Ok, thanks for telling. I will play-test it later today and fix things.

EDIT: It seems that it is working as it should on my computer at least. If you have reached the skeleton then you're on your way. He can be defeated by:
SPOILER: jump over his head and hit him in the back. He will stop for a while after you've jumped over him and there's your chance

If that still doesn't fix the problem, let me know!

<td style="width: 350px; vertical-align: top">
    <strong>Space Funk Hunter (beta)</strong><br/>
    <em>by Canute</em><br/>
    <b><a href="http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=13460.0">Thread</a></b>
    
    Windows<a href="http://www.mediafire.com/?e9j0duwy7r59l5y">Beta</a>
</td>

And so at last it is (somewhat) done!

I have been working with the last main issues for about eight hours today, and now I feel that its good enough to be released as a beta-version.

The beta includes all elements of gameplay, but lacks the extra polish (i.e. graphics, texts and some sound effects). I blame time and motivation for not having fixed these things by now, but at least it plays like I intended. Sadly, I didn't get time to fix all the issues discussed the thread, but I plan to come back and fix the game in a while.

And for the soundtrack... This version has a slightly mixed midi version of "Chameleon" in it. It was not my intention, but there was again no more time. If anyone would like to contribute by making a funky 4-instrument song it would be much appreciated.


Features;
*Funk!
*Sounds by Shaktool
*Plenty of collectable items!
*Bossfights! ( at least one)
*A save-system with unlimited continues!
*Challenge! (The game is hard, you only get four hearts and you cant refill them...
             This was sadly skipped because of the deadline. Saving works almost like
             extra lives.)

Get it here:
http://www.mediafire.com/?e9j0duwy7r59l5y

I know of a few bugs, but please report them if you find any  
Since the deadline is tomorrow I might have time/energy to fix some of them.

(Ohh, I just realised that this is my first released/finished game in my ten years of gamemaking
The first game that didn't suck or that I didn't get tired of making...)

Nice work! It plays and looks as good as I expected. I reallt like how you can deconstruct house pieces and build stepping stones with them. Looking forward to the final release!

I woted yes, because if given another week, I will probably have time to release more than just a beta-build of my game. I also think that this compo has many promising and ambitious games and that the overall quality of the final releases will improve if given a little more time.

Yeah, I was wondering about whether hoovering in the air when attacking was a good or bad thing myself. I will look into how it plays when that bit is removed.

Also, an appologise for the strange colors The laptop I'm working with tends to display a much darker hue than it actually is.

Thanks for the feedback! It's sometimes hard seeing the flaws when you're working so close to it.

Thanks for the comments guys, I haven't had time to play around with the graphics, but I'll probably will soon.

Anyway, I finally complied a demo. It features three rooms and the second boss. The engine is working but it's not flawless, especially when you get stunned. Sound and music is yet to be added and some animation could be inproved, but I still hope it's playable enough

Arrows to move, Z to jump, X to attack, C to attack downwards (breaks blocks).
 
http://www.mediafire.com/?9hq1u35xv8urs5u

Thoughts?

It's been a long time since I last updated, so here's the news:

For the last two weeks, I've almost only been designing levels. Work has been slow but steady, but I almost lost hope of finishing it in time. So yesterday I begun programing the attack move and some enemies. The game is almost playable by now, and perhaps I'll upload a demo soon.

The biggest issue right now is how to draw/color the background. I'm looking for a cave like background that doeesn't show too much, but adds a discrete feeling to the level. I wounder if the ground is too detailed in comparition with the rest of the graphics? Suggestions are welcome.



Coming up next: enemies and bosses!

UPDATE

The last few days I've been playing around with the game design; after a lot of pen paper sketching I now think I've found the layout and mechanics I want.

After the first pixeling, I finaly got around starting making the actual game in MMF2. I had to rescale the character for the third time in order to make the proportions look good in full screen mode, but now it looks nice. The platform engine is almost done, and now that I've decided on how far you will jump, level design is coming up nicely.

I have also begun making some tilesets for the levels, they're pretty basic but fits with the NES-style graphics on the cartridge. I'm looking for a Metroid 1 feeling in the graphics. By now about 1/4 of the rooms are finished. Here's an early ingame screenshot (WIP) of one of the rooms:

  Oh my, that must be the best character classes I've ever heard about in a video game! Would be cool if you could choose a mix of two of them, I'd be Matador Dentist every day!

The work so far:
Repixeled the characters from the box (in order to get "clean" sprites ):

The third guy from the left is based on this awesome cover. I'll probably include the ship as well.

Also made a quick'n'dirty walk animation fro the main character.

I'll probably decrease the struttering later, but it's decent as for now.

Haha Not exactly what I was going for, but we'll see how it turns out. Hopefully, I'll have some sprites ready later today. 

Wow, that looks really cool! I like the sketchy style and the color palette. Looking forward to this!

