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[Catman]

In short words: a village simulation game. Otherwise, read further...

Last build:Pipo 0.0.9

Which now features farming!

- notice: new interface! in order to build you must click on the builder's hut, which will open the building's menu! I am trying to remove any fixed menu!

- notice: due to the terrain loading, the first seconds the game will be slow!

- notice: move the camera with WASD and rotate it by holding right click, zoom with your scroll wheel!
- notice: check the new screenshots below!
- notice: no catastrophoes in this build, working on the village buildings!!

Please notice it runs only under Windows.

Implemented features:

Building placement and construction, with many different types of buildings (12 as of now)
Building and utilization costs, gains and benefits.

Terrain height, texture, detail and raw resources generation. Terrain adaptation. Resource gathering.

Pipos (villagers) with many different jobs. Complex goal-based AI. Needs and status. Resource transport, working and worflow: raw resources to finished products!

Many different animals, herds, hunters, flying and (soon) mounts!

Menus and pop-ups for village

Night and day cycle

Catastrophes: earthquakes, tsunami and flames!


If you need the complete changelog, check my posts!!!


Game scope
many pipo types: Pipo, Farmer, Miller, Builder, Hunter, Monk, Miner, Fisher, Stonecutter, Lumberjack, Cook, Baker and more!!!
many buildings: Hut, Farm, Mill, Mine, Bakery Builder Hut, Hunter Hut, Stonecutter Hut, Woodcutter Hut, Warehouse, Clocktower and more!!!
12 animals!
18 resources and counting...

Planned features:
Adding a lot of Jobs and Buildings:
 - among them working on Monk, Priest, Guard, Boneworker, Leatherworker, Butcher...

Pipos: personalities and religions

- More catastrophes!
   - protect your village!!!

- Roads

- Inventions & Research

- Divinities

- Quests

- moreeeeeeeeee

Instructions:
 - use right click to look around
 - use WASD to move the camera

 - left click on a pipo or building to get information
 - left click on Buildings->BuildingName and then on a place to place that building (I like to repeat myself)
 - left click on a Pipo, then right click on a building to send him working there (or vice-versa)
 - left click on a Builder, then right click on a building to build it!
 - just because it is a dev build, you can press the spacebar to have time advance!



NEW SCREENSHOTS!







Game snapshot

Here starts the old post


Hello people.

Alongside my main project Xenophonic, due to the small experience I have been amassing in the last months about the Unity framework and my restlessness, I have been developing a *secret* side project. (Woo!)

This is Pipo (name subject to change) and I have been thinking about it for months. I have been actively developing it for two months in the small bits of free time I had available. I tought it would be a good idea to have feedback troughout the whole project so here I am!

This is a game about village simulation, spawned from the fact that when I was 4 I played the first "The Settlers" and never attacked enemies. I just created the village and watched it grow. Since I have not had the pleasure to experience anything like that anymore until Black and White, and that too was not focused on the villages, I decided to try and create it myself.

Pipos are the inhabitants of this place and they are hard workers, almost stakanovistic, rude and rough. Your goal is to help them build their village and grow their population, then live happily!



Comments?

 

[TrampolineTales]

Looks pretty cool. I'm curious if the characters are just mindless statistics like in roller coaster tycoon, or if you're going to try to make each character have certain traits, likes, dislikes, and personalities. I realize that the latter probably takes a lot of time, and either way I'll probably give the game a try.

[Catman]

Thank you for your comment, TrampoilineTales. I want to make this more than a cold simulation machine, in order to find the joy I had when playing the old settlers.

Don't get me wrong, I really like games like SimCity or Roller Coaster Tycoon, but people there are, as you said, mindless statistics. I plan to add personalities and traits to all pipos, each having its own story and advancement, its proficiencies and more.

My aim is that the gamer should be fond of his villagers and feel really bad when, because that can happen, they die.

[delete me]

>Implying roller coaster tycoon doesn't have thoughtful and intelligent AI with personalities.

[Catman]

Posting this game development log really got me even more eager to work on this project, which could potentially be bad for the thesis I need to finish!!!


Anyway, I hope I can update this fast enough to even get a playable alpha out there.

