I've been getting some solid development time over the Christmas break. Can't wait to get to combat fx:
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Screenshot Saturday and also a new year. Someone was sick of just stills, so I made a couple of short videos
Combat is almost where I want it. Maybe some fiddling with camera angles and some minor "state" bug (one of which is on the lock on video.)
but I am very happy with how it feels gamewise
Combat is almost where I want it. Maybe some fiddling with camera angles and some minor "state" bug (one of which is on the lock on video.)
but I am very happy with how it feels gamewise
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Back from my break and solved some problems I was struggling with. It's nice to look over my project with fresh eyes. I've got one more programming task left related to audio. After that it's the last push to get the vertical slice done which is: finish drawing the rooms, building puzzles and fleshing out the HISText side of things a tad. Should be fun... hopefully.
Here's what it looks like at the moment. Sorry for the poor quality.
And a little sneak peek.
Here's what it looks like at the moment. Sorry for the poor quality.
And a little sneak peek.
Hey guys, I was wondering: is there any toolset out there that offers good support to raspberry pi, orange pi architecture? Which one is the best?
I'm hoping to take advantage of the Unity Asset Store sale to shore up some items for an upcoming VR project, but I'm embarrassed to say my brain has been scrambled this last week or two and I haven't researched it enough, and the sale ends tonight. I'd like to at least grab a few things that might be helpful.
The project is a bit like Bogo, if you've ever seen that, but with more of a person-like monster companion. A fair bit of dialogue, and some mini-games. The plan is to make this for PC VR, Quest 2, and hopefully Quest 1 if I can work the game into the hardware's limitations. (I've already made a Quest 1 micro-project, so I know it's a tight squeeze.)
Assets are something I'll probably have to sort out on my own (I've been looking at Synty's Polygon series, but I'm not sure how appealing the assets would look close-up in VR), but suggestions for tools, rigged hand models that can be customized, etc. would help a lot.
For example, I was eyeballing this Hand Collision tool, which seemed promising: https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/modeling/auto-hand-vr-165323
Edit: Got some recommendations elsewhere, but suggestions are still welcome.
The project is a bit like Bogo, if you've ever seen that, but with more of a person-like monster companion. A fair bit of dialogue, and some mini-games. The plan is to make this for PC VR, Quest 2, and hopefully Quest 1 if I can work the game into the hardware's limitations. (I've already made a Quest 1 micro-project, so I know it's a tight squeeze.)
Assets are something I'll probably have to sort out on my own (I've been looking at Synty's Polygon series, but I'm not sure how appealing the assets would look close-up in VR), but suggestions for tools, rigged hand models that can be customized, etc. would help a lot.
For example, I was eyeballing this Hand Collision tool, which seemed promising: https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/modeling/auto-hand-vr-165323
Edit: Got some recommendations elsewhere, but suggestions are still welcome.
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Been working on non-coding stuff all vacation like art and music so now that I'm back at work where I code, that means it is time to start coding in my game again
Working on some simple UI stuff cause it's probably the area I'm least happy with atm. Next is a health display meter.
Also should the OT name be updated to 2021?
Working on some simple UI stuff cause it's probably the area I'm least happy with atm. Next is a health display meter.
Also should the OT name be updated to 2021?
I'm doing another Mapcore challenge - been documenting my process in this thread:
And here's where I'm at so far. Am I an enviornment artist yet?
And here's where I'm at so far. Am I an enviornment artist yet?
The cable makes nice set dressing, but if you ever need a more general solution to intersections like that, you could try mesh decals. This is a good example of how they work, and this is how you set them up in Unreal. The cables definitely add to the scene, though, so maybe combining the two things would let you bring that one off wall a bit to match the more natural look of the other one.
Yeah, that's what all of the other details in the scene are! All of that geo is actually flat, I'm using normal map decals to add detail (I mention it in the previous tweet). I just didn't think it would work well on an inner corner (inside corners are usually dirty, but undamaged). That's where artists tend to use blends or those wee skirt things, I just didn't really feel it would fit no texture/no gradient style I was going for. And there's no need to do anything too complicated when a cable works just fine ;D
Edit: but also, thanks for the link! It's great to see a breakdown of mesh skirts too (I want to use them for another project) :)
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Aha, yeah, I noticed that after I took a better look at the thread 😅
But you're definitely right that the cable works fine here. I only wanted to mention it in case you had a situation where you couldn't find a natural prop to cover it. I know what you mean about the inner corner being less damaged but I think if you're using normal decals all over the place anyway, smoothing it somehow is more visually appealing than a razor sharp intersection. This is a quick and dirty test with a decal, and without. It's only a 4 tri mesh with a 1x64 gradient texture, could be worth having just to slap around.