[Space Funk Hunter]

Space Funk Hunter

Description The first thing that came to my mind when I saw this was the cover of Herbie Hancocks Head Hunters. I have no idea what it says on the game cover, but inspired by the record this is the concept: The space village of Funk has lost its grooves, and now it's up to the guy in tribe mask to restore the funk to Funk. By finding the lost band members, music will gradualy return to the game world. (Oh, and the picture was in the zip-folder in the competition topic, so I uploaded it myself).		Inspired by

Download
http://www.mediafire.com/?e9j0duwy7r59l5y

How to play
Mini metroidvania: explore space caves, collect items and find your band mates in order to restore the funk!

Arrows to walk, Z to jump and make many choices, X to attack, C to play drums.

I love it! Nothing is better in my book than well executed absurdism and strange humor.
Had myself a great laugh at the dollar monster so far, that was hillarius! And now I'm stuck at the numbers, but I hadn't the patice so I quit. I'll try it again soon though; it looks really promising.

Just me who thought of this while reading the tread?



(Naughty, Naughty Parodiuos!)


Can be a amusing game though, I say go for it.

So, after a busy week, I managed to squeeze in some time for the game, and now the movement and interaction engine is practically done (although far from perfect, but at least working). I’ve got the different events on the train and the many deaths left to program, but with the much of the basic engine done, I hope that it’ll go on smoothly.

Also, thanks for the encouragement so far guys. I’ve been thinking of having many different ways of dying in order to make things a little more interesting. For diseases, pneumonia, aggressive flu and some STD (Leisure Suit Larry 1 – style) is what I have considered so far. Suggestions on that and how to introduce some more adult themes are welcome.   

Nice idea, looking forward to this. "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is one of my all time favorite poems, hope you'll pull something great out of this.

Jet Set Radio

Oh, yes this is great, and what's more amazing is that I'm not a fan of neither skateing nor grafitti, but this game makes it fun. Love the slapstick moves of the police and soldiers, and the ludicious thing that they send tanks and attack helicopters to stop the spraycan youth  a few levels in:-*
And also, it proves that cell shading rocks if used well.

The Secret of Monkey Island
Oh, how I loved this game as a child, and how I love it still. Ah, the nineties! Humour and a good narrative, in a computer game! ! If you, like me only had played games like Pacman and Prince of Persia, Super Mario Brothers and Sonic The Hedgehog before, this was a blast. Look behind you, a three headed monkey!
I'm a little anxious to see what telltale has done with it, I'm about to install it soon.

[TRANS CONTINENTAL TIN CAN TRAVELLER]

Inspired by Bennett's comment on a game dealing with dysentery in the Water Safety on The Oregon Trail tread, here is:

TRANS CONTINENTAL TIN CAN TRAVELLER
Misadventures on the Moscow-Beijing Line

DO YOU DARE TO TRAVEL ACROSS THE VAST RUSSIAN CONTINENT WITH THE CHANCE OF GETTING BOTULISM?

You are a poor and tight fisted young backpacker who is travelling on the Trans Siberian Railroad from Moscow to Beijing in the absolutely cheapest class. Before you boarded the train, you were lucky enough to stumble over an incredibly good supply on somewhat expired and/or misshapen tin cans with various content, which you plan to eat on the seven day trip, since your cheep ticket doesn't include any train food whatsoever.
   But what you didn't know when you made this fine deal was the questionable quality on the food, and that some of it is infested with botulism!
   What will you do? If you eat it, you might be sprouting some mighty fine rigor mortis in your hard-as-rock bunk bed, after painful hours losing various body fluids - or you might attempt to make it across mother Russia on an empty stomach. And since you blew your last rubles on the cans, there's no use trying to buy something onboard...
   Unless you can come up with a cunning plan and be quick about it, you will die, in a more or less humiliating way.

---

So the concept is to make an old school adventure game with 80's Sierra-esque graphics, with some "arcade-ish" features (health meters, brawling, day-timer etc.). But after poking around a bit in MMF I found that Lucasarts style point and click and verbs will be a whole lot easier to code than a text input, so it'll be a mixture of both.
   The educational bit will be going towards the now half-famous Calvin & Hobbes strip: grown-up issues like that you shouldn't eat badly tinned foods and never travel across Russia on your own etc. etc. The adult features would not primarily be sex and nudity, (haven’t decided yet) but to get drunk, acting unmorally, start fights, kill and steal. And of course you will be able to die and/or get thrown of the train in a multiple ways.

But basically it’s just a sophisticated "eat strange foods and eventually get botulism"-simulator...


Here is some mockups of the work so far:



Walk around the beautifully coloured train cars, trying not to starve, avoiding (?) fellow travellers.


You do have a choice, you know.



Graphics will be kept simple in order to get the right feeling (a nice way of saying that it'll help me to concentrate on programming)

And oh, since I'm not very familiar with AGS (which probably would be the natural choice for a game like this) I'm sticking with MMF2.


As for now:
Programming the main game features and events.

Done:
The player movement is almost done and I hope to start on the interaction next week.