For now, I have created a changelog and will be posting here what I will be adding. Feedback on anything is appreciated, as this is still in early development and I have not yet decided on many features!

CHANGELOG
   System
      YAML parsing for building types for easy adding or modyfying statistics (soon for other types)
         

   Buildings
      added building phase with different building times
      added Farm building

      
   Pipos
      added job for jobless Pipos: lowcost worker (no more laziness!)
      base pick up and transport of resources

   Resources
      added visual resources (in-game elements)
      added main methods for resource assignment to building

[Ishi]

I've always like the idea of "Settlers without combat". I used to love just watching the farmer guy throwing seeds around, then I'd scroll back later and suddenly there's yellow fields everywhere. Very exciting.

I've only played the first and fourth Settlers. Something I loved in the fourth one was that the paths were sort of emergent - instead of manually drawing them out, they just appeared naturally in the places and routes that the people walked on the most. If you could get some of that kind of natural, emergent alteration of terrain in that would be amazing - it removed niggly micromanagement and made it feel like the people were really living in the place.

Looks interesting anyway, good luck with the project!

[Catman]

Thank you for the input! You exactly matched my idea so this is great!

I only played the first Settlers myself, back in the days.

However, the idea of emerging terrain alteration was already in my mind, as I have been thinking about a way of linking buildings together by automatic road drawing. That is, based on the position of the buildings, the roads will be forming at times passes and Pipos travel over them!

I spent a few hours working with the Unity terrain assets, they are quite undocumented but I think I finally nailed down how it works. I can modify at runtime height, texture and detail (like trees), so road drawing is not a problem.

I am only trying to find the right algorithm for the traveling, I think I may settle for an A* algorithm with fixed routes based on the gradient of the terrain - after all, the Pipos wouldn't lose time walking on a steep hill when they could just walk around it!

[Catman]

I spent again some time on this project today. I am liking more and more where this is going! It's already fun to watch the Pipos walking around.



Here is the changelog:

System
   Better zoom
   Debug: speed increase

Buildings
   Building phase animation
   Primary resources buildings - working on terrain
        Added Mine (first primary resource building)   

Resources
   Resource harvesting with popup on buildings
   Resource gain modifiers - resource gain is dependent on different stuff! (ain't going to specify for now)

Pipo
   extended pick up and transport of resources
   working tool and hat switching
   work animation

Bug Of The Day:
   All pipos leaving the village in a hurry!!!

[Catman]

I have not had much time today, but I have done a few new things.

I hope I can get a playable build out soon, now it's just a sandbox. I'll have to balance a bit the resources!


Buildings
   rea primary building - working on terrain around the building
       Card showing more pipo number information

Pipos
   They get to the working place and work in the open air!
   Added left-handed pipos
        Fixed work animation

And here is a screenshot of the new features: (those are females, hence the hair)

[Catman]

Hello. I have been working a lot lately due to deadlines coming short. Xenophonic has been registered for the IGF and my thesis is due in a few weeks.

Tonight, however, I really wanted to go on with Pipos and so I did an update.

I think that after this, when I've polished it a bit, I can safely get a a first 0.0.1 demo out to everyone for playing. (For now, there is not much to do!)

Here is the changelog!!

02/11/2011

   System
      Global parent values and parent assignment

   Resources
      Pop up at any increase or decrease
      Added meshes for various resources
      Resource game objects spawning when created in a building
      Resource game objects with increasing value
      Resource game objects increase in size with value

   Buildings
      Limit of resources around a single building

   Pipo
      Added Woodcutter job and initial meshes
                Added Miner job and initial meshes


And the obligatory screen: ( that greenish things behind the mine are the resources being harvested)



      

[Catman]

Here is today's changelog.

I thin I will be polishing things now, fixing bugs and all, before adding new features. When I'm done with the bugs I will post the first build!

03/11/2011
   System
      Modifications to account for resource limits
         Maximum Pipo limit
         Can build only if resources are currently available   

   Menu
      Added news text in the upper part

      
   Buildings
      Added Werehouse
      Added WoodCutter house
      Better primary building working positions

   Pipos
      Working values assigned directly to Pipos

[Catman]

Hello people!

