[AWESOME SCREENSHOT]

AWESOME SCREENSHOT

Here, I corrected it for you.

ps. srsly

Wha...?
NO WAY THAT IS SO AWESOME!!!!

[AWESOME MOCKUP]

Hi five!

I like your concept art! I especially like the confidence in the main character's pose.

The concept in itself is intriguing! I must say, looking at the list you've made, this is unlike any other game I've seen in this competition (maybe ever!).

I'd offer art help (mainly because I'm impressed by your mockup) but I think I wouldn't be able to do the game justice as well as you'll do with your own art (again, mainly because I'm impressed by your mockup). If you'd like me to join in to do some paint graphics (I don't draw in paint, but I'd draw in a way people would think I did), I'd be happy to be your second-in-command (or rather, nth in command, seeing as people will probably be flocking to this thread soon).


No read wall of text?
AWESOME MOCKUP

Wow, nice boss sketches! 

I really like the Death sketch (or Death-lookalike). Is it too much too hope for that it will play like Death in castlevania games?

They told him don't you ever come around here
Don't wanna see your face, you better disappear
The fire's in their eyes and their words are really clear
So beat it, just beat it!

Knife dancing for the win!   

Cute little elks, throwing ninja stars! Very nice sprites, they... they... is that...?

...

They almost look like they're dancing! This game must have dancing elk animations! 

[Gameplay]

looks/sounds nice, but maybe keep it simple =)

Of course! I actually plan to keep the basic gameplay pretty simple, but then work on refining the details and balancing stuff, and polish.

So I've been busy and lazy, and haven't done much more since the last post. Today I decided to finally do something, so I made a new version of the planet graphic, to motivate myself to work more often



There! Now I'm good for at least 4 more days!


Gameplay

So I decided I might as well write some about the gameplay, in case anyone would be interested.

You have a castle on top/bottom of the planet, as do your opponent. Whoever trashes the other player's castle wins.

The planet

The planet is divided into two halves: yours and your opponent's. The sides are "lava zones" which belongs to nobody (nobody can build there).

Towers

Build towers on your side to gain energy at a faster speed. The further a tower is from your castle, the more energy it generates. You cannot build towers on your opponents side; but you can destroy his towers! You can have a maximum of 6 or 8 towers.

Energy/Magic

All the time you stay on your side of the planet, you gain energy. Energy is represented by the lighting symbol. You can use energy to build towers or upgrade the castle.

Size and growing

You grow all the time (even when not on your own side). The more energy you have in stock, the faster you grow! (so don't spend it all too quickly). The bigger you are, the stronger you get. Your strength is represented by the red man symbol.

The castle

You can upgrade the castle, using energy. Each time you upgrade your castle, your defence improves (symbolized by the blue shield). Defence improves personal defence, castle defence, the HP of towers, and creates protective aura which protects towers close to the castle. The highest level castle will protect all towers from being destroyed.

Fighting

When touching your enemy, you will hit each other. The strength decides how hard you hit. An offensive and defensive bonus is given to the player currently on his own side of the planet. You cannot lose life / die, but when you get hit you lose energy instead. As well as fighting with your enemy, you can attack is castle.

Other (these are "maybe-ideas")

Use energy to buy landmines, which will injure your enemy.
At random times, free energy bonuses will appear in the lava zones. First one to get them, gets lots of free energy.

Controls

Move left and right using the arrow keys. Push up while on your own side to build a tower. Push down to place a landmine. Push up while in front of your castle to upgrade it. Simply touch an opponent building, or the opponent, to attack (alternate: push down to attack, and up to leech power from enemy towers).

This is a preliminary control scheme, designed for ease of use with several players locally. If the main feature is online play, then maybe a GUI for the mouse will be better.

Feel free to ask questions regarding gameplay if the description seems confusing.

The sprite size! The detail level! The circular explosion clouds! The particles and animation! 

This is looking REALLY good. To finish this game seems pretty ambitious... good luck! 

These tiles are some of the best graphics I've seen in the competition so far! Gorgeous! You say doing vector art is hard? I say you're doing fine! What tools are you using in making this game?

Gameplay seems pretty easy to understand, and should be fun. Seems like a solid game overall. And for the record:

If someone is curious about my workflow <...>

I am! Any pictures, screenshots and whatever else are of interest. Keep us updated! 

