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[Jimbob]

Hey, started making a game for a competition. Here's what we entered.



Download (1.35Mb)

- Good ol' platforming action
- S'only four levels and only the main game works (i.e. no Time Attack as the menu shows)
- You've got a sword and you're not afraid to use it

My main concern is that I've been told it runs like a dog... that's been run over.
So I'd like to hear if it's true for everyone. I get it on level 4, but not the others generally. Gotta see if I can fix it up (although as of right now, I haven't done any of the code, but it's in MMF2).

And if it ain't slow, I challenge you to get 100% for all three things (coins, enemies, health) on level 3. Just for fun.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

Yeah, it felt like 10fps on my computer, too slow to play with any degree of fun, so I stopped it part way into the first level.

My computer's stats:

2ghz CPU
64 MB videocard
1 GB Ram

[Guert]

Hey there!
I downloaded it and tried it for a couple of seconds. It seems to run ok on my cpu.
1.6 ghz, 960 mo Ram, AMD processor, ATI video card

ANyway, I'll play more and I'll post my thoughts.
Take care!

[DrDerekDoctors]

For a competition thing it ain't bad but it really suffers from levels where you can't tell what's solid and what ain't, unresponsive controls when you're trying to hit a person you just bounced off the head of and a lack of variety. Tbf, that last one is symptomatic of not having long to make the game, though.

Potential, but unfulfilled at the moment. And it ran fine for me until I got killed and then it dropped frames all over the shop as I popped into the air.

[Jimbob]

Which parts did you have trouble with determining what was solid or not?
I kinda agree with the 'wait' you have after bouncing off an enemy, I did notice that. I think it's the little recovery from the fall. I did like that initially, but I guess it's also a pain in that circumstance.

And that 10fps is quite worrying as well. Thanks for trying it though.
I know a simple 2D platformer shouldn't run slow on a 2GHz computer, I'll see what I can do. I wanted it to be generally quite fast, hence the skiddy behaviour and the (at the moment unavailable) Time Attack mode, so this is not good news.

[DrDerekDoctors]

Some ceilings at the start, basically. I was hitting my head on things I didn't think I should have. I got used to it, but some use of shadow for underhangs wouldn't go amiss.

[Xion]

Hey, man, you got it backwards! When you run and turn around, you don't want to slide farther forward before turning around than if you had just let the key go, know what I mean?
Some collisions are too sensitive: like when you go to jump up onto a platform from beneath, but the gettin' up space is only as wide as your character? Yeah. I really think I shouldn't miss twice before getting it. But then again, that might be me sucking.
And I agree with Doc Derek Docs about the ceiling thing.

The lights just flickered, I think a storm is coming. Post...and bye!

[Guert]

Hey!
I'll try to make this brief...

First of all, we have problems controlling the character. As mentionned earlier, the character should slide because it's trying to go on the opposite side, not as if he was breaking to stop. Second the animation of the dog looks weird, as if it's marching with a world war 2 military step. Maybe that's intended but this walk is not very believable. Then, as mentionned earlier again, we can't tell where we can or cannot go. The player must always know whats the background and what's not. Also, we can't really tell what we can break or not. Why can we break vases but not barrels? And why are there vases on barrels in the first place? You have to provide answers to all those questions to the player as they play.

Then, we move on to fighting. How can we outwit our enemy? It seems that the only way to defeat them is to run straght for them and hit before they can. Most of the time, they hit you back meaning that you can defeat 3-4 enemies top. If you decide to wait for abattle, they'll block every move you make. The only efficient way i found is to wait until one has it's back turned and run like hell to stab him. Can't help to feel that this is not a true way to fight, specialy for a fencer like the hero of the game Also, it seems that you can jump on their helmets. I dunno, I naturaly tried to kill them with swords instead, so perhaps using a different appraoch at first like not having a sword and then find one so people know they can defend themsleves by jumping on the helmets... Just a thought.

The helmets left on the ground is a nice touch tho
Post when you got a new version!
Guert

 

[Xion]

Guert: I believe the strategy to beat enemies is to either hit them from behind or jump on their heads to stun them, then strike...?

Also, the barrels are like a pixel smaller than the boxes, and with such pixel-perfect collision detection, you can't walk from on top of a barrel to a box when they're right next to each other.

When you fall, and the character touches the bottom of the screen 'cuz the camera ain't fast enough, it's got this jagged sort of hasty "I'm trying to catch up to the player!" thing going on.

I can't turn around when facing away from an adjacent destructible obstruction.

Unexpected 1-hit death from the gun = not very fun.

That thing with the barrel-box? Yeah, that happens with the jars, too.

You can't kill the gunners unless they're stunned, even if you're right there?

BTW, I'm typing this stuff as I find it.
I should be doing my math homework.

[Jimbob]

Thanks for trying it, all the peeps that have. I'm possibly going to rebuild it from the ground up again because there's a lot to think about and it was very rushed from the outset.

