One thing I was thinking about was combining an open world game with Civilization - you pull the terrain for your open world map from a hex strategic map, and you keep your current hex and 6 surrounding hexes loaded.
Elder Scrolls or Mount and Blade gameplay combined with a Civilization like turned based strategy game that influences the open world, and what you do in the open world for the hex influences the strategic map.
While not the same thing you're talking about, it made me think of all the amazing things they could do if Lionhead made Black & White 3. What I wouldn't give to be on the production team for that. XD
Just finished the space shooter beginner tutorial on the unity tuts page. These are so much better than when I started a couple of years ago. I can see recommending this to a total beginner rather than starting with a training wheels engine like Stencyl. This one doesn't use the 2d engine features, instead it uses an orthographic cam and 3d objects constrained in a plane so it is very simple. Also uses the old gui instead of the new one but the tutorial has some text instructions for the changes between the old version and the 4.6 gui.
I could do all of this stuff already without the instructions but I did learn some neat stuff like how to open the online documentation from monodevelop by select a keyword and typing cmd+singlequote
also learned a bit about 3d lighting which I know nothing about
the project comes with some nice assets which have a permissive license as long as they are used in Unity engine projects
Man, the FMOD studio tutorials from FMOD are all the fuck over the place.
They skip over some really important FMOD-specific stuff in favour of droning on for long stretches of minutes about really basic ideas of sound and DAW. Like, who do they think is going to be trying to learn the specifics of FMOD studio, and will need a detailed breakdown of what a signal path is, or what the difference between pre- and post- fader sends is?
I seriously can't wait for GameMaker: Studio 2.0. This non-tab crap frustrates so much. I just.. see a lot of workflow being spent moving windows around and it gets super annoying. I should not be spending most of my production time moving windows around to see what is going on with my code.
GML is great but the UI for this software is ass-backwards.
Is there a way to influence particle systems with variables? For example, a particle system whose spawn rate varies based on a float determined in another blueprint?
I found this, but I have yet to find any other particle component that has Set up Particle Parameter as an option, which makes the documentation seem misleading as to how easy this is expected to be.
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MachwingIt looks like a harmless old computer, doesn't it?Left in this cave to rot ... or to flower!Registered Userregular
Is there a way to influence particle systems with variables? For example, a particle system whose spawn rate varies based on a float determined in another blueprint?
I found this, but I have yet to find any other particle component that has Set up Particle Parameter as an option, which makes the documentation seem misleading as to how easy this is expected to be.
That page's last revision was in July of 2014, soooo I'm guessing they abandoned that setup for the current one??? Anyway-
Yes - any distribution particle vector parameter or distribution particle float parameter can be set via blueprint using the set float and set vector parameter nodes. Nothing as complex as the link there is necessary- just need a reference to the particle system and the name of the parameter you're trying to set (remember to name it!)
The same technique can be used to drive material parameters on a per-object basis if you create a dynamic material instance in the object's BP and assign it to the object (otherwise, the parameters will be across all objects with that material!)
(obv just plug whatever you want into the value, I'm turning the emitter off here)
Machwing on
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MachwingIt looks like a harmless old computer, doesn't it?Left in this cave to rot ... or to flower!Registered Userregular
Also, a question for all y'all using UE4: are there any good tutorials out there that go over all the weirder material functions? Stuff like SphereMask and VectorToRadialValue.
If not.... would you watch a tutorial series on them?? Thinkin' about doing one
Ah! Perfect. I figured it had to be something much simpler than that link. Next question - is there a way to set the pivot/origin point of your particles? For a radial sunburst, all the particles should rotate around the emitter point, but if the pivot of the particles is at .5, .5 then all the particles overlap in the center.
Edit: Nevermind, I think I finally found it under Location > Pivot Offset.
YoYogames took Particle Physics out of GameMaker, so I end up writing my own, which is tedious and not efficient at all. Particle systems with GM:S work faster because the drawing is handled by a single entity, in order to have physics I have to have instances for each particle so that it can retain properties to manipulate. On Windows this is not an issue for performance but once you start looking at HTML5 or Mobile platforms.... game over.
