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[Evan Balster]

Hey, guys.

My freeware world-drawing MMO, Infinite Blank, is playable again after four months of downtime.  It's a prerelease; an incomplete version of the coming 0.3.0 update I put out to help myself deal with some motivation issues and because I've kept pushing back the release date.

For those not familiar, it's essentially an online game with an infinite world which is filled in cell-by-cell by players.  Players draw their own characters, explore the world as a sidescrolling platformer, and can talk to one another with drawings.  When they hit the edge of what's been created so far, they can make more using an MSPaint-like tool.  The world gets larger and is unbounded in size.

This prerelease has a lot of backend differences but few frontend differences from previous versions.  I need feedback on usability issues (and I'm aware of many) and technical bugs.

Give it a try:  http://infiniteblank.com
(Windows, Mac and Linux are supported, though the prerelease imposes some extra restrictions)

Video: 

[PowRTocH]

I <3 this game, glad to see it back!

[mcc]

Awesomme Infinite Blank is back

I accidentally made a post earlier for a split second but didn't mean to

Here is the real post

Thoughts:

- The music is interesting, is this all in-engine? it would be neat if there were some way to post your own music for some areas

- LEVEL EDITOR NEEDS TOOLTIPS BADLY HOLY CRUD WHAT AM I DOING

- The "password" feature is interesting but it seems a bad idea to allow cells to be password protected close to the "start point"?

- Sometimes ctrl-Z takes many presses before it does anything

- Simple magnifying glass when drawing would be sort of nice?

- Something that draws straight lines would be nice though maybe this would have the bad effect of changing how people draw...

- Nitpicky stuff: "Ctrl-Z" for undo is weird on mac, we're used to cmd-Z. Is there a reason it's 10.6 or later only? Do you need help with your build process? Also, have you considered hiding the "cursor" when the mouse leaves the window?

EDIT: Also, did you *mean* for your application to be named "Savior" on mac? I mean, that's actually sort of awesome, just wasn't sure it was intentional

[Evan Balster]

- The music is interesting, is this all in-engine? it would be neat if there were some way to post your own music for some areas

No, but I would love to implement a feature like that.  It's something I've given some thought to.

- LEVEL EDITOR NEEDS TOOLTIPS BADLY HOLY CRUD WHAT AM I DOING

The painter will be seeing a facelift very soon; there are a huge number of glaring usability issues there.

- The "password" feature is interesting but it seems a bad idea to allow cells to be password protected close to the "start point"?

Password protection is a good safeguard against defacement and hurt feelings on the part of the original artist.  (It's a lot easier to remove an immature cell than repair a defaced one.)  If your concern is the ability to draw, I'll be making sure players can easily get to drawable spaces with some new features planned for 0.3.0.

I do plan on having a wiki-style world as an experiment starting sometime after 0.3.0's release, but I think it'll need some features like rollback to work properly when someone comes along and draws an overlay of filthy words or some such.

- Sometimes ctrl-Z takes many presses before it does anything

- Nitpicky stuff: "Ctrl-Z" for undo is weird on mac, we're used to cmd-Z. Is there a reason it's 10.6 or later only? Do you need help with your build process? Also, have you considered hiding the "cursor" when the mouse leaves the window?

It's a terrible hack I'm using to detect that control; I will look into fixing it.

As for the 10.6 requirement, everything but my SDL framework supports 10.4 universal and higher; I just need to build a compatible version of SDL.

- Simple magnifying glass when drawing would be sort of nice?

Page up.  It's mentioned in the help dialog.

- Something that draws straight lines would be nice though maybe this would have the bad effect of changing how people draw...

On its way, for drawing AND terrain.

EDIT: Also, did you *mean* for your application to be named "Savior" on mac? I mean, that's actually sort of awesome, just wasn't sure it was intentional

The "Savior" thing is an oversight; "Savior" is the name of the binary that's pretty much everything I've worked on in the last two years or so compiled into one monstrous binary.  I forgot to rename that one to "Infinite_Blank".

[namragog]

It looks really fun, And I will probab;y download it when I am back home, but isn't this basically a huge attraction to trolls? Horribly drawn penises everywhere. That would be terrible. 

[Evan Balster]

It happens here and there, but a lot less than you might think.  I'm surprised too.

Honestly the "bad" areas are just ones where people don't seem to be trying very hard.

[Blademasterbobo]

I had a lot of fun with the older versions. The level designer is pretty nice, although going downwards instead of upwards always results in getting stuck in some crappily drawn cavern. Maybe add a way to go back to the previous screen / location in case you get stuck or something?

