Health Packs did not make it in,. but yeah Droqen I think they will fall slow so you can try to get under them..,

Not really "done" however, I do like how it is going, and I will continue to work on this,. till I get it where I would like it to be.  Still, it is playable, and some fun right now,. also I added an OS X build that I can not test, so anyone please report if it has any issues.  Thanks all.

A new version, 041 up.  Now with the Turrets!  You just hold the Build Button till you hear a sound,. there is also a part on the player that pops up,. then you release and the Turret is build where you are faceing.  You can 'bump' them to move them around a bit,. they take about 3 or 4 shots to destroy. You will notice they only start to aim when the other player is in range,. this gives you the ablitly to sneak up on enemiy turrets from a distance,. the interesting thing is since you can not aim anywhere but at the the other player some stategy of movement is needed to shoot the turrets or to stop the opponent when they are trying to shoot yours., more testing of this is needed, to see how well it works,. I just wanted to get them added and then will work on the ballance, timeing, etc.  

Inanimate, oyog- thanks so much for all the great suggestions,. I was also annoyed by the energy walls,. took you guys commenting to spur me to do anything about it 

I think this is much better now, you take one tenth the damage you would get from a shot when touching the walls, I still like the idea of a bit of a penalty. and now you bounce off, and the walls move away too,. they move more when smaller!

Glad it is playable on a single keyboard,. I will add some way to re-configure the keys, but not likely till it is more 'done'. joy2key and a gamepad  are suggested in the interm.

I am unlikely to do online play as my target is an old arcade machine, 2up realtime in person.    However perhaps, if I get some help, it could be done. ZGE now has DLL linking so it could turnout to be much simpler than i think. .,

The wall building was just a test of building in general and more buildings should be added soon. I find it usefull to block shots and run when needed.

Oh,. now when you grab up the bits you get health regenereated but it is tinny,. 0.1 of a shot hit, this stuff will all need to be ballanced more when all the rest is working. I am planing random health packs to drop from on high,. or perhaps from 'mining' the walls?

Hey Droqen, you found me!  What does it "strikingly" remind you of?? I would like to see more nul-shaded 3d, but not that much of it around that I find.
 Sometimes using a minimalist style leads to games looking similar to other ones that used that same style,. i find this also true with many pixel-art style games, especialy the very low bit ones., however there are always many ways to individualize even these minimalist depictions,. making them unique. Anyway, try the newest ver. on the top post, it is now working as a 2up game.

Ivan- you can, but not till ZGE gets an update to add the current beta features to the release version,. the beta always has Windoz building and the Mac an Linux only gets updated when those features are locked into a proper release version,. after bug hunting, testing, etc.  

I will post a video later today, so you can see the thing in motion.,  I have to run out to get beers.    Cheers.

[something]

Hi Oral, no dog in this fight?  thanks for the kind words,. iterationGAMES is a fan of you. Put something (a game or demo) on your web site please! (the scary face is neat thought)

Frog-  I was using the release build of ZGameEditor I could just build for the other platforms now,. however, I am using the beta, for some of the new scripting and collision handeling features,. it will therefor have to wait till Ville does a proper release with the new beta stuff. Shouldn't be too long he is quite qick..,

JamesGecko- thanks bro. flat 3D is an under used style that i still happen to like a lot.

I am still not done with the friggn camera,. but I can see some cool play emerging from play testing and dreaming with this demo,. . more to come.

Bump for new version,. get i021 from top post, info there,. Cheers.

looks great,. perhaps some Rampart influance on the design?  Always a fav. of mine, for the rebuild/defend game structure,. . nice work so far.

Thanks, I do try to make it look nice,. spent some time fixing visual glitches, and designing colors and shapes,. however it is still just a prototype demo. Loads left to do still, like devise some actual gameplay  . I have been just working out some ideas, to see what could work, and testing implementations, no telling how it will develop from here,. I had some ideas when I started, so I will see if I am able to develope those into a workable 2up battle game.  My main goal is to get it playable on old arcade controles for those hardware machines.  I had some other ideas for player movement (a towards/away +/-rotation style) as well last night (in a dream!) I would like to try those too.  So I am still just testing ideas I guess.., stay tuned.