Also, did you do the doors?

Yes, I did. :D Why'd you ask?

The reason I asked is because it fits so well with the stuff you borrowed from other games, I thought you might have accidentally left it out of the list. It looks really nice, and I have no doubt the background will look great when you are done. Keep it up!

Naturally select your B-Ball players

I see what you did there.

Whoa! Nice one, didn't notice this myself.

I totally dig the artstyle! Very reminiscent of cartoons, so I hope for cartoony animation as well  The humoristic idea behind the game is a great one, and I sense the gameplay may be a little inspired by the gamecube/wii mario soccer games? With that said, bring us more progress and screenshots!

Also, the standard question: what OS(es) are you releasing this for?

The witch sprite is really nice, and the level layout and sketch is stunning as well! It'll be very interesting to see it in color when you're done with it. 

I do like the style of the sprite and the shading, but still you should be cautious. For your own sake consider not using soft gradients for sprites. Though I'm sure it can be done, it could be hard for you to make it look natural when using such soft gradients in sprite animation. From my own experience, it has been easier to use cell-shading (using 2-3 shades per color) rather than soft gradients, when animating.

I'm not saying you should change the art style: I'm suggesting you do some animation tests soon to see whether the soft colors work in motion.

Also, did you do the doors?

METAL GEAR!? </snake voice> 

When I first saw that watermelon video whenever it was released, I was impressed. Now you're doing the same thing (kinda) in an indie-game competition, so I'm even more impressed! The youtube video didn't let me down, and I wouldn't be surprised if you did win. Keep it up, and more importantly: more screens and videos!!

What is a gentleman? An awesome pile of money and lots and lots of top hats! 

When I saw the screenshot combined with the description of the game it made me feel happy inside. Though the sprites may not be final, I'll have to say I wouldn't be disappointed if they were. The online easy-to-pick-up turn-based concept seems really nice, but will it be possible to play with less than 4 players? Also, I want to know more about the rules and gameplay! 

[Fully finished]

Fully finished movement system (slopes, moving platforms, elevators, etc)
Inventory System Framework (this was a fucking BITCH to deal with)
Item System Framework
Basic Random Terrain Generation
...
Jetpack System
...
<Neverending list>

Whoa! This is just... whoa! And the screenshot as well... I'm speechless.

As far as platformers go, you seem to know the ingredients pretty well. I'm sure this will be awesome to play.

Must... find... something to distract from the awesomeness...  Oh yeah! The whitespace placement in the code snippet is suboptimal! Haha, that sure showed him!

Will it be online?

I would like to know this too. Also, what programming language / tools will you (most likely) use? What OS will it be for?

Wario ware is very nice, I played it a lot for the GBA. Looking forward to what games you will come up with, and it will be nice to see the mockup you promised. Remember; the weirder the games, the better! (remember the snot game in WW)

These sounds like the kind of Shenanigans I'd like! Gameplay seems very fun from your description. How do you control the DM / adventurer?

As TobiasW said though, be wary of the dangers of network programming! I wish you good luck in learning though, and hope you won't get in too much trouble  May I inquire what OS(es) you use and intend to release the game on?

The unit sprites and the portraits are by me.

They're very nice! They really look like little miniature soldiers on a game board / table (kindof like Risk, but with more colors and detail). The neck on the foot soldiers seem just a little stiff though.

Cool mockup and idea. Is (any of) the art in the mockup made by your team / dbb?

Judging by the many teams and goals, this looks like playing a game of this could be very complicated and interesting. From the looks of the descriptions, you (or whoever wrote it) seem to be a witty person and I'd love to see more of this humor in the game.

This idea is very interesting, super smash bros with lots of extras! The classes systems is very interesting and I'm sure it'll be very intriguing to play. I look forward to seeing screenshots whenever those are made available.

And I dunno about network capability in MMF2... Is it gonna be a local game or could we hope to play this in an online mode? 

I love action platformers, and the radial menus look fantastic. How could a game like this possibly go wrong? (hint: it couldn't)

I wish you the best of luck in finding the perfect artist(s), musician(s), and finishing this game! Although I must say using 8 attacks for every boss (like in the mockup) for 4 boss could be quite a lot of work to do. Even if the number of bosses/attacks would turn out to be less I would very much like to play this.