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[QuadrupleA]

A little prototype game developed over the course of a month - you're a submarine miner attempting to fulfill your life's dream of earning $2,816 in the oceanic mining business.

It's a bit of a homage to Terraria and Miner Dig Deep, along with some other random influences - if you know what you're doing it can be completed in about an hour.

Controls:

   Move: WASD / arrows
   Use selected weapon: Left mouse
   Select weapon quickslot: Number keys 1-5
   Choose block for block placer: Click a block in inventory
   Eat Shrimp Snax: Click it in the inventory
   Load/save menu: Esc

Gameplay notes:

* Selling Copper Ore, Quartz Ore, and Gold Ore unlocks better drills and items, including a shrimp proximity zapper.
* Discolored terrain blocks contain hidden items.
* Gold Drill is the best, and is ridiculously overpowered.
* You get a special reward on earning $2816.

The main intention was to prototype gameplay and learn a bit about these types of games, so I didn't put much effort into graphics and sound.  If anyone digs it (no pun intended) or thinks it has potential, let me know - I might consider making a larger, more polished version of it down the line with a lot more items, enemies, biomes, gameplay mechanics, etc.

For those who like modding, almost everything in the game is defined in .json files in the "Content/Prefabs" folder - go nuts

Download the .zip file (2.98 MB) at:

http://www.quadruplea.com/  (click Download Now underneath the screenshots)

[QuadrupleA]

No downloads... sigh... another month gone to waste

[eigenbom]

Didn't play it but by the idea definitely has potential. I think with a nice coat of paint you'd get some more interest.

[QuadrupleA]

Yeah - in the past I've polished the hell out of games as I went, but they ended up spiraling into huge overambitious projects (e.g. the Procedural Metroid Game ). Feel like I'm too much of a noob still to commit multiple years of my life to a single game like that.

So been planning to do some smaller 1-month type projects, to improve my gameplay and game design chops - but I guess when the graphics suck nobody's inclined to delve into the gameplay .

[Indievelopper]

Hey dude!

I've looked at some of the games you made (didn't play it though, only watched screenshots).
There's something with the graphic style that seemed weird. Most element taken apart looks good enough, but I think they don't "vibe" together. I couldn't get to pinpoint exactly what was wrong, but I think I kind of got it now. Maybe you shouldn't try to bring realism to that sort of game. When I saw the thumbnail of the Procedural Metroid Game, I thought it was looking beautiful, but upon seeing the actual screenshots I lost all interest just because it was 3D. Well, it's my point of view anyway.
If I were you, i'd use contrasted, maybe more saturated 2d tiles or something. 

[QuadrupleA]

Thanks for the feedback - yeah, I agree there's something the Metroid game that's a little stale visually - some more contrasting colors on the individual screens might help maybe. I kinda like the pseudo-3D - it's actually normal mapped 2d sprites, a fairly uncommon technique. I'm definitely a programmer first and an artist second though - might be biting off more than I can chew trying to be good at all of them.

The SubMiner game intentionally looks like ass, but is actually built on a solid, pretty advanced C++ engine - just scrolled through the screenshots again today though and could see how people would see those and think "ehh, it's gonna be buggy crap from some overenthusiastic drooling teenager". That's what I'd think anyway

[eigenbom]

Yeah if I were you I'd go through and do a simple set of sprites, say a four colour palette and big pixels. Then make all the UI consistent. Even if its just a short project, its worth the extra effort to make it attractive to people to play, so they can experience this advanced engine of yours.

The problem with having more complex sprites like the ones you've got is that they look like crap unless you are an expert or spend way too much time on them. Find a simple graphics style that you can re-use in other games too.

[QuadrupleA]

I guess I worry that the pixel art style is so overused - that's why I've stayed away from it so far. People still seem to love it, and I guess I do too - but my instinct is to want to find something unique and visually different.

[eigenbom]

It's such a broad style you can definitely make it your own. But it was only a suggestion, there are other ways to have a clean, simple and tight aesthetic: simple shapes like in geometry wars, sketches that are cut-out and animated simply, ascii-art, etc. The key thing is to keep the primitives simple enough so that you can maintain consistency across the whole thing, without having to spending a lot of time on the art assets. anyways GL!

[QuadrupleA]

True - pixel art covers a lot of possibilities. Been thinking a lot about developing a personal visual style, that I can reuse and improve over time - maybe for my project-o'-the-month this month I'll port my normal-mapped 2d engine to C++ from the Metroid game, see where I can go with that style.

Anyway thanks for the input.

Intrigued by your moonman game - hope to take a peek at the alpha tonight.

[eigenbom]

np

[moi]

welcome to tigsource, where a hip mockup is celebrated one million times more than a game that doesn't have pixel art graphics

[Cunnah]

I have a few suggestions on your art style;

1. You could either make your non block graphics more blocky or give each of your block tiles an uneven edge.

2. the background is a little...teal. It can work but perhaps you could give all your graphics a teal tint so they look like they are all sitting in water as opposed to hovering in mid air.

3. give the play area some context. Not sure how you would do this but perhaps make the mine-able blocks look like they are part of a cave structure by having background blocks that would form the walls of the caves. Perhaps give them an even more teal appearance so it looks like they are fading into the background?

Anyhow all I can say is don't give up! Something I could do with living by.

[moi]

I finished the game, nice prototype, I liked the progression, needs more things to explore

[QuadrupleA]

I have a few suggestions on your art style;

Hey - so with this one, it's actually a gameplay prototype - I only spent about 2 hours of the entire month on graphics, so they definitely look like ass. It could use smooth cornered edge tiles and tile frames, parallax backgrounds, gradient color transitions at different depths, bubble particles and subtle things in the foreground, warp post process for an underwater effect, etc.

If I decide to make it into a full game I'd probably use my normal-mapped lighting engine (ala Let's Play with Ants and Procedural Metroid Game) and maybe incorporate light as a game mechanic.

[QuadrupleA]

I finished the game, nice prototype, I liked the progression, needs more things to explore

Thanks man! You're literally the first person to play it in the couple months since I posted - nice to hear, the no-plays was a bit discouraging. And agreed, more things to explore would be good - more enemies, weapons, items, variety in the biomes, etc.

[pl1x]

Your graphics are quit simple. But I don't like the style too much. I would increase your graphics a bit! Gameplay is good. I think. There are a lot of thinks to approve but I stay tuned and follow your project!

Cheers!
- Marcel

[QuadrupleA]

Hey Marcel - thanks for playing and for the feedback. If I decide to expand the prototype into a full game I'll definitely keep this thread up to date and let you know.

[framk]

If I were you - which I'm not, mind you - I would go for an art style that incorporated a more vibrant underwater look. I would love to see something dynamic, rather than just a blank blue texture for the water. As a person on a mac, (and occasionally linux) I would be more willing to play it if it were cross platform. I will happily support this project, however. Don't get discouraged!

[QuadrupleA]

Thanks - yeah, this was a gameplay-focused prototype, so I deliberately made the graphics as bad as possible.