Also, it's Screenshot Saturday so I thought I would switch it up a bit. Instead of screenshots of the current game digitally, I thought I would share some notes I have on paper. I've found a lot of developers who never finish games or get stuck don't actually plan their games out, and I think it's a testament to "Paper before Pixel" which is something I just made up.
Also, a question for all y'all using UE4: are there any good tutorials out there that go over all the weirder material functions? Stuff like SphereMask and VectorToRadialValue.
If not.... would you watch a tutorial series on them?? Thinkin' about doing one
One thing I was thinking about was combining an open world game with Civilization - you pull the terrain for your open world map from a hex strategic map, and you keep your current hex and 6 surrounding hexes loaded.
Elder Scrolls or Mount and Blade gameplay combined with a Civilization like turned based strategy game that influences the open world, and what you do in the open world for the hex influences the strategic map.
I actually had an idea recently that I had never seen done, which was marrying a turn-based strategy with a first person shooter. Not like Valkyria Chronicles or Codename STEAM which just looks like an action game but still follows turn-based movement rules, but something akin to Total War which has a turn-based grand strategy map and instead of switching to an RTS for battles, would drop you you into a battle like a giant game of Battlefield(1942 is still the best one) or Planetside wherever you are fighting at. But that might be boring as a single player game because those shooters are better with real people instead of bot armies and that idea wouldn't work too well multiplayer when you would need a multitude more soldiers than commanders.
I don't know, your idea just reminded me of that. Good luck with making yours though, I would totally play it.
Finished up my level select UI today. I'll pick up finishing animating it on Monday, since I take Sundays to prototype other things. I am actually more happy about the navigation menu animation that nearly the entire game, haha. It's been fun making neat effects.
The difficulty I landed on was the fact that the game has 100 levels, and I will be releasing packs of 50 levels as time goes on. With that much volume I had a few options but none of them felt right. So after some experimenting I decided to break down the volume into bite-sized delivery "chunks" so while the player doesn't get all the levels on the screen at one time, it's very easy for them to navigate through "chunks" to determine which levels they need to play. This design also allows me to really keep the seamless transfers/transitions from area to area that is core to the gameplay experience.
(It looks smaller here, but it is very sharp and just the right size on mobile)
Is there a good tutorial for making an Asteroids-style game in UE4? I've tried to make a game before in Unity, but the difficulty of getting something working eventually made me drop it, so I'd like to get a basic Asteroids-style thing up that I can fiddle with.
Is there a good tutorial for making an Asteroids-style game in UE4? I've tried to make a game before in Unity, but the difficulty of getting something working eventually made me drop it, so I'd like to get a basic Asteroids-style thing up that I can fiddle with.
The new Unity video tutorials are REALLY good. I say this from having started learning 2.5 years go and its gotten so much better.
Is there a good tutorial for making an Asteroids-style game in UE4? I've tried to make a game before in Unity, but the difficulty of getting something working eventually made me drop it, so I'd like to get a basic Asteroids-style thing up that I can fiddle with.
The new Unity video tutorials are REALLY good. I say this from having started learning 2.5 years go and its gotten so much better.
If you want I can give you the project to play with.
Sorry for not being more clear. I used to use unity but I'm trying out UE4 now, so I'm looking for a tutorial on that. Thanks for your help though, it would have been great a few months ago when I was getting stuck in unity
This is kind of tangential to the topic, but touches it just enough to be relevant.
Please, fellow game developers. Please. If you are developing a metroidvania, remember the cardinal rule of the genre: the player must always be able to go back and get everything. Ori and the Blind Forest violates this rule; if you zig instead of zag at certain points, you'll trigger a scripted sequence and an auto-save that locks you out of certain areas that might contain items that count toward 100% completion and oh my fuck it is so annoying.
If I can stop one future metroidvania game from making this boneheaded mistake by saying that here, then I have to. Seriously. If you're going to track completion percent, let the player go back and pick up everything.
