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[György Straub]

SPACE GARDEN PUNCHONAUT
Current version: v1.00a
Final compo version v0.96a
(GameJolt Quickplay ready + downloadable for Win32 & OS X)

Entering PopCap country in 3 -- 2 -- 1.



It's a Tetroidvania, basically (with not a whole load of emphasis on the vania bit), written in C++ / SDL / OpenGL / XRhodes.

Using assets by:

• Arachne (main character + coins)
• KittenEater (veg sprites + chasers)
• im9today (tile frame)
• Melly (backdrop)
• -N (font)
• Wyvern (soundtrack)
• pgil (sound effects)

so far. More to come.

Day 1:
- object hierarchy
- animations
- framework debugging
- visual tweaks and much procrastination

Day 2:
- matchmaking logics complete
- scoring system doesn't make me unhappy
- hurrah! we can now colorkey RGB mode images.

Day 3:
- random selection of n vegetable sprites (based on difficulty)
- new HUD layout including next vegetable
- platforming action implemented!
- animations reimplemented
- player character and some of its abilities is done
- difficulty progression and scoring feels okay
- text messages about game events
- screen rumble
- conversion of palettized mode images to OpenGL textures with transparency
- singularities!

Day 4:
- killed prototype; that's mostly everything except for the visuals (Explosions, GameMessages). The reason for this is because I've needed a more robust approach to the movement of the vegetables, collision handling, and animation handling. I've started to build stuff up from the platforming side. The collisions and the animations now work perfectly. The rest will have be copy-pasted, but I expect blood splatters.

Day 5-6-7-8-
- collision detection fixed
- animation fixed
- player interactions fixed
- lives and dying done
- SPOILER added
- credits roll added
- variable difficulty and complexity added
- new HUD
- demo numero uno

Days 9 - 12
- not a whole lot of time for updates, however the game is still ON.
- implemented a bonus system, where you collect coins and can get different events (singularity, time freeze, extra life, and whatever else I can think of until deadline).
- sound effects, baby!
- preparing the code for the implementation of the two player cooperative mode.
- small tweaks

Days 13 - 26
- cooperative multiplayer implemented.
- some bugs swatted, including the ominous texture loading one.
- intro, title and credits states implemented
- main menu with settings; music and sfx volume, windowed / full screen modes
- pause / unpause

Day 27
- fixed music volume bug
- fixed landing on falling vegetables bug
- fixed speed / framerate bug
- added config file and config save/load functionality
- play area size is smaller

Day 28: v0.93a
- got highscore table!
- got tile frame around play area!
- tuned rumble effect
- SPOILERS' fadeout fixed
- further adjusted timing -- only 180 updates per sec.
- play area back to normal. spawn frequency increased. some initial vegetables added.

Day 29: v0.94a
- revamped bonus system, then tweaked it for some more (the chance for getting coins now depends on the number of vegs cleared off simultaneously)
- tweaked the color of the bonus coins and the transparency on the vegetable tiles.
- added a surprise bonus event
- revamped the tractor field, then tweaked it for some more (shorter delay, delay depends on the horizontal distance of the closest veg).
- fixed Chasers' fadeout and added an explosion to indicate Chasers' expiry.
- put SGP up on GameJolt.

Day 31: v0.95a
- abolished complexity option. complexity is fixed at 7. highscore format is changed to reflect this.
- some minor tweaks (mostly on the framework side; resource management & c.)

Day 32 - 35: v0.96a
- XRhodes' texturing model has been destroyed and recreated in favor of a more robust and faster approach.
- main menu bug fixed.
this is the final release before deadline.

Day x^2: v0.97a
Bezzy suggested wall jump and animation of the punched vegetables to indicate how they move into their new positions. It is done! (OSX version to follow soon.)

TODO:
- got a few bugs and anomalies left to fix. these are not very annoying or inconvenient, but still.
- internet highscores?

[Crackerblocks]

0 google results for "tetroidvania". I think you're on to something special.
 

[György Straub]

0 google results for "tetroidvania". I think you're on to something special.
 

I've implemented the colorkey -> OpenGL transparency stuff (as of now, only for RGB images), which is yayness. (I've killed OS X only twice, corrupting the video memory.)

Right now I can't resist the temptation to post a screenshot. And have some sleep.

[György Straub]

bump. I've managed to do oodles today. new screenshot, not very different, you know this kind of game.

[KittenEater]

I don't even like Tetris that much, and this looks cool. "Punchonaut" sounds like the best kind of naut to me.

also, maybe this is just me, but the transparent teal playfield could stand to be a little bit brighter, or possibly have an opaque frame around it, so we know where the fields ends are, you know? 

[György Straub]

I don't even like Tetris that much, and this looks cool. "Punchonaut" sounds like the best kind of naut to me.

also, maybe this is just me, but the transparent teal playfield could stand to be a little bit brighter, or possibly have an opaque frame around it, so we know where the fields ends are, you know? 

Hey, thanks! And also for the highly awesome vegetables.=) I wonder what use did you have in mind for them?=)

I'll build a proper 'frame' around the playfield, using someone's tileset, I just wanted to get the game mechanics done. I guess I'll still keep the transparency thing.