- The music is interesting, is this all in-engine? it would be neat if there were some way to post your own music for some areas

No, but I would love to implement a feature like that.  It's something I've given some thought to.

please don't do this

[Evan Balster]

There's a single teleport point on the map that you can click.  It's in the starting cell.

And regarding cell-specific music, you'll be able to switch that feature off if I ever do implement it.  Its default behavior would be pausing and overriding the radio, though.

[Blademasterbobo]

There's a single teleport point on the map that you can click.  It's in the starting cell.

Yeah, but it's pretty tedious to have to keep going back to the start every time you get stuck, which, when going underground, happens pretty often. It's a pretty casual game, so things that limit frustration would be a good thing, no? There are probably other ways to deal with this, one of which is to ignore it, I guess, but it was pretty annoying.

And regarding cell-specific music, you'll be able to switch that feature off if I ever do implement it.  Its default behavior would be pausing and overriding the radio, though.

Audio has a way higher potential for abuse than drawings. I hope that if you do implement it, you at least add some sort of approval system. Trolls + custom sounds could result in anything from obnoxious sounds to sounds that are actually painful to listen to.

[mcc]

Small observation: The "talk" bubbles are unreadable when used in rooms with black backgrounds.

Ways to get around the "it's hard to go up and easy to go down, and i keep getting stuck in caverns" problem: The ability to do something like "ninja rope", jump off a ledge but hang off a rope so you could pull yourself up (this means you can experiment if you think ahead, but doesn't mean you can basically just fly around. The ability to place trampolines in specific places (thus making it possible to make an easy way out of a deep pit or cavern).

[Blademasterbobo]

just to clarify what i meant by "getting stuck":

the main problem i had was falling through small holes and then getting stuck "outside" of the rooms. not so much of a problem when going up, since there weren't many enclosed spaces to get stuck behind, but it happened quite a few times when going "underground." this also happened because the level edges weren't always matched up. i sometimes fell through when i didn't jump into the next screen, especially if they used a smaller brush for collision. plus, some rooms were just impossible to leave. basically, maybe the player should have some way of dealing with poorly designed rooms / poorly drawn collision lines? short of going all the way back to the start, that is.

it basically kept me from bothering with anything "below ground." 

[Evan Balster]

There's a feature I'll be re-adding tomorrow where players can place their own teleport points, at their current location.  The number isn't limited, but you can't place them too close together.  I'll also be adding more start points.

As for audio, it'd be module-like; a limited range of instruments and musical notes.  You make a good point about abuse, though.


Regarding the "ninja rope" I'm planning a climbing hook that will help players get out of most sorts of pits.  I might make a material that prevents it from working, though.  

Chat needs a lot more work, but it's worth noting how different colors are available.  A log would be good.


Oh prerelease.  You are such a mess.    

[mcc]

Oh, I somehow missed you could color your chat messages

[eclectocrat]

Hey Cellulose, really want to try IB, but I have a problem.

Short story: are there any download mirrors? I've been trying to download it for a couple days now, and it's just not working. The transfer speed starts at 10k and slowly winds down to around 0.1k/s, then just fails. It's probably because I'm in China and the net is crippled here, but I'd really like to try your work. Please mirror!

PS. I haven't forgotten about the Update Manager Project.

[Nugsy]

I don't think there would be any need for custom sounds. A basic set of musical instruments could be provided, along with a simple interface for music creation (think WarioWare DIY).

[Evan Balster]

Eclectocrat -- I could try to find a mirror, but I suspect an Iowa-based game server will also give you a lot of trouble.  Any recommendations on the file mirror?

[AirBasher]

The troll seems to have added a lot of walls (press T to to see them) and you cant get to some of the cells since they are walled off.

[StephenM3]

Aah, glad to see this is back up! I've been meaning to try it out since we talked in Boston. (And you successfully convinced me to spend some time on the TIGS forum.) Unfortunately, I only have OSX 10.5.8.

I'm guessing/hoping compatibility for at least a version or two earlier than 10.6 is planned, eventually?

[Evan Balster]

I'll support as far back as 10.4 (and ppc!) as soon as I can get my mitts on a compatible SDL framework.  It could be as soon as the next few days.

As for the walls issue, I plan on adding some more navigation features very soon that should help deal with problems like that.  The exploit M was using has been patched.

[Starflier]

O.O I love this...