My favorite musical instrument is the air-raid siren.
I've been saying this since I saw the gameplay - Ori and the Blind Forest doesn't look like a Metroidvania to me. There is more to a metroid game than being a platformer with a large world and permanent upgrades.
I have no idea what other genre you'd class it as.
EDIT: Detail is good!
I mean, I realize that Ori controls way closer to Meat Boy than Samus. But insofar as OatBF is really strongly defined by the way you get new navigational tools that open up different pathways all over, including areas you've already been to to encourage further exploration and collection of upgrades, and the fact that its Achievement array is almost entirely about "get all the things and/or get very few things and win quickly", it feels about as Metroid as it gets. Call it Super Meatroid if you want. But, yeah. If it isn't a metroidvania, I have no idea what the hell it is.
Kupi on
My favorite musical instrument is the air-raid siren.
On the topic of metroidvania, how would you guys classify a zelda type game, is there a generic term. Action-Adventure is too broad for the zelda formula, these are games with specific mechanics. Is link to the past is almost a top-down metroidvania?
If zelda was on steam what tag would you give it, what genre is it?
I have no idea what other genre you'd class it as.
EDIT: Detail is good!
I mean, I realize that Ori controls way closer to Meat Boy than Samus. But insofar as OatBF is really strongly defined by the way you get new navigational tools that open up different pathways all over, including areas you've already been to to encourage further exploration and collection of upgrades, and the fact that its Achievement array is almost entirely about "get all the things and/or get very few things and win quickly", it feels about as Metroid as it gets. Call it Super Meatroid if you want. But, yeah. If it isn't a metroidvania, I have no idea what the hell it is.
I had a similar issue with Outland on the Xbox. Yeah, the areas are large and you get progressive enhancements, but the world isn't interconnected. It's a very linear game, and there's no compelling reason to backtrack except for pickups. There's no way to explore areas before you're "supposed to". Abilities gained later in the game don't unlock exploration opportunities from previous areas. You'll never get lost and wonder where you need to go next.
This is kind of tangential to the topic, but touches it just enough to be relevant.
Please, fellow game developers. Please. If you are developing a metroidvania, remember the cardinal rule of the genre: the player must always be able to go back and get everything. Ori and the Blind Forest violates this rule; if you zig instead of zag at certain points, you'll trigger a scripted sequence and an auto-save that locks you out of certain areas that might contain items that count toward 100% completion and oh my fuck it is so annoying.
If I can stop one future metroidvania game from making this boneheaded mistake by saying that here, then I have to. Seriously. If you're going to track completion percent, let the player go back and pick up everything.
I cannot, for the life of me, find it but I swear that I read somewhere that the devs were going to fix that exact problem.
On the topic of metroidvania, how would you guys classify a zelda type game, is there a generic term. Action-Adventure is too broad for the zelda formula, these are games with specific mechanics. Is link to the past is almost a top-down metroidvania?
If zelda was on steam what tag would you give it, what genre is it?
I think that metroidvania wouldn't be wrong. It is an open world with hard locks that require visiting one part of the game to open up other parts.
That said I don't think its possible to categorize modern games with a single "genre" word anymore. In the olden days games had to be built on such a small resource budget that they necessarily had to be feature conservative. But now every game can do every damn thing.
I think a better way to classify games is to list the most important features. I only played LoZ NES but I assume Link to the Past follows the same formula.
I would say that LttP would be more of a traditional rpg, and that is using the old definition of rpg. Now pretty much if your character has stats in some way, it is an rpg.
If zelda was on steam what tag would you give it, what genre is it?
For all of the things that steam does right, the oversaturation of tags that it gives games is not one of them. When I click on strategy games I expect to not see any FPS games, but counterstrike and arma 3 pop right up.
The biggest problem I have is that newer games are trying to claim that they have everything, but the past few years people have hated games to the extent that hasn't been seen before. In my opinion developers need to refocus what they are doing, because it's mind blowing when you read "first person" and "third person" in the tags for the same damn game. Pick one and make it awesome, don't throw in 2 half assed things so you can get an extra tag.
