravity scale (shot put ball vs. beach ball). "Powering up" is not intended.

[Zorg]

http://zachau.info/krams/unity/normal/normal-v05/

Added some 'dumb' enemies and tried to wrap my head around textures in Unity.
The enemies cannot hurt you at the moment.

[ProgramGamer]

Oh man this is coming along nicely, you should start a devlog for this!

[Zorg]

Thank you very much. I want to start a devlog, but i feel that a lot of things (the vision) are not settled in my mind, yet. At the moment i'm toying around with the physics engine and building around my limitations instead of honestly trying to overcome obstacles. For example have no idea how to build 'simple' things, like a pause button, a menu, scene transitions, scripted events, ...

---

Version 5 got a small update, more mockup textures.

[diegzumillo]

I enjoyed playing around with it. I experimented with the enemies, like trying to flee, trying to jump over, jump on, run underneath etc. Jumping on like mario seem to require air control to be interesting. Running FROM them could be fun! specially considering the collision system going on. Maybe a platformer where the enemies don't kill you directly but bump into you, taking off your balance etc. And the playfield is almost like a 2d racing track, with them gaining momentum down a slope after you etc.

Rigid body controller is cool. Take advantage of it and play with constraints too. Give the player moving parts and see what happens. Make the level dynamic too.

I love Gish and it's a great example of physics based controller.

[CarbonHack]

Controls feels super smooth - natural and dynamic. I'm not really sure about the arrow thing - it seemed pretty straightforward to me what direction I jump. But it's a minor detail, not very distracting and possibly helpfull for some. Anyway, the movement is really fluid, responsive and fun. I'd love to see what you're gonna do with it!