As I said in the last post, I am working in order to provide a playable first 'pre-alpha' of the game, fixing bugs and creating a bit of gameplay!

I added a Builder job, which is required for building buildings! (duh!)

I am trying to find the better method for handling resource scarcity, because for now Pipos can work endlessly and get lots and lots of wood... I think I may be placing an exponential cost on 'living expanses' for Pipos, so that the more Pipos you have, the more and more corn is needed and thus they'd all need to be farmers for that to work (up to the point where there are not enough farmers!).
For now, a maximum Pipo limit has been put into play, I'll think about it! Any ideas?

04/11/2011
   System
      Added JobAI for different job behaviors

   Pipos
      Fixed all hat and tool meshes and positions
      Added Builder Pipo

   Buildings
      Building phase registered
      Builders build them if available

05/11/2011
   System
      Better organization for pipo and building creation
      initial buildings and resources available

   Pipos
      Divided male and female pipo names
      Colored hats and tools
      Different need minimum hours

   Buildings
      Colored buildings (temporary textures)

   Menu
      Fixed pop up 'minus' bug

[Catman]

Hello!

Today I gave my thesis to my professors, so I think I will finally have more time to dedicate to more fun activities!

I have decided to upload a first version of Pipo, full of bugs and with little to no gameplay, because after all this is a development log and it would not be fun if I gave you all a fully-working build.

I know there are a lot of bugs and I am working to fix them, but I cannot resist adding new features every time, so I will do both at the same time! 

This build does not feature everything I did so far, it just has:
 - building placement
 - pipo AI choices
 - pipos working their arses off

Here is the link to the file:Pipo 0.0.1
Please notice it runs only under Windows.

If you need instructions:
 - use right click to look around
 - use scroll wheel to zoom
 - left click on a pipo or building to get information
 - left click on Buildings->BuildingName to build that building (I like to repeat myself)
 - left click on a Pipo, then right click on a building to send him working there
 - just because it is a dev build, you can press the spacebar to have time advance!

(I know corn is not working, by the way)


And here is the changelog:
08/11/2011
   System
      Night time checking

   Pipos
      Increased AI scope
      - meaningful choices based on needs
      - need increase/decrease 2-way matrix
      - need increase/decrease arrays for different purposes
      
      Initial improved movement study
      - based on terrain gradient (slopes)

   Misc
      Various bug fixes

07/11/2011

   System
      Better resource availability checking

   Pipos
      Pipos consume Corn while eating
      Pipos get hungry if no corn is available

   Buildings
      Added Clock Tower (altough it is not working)
      Added Village Center

   Menus
      Fixed building and pipo cards

[Catman]

Check the first post, a new build is available (UPLOADING AT THE MOMENT)!

I will be writing two changelogs from now on, one concerning the development work and the other concerning what is put inside the build!

I am considering what to do for save games, I read around that the Serializing trick should be good and will look into that!

I am also thinking about jow buildings will be earned in-game, I have three ideas:
  - Research-based, Pipos can research technologies, much like in Civilization, and thus new buildings and jobs will be available!
  - Achievement-based, build X buildings, reach Z resources and more strange ones, so that you can gain additional buildings!
  - Time-based, after a while they just appear!
 
What do you think?

Here is what is new in the build:
  - building: Clocktower
  - building: Warehouse
  - Pipos bring stuff to the warehouse
  - correct night-day cycle with lights


Here is the development changelog:

   Menu
      Fixed Pipo jobs number in Pipo Menu

   System
      Better creation of building, pipo and resource types
      - can leave blank parts
      - better YAML support
      Better data structures
      More bugfixes

   Buildings
      Added Warehouse
      Fixed Clocktower
      Added light for the night

   Resources
      Resources get amassed in warehouses


   Pipos
      added Monk
      added Confectioner
      added Eating animation

   Terrain
      Fixed Sun movement and lighting

[RCIX]

Wow! This looks really fun, simulation games have always been neat to play with. If an artist doesn't start helping you soon to make this a truly beautiful game to look at as well as play, so help me i'll punch something in the face! (no offense to your programmer art though)

[Catman]

Thank you RCIX, no offense at all since I am indeed a programmer after all and my artsy skills get only this far! I hope the random-taken-from-the-internet textures and extremely low poly meshes do their job of giving the right idea, tho.