Anyway, nice work so far, good luck with the rest :)
I love how reuseable this is, so I'll probably make one anyway just to use where I need. I also should probably move some of my edge wear to floaters rather than decals (not because this needs to run fast, but it's a good habit to get into).
Here's how stuff is looking now...
Scandinavian dev here - Hi all! :)
I've been working on a project, Beggar's Choice, and I'm at a point where I would like some feedback, before I continue on.
I hope some of you will take the time to give my short demo (10-15 minutes) a try. You can get it here:
beggargame.com
The Beggar can "hide" on a plane behind the bullets
Beggar is a 2D side-scroller, adapting the gameplay from Dark Thorne, and speeding it up, with a larger focus on mobility and player input. Visually it's inspired by several games on the Amiga 500, mainly Shadow of the Beast and Moonstone.
Please give the game a try, and feel free to leave a response in this thread. Thanks!
I've been working on a project, Beggar's Choice, and I'm at a point where I would like some feedback, before I continue on.
I hope some of you will take the time to give my short demo (10-15 minutes) a try. You can get it here:
alpha - Beggars Choice
Thank you for showing interest in Beggar's Choice Beggar's Choice is, for the most part, a one man show. The game is a passion project, still in it's infancy, but with most of it's core systems in place. I hope you'll give this short slice of the game a try - perhaps even report any […]
beggargame.com
The Beggar can "hide" on a plane behind the bullets
Beggar is a 2D side-scroller, adapting the gameplay from Dark Thorne, and speeding it up, with a larger focus on mobility and player input. Visually it's inspired by several games on the Amiga 500, mainly Shadow of the Beast and Moonstone.
Please give the game a try, and feel free to leave a response in this thread. Thanks!
I'm getting close to having a functional demo of Void Marauders so I uploaded a new gameplay video:
It's gonna be tight but I think I'll be able to particiapte in the Steam festival. We'll see if it was worth the effort (well, at least it was good motivation to focus and get stuff done).
It's gonna be tight but I think I'll be able to particiapte in the Steam festival. We'll see if it was worth the effort (well, at least it was good motivation to focus and get stuff done).
(sigh) I know this is annoying vaguebooking, but I miss this thread and really wish I could share my work :( I lurk here a lot and don't really post, but I wanna say that so many of these projects look so cool and I'm really looking forward to playing them!
<3<3<3
<3<3<3
It's perfectly fine, the support is much appreciated. <3
I keep putting this off but we need to make a thread where indie devs ask for general members to try their games. We're usually too busy to try each other's games and we have a developer's mindset anyway and often focus on different things than gamers without a dev background.
Just started a new small project. So excited.
A small story game set in a small british village.
A small story game set in a small british village.
Adding a traditional gibbing effect. It's a skeletal mesh swap in Unreal with a completely new PhAT asset and broken constraint (same as Gears 1 which was also built in Unreal).
It's really rewarding when you finally get some of your systems lined up into a cohesive gameplay element.
It's always important to ponder on the medium stuff in life.
Looking incredibly charming as always. :)
Forgot to share this here! My latest video came out on Sunday and it's all about Unity's character controllers!
Thought I'd share something going wrong...
...and to expand on this, the problems weren't visual - it's rough looking, but that's normal when exploring a mechanic. Form follows function, you know? The issue here is that whilst exploring said function I discovered that the mechanic felt confusing when looking up. Ideally, the force field would be locked to the ground, and that became a requirement to communicate to the player. This is extremely difficult ON TOP of communicating poking your gun through. This would need to be rethought to suit the perspective. Something completely out of scope for this little "for fun" exercise.
...and to expand on this, the problems weren't visual - it's rough looking, but that's normal when exploring a mechanic. Form follows function, you know? The issue here is that whilst exploring said function I discovered that the mechanic felt confusing when looking up. Ideally, the force field would be locked to the ground, and that became a requirement to communicate to the player. This is extremely difficult ON TOP of communicating poking your gun through. This would need to be rethought to suit the perspective. Something completely out of scope for this little "for fun" exercise.
