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[jddg5wa]

At this rate I'm going to be considered a spammer, my first and second post mentioning the game I'm working on. But I just couldn't wait to post in here. I've been wanting to keep track of my game progress online but my blog is not up and running yet. This should hold me over until then, at the point I finish my blog, I'll just have two places to post.  


Storyline Rough Draft:
You play as an alien that crash landed on earth while trying to collect some "thing/s" as a mission from your mother ship. You need to fix your ship as you don't have enough power to escape the atmosphere that one thing you need is somewhere deep in the human cities. Of course the humans are afraid of your presence. They try to make contact with you but your ships transcommunicator is still broken from the crash so it jumbles all the signals. Something gets through to the humans but it sounds menacing and evil. At this point the humans are even more afraid and decide the only logical thing to do is attack. You try to steer clear of the human weapons but you can't stay away forever.

After a while of running your tired and just want to leave planet earth so you decide it is ok to break a few rules in the case of your own safety. This turns to you abducting everything and anything to get where your headed, the location of part to fix your ship and leave the planet. The only problem is that your ship is weak and so you need to upgrade as you go salvaging parts from the items that you abducted. This way you can have enough power to abduct, and be protected from, bigger and more powerful things.

Currently this is where the story stands. I would like to add in more features besides abducting items and characters for levels on end. There is also no ending as I have no clue where to head with that. I'd like it to be open ended, for possible sequels and bonus levels, but still sort of "end" when you get the item you wanted and can escape the atmosphere. We'll see where the story goes. It's gonna be a ride!


So far I have some sprites, a working test of the tractor beam, and a story idea. I am making this game in gamemaker 8.1, soon to be upgrading to gamemaker: studio.



Click Sprites to See High Resolution



I'll be fleshing out the story next, a list of levels, and potential gameplay features. I am also thinking of remaking the human characters. Their simplistic shapes don't match the detail that the environment will have.

[jddg5wa]

I got the UFO controls down for the most part; landing gear, tractor beam, and movement. Movement now consists of rotation which I got all figured out too, took a while. There may be some tweaking here and there but I like how it is right now. Except I did realize that the landing gear does not retract but instead disappears before the next sprite. I need to work on fixing that before moving on.







I've also added some new props and made modification to previous ones.


Updates:
• Gave shop a hardware sign
• Updated perspective of UFO
• Gave humans and alien mouths.
• Added new house, fire hydrant, and mailman

[Games Inquirer]

Looks neat.

[Udderdude]

The art looks pretty cute, good luck with it.

I'd change the citizen's yellow spandex outfit though ..

[jddg5wa]

Ha thanks, can't say I thought of cute while making the sprites but I guess it works.

I'm actually planning on redesigning the human characters so that they look more realistic. When I first made them I was happy with the round shape but I was also just being a bit lazy. Now that I've been putting a lot of work into other parts of the game I though I might put as much work into the humans also. I'm thinking of getting to those next once I have the standalone alien sprite designed.

[skrjablin]

Hey, a game where you play an alien that has crash landed on Earth... I'm making one of those too... this one has more promising graphics though! 

I wonder how the complex stages of storyline are supposed to happen though. Will you just be informed by some alert box when you have played for some time, that the objectives have totally changed? Or will it happen sort of organically?

[Kyle O]

This to me, really seems to hearken back to the 90s... Is it just me, or did cows seem to get abducted more often back then?

[OniWorld]

Hey, a game where you play an alien that has crash landed on Earth... I'm making one of those too... this one has more promising graphics though! 

Graphics don't create a game, keep going at yours

I love simple little ideas like this. Personally I think that you should move away from game maker and learn to program as soon as possible. You could put a game like this on mobile devices (iPad, iPhone etc) and it could get addictive if done right. People seem to love playing games that don't require time on their commute to work!

My advice is to port this to Flash (AS3) using either the Flash IDE (shudders) or FlashDevelop and then using Adobe Air you can compile this game for mobiles. If you make it really touch friendly, you could be onto a winner. Hell, even if it's just a hobby and you don't want money from it releasing it for free and being able to say "Yep, I have a popular game on the app store" would be awesome. Take it from as guy that's made loads of games and then never released.

I love the fluidity of the UFO by the way, really makes the game feel more "juicy". Keep at it!

[jddg5wa]

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

Hey, a game where you play an alien that has crash landed on Earth... I'm making one of those too... this one has more promising graphics though!  

I agree with OniWorld, you should keep at it! While graphics are an important aspect they aren't everything. Good luck with your project!

I love simple little ideas like this. Personally I think that you should move away from game maker and learn to program as soon as possible. You could put a game like this on mobile devices (iPad, iPhone etc) and it could get addictive if done right. People seem to love playing games that don't require time on their commute to work!

