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[c023-DeV]

Wow, heavy weekend. I'm still alive and well.

Just had to get wild, so  I hope you excuse my gibberish but I'll leave it here for future confusions.

That super creep from the street seriously freaked me...  ... he was seriously telling me to sell porn of myself instead of games... that some people don't get that:

I'm NOT doing this to get heaps of money!? But because I have a strong desire for expressing myself this way.

I am even re-concidering to give out the final game completly free of charge again. What do you think about that?

FREE GAMES = FREE DEVELOPMENT!

 

[Xienen]

I am even re-concidering to give out the final game completly free of charge again. What do you think about that?

FREE GAMES = FREE DEVELOPMENT!

I completely agree with you, in principal. I develop my side projects because I just love to do it, but at the same time, it would definitely be nice to be able to do it full time and still pay the bills. I am definitely not in it to earn heaps of money, either, but I'd love to be able to afford to spend all my time developing my games and not have to work any sort of day job. Some indie developers may think that's the wrong goal, but I certainly haven't ever decided to develop a game or any particular feature because I think it will make more money. I just want to develop great experiences and if the money comes as a consequence, awesome.

Of course, everyone has their own hopes and dreams, I'm certainly not trying to press my views onto you. You're doing a great job with this game whether it turns out free or paid!

[c023-DeV]

ENYO now has awesome TYPE WRITER SOUNDS that I recorded from an old 'Olympus' typewriter in the Munich district court building. It's the 'sound of Bavarian justice being made':

https://soundcloud.com/dev-zoo/audio-sfx-type-writer

(Recorded with OP-1 built in mic and enhanced with nitro)

Use them freely under the creative commons rights.

[benexclaimed]

Just a freaky report of my everyday struggle: (may contain content inappropriate for children but I'll keep it low)

As I've already mentioned I sometimes go out to perform as street musician (to meet people, entertain and sometimes people drop money in my case too... strange but true)

I usually put up a sign in german that either displays my website or mostly my company philosophy:

Freely translated: "Capable yet useless"

And I get quite a few funny reactions to that, some are nice and kind, some are ignorant and others rather concerning.

Yesterday one older lady said: "You aren't useless! You make us happy!!!" -Thank's dear lady! ♥

And then this strange older guy (maybe in his mid fifty's with a wig and sunglasses, looking a quite like Paul McCartney but a bit taller) comes along and starts a chat because those words stuck to his head and he wanted to talk about it - ok, so we go for coffee. I tell him that I actually make video games and am not dependent on street music. He starts flirting with me and after a while tells me that he will visit my website and 'Do you mind if I *fap* to it?' -he asks!? 'Well I can't stop you, but it's not intended for that and I don't think my work would encourage that!?' I answered, still a little surprised. (This guy seriously thinks that anything online is just for ***** ... and now I feel dirty all over... since he told me more and more until I could get out out of that situation without hurting the guy...

I won't share the rest... but has this ever happened to any of you? I've got a headache from being too friendly ... I hope this wasn't too offensive. I am concerned about these type of things since I am concerned about society in general, so I had to share it... it was a creepy experience. And is yet another proof to how some people just live in strange perceptions of the world around them. That stuff plays a major role in the work I do and in this Game... perception of reality.

Damn...

Oh yeah and by the way: ENYO Arcade now has SLOPES!

*cough*

This is bizarre.

[libertango]

Just a freaky report of my everyday struggle: (may contain content inappropriate for children but I'll keep it low)

As I've already mentioned I sometimes go out to perform as street musician (to meet people, entertain and sometimes people drop money in my case too... strange but true)

I usually put up a sign in german that either displays my website or mostly my company philosophy:

Freely translated: "Capable yet useless"

And I get quite a few funny reactions to that, some are nice and kind, some are ignorant and others rather concerning.