I don't know whether I should approach an artist yet, nor exactly what I want to do with this project, I'll see what comes out as time goes!

[Catman]

Sadly, I won't be able to work on Pipo today, at least not on the code, due to lots-a work for my thesis.

However, I have begun reading the "Game AI by example" book and I am finding a few interesting options for pipos' movement and behavior and I will try to work on these next!

Before that, however, I want to add sheep, because everyone loves animals in their game!

[Catman]

Hey there!! I have been quite busy lately and not only with my thesis, but with Xenophonic and Pipo too!

As I said in the last post, I have been researching Game AI, reading books like "Programming Game AI by Example" and lately "Artificial Intelligence for Games". I have chosen to implement some of the techinques in the books and I am converting my system to them, so it will take a bit!

However, I have implemented most of what I wanted and I can safely give you the next build, which actually is more of a tech demo for game AI!

This new build features steering behaviors from Reynolds as well as a new goal-based AI for Animals and Pipos. Pipos aren't yet working, you get just one walking around, because I am converting all the behaviors I have done in the old build for the new system

However, you can appreciate the herd of sheep I put in, tell me if you like it, I think I'll be putting more animals in the game! :D

Check out the first post for the new build!!!

Here is a changelog for the last days:

15/11/2011
   System
      Continued working on AI behaviors
      Neighbor grid for distance-based computations (dramatically increases performance)

      
   Pipo & Animals
      They now have a brain!
                Flocking behavior for Sheep inside!


13/11/2011

   System
      Goal-based AI behaviors - first implementation

11/11/2011

   Animals
      First animal implementation
      Added Sheeps

   Pipos & Animals
      Steering behaviors implemented for better autonomous movement

[Catman]

Back again with an update.

This time, I have been working on Pipo's AI and have transformed all previous behaviors to the new system (apart from the normal Pipo and the Farmer, which I am still working on!)

Apart from that, there are a few new features:
- First implementation of water avoidal
- three animals: Sheep, Cow and Pig (sheeps should flock, tho I disabled the behavior for debugging)
- new Pipo: Hunter! It will go around and kill animals, which will drop stuff! (he should also bring it back, but I'll get to that later)
- Click on terrain and see what resources are underneath (not available in the full game!)
- Debug stuff: press 's' to switch sight on/off and see the sight range of creatures and Pipos. May be a feature later?
- Debug stuff: the red blocks show the neighbor list area around a random Pipo. This of course is just for debug but I needed it there for now


As always, check the first post for the build!


Complete Changelog:

18/11/2011

   Animals
      Added Cow
      Added Pig
   
   Pipo
      Hunter kills animals!
      Miner and Hunter brain ready
      
   Terrain
      Click: show resources underneath



17/11/2011

   Pipo & Animals
      Pipo and Builder brains ready
      Sight property (AI enabled)
       - determines what a Pipo or Animal can see and interact with
      Life property (AI enabled)
       - sheep can die now!
      Pipo actions shown in their card
      New Pipo: Hunter
      Water avoidal
            

16/11/2011

   System
      Still working on goals
      Neighbor search - utility functions

   Sheep
      better sheep brain! (still stupid sheep tho)

[Catman]

Hello people!

I have been really busy lately due to deadlines on my thesis, so I have not been able to work on Pipo for  the past days.

I have however made something in the bits of free time I had. I am not posting a new build, but here is the current changelog:


from 19 to 24/11/2011
   Hungry Pipos lose health
   Pipos can DIE! (now the game is getting difficult!)
   Life info shown in cards
   Added death animations
   
   First achievements! (Why this? I think I may tie achievements to research and development of new technologies in the game. Otherwise, just for the sake of it, they sure don't ruin anything.   )


If anyone reads this, since I got not a lot of time for work, I think this would be a nice time for discussion on gameplay and design, so feel free to ciritcize or suggest stuff you'd like to see, even about stuff I mentioned in the last posts!