Now in 3d, and holding Z will charge up to do a burst shot. (tap for single shots  ) many tweeks to camera and play,. still a 1up demo with a drone to play with., since I have noone to test with here I will build an AI and then add 2UP controls at the end. Drone is dumb still,. .

lovin' the look of this,. and drinkin' up the idea! 

   sizure,.

Looking very interesting,. I have a thing for pyramids with eye beams,. .

[Finally a 2up playable prototype demo is up!]

UPDATED; Now in 3d,.  holding Z will charge up to do a Burst Shot. (tap for Single Shots   ) many tweeks to camera and play,. still a 1up demo with a Drone to play with., since I have noone to test with here I will build an AI and then add 2UP controls at the end. Drone is dumb still,. .

UPDATED Feb. 1st; added obstacles (energy walls) these can be destroyed!  added some crazy fractalesq turnbucles(?) to help define the arena,. and just cuz they looks cool.  the 2up Drone is faster and a bit more fun to play with now, but still does not have Boost or Burst capablities,. remaines single player for now, still working out the gameplay concept, but having some good ideas from experimentations,. so will continue freejazz style.

UPDATED Feb. 4th; - Added 'bits' that are smashed off stuff when shot. These land on the ground and can be collected, for what, I do not yet know,. mostly cosmetic changes, the arena is now golden. the turnbuckls look better,. etc.  

UPDATEd Feb. 19th; - Finally a 2up playable prototype demo is up! Please test and let me know how it playes., I intend this to be played on arcade controles, not sure if 2up on a single keyboard will work or have key stealing issues? Use joy2key to map at least one of the players to a usb pad for now. For single player, my testing AI is now availible for each player press 1 or 2 to toggle. (they can self fight, poorly)  this is still a crappy testing AI with limited use,. they just shoots a bit and move around a bit (no burst, boost, or walls).
 I have made a lot of additions, but this is still just a prototype and much will likely change still. Players can also now drop small Energy Walls to build protection. This uses up matter, that you need to collect (bits).  Anyway,. there are now winning conditions, and basic play is all working well.  I have a lot more planed (building turrets, other weapon types, etc.) but time is always a limiting factor.    

UPDATED 21 Feb. - implementing some suggestions,. walls are now LESS painfull when touched *0.1,. also they now move, mpore when smaller., added a start to a GUI with health bars.., added a cool sound effect when holding fire to do a charged shot,. came up with a name I like,. and whatever else..,

UPDATED 23 Feb. - TURRETS!  hold build till you hear a 'click' release to build a turret,. takes 8 bits,. gotta fix the GUI, bits are just shown as a number now.  seems to be working well, still needs more balanceing,. . also re-did the player designs as I found the much simpler turrets looked better., yes I spend way too much time tweeking and retweeking useless stuff.., alas, this is my process.

LAST UPDATE 27th Feb. - not much else added minnor tweeks done, and an OS X build added. I just ran out of time,. due to some paying work comeing up,. (send me more contract work!) I will continue to develop this, and hopefull get it more balanced, and feature rich in the future,. it is what it is.

Entry
Windows DOWNLOAD: nulShade_042.zip (ver. 042, 147Kb)

OS X DOWNLOAD: nulShade_042_OSX.zip (ver. 042, 227Kb)
OS X version will need SDL to run, get from here;  http://www.libsdl.org/download-1.2.php

Post Update 7th March;  Added the Sky Drop Bonus items, they give 25 health and 5 build points, perhaps they are too frequent, but they are to be fought over. So they bounce high and disolve when out of bounces. Added a Match Counter, to help keep score, no way to reset that yet. Lowered the number of 'bits' that spawn when stuff is shot,. this cleans up the field, to make the Bonus items more desirable.

Update (post deadline)
Windows DOWNLOAD: nulShade_043.zip (ver. 043, 145Kb)  

CONTROLS
1up controls; WASD to move, tap C to fire (hold for burst), V to boost. tap B to build sheild wall (hold for turret).
2up controles; ARROWS to move, tap I to fire (hold for burst), O to boost.  tap P to build sheild wall (hold for turret).

SPACE to pause.
M to mute the sounds.
R to restart.
ESC to quite.
1 and 2 to toggle the sadly difficent AIs (just for basic testing).
F toggle FPS should be around 60.