My advice is to port this to Flash (AS3) using either the Flash IDE (shudders) or FlashDevelop and then using Adobe Air you can compile this game for mobiles. If you make it really touch friendly, you could be onto a winner. Hell, even if it's just a hobby and you don't want money from it releasing it for free and being able to say "Yep, I have a popular game on the app store" would be awesome. Take it from as guy that's made loads of games and then never released.

I love the fluidity of the UFO by the way, really makes the game feel more "juicy". Keep at it!

I totally agree about moving away from gamemaker and learning to program. The problem is that it would take me forever to get my first game out because I wouldn't just be learning game design but instead also the programming. I used to think that using gamemaker was cheating myself but I talked myself into using gamemaker just so I would get a game created. After all I have a larger idea that couldn't use gamemaker but decided I needed to make smaller games to learn. I'm also planning on going back to college to learn programming so I won't be sticking with gamemaker forever.

Also can't you port gamemaker games to iOS? At least that was my plan all along.
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And I will leave the comment with this! Had to rewrite the code for the ship because I broke it and rewriting code was the easiest way to fix. In the process I added in some finishing touches. I'm planning on adding eye movement but to make it look better I may redraw the alien character in a front facing perspective. We'll see what happens.  

[OniWorld]

I totally agree about moving away from gamemaker and learning to program. The problem is that it would take me forever to get my first game out because I wouldn't just be learning game design but instead also the programming. I used to think that using gamemaker was cheating myself but I talked myself into using gamemaker just so I would get a game created. After all I have a larger idea that couldn't use gamemaker but decided I needed to make smaller games to learn. I'm also planning on going back to college to learn programming so I won't be sticking with gamemaker forever.

You'd have to learn game design with game maker aswell. Of course it'll be a big struggle, but it'll pay off in the end. Don't bother with going to college to learn to code, you'll never learn that way. People on my course at college (UK) before I left only ever programmed in lessons and for coursework, thinking that they'll learn that way. Most of them wanted to be game programmers. The teacher we had wasn't the best either - in my opinion nobody but yourself can teach you to program. It requires hours infront of the computer focusing on one thing - that was easy for me growing up (been programming since I was 10), as I had nothing to do after school but go on my computer, didn't care much for a social life.

It's paid off though, I'm only 18 now but I'm earning a good wage working freelance in my own hours and developing my own games. No school, college or university has taught me to code or do anything similar - infact when I got to college I skipped pretty much every lesson because I learned what everyone else was being taught when I was about 12 years old. Moral of the story is, don't delay because of time - it doesn't matter how long it takes aslong as you get there. Learning to program isn't just learning to code, it's developing yourself into someone who is logical, observant and dedicated, which you can apply to anything in life. You also learn a lot more along the way than syntax and algorithms which most people seem to think programming is.

You'll benefit alot more from learning to code in general and for games than learning game maker.

</inspiringpost>

Also can't you port gamemaker games to iOS? At least that was my plan all along.

I honestly have no idea, maybe you can now. I haven't used it or even looked at it in years.

[jddg5wa]

You'll benefit alot more from learning to code in general and for games than learning game maker.

Yea but I think at this point I'm not using gamemaker to learn programming. I'm more on a goal to just create a game. Having to learn how to program has been what was holding me back. I am fluent in a few minor languages, html and css and some javascript, but nothing much else. I understand the self teach aspect as I taught myself 3D and graphic design.

I've also tried to teach myself programming and taken programming classes, to say I like the classes way more because I had a teacher I could ask for help and get quicker feedback. It made the process a lot easier. Plus I am not one of those people who just does things in class, especially if I enjoy them, so I am sure there would be a lot of programming outside of classes. I'm still debating if I want to go back to school for programming, I have to look into it more before deciding.
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The eye's have it!  


I've also realized a way that I can make the eye look in all directions and will be testing with that later. Was previously using animation for 360 eye movement but it was too jerky. Anyways will be finishing the animations by Sunday so that I can move onto the physics and abduction aspect of the vehicle.

[somin]

love they darting eye movement gives him a lot of life imo.

[jddg5wa]

love they darting eye movement gives him a lot of life imo.

Thanks!



Now pardon me for one moment...
Demo Demo Demo DEMO!  

Ok, thanks for waiting... I am back on earth now. So this demo shows the finished abduction and landing gear gameplay features which are most important to the game. I decided that finishing these features were ground enough to release a small demo instead a gif. There is still not much to the game but I hope you enjoy what the demo does contain.

I've also decided a working name, "AbductEarth!", which may change as the game progresses.

Check it out!
http://www.filedropper.com/abductearthdemo

Let me know what you think! If you happen to come across glitches, please do point them out, it helps a lot.


And some gifs, they can do the wave!


And some landing gear.