I'm getting really close to fixing all the bugs in Quest 2, and I've managed to produce Quest 1 from Quest 2.
The next hurdle is getting the Medium and Expert difficulties working, but I'll do those once I've perfected Quests 1 - 3 on the Easy and Hard settings.
I'm also putting the final touches on the overworld art. Here's a screenshot of the Forest :P
Pretty soon I'm going to need a place to host the files and post info on this game. Any suggestions of a website of sorts that I can host the files and post screenshots/videos and possibly have a section for submitting comments or suggestions?
Pretty soon I'm going to need a place to host the files and post info on this game. Any suggestions of a website of sorts that I can host the files and post screenshots/videos and possibly have a section for submitting comments or suggestions?
Pretty soon I'm going to need a place to host the files and post info on this game. Any suggestions of a website of sorts that I can host the files and post screenshots/videos and possibly have a section for submitting comments or suggestions?
Google pages?
I might. Can I host Zip files there?
I also was thinking about having something that people can post comments/suggestions on. Any way to add that to Google Pages easily?
Yep, I think it can also work as a blog besides allowing you to host files, although I think the maximum size is 25mbs but don't trust me as I haven't used it in a long time. Anyway, if you need extra space there's always Skydrive (25 free gbs of storage, although with a 50mb limit on each file).
slash000 - I decided to register just to let you know that I'm very impressed so far with how this looks. Although I love my share of modern games, I would consider Adventure one of the 10 greatest video games ever made. I think it's hard to dispute it has had a profound effect on the history of games and rightfully deserves some sort of recognition.
I've always fantasized what a modern update would look like. I must say, the pictures you have shared are far better than anything I could have imagined. The way you have conceptualized the blue maze and how the bridge functions in it is an inspired idea. I'm looking forward to (hopefully) trying this out someday!
What's the filesize cap for Google Code? If you host something there, would it be accessable to the public without them needing to handle it as a repository?
slash000 - I decided to register just to let you know that I'm very impressed so far with how this looks. Although I love my share of modern games, I would consider Adventure one of the 10 greatest video games ever made. I think it's hard to dispute it has had a profound effect on the history of games and rightfully deserves some sort of recognition.
I've always fantasized what a modern update would look like. I must say, the pictures you have shared are far better than anything I could have imagined. The way you have conceptualized the blue maze and how the bridge functions in it is an inspired idea. I'm looking forward to (hopefully) trying this out someday!
Yeah, Adventure really was an innovative game, with a surprising amount of depth, and it really pushed what the Atari 2600 could do.
I'm glad you like the look of it. The appearance and audio will all be totally new, of course. But the gameplay will stick true to the original.
Hopefully fans of the original will enjoy this when it's done, as I hope players who have never played the game until now will be able to appreciate the gameplay of something originally created 30 years ago
What's the filesize cap for Google Code? If you host something there, would it be accessable to the public without them needing to handle it as a repository?
Hm... I'm not sure, I don't know anything about Google Code
OK, I've finished fixing just about every glitch that I know of to the best of my ability. So the glitch-fixing phase for Quests 1 and 2 is done.
I'm still polishing graphics here and there, and I'm trying to make the User interface a little nicer and cleaner and more user-friendly.
But here's my next important step:
What is the "algorithm" for the Quest 3's random placement of items?
Does it just randomly generate a room, then an X and Y coordinate for each item? That seems a little too random. I'm going to investigate.
Also this means I'll probably need the Music and Ambient Sound pretty soon, because once I finish some polishing and create Quest 3, it'll probably be the ideal time to implement the Music and Ambient Sounds before generating the next 2 difficulty modes...
It's bad practice, but in the case of such a simple game, you could randomly place the items and then run collision detection and try again if the item is stuck in a wall.
Technically, this is bad because it relies on a properly working random number generator to avoid an infinite loop, but it really is the simplest way to place items randomly and avoid making the game impossible to complete.
Apparently the items' X and Y coordinates are not random. In Quest 3, the X and Y coords they acquire are the same X and Y coords they are set at in Quest 2.
The only thing randomized is which room they appear in.
Also, from what I've observed, all of the items and dragons and bat get randomly placed in Quest 3, except the Chalice, which I think is only randomly placed within the 4 rooms of the Catacombs (the dungeon of the Black Castle).
I'm not 100 % sure that the Chalice is only random among the Catacombs though, but I'm fairly certain. And it would make sense, because, it would be too easy in Quest 3 if the Chalice were randomly placed, because the probability of it landing in an easily accessible room would make it too easy. At lesat by requiring it land in a random Catacomb room, you still gotta find the black key to get to it if nothing else.
Apparently the items' X and Y coordinates are not random. In Quest 3, the X and Y coords they acquire are the same X and Y coords they are set at in Quest 2.
The only thing randomized is which room they appear in.
Also, from what I've observed, all of the items and dragons and bat get randomly placed in Quest 3, except the Chalice, which I think is only randomly placed within the 4 rooms of the Catacombs (the dungeon of the Black Castle).
I'm not 100 % sure that the Chalice is only random among the Catacombs though, but I'm fairly certain. And it would make sense, because, it would be too easy in Quest 3 if the Chalice were randomly placed, because the probability of it landing in an easily accessible room would make it too easy. At lesat by requiring it land in a random Catacomb room, you still gotta find the black key to get to it if nothing else.
One aspect of the original game you should try and not recreate is the ability for quest three to lock all the keys inside castles (or one or more keys inside it's own castle.)
Apparently the items' X and Y coordinates are not random. In Quest 3, the X and Y coords they acquire are the same X and Y coords they are set at in Quest 2.
The only thing randomized is which room they appear in.
Also, from what I've observed, all of the items and dragons and bat get randomly placed in Quest 3, except the Chalice, which I think is only randomly placed within the 4 rooms of the Catacombs (the dungeon of the Black Castle).