I am going for something sorta' Virtual-ON informed, as I always loved that one, however this will b much more minimalist.  I decided to go with a standard 4-direction stick, and 3 action button setup for the controls, as I have recently been retrofiting some arcade cabinets to play PC games,. and this shall work well on some of those systems (most any 2UP MAME machine setup).  

see;


or;  http://www.flickr.com/photos/jphwacheski/4976912243/

 
I am building using the ZGameEditor engine (free, open source) as it just keeps getting better all the time with new features poping up constantly.  So the game is running in openGL and I can build for win, osx, and linux.  

See; http://www.zgameeditor.org/

Sorry the Mac and Linux will need to wait till ZGE gets its next release.  I am using some features only avalible in the current beta version. (beta only builds for windows) I will post a video later so everyone can at least see it in action.

After a month of retrofitting 5 arcade machines, (We also used last years TORONTRON http://handeyesociety.com/torontron/ giving us 6 machines.) and more time before that hunting them down and planning the event we had an all night Arcade setup in Toronto for Nuit Blanche.



Info. and all the game details are here;
http://handeyesociety.com/event/the-arcadian-renaissance-games/

The local indie games in our arcade where;












Well Osmos did not show due to the TORONTRON's computer suddenly dieing as we where booting them all up,. We quickly borrowed a laptop, but alas where unable to get the game working on the hardware.  We reverted to running the TORONTRON on that cabinet. We will try to show Osmos at a future event.

here is a video of the event; 



A sort of photo-blog of the retrofitting process is posted here;

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jphwacheski/sets/72157624411709701/

I ran out of room on the flickler account so there will be a post mortem later, with the rest of the images.  The Society has dibs on these arcade cabinets for future events and some will be deployed around the city in public places for all to try.  All in all a good experiance.

I also find Blender to be crazy confusing, to just do simple stuff with,.  Wings3D is nicer.  P-XCEL is very nice!  Some of my .obj files don't load, but they where just random things I had modeled and could have been huge poly counts,. this looks great for low-poly-pixel-art-3d, and that could lead to a nice looking game for sure,. thanks for post it!  Good luck bug hunting.

As anyone who knows me has had to hear, I have been using ZGE to build all my games and media experiments for a past 2 years (haveing previously worked mostly with GameMaker).  The system has a great IDE to build games in and test in real time, with out having to pause to compile!  I highly recomend at least giving it a look, it is constantly improved, fully free, and a major update has just been released!  (can this get a little mention on the front page?)

for da press;

ZGameEditor 1.9.9 released

ZGameEditor is a free game authoring tool that generates native high-performance stand-alone compact executables for Win32, Linux x86 and OS X. Now 3 years after initial release ZGameEditor has reached version 1.9.9 and it's the most feature packed update yet!

ZGameEditor is an ideal tool for experimenting with procedural content generation techniques and developing OpenGL-applications. Make games, demos and screen savers using advanced graphics features such as multiple render passes, render targets and shaders. Instant GUI feedback of your changes. No waiting for build times!

ZGameEditor is 100% Free Open Source software.

New features in 1.9.9 include:

    * render to texture
    * multiple render passes
    * web-connectivity
    * string support in scripting language
    * calling external libraries

And also many other improvements and changes!

Download ZGameEditor here:

http://www.zgameeditor.org/

Yeah without the controlers it's just down to faith in the functions,. . 

I quite enjoyed that!  It's sotra like Gratuitous Space Battles, only fun   Excellent design for a one stratagy game.  The graphics and music are great too.  Congrats. 

yup, it is doubtfull I would be able to affort the expence of travel as well,. perhpas a very long BUS ride, and finding someone local with a couch (or floor space) to crash on,. but that just don't sound like too much fun, so I will likely not be attending should my little game be selected anyway.  I just like the deadline and design challenge,. seems to give me enouph presure to get a game done, otherwise I tend to tweek the mechanics, and art endlessly,. . 

Melly- I just played it again, after taking some time away from it to do my Gamma IV game and the gameplay mechanics are indeed "obscure"!  I took a simple game and made it sorta hard and overly complex perhaps.., I will have some time wokr on this again in a few days,. and perhaps it will change some more? I find when I work intensly on something for too long, then not look at it for a while, and then come back to it, I then see all my mistakes.  Well at least I will add the net highscore table, as in the time since I finished this competition version, Ville has added string suport to ZGE and that should make the table building a tad simpler for me.

feeblethemighty- thanks man,.