Just as an exercise, the solutions that came to my mind were:
- For the readability of the gun, color the entire gun a different color when it's gone through a portal enough that it will shoot through it. I guess the way to compute that would be to check if the segment from the tip of the gun to the player's eyes goes through a portal itself.
- For the "looking up" issue, limit how far up the player can look (e.g. 45º max, or less), although of course the viability of that depends on the rest of the map and what it requires). As a bonus that solves a common issue with FPS that don't have that limit, where looking straight up and spinning around can be really disorienting. :)
Aye, they're just patches to the problems. It's a fundamentally messy mechanic when moving to 3D, it would probably need a redesign. Like I said, aesthetically it could be very easy to sovle, it's problems are within the design.
My screenshot saturday. This took me about 6 hours-ish over two days to make. I'm actually quite proud of that, it's the best face I've ever drawn. Trying to crank out the vertical slice at the moment. I'm trying so hard to resist fixing/improving/tinkering with code until after I'm done with this, just logging it all down for the next milestone.
Hey all. First, I wanted to say how impressed I am with the game dev community on ERA. You all are doing some fantastic, creative and interesting things, and it's been a pleasure lurking in this thread and seeing the fruits of your labor! Second, I'd like to participate after quite a while and share a new waterfall puzzle of sorts I made for my own game, made in RPG Maker MV. Looking to clean up the tiles that appear when the boulder is pushed. Regardless, this puzzle is meant to teach the player they can push boulders, meant to be done in a later part of this dungeon.
Scanline hit FX in Unreal.
The Jelly Fish writes to custom stencil which is sampled in a post-process and shifted horizontally.
The Jelly Fish writes to custom stencil which is sampled in a post-process and shifted horizontally.
I finally replaced my prototype with a demo. It's a very early demo but a demo nonetheless:
Now I'm going through the process of uploading the demo to Steam. I just want to be done with this festival stuff, having a deadline worked as a way of making me work harder but now I want to go back to my previous rythm.
Now I'm going through the process of uploading the demo to Steam. I just want to be done with this festival stuff, having a deadline worked as a way of making me work harder but now I want to go back to my previous rythm.
Scanline hit FX in Unreal.
The Jelly Fish writes to custom stencil which is sampled in a post-process and shifted horizontally.
Love it!
One suggestion that may or may not help: when it gets destroyed and falls to bits, maybe set the physics on the bits to be low gravity/damping? would be consistent with the "floating" of the Jelly Fish
Yo...that's a good catch. I'll try it out thanks!
I might be getting an actual vfx artist to help me out so the visuals may get a boost here shortly :)
Dude I stumbled onto this a when trying to figure out how to move my character without having to manually handle collisions with obstacles. Super well made video!
Hey!! Thanks so much! I appreciate it and hope that it helped you figure out whatever you were trying to do!
At risk of sounding like a fickle person, I'm starting to think that I should just register my X-COM inspired game for the next Steam festival (June, I think) instead of showing my demo next week on Steam.
Not only because I finally got some feedback saying something I already noticed: that the gameplay needs more time in the oven.
But also because having almost no feedback is feedback in itself: it means, there's nothing that draws the attention of people. Now how to solve that? that's the mystery but I'm thinking I could try to remake some of my most generic 3D assets and try to look for a more unique style (for example, I have this idea of a sci fi world where magic is used instead of advanced technology and the visual style is mixed fantasy/sci fi) and basically go back to the drawing board.
I'll give it a day or two before I decide if I stay registered for February's festival.
Not only because I finally got some feedback saying something I already noticed: that the gameplay needs more time in the oven.
But also because having almost no feedback is feedback in itself: it means, there's nothing that draws the attention of people. Now how to solve that? that's the mystery but I'm thinking I could try to remake some of my most generic 3D assets and try to look for a more unique style (for example, I have this idea of a sci fi world where magic is used instead of advanced technology and the visual style is mixed fantasy/sci fi) and basically go back to the drawing board.
I'll give it a day or two before I decide if I stay registered for February's festival.
Questions, what were the goals when you were going for when designing the game? Was there something you wanted to stand out? Do you have an elevator pitch for the game on why people would play it? If someone likes XCOM, what about your game would make them interested in it over just playing more XCOM? Could be story, gameplay, concept, etc.
I think this kind of questioning can help focus your idea on what you want to the game to be and can determine if you need some kind of rework. Getting attention in general is incredibly hard so I personally don't think it is fully indicative of everything. Marketing is a job in itself.