RE: Fighting
Yeh, I've been discussing this with a few people and I don't want the fighting to be too frustrating, but I also don't want it to be a case of just run up and attack without any danger. I'm considering having a more Prince of Persia style of fighting, where you can parry or attack, but I don't know if the extra button would confuse more people. I'd also have it so that you can bounce on their heads and do a 'low' bounce somehow (by pressing down or by simply not having the jump button held) to make it less frustrating to defeat them that way. I suppose making their reactions a bit more predictable or structured would work as well.

Any other ideas? I've not really played a platform game other than Prince of Persia that has any sort of duelling mechanism.

The gunners and vasedroppers were added quite late on in the game, hence the few little quirks (immediate death and dodgy killing method) that will definitely be fixed in the next version.

RE: Movement
I didn't actually realise the extra sliding existed from running until you pointed it out. I quite like the slippy nature of his movement because he is little fox and much quicker than everything else in the game, but I can tone it down a little as a lot of people have mentioned it so far. The other things are just general bugs we didn't have time to fix.

RE: The actual game
Initially I just wanted to make a simple platform game (the aim of the competition was simply to create a little mascot with a game) which is an excuse (haha) for the seeming lack of variety or the reason why collectables don't do anything yet. To turn the game into a more interesting prospect I was going to turn the whole thing into a time attack, where certain actions (collecting coins, stunning or killing enemies) would gain you extra seconds on the clock to finish a particular level, that could carry on to the next stage. This is the reason each level at the moment has a few ways of getting across it, some ways are easier but have less coins and take longer, some have more enemies and are harder, and you can use the enemies for a couple of shortcuts in the game. Times and progression could be stored to let the player get better (admittedly I just got this idea from the Stock thing from Immortal Defense, cheers Rinku ) and get extra time for the later levels.

So right now the levels do need tinkering with (I guess graphically a little as well, you picky sods ) to make them more appropriate for this mode, but I hope you catch my drift (like if you look at level 2, you can take the quick route with few coins under the bridge, or the longer route with enemies and coins to get over the bridge).

Anyway, thanks again for trying it out. I'm sure the next version won't disappoint you quite as much...

[Guert]

Don't get yourself down. For what I understand, you did this relatively quickly in order to enter it in a competition. I'm pretty sure that if you take a second round at designing the concepts you'll have something more solid.

For the fighting, perhaps you could make it that the player has to hit the enemy 2 times. Once to parry an attack and the second to attack the stunned enemy. So, baiscally, you'd have the player and the nemy standing, the enemy tries to attack the player and the player attacks. The attack is parried, the enemy is stunned and wide open for an attack. You could have enemies that can only be doged, such as some wielding big axes, those with guns would have to reload between shots (y'know, with the powder and all), and so forth... I don't believe that jumping on the enemy to stun them is a bad thing but I feel like it's not properly introduced to us.

I feel like the sliding lenght is okay, I'd just make the fox look in the direction i pressed rather than looking forward then look the direction I pressed. Just pop a mario game and you'll see what I mean.

Keep it up!
Guert 

[sega]

I think the sliding length has problems in itself.  It's strange that the fox will slide further when you press the opposite direction than if you just let go of the keyboard, or even change directions in mid-air.  This inconsistency in motion can feel bad to players on a subconscious level, or in the case of this forum, a conscious one.  Guert makes a good point about the character looking in the direction you're pressing.  Even if you just change his head, I think it'd make a difference.

And like someone else said, it's hard to see what's background and what's foreground.  For instance, one big problem is on the first stage right after the first enemy.  There's a box behind a fence which looks to be connected to the background building.  The player wouldn't expect to be able to interact with that fence, let alone anything behind it.  And even if it were in front of the fence, perhaps the interactive objects should have higher contrast.  The characters have black outlines, which really makes them stand out.  maybe the same can be done for barrels and boxes?  Or at least make the outlines higher contrast.  The platforms on the buildings have SUPER low contrast.  Low contrast implies distance from the camera.  It also tells the user to ignore it.

Now on the good side, I like the paralax scrolling, and I always dig pixel art.  I used MMF2 before too, and like it.  However, on some machines, it seems to chug, and it doesn't like full screen transparency on any machine (I've had it slow down on dual core 64 bit systems using full screen transparency), so I mainly use it for quick prototyping.  Your game is cool though.  Keep it up, and good luck with the competition!

[Robotacon]

Great game!

The graphics did a lot for the game.
The sound effects for jumping and landing was annoying though.

I liked the game mechanics a lot. Also it was nice to play a game that doesn't explain everything you have to do. It took a while before I found out I could jump on things and break other things.

I didn't find anything wrong about the slide, at first, but you shouldn't slide longer when you turn around than if you just halt and then run the other way.

I enjoyed the fencing quite a bit. With even more AI for the guards it would be a game winner. Great work so far. I think a guard killed me once by hitting my sword though.

I liked that you could look-ahead but I don't think the screen should scroll back unless you walk the other way. Also it would be great if you could look-ahead without having to walk against something.

/ Robo

[Shabadage]

Swords + Attack Combo's (even as simple as the one in Ninjuken) = Win .  I know a deeper combat system would definately draw me into this game for more than a quick 5 minutes or so.

How about making what attack you do relative to what direction you're pressing?  L/R + Attack = Normal Attack, U + Attack = Big swing, D + Attack = Parry.  Someting like that maybe?