Yesterday one older lady said: "You aren't useless! You make us happy!!!" -Thank's dear lady! ♥

And then this strange older guy (maybe in his mid fifty's with a wig and sunglasses, looking a quite like Paul McCartney but a bit taller) comes along and starts a chat because those words stuck to his head and he wanted to talk about it - ok, so we go for coffee. I tell him that I actually make video games and am not dependent on street music. He starts flirting with me and after a while tells me that he will visit my website and 'Do you mind if I *fap* to it?' -he asks!? 'Well I can't stop you, but it's not intended for that and I don't think my work would encourage that!?' I answered, still a little surprised. (This guy seriously thinks that anything online is just for ***** ... and now I feel dirty all over... since he told me more and more until I could get out out of that situation without hurting the guy...

I won't share the rest... but has this ever happened to any of you? I've got a headache from being too friendly ... I hope this wasn't too offensive. I am concerned about these type of things since I am concerned about society in general, so I had to share it... it was a creepy experience. And is yet another proof to how some people just live in strange perceptions of the world around them. That stuff plays a major role in the work I do and in this Game... perception of reality.

Damn...

Oh yeah and by the way: ENYO Arcade now has SLOPES!

*cough*

Something like that has happened to me before...I guess it isn't too rare. 
Your personality and little diary tidbits increase my interest in your game.  And regarding the skin, I feel that since the popularity of Tarantino, exploitation art has now been legitimized by the art world.  I don't think I saw the original images, but I don't have a problem with gender exploitation in fiction/art.  It kind of represents a retro style to me. 

[c023-DeV]

I was beginning to wonder if I'm in the wrong place here and was thinking that the internet just isn't ready for my humor yet. (but their kids will love it...)

But I'll keep on walking. Steady pace. And sure, ENYO Arcade might not be a revolutionary game changer but it's honest hard work that I've spent a few hard years with blood sweat and tears on.

And maybe it only makes sense in the full spectrum of my own perspective. To many of my friends I'm an inspiration to back them up when they work hard to live out their soul purpose and loose some fear of failure.

I'm a great looser I guess... never intended on winning anything since I haven't found any other challenge than life its self and you can't loose that if your real and not playing... so nothing to win and nothing to loose. I'm drifting off, sorry.

And the troof about the naked lady:
I got told that I should think about what motivates me, since I will be working on this game for quite a while (never thought it would be soo long) ... however .. I love women... I don't want to dictate sexual idealism or anything the whole thing about naked humans is a massive topic, male or female. But honestly I just love the character. Spent so many years studying 3D human - anatomy and she was the character that came out at the end.

So I had this lovely 3D female body and wanted to give her some Iron Man type of suit but thought it would be a shame to cover up all the hard work on her body, so most of it was left unconcealed.

Although it is nowhere near the beauty of a real human body with all its imperfections... It's the best I could do.

And loving TankGirl I thought I might as well use her as the main protagonist of my games.

And like I said, I'm not the guy that can be influenced easy by other peoples misinterpretations so I only listen to advice that I find useful.

Keeping it real since 1983. =D

[c023-DeV]

Just a little pic of the stages I'm working on:



I'm boiling down a lot of the game and making it more compact. Like throwing out some useless mechanics. And making the relevant ones more fun.

Also I had a great little practice by making a quick little HTML5 Game withing the same universe, you can play that here:

http://www.dev-zoo.net/projects/blasterZoo/

[c023-DeV]

Heya,

just wanted to check back in here and give you guys a quick update.

I'm currently optimizing the crap out of the game and speeding up the whole performance of the game.

One of the things I've done is aggressive object recycling. This was already built into flixel but I wasn't using it properly yet. I used the recycle function (that also creates new objects if there aren't any in a defined array). But now I create a bunch of the required objects on level start so that I know how many there are and can always use them without re-creating them.

Another thing was Adobe's update to Air 15 that now has a high precision timer. All older versions seemed to slow down notebooks with power saving options and caused a bad stuttering that looked like a problem with the garbage collection.

I've also created a new title logo for the game:



Oh, and the game is uploaded to STEAM and I've started creating achievements and other STEAM features.