[KittenEater]

Sounds good, dude! :>

[Pencerkoff]

Hello this is Pencerkoff

Very good use of those fruits and veggies.  I hope you take the retarded eggplant and do something funny with him in the gameplay, like he randomly explodes or something.

It's also nice to see a puzzle game out there, these rouge-likes are giving me cancer.

-PENCERKOFF

[György Straub]

New day, new life.  Yesterday I had to redo almost the whole bloody game from scratch because things got VERY messy.

I also realized that I suck at animation( logic)s. I wonder what the hell stuff like GM and MMF use to handle these action based animations, cause it must be a friggin' bliss. Of course, google is my friend (and so is yours), and I've found an antedeluvian article (from 1995(!)) on action based animations, must be of interest to others like me.

It did help a lot, so thank you, Diana Gruber.

Hello this is Pencerkoff

Very good use of those fruits and veggies.  I hope you take the retarded eggplant and do something funny with him in the gameplay, like he randomly explodes or something.

It's also nice to see a puzzle game out there, these rouge-likes are giving me cancer.

-PENCERKOFF

Thanks.

[Wyv]

Ooh, someone's using my stuff.

This one looks very interesting, I'm a fan of both puzzle games and platformers, can't wait to see what'll come out of it! I don't have the slightest clue how platforming will be incorporated, looking at the screenshot you provided, unless it'll be something like Eggo Mania. Definitely gonna keep an eye on this thread!

[György Straub]

Ooh, someone's using my stuff.

'cause it's awesome. 

This one looks very interesting, I'm a fan of both puzzle games and platformers, can't wait to see what'll come out of it! I don't have the slightest clue how platforming will be incorporated, looking at the screenshot you provided, unless it'll be something like Eggo Mania. Definitely gonna keep an eye on this thread!

I'm glad you like it, it's not so much EggoMania than Wario's Woods (which it isn't very much either... anyways).

I'm about to post a playable engine demo this weekend, I just have to round it up a bit. On that note, if any of you guys want to be credited in your civil name, please pm it to me.

Cheers!

[György Straub]

the first gameplay demo is out. the difficulty (minimum number of vegetables to be matched to score) and complexity (number of vegetable varieties) levels are fixed at 4 / 5 respectively.

controls:
LEFT - left
RIGHT - up (no, it's right)
A - jump
S - punch (use it on landed vegetables, you can push a single veg, or shift a group of them  in the direction of the punch)
D - pull (hold down to pull the closest falling vegetable towards you)

M - music pause / resume
F - FPS on / off

[KittenEater]

Problem! I loaded the game and unzipped it, clicked on the .exe, and then it wouldn't start. Or rather, it brought up a small batch(maybe?) file, then closed itself in less than a second. Is there a reason for this, or perhaps is it a bug you didn't catch?

[György Straub]

Problem! I loaded the game and unzipped it, clicked on the .exe, and then it wouldn't start. Or rather, it brought up a small batch(maybe?) file, then closed itself in less than a second. Is there a reason for this, or perhaps is it a bug you didn't catch?

is that v0.80a or v0.81a? if you've got an stderr.txt file complaining about an assertion in astro.cpp, then it's most likely the bug I've fixed for v0.81a, could you try that one?

EDIT: sorry, that'll be stdout.txt

[KittenEater]

Well, it is v0.81a, and the error about an assertion is in the stderr.txt file, not the stdout.txt file.

edit: doesn't say anything about astro.cpp in it, though.

[György Straub]

edit: doesn't say anything about astro.cpp in it, though.

what does it say?

edit edited for editness: what windows version are you on and what OpenGL support does it have? (nothing brutal is needed, but you might run into problems if your vga drivers are aulde)

[KittenEater]

ERROR: Failed to create surface due to an OpenGL error: 0
Assertion failed: pTex.GetRefCount() > 0, file D:\My Dropbox\development\XRhodes\slicer.cpp, line 234

abnormal program termination

and I'm running on Windows 2000. I don't know what version of OpenGL it's supporting, but I can only assume it's the latest one...

[György Straub]

ERROR: Failed to create surface due to an OpenGL error: 0
Assertion failed: pTex.GetRefCount() > 0, file D:\My Dropbox\development\XRhodes\slicer.cpp, line 234

abnormal program termination

and I'm running on Windows 2000. I don't know what version of OpenGL it's supporting, but I can only assume it's the latest one...

I really appreciate you helping out with the bughunt.

=( The executable was built with on a Vista config, I'm not sure how does that affect the compatibility with earlier Windows versions -- the game did run on an XP config, flawlessly, but I have no access to 2K. I'm guessing it should be alright.

The OpenGL error is a puzzle, as the 0 stands for OpenGL's no-error code. But from the message and what you've said (only the console window shows for a split second then it's closed) I have to guess that OpenGL can't be initialized correctly. Any idea what video card are you using?

Obligatory editliciousness: I wonder if anyone else is running into the same error?

[KittenEater]

ATI 9500 pro.

...You built this on a Vista machine? The problem might just be that my computer is too old. Stupid thing is pretty buggy anyway. So maybe I could just play it on a different computer, it'd be no problem to me, though it might to others.

edit: Just tried playing it on my laptop which does have XP, and it gets the same error on it. The laptop isn't very stable, though, so it's almost expected.

[Skab]

nice demo !
osx version works just fine !