I don't know how people find the time for those jams. I'm lucky if my wife leaves me alone for 2 hours let alone a whole day/weekend. A week would never happen.
I've got just pages of ideas scribbled and doodled out in a notebook, and plenty more I'm just kicking around in my head. I'll just never get the chance to try and make them a reality. And that is just games. The idea I'd really like to work on is more of a social website, but I've got less of a clue about that than anything so I'm not going to make any headway there either.
A week is a bit much, but 48 hours is reasonable. You should just tell your wife "I want to do this for two days." She should understand.
Jams are fantastic. There is a lot of community comrade and sharing of tools and ideas, and it really pushes your skills, let's you find areas you need to focus on. I always learn a lot from Jams and have a great time.
On that subject, today I got to experience something different that I can only chalk up as invaluable.
I was fortunate enough to have 11 people (ages 19-29, female and male) play a build my current game, and that was quite the experience. Watching someone play your game, give you feedback. So great.
So not only was the feedback super positive and realistic, which is so awesome to hear, but most importantly, watching how people play. This unspoken information is super valuable. It was an unexpected personal experience to watch people play. I've always tested with my wife and heard feedback from people online, but to actually witness the nuances and their reactions in a group is... nothing short of amazing. It makes me want to really expand on this experience by taking a couple phones and going to the mall and just asking people to play or something.
That being said, it's something I really enjoyed and really makes this entire process worth it. All the bugs and hard work and creative "indecision" making. All a super fair price to pay to see people enjoy something you've made.
Started making a procedural building generator, starting with rooms. So far it can make a room of any x/y dimensions (z to come) out of existing wall/floor/ceiling meshes while keeping scaling consistent (if not always uniform). If a room’s length or width isn’t a multiple of the length/width of the mesh being scaled, all meshes on that wall/ceiling/floor are scaled to compensate which means they’re often stretched slightly but never more than like 10%, which is fine because modular mesh based level design routinely requires level designers to stretch meshes more than that anyway. Also this uses instanced meshes and can use random meshes if required. You can also elect to use a single scaled mesh for floor/ceiling rather than gridding them like this
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MachwingIt looks like a harmless old computer, doesn't it?Left in this cave to rot ... or to flower!Registered Userregular
Posts
While not the same thing you're talking about, it made me think of all the amazing things they could do if Lionhead made Black & White 3. What I wouldn't give to be on the production team for that. XD
I could do all of this stuff already without the instructions but I did learn some neat stuff like how to open the online documentation from monodevelop by select a keyword and typing cmd+singlequote
also learned a bit about 3d lighting which I know nothing about
the project comes with some nice assets which have a permissive license as long as they are used in Unity engine projects
final project here
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/221516245/Unity Tutorials Final/Space Shooter/space-shooter-final/space-shooter-final.html
arrows/wasd moves, control shoots - no real gameplay but it shows potential and is a really good learning tool
They skip over some really important FMOD-specific stuff in favour of droning on for long stretches of minutes about really basic ideas of sound and DAW. Like, who do they think is going to be trying to learn the specifics of FMOD studio, and will need a detailed breakdown of what a signal path is, or what the difference between pre- and post- fader sends is?
GML is great but the UI for this software is ass-backwards.
I found this, but I have yet to find any other particle component that has Set up Particle Parameter as an option, which makes the documentation seem misleading as to how easy this is expected to be.
That page's last revision was in July of 2014, soooo I'm guessing they abandoned that setup for the current one??? Anyway-
Yes - any distribution particle vector parameter or distribution particle float parameter can be set via blueprint using the set float and set vector parameter nodes. Nothing as complex as the link there is necessary- just need a reference to the particle system and the name of the parameter you're trying to set (remember to name it!)
The same technique can be used to drive material parameters on a per-object basis if you create a dynamic material instance in the object's BP and assign it to the object (otherwise, the parameters will be across all objects with that material!)
(obv just plug whatever you want into the value, I'm turning the emitter off here)
If not.... would you watch a tutorial series on them?? Thinkin' about doing one
Edit: Nevermind, I think I finally found it under Location > Pivot Offset.