So get ready for some freaking fast action pretty soon =)

[c023-DeV]

I'm now boiling down game mechanics to focus on only a handful that were the most cunning for me over the last year, the reason I stay motivated. Basically that is movement/momentum and action (with a Tank Girl like avatar).

And maybe I'm going to add more characters too, for those that feel uncomfortable by getting virtual video game satisfaction provided by such a thought provoking avatar.

I've recently laid out the requirements and opening up to integrating user generated content via SteamWorkshops and I think that is a fun route to go.
I hope to find a bunch of people that enjoy the feeling of the game and wish to help it grow further than I can provide. And I am pretty happy to get that all working since I too started out by modding other games and I hope I can give out that experience and a sweet environment to others that enjoy doing so.

A lot has changed and I'll do my best to get some information (And some STEAM Keys) flowing soon.

[c023-DeV]

===TABULA RASA Pt.4===

So here's a quick update: (quick, haha, Behold the Wall of Text!   )

Biggest change first:

!!!NO SHOOTING!!! --- yes I scraped a big part of the 'game' for now... until I find a really useful(!) way to implement it again.

I had to think a lot about what 'games' are and what is 'fun' about mine. I was even re-considering if I want my game to be 'fun' at all! Since I don't want anyone to waste their time without at least giving them a tiny drop of something that matters. And I knew at that point the only statement I could make would be: STOP THE MADNESS!!! So I felt like just creating something that was awesomely disgusting that I could heat up a few discussions on that topic. Creating the whole controversy. Since to me the whole matter is pretty controversial. I was hooked into social models and into business matrices that made me sick. And I was angry, very angry.

So I thought I'd have to do it all by myself and giving the rest of the industry a BIG middle finger. In fact getting away from  all social norms and metrics. The main character is my way of showing that. I gave only what I saw was ugly about the games industry in general.

I may amplify what I despise sometimes. Yet I find it more useful not to hate but congratulate what I like about games. And I was also doing that in the shadows, secretly enjoying playing this game. *Whuhahaha*    My precious!   

In these last two years I have learnt a lot. And I think it is about time to reboot this project and do my best.

So enough blahblah, here are some of my fresh conclusions for the game that I would like to talk about:

• Central Mechanics: I found that the 'Aiming and Shooting' wasn't really where the fun is, it's a nice gimmick that complicates and obscures the rest of the game play. The 'Moving and Acting/Reacting' was what kept me busy and entertained. So that is something I have already started to focus on. Another thing is: 'creating objects that matter' - As artist I've spent a LOT of time creating stuff that makes the world feel 'alive' rather than creating things that were relevant to the gameplay - not too bad since now I have tons of decoration but now I'll try to focus on gameplay relevant assets. That can be as simple as 'falling blocks' or 'spikes' keeping it minimal, but relevant.
• Main Caracter: Yes she is still a girl that doesn't think that the naked human body needs to be hidden. She is a toy built for entertainment purpose - only? Rebell, rebel!
• Technölögy: I've had a hard time Optimising the flixel2.55 version and I've tested a lot of great frameworks and engines yet I stick to my custom version of flixel running as a self contained adobe air program (no air installer) for this. I just like the way that bit-blitting feels maybe.
• User Generated Content: I'm doing my best to integrate SteamWorkshops as well as clean accessible code that allows some modding and custom level creation. Because that is where the real 'games' are. Oh, and keeping this stuff simple but deep.
• Gritty Audio and Visuals: Same, but better. Vivid, intense.

Ok, 'nough said... fuk, oh yeah and I almost forgot some of the more important parts:
Not taking **it serious. Not to be forced. Things happen when they can. I rather stay useless than contribute to crap.

 

[c023-DeV]

Here is a little mockup cover I'm working on next to coding:

[c023-DeV]

A little attempt in visualizing my new game architecture:



Not sure if it's clear to outsiders but at least it helps me abstract my thinking.

[c023-DeV]

Shooting is back.

Due to popular demand the shooting is back in the game.