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Out of curiosity, do we plan on making a 2021 thread? Or are we gonna just stay here until it hits Post Limit and autolocks? Just asking since the OP is Perm'd and the person who was making these OTs before doesn't seem to be as active in these threads as they used to.
Anyway, my Valve Index arrived today... So I'd say it's high time for me to get cracking on a little idea I've had for awhile now that I've got the single best piece of VR hardware there is to develop-against now. See you soon, Space Cowboys...
Anyway, my Valve Index arrived today... So I'd say it's high time for me to get cracking on a little idea I've had for awhile now that I've got the single best piece of VR hardware there is to develop-against now. See you soon, Space Cowboys...
The objective was to create a combat system for future projects so I don't have to start from scratch with every new game (like it happened with my previous games), making a space pirates game with it was a bonus.
I already have a pitch in my Steam page, it's not like I want to change the basic gameplay, it's just that it seems I need more time to make an attractive demo and experimenting with a different visual style might be worth my time.
And yes, getting attention is hard but I can't just pretend everything is right if I get none. Something must change.
It depends on what attention you are looking for. What's your goal from said attention?
On my side of things, pretty much done with this scene - got one model left to work on before I spend time figuring out how to present this (I'm not an artist so I have no idea about this kinda thing).
Side note: if I was to make a blog post/video/whatever showing how I put this together, what aspects would people find most interesting? I'm compeltely okay with going 100% transparent on any aspect :)
This is really, really important, especially the part about "the hook". You want your game to be "like XCOM, but [x]!", never "just like XCOM". Because, as you say, that begs the question "why would I play this instead of XCOM?".
That said:
Looking again at Void Marauder's Steam page, your game does have a pretty interesting pitch. Out of curiosity, who have you recruited for feedback that is not reporting back? I see the page has no demo, so I'm assuming friends and family? Don't judge an indie game's potential popularity from that because most people aren't that interested in indie games to begin with, and even less specific subgenres like XCOM-likes. You can definitely find a sizable, devoted audience for these within the larger ocean of gamers in general.
I also see you have 2000 followers on Twitter, which is 20x what I have, hahah. You must definitely be doing something right!
I really should put aside some time to make three new threads:
- The next OT.
- The "so you want to get into game development" thread (where I link to a modern and editable version of that ancient post of mine about the University of Michigan courses, which BTW are apparently getting a full revamp this year).
- The "so you want to test games and give feedback" thread (where players and devs can meet and have the latter provide keys or whatever to the former, so they can give feedback).
... and then have each link to each other for visibility.
Unfortunately I'm currently pretty busy with v.2.0 of my own game which I released recently in beta form to testers and I'm getting an unexpectedly (but in hindsight, given that the previous version was from March, predictable) amount of feedback for it; I'm having trouble even replying to everyone. I generally disconnect on Sundays for mental hygiene so I'll see if I can set aside some time to prepare the above OTs.
Attention is the goal itself, if random people are not saying anything about your game (good or bad) then something's wrong. I need to find a way to make at least a few people stop scrolling when I post something on Twitter or Steam.
I haven't recruited people for feedback, the goal is to get organic feedback, people need to feel compelled by themselves to stop and share feedback, if I force it by recruiting people or sharing a sob story then it's not good enough to gauge interest.
2k followers on Twitter mean nothing, when I join the site I did a lot of follow back so I got my numbers up quickly but people that actually engage are just a few. In fact that's worse, it means I have 2k followers that don't feel compelled by what I post.
Please don't misunderstand me, I'm not debating if I'll keep working in this game, I'm GONNA finish it. What I'm debating is if I give more time in the oven to my current demo before releasing it in Steam (the one I have is already approved, I just need to press a button) and if a visual revamp would be worth my time.
Hi Dev Era,
I am currently taking a class on numerical ODEs in grad school, and out of curiosity, I started looking into the implementations used in games. From some cursory reading, it seemed like most sources advocated for RK4 or symplectic methods (Verlet or implicit Euler), but I am still wondering how a developer would decide which to implement. Could anyone provide more insight or some good reading material about choosing a method?
I am currently taking a class on numerical ODEs in grad school, and out of curiosity, I started looking into the implementations used in games. From some cursory reading, it seemed like most sources advocated for RK4 or symplectic methods (Verlet or implicit Euler), but I am still wondering how a developer would decide which to implement. Could anyone provide more insight or some good reading material about choosing a method?
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