Also, it's Screenshot Saturday so I thought I would switch it up a bit. Instead of screenshots of the current game digitally, I thought I would share some notes I have on paper. I've found a lot of developers who never finish games or get stuck don't actually plan their games out, and I think it's a testament to "Paper before Pixel" which is something I just made up.
do it
you raging material lord
Totally. There is something awesome about grid paper. I always have some with me.
This UI kit from UI Stencils is fucking SEXY.
http://www.uistencils.com/products/the-ui-stencils-starter-pack
And they have all kinds of neat stuff. Sadly I print out the free stuff from http://www.interfacesketch.com because I am broke as shit.
This guy makes solid tutorials.
Basic intro to GameMaker:
I actually had an idea recently that I had never seen done, which was marrying a turn-based strategy with a first person shooter. Not like Valkyria Chronicles or Codename STEAM which just looks like an action game but still follows turn-based movement rules, but something akin to Total War which has a turn-based grand strategy map and instead of switching to an RTS for battles, would drop you you into a battle like a giant game of Battlefield(1942 is still the best one) or Planetside wherever you are fighting at. But that might be boring as a single player game because those shooters are better with real people instead of bot armies and that idea wouldn't work too well multiplayer when you would need a multitude more soldiers than commanders.
I don't know, your idea just reminded me of that. Good luck with making yours though, I would totally play it.
The difficulty I landed on was the fact that the game has 100 levels, and I will be releasing packs of 50 levels as time goes on. With that much volume I had a few options but none of them felt right. So after some experimenting I decided to break down the volume into bite-sized delivery "chunks" so while the player doesn't get all the levels on the screen at one time, it's very easy for them to navigate through "chunks" to determine which levels they need to play. This design also allows me to really keep the seamless transfers/transitions from area to area that is core to the gameplay experience.
(It looks smaller here, but it is very sharp and just the right size on mobile)
The new Unity video tutorials are REALLY good. I say this from having started learning 2.5 years go and its gotten so much better.
https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/projects/space-shooter is top-down shooter but it would be very straightforward to transition it to asteroids style.
I made this 3d version in a couple of hours from scratch: (no shadows in webplayer sadly)
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/221516245/flyingovergroundthingy/flyingoverground-a1/flyingoverground/flyingoverground.html
arrows move, control shoots
If you want I can give you the project to play with.
Sorry for not being more clear. I used to use unity but I'm trying out UE4 now, so I'm looking for a tutorial on that. Thanks for your help though, it would have been great a few months ago when I was getting stuck in unity
Please, fellow game developers. Please. If you are developing a metroidvania, remember the cardinal rule of the genre: the player must always be able to go back and get everything. Ori and the Blind Forest violates this rule; if you zig instead of zag at certain points, you'll trigger a scripted sequence and an auto-save that locks you out of certain areas that might contain items that count toward 100% completion and oh my fuck it is so annoying.
If I can stop one future metroidvania game from making this boneheaded mistake by saying that here, then I have to. Seriously. If you're going to track completion percent, let the player go back and pick up everything.
EDIT: Detail is good!
I mean, I realize that Ori controls way closer to Meat Boy than Samus. But insofar as OatBF is really strongly defined by the way you get new navigational tools that open up different pathways all over, including areas you've already been to to encourage further exploration and collection of upgrades, and the fact that its Achievement array is almost entirely about "get all the things and/or get very few things and win quickly", it feels about as Metroid as it gets. Call it Super Meatroid if you want. But, yeah. If it isn't a metroidvania, I have no idea what the hell it is.
If zelda was on steam what tag would you give it, what genre is it?
I had a similar issue with Outland on the Xbox. Yeah, the areas are large and you get progressive enhancements, but the world isn't interconnected. It's a very linear game, and there's no compelling reason to backtrack except for pickups. There's no way to explore areas before you're "supposed to". Abilities gained later in the game don't unlock exploration opportunities from previous areas. You'll never get lost and wonder where you need to go next.