About the new game mechanics:
I guess I am getting closer to what I actually had in mind where I first started working on the game. I just had absolutely NO fu**in idea what I was doing. But things have changed and I can now make better choices on creating my game elements with a specific purpose and with better foresight in terms of usability.

For the game experience I am now going towards a rather open staged set of 'levels' all nested within it's overall 'arena'. So you get a better sense for the connectivity of the World. You can transition freely between the levels and respawn at the last transit point if something fatal happens.

The game was always meant to be fast, so I have put a lot of effort into performance and fluid movement supported by cool animations and locations. The gameplay will focus on fast and sharply timed movement with occasional 2D Shooter elements.

My overall aim is still the same: making a solid single player experience that is easy to learn and fun to master.

I hope you like what you read and I'll be back!

[c023-DeV]

I've set up a fresh level to test the one of the gameplay styles. (Currently rough blocked)

It's called SABOTAGE and has the objective to override 3 majior communication units and then return to base.
The arena consists of 8 connected levels, so you can choose your own route and order. The main challange will come from beating the arena without dying as well as beating times and highscores set by me and the STEAM leaderboards.

Today I'll practice some music theory (focus on blue notes) and carry on with the level design.

[c023-DeV]

Oh and a quick advice for those new but interested in music theory:

All the ABC, Do, Re, Mi aside and stuff. What is most important in music for me is exploring the feeling. Relations between tones and what emotional values they express. The intervals (or distance) between notes(pitch/frequency peak) create this kind of emotion (harmony or tension). Generally, the closer two notes are to each other, the more tension they have. A good example is the theme of JAWS(movie) - that 'di,ding,di,ding' is one half step. So pitch-intervals are essential for communicating emotion within melodies. Of course combined with volume and timbre. So it'S best to know a lot of these first hand to build up a 'musical vocabulary'.

There are TONS of information's about music theory, mostly it always sounds overwhelming. However keep in mind that it is NOT necessary to play an instrument. Music theory is just for communicating between musicians, as helper, to share musical ideas and practice. So if you are just starting out, don't worry about it too much, just keep on exploring your instruments of choice (develop a feel!) and come back to the theory when you are stuck or need inspiration. It all falls into place once you've been doing it for a while.

Synthesizers are good fun to experiment with free tonal creativity, however for beginners I would recommend to stick with something real. Like a piano or string instrument and always practice rhythmic patterns too. Get your grooves tight!

Hope it might help someone starting out. Since this was stuff that helped me understand a lot.

[c023-DeV]

Phew* not much sleep lately, but enough =D

(Aside from 're-developing' the game) I've updated THE WEBSITE to support the coming changes and have set up the STEAM COMMUNITY HUB(check that out! yeey! ENYO has an official STEAM presence now *so-proud* )

As far as development goes. I've been painting some portraits for the ingame chit chat, tweaked the testing level and added the explosions again as well as a bunch of other things.

Looking into more PR related things, but so far I'm pretty happy with my little homebase on steam. Once the game is ready I'll be picking a few random testers there to tighten up the gameplay and I'm pretty much looking forward to that.

[c023-DeV]

Just vitualy met this dev:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/broken-core-videogame

Support it!

[c023-DeV]

ENYO Arcade in GML:



After aaaaages of evaluation I have chosen a new engine/toolset to make this game.
I've spent the last 2 weeks porting ENYO to Game Maker Studio and am pretty happy with my results so far.

I've made my own tilemap scripts and tried all kinds of collision types and settled for a fast meat boy like physics implementation.

The nailgun now also does its collision checks on the line instead of a sprite collision and 22.5° slopes

Other than that the feedback from the steam community hub has been AWESOME!
So join the OFFICIAL STEAM GROUP HERE to get future updates!

[c023-DeV]

So location switching works again, all of the player movement is set up again, level creation has been improved with an autotiling function. Collisions work smooth, performance is great. Joy, joy!

Next up: weapon changes...

[c023-DeV]

Here is a little development time lapse of the past 4 years solo development:





moo!