I cannot, for the life of me, find it but I swear that I read somewhere that the devs were going to fix that exact problem.
SteamID: edgruberman GOG Galaxy: EdGruberman
I think that metroidvania wouldn't be wrong. It is an open world with hard locks that require visiting one part of the game to open up other parts.
That said I don't think its possible to categorize modern games with a single "genre" word anymore. In the olden days games had to be built on such a small resource budget that they necessarily had to be feature conservative. But now every game can do every damn thing.
I think a better way to classify games is to list the most important features. I only played LoZ NES but I assume Link to the Past follows the same formula.
Btw while looking stuff up I found this sweet article about Super Metroid: http://nickkooy.blogspot.com/2011/05/20-reasons-why-super-metroid-is.html
worth a read for the soft lock/hard lock comparison.
For all of the things that steam does right, the oversaturation of tags that it gives games is not one of them. When I click on strategy games I expect to not see any FPS games, but counterstrike and arma 3 pop right up.
The biggest problem I have is that newer games are trying to claim that they have everything, but the past few years people have hated games to the extent that hasn't been seen before. In my opinion developers need to refocus what they are doing, because it's mind blowing when you read "first person" and "third person" in the tags for the same damn game. Pick one and make it awesome, don't throw in 2 half assed things so you can get an extra tag.
Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198004484595
Unreal Engine 4 Developers Community.
I'm working on a cute little video game! Here's a link for you.
Just a reminder that http://www.meatlyjam.com is this weekend, if anyone is interested. I am not 100% what to expect, but ya know fun is fun!
http://ludumdare.com/compo/ is also 25 days, and that is always a blast.
I've got just pages of ideas scribbled and doodled out in a notebook, and plenty more I'm just kicking around in my head. I'll just never get the chance to try and make them a reality. And that is just games. The idea I'd really like to work on is more of a social website, but I've got less of a clue about that than anything so I'm not going to make any headway there either.
Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198004484595
Jams are fantastic. There is a lot of community comrade and sharing of tools and ideas, and it really pushes your skills, let's you find areas you need to focus on. I always learn a lot from Jams and have a great time.
On that subject, today I got to experience something different that I can only chalk up as invaluable.
I was fortunate enough to have 11 people (ages 19-29, female and male) play a build my current game, and that was quite the experience. Watching someone play your game, give you feedback. So great.
So not only was the feedback super positive and realistic, which is so awesome to hear, but most importantly, watching how people play. This unspoken information is super valuable. It was an unexpected personal experience to watch people play. I've always tested with my wife and heard feedback from people online, but to actually witness the nuances and their reactions in a group is... nothing short of amazing. It makes me want to really expand on this experience by taking a couple phones and going to the mall and just asking people to play or something.
That being said, it's something I really enjoyed and really makes this entire process worth it. All the bugs and hard work and creative "indecision" making. All a super fair price to pay to see people enjoy something you've made.
Watch youtube videos at higher speed. At 1.5 I can understand everyone perfectly, at 2x I miss stuff so I'll stick to 1.5 for now
website says how to do it
http://dottech.org/157904/how-to-play-youtube-videos-in-slow-or-fast-motion-tip/
Currently watching https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/projects/survival-shooter
Its really long but has a good intro to the 4.6 GUI system (which is awesome) and more about the animation system which I still only half get.
Started making a procedural building generator, starting with rooms. So far it can make a room of any x/y dimensions (z to come) out of existing wall/floor/ceiling meshes while keeping scaling consistent (if not always uniform). If a room’s length or width isn’t a multiple of the length/width of the mesh being scaled, all meshes on that wall/ceiling/floor are scaled to compensate which means they’re often stretched slightly but never more than like 10%, which is fine because modular mesh based level design routinely requires level designers to stretch meshes more than that anyway. Also this uses instanced meshes and can use random meshes if required. You can also elect to use a single scaled mesh for floor/ceiling rather than gridding them like this
that shit is dopelord and reminds me a bit of spire
Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198004484595
That is clearly a super high-tech railgun.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]