I'm not 100 % sure that the Chalice is only random among the Catacombs though, but I'm fairly certain. And it would make sense, because, it would be too easy in Quest 3 if the Chalice were randomly placed, because the probability of it landing in an easily accessible room would make it too easy. At lesat by requiring it land in a random Catacomb room, you still gotta find the black key to get to it if nothing else.
I posted this already, but here it is again
// Room bounds data for game level 3
// Ex. the chalise can only exist in rooms 13-1A
static const int roomBoundsData [] =
{
OBJECT_CHALISE, 0x13, 0x1A,
OBJECT_REDDRAGON, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_YELLOWDRAGON, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_GREENDRAGON, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_SWORD, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_BRIDGE, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_YELLOWKEY, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_WHITEKEY, 0x01, 0x16,
OBJECT_BLACKKEY, 0x01, 0x12,
OBJECT_BAT, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_MAGNET, 0x01, 0x1D,
OBJECT_NONE, 0, 0
};
And here is the room list
00 - Number Room
01 - Top Access
02 - Top Access
03 - Left of Name
04 - Top of Blue Maze
05 - Blue Maze #1
06 - Bottom of Blue Maze
07 - Center of Blue Maze
08 - Blue Maze Entry
09 - Maze Middle
0A - Maze Entry
0B - Maze Side
0C - Side Corridor
0D - Side Corridor
0E - Top Entry Room
0F - White Castle
10 - Black Castle
11 - Yellow Castle
12 - Yellow Castle Entry
13 - Black Maze #1
14 - Black Maze #2
15 - Black Maze #3
16 - Black Maze Entry
17 - Red Maze #1
18 - Top of Red Maze
19 - Bottom of Red Maze
1A - White Castle Entry
1B - Black Castle Entry
1C - Other Purple Room
1D - Top Entry Room
1E - Name Room
By the way, when you dropped the bridge, did you fix it so it's dropped where it is. (In the beta I played it was cast in the direction the hero was facing). That needs to be fixed.
Thanks for reposting that, Halkun, I'll look it over and have the inevitable questions in a bit.
question: The Chalice can only wind up in these rooms?
13 - Black Maze #1
14 - Black Maze #2
15 - Black Maze #3
16 - Black Maze Entry
17 - Red Maze #1
18 - Top of Red Maze
19 - Bottom of Red Maze
1A - White Castle Entry
So you could start a Quest 3 game and end up finding the Chalice in the White Castle Entry, which is really easy to get to from the get-go of the game?
By the way, when you dropped the bridge, did you fix it so it's dropped where it is.
(In the beta I played it was cast in the direction the hero was facing). That needs to be fixed.
Er, I made it like that on purpose..
The reason being is that, if you only drop it where you're holding it, rather than where you're facing, you can't place it necessarily where you want...
In the original game, the bridge (and all other items) would be affixed to the square Hero at any point around the hero that he touched the bridge. Thus you could "hold" the bridge below you, above you, to the left, right, or at some weird angle. The point is, if you wanted to place the bridge below you, but it was held above you, you could drop it, walk around it, then grab it, and lower it into position.
In this game, the hero is an actual guy, who carries stuff above his head. Thus, he cannot "hold" things below him. Therefore, it would be impossible, if, when releasing the bridge and only have it land where it was held, to place it below the hero. It would be problematic in situations, such as the Wharf, if you were trying to move downward across the maze, because as soon as you touched the Bridge, it would be lifted above the Hero, and you could not place it over gaps and cross the wharf southward.
It's hard to explain, but basically, if it only ever releases the bridge where it's held, you could never move downward across areas using the bridge.
The only solution I could think of was allowing the player to place it left, right, up, or down depending on which way they're facing. I think once you know this, it's very easy to navigate in up or down with the bridge, and I figure, it's better to be able to make navigation with the bridge easier than to seriously limit how the bridge can be used.
What is your opinion?
It's not too late to make it to leave the bridge where it's held when dropped, but I can assure you it would result in the inability to move downward across gaps (unless you placed the bridge from below, them went around another way and then down the bridge, which largely defeats the purpose of the bridge...)
I'm uploading a Youtube video to show how bridge placement works in the original, compared to the remake. In the remake, you can place it where you want more easily, as you'll see.
Slash just to let you know, my ass is working on overtime to complete the ambience.
My goal is to finish it off this weekend.
OK, that would be awesome :^:
I'm still working out little kinks and polishing artwork and the HUD, but ideally placing the ambience and music in before creating Normal and Expert difficulties would be best.
Thanks for reposting the randomness Quest 3 code, Halkun, I'll look it over and have the inevitable questions in a bit.
question: The Chalice can only wind up in these rooms?
13 - Black Maze #1
14 - Black Maze #2
15 - Black Maze #3
16 - Black Maze Entry
17 - Red Maze #1
18 - Top of Red Maze
19 - Bottom of Red Maze
1A - White Castle Entry
So you could start a Quest 3 game and end up finding the Chalice in the White Castle Entry, which is really easy to get to from the get-go of the game?
By the way, when you dropped the bridge, did you fix it so it's dropped where it is.
(In the beta I played it was cast in the direction the hero was facing). That needs to be fixed.
Er, I made it like that on purpose..
The reason being is that, if you only drop it where you're holding it, rather than where you're facing, you can't place it necessarily where you want...
In the original game, the bridge (and all other items) would be affixed to the square Hero at any point around the hero that he touched the bridge. Thus you could "hold" the bridge below you, above you, to the left, right, or at some weird angle. The point is, if you wanted to place the bridge below you, but it was held above you, you could drop it, walk around it, then grab it, and lower it into position.
In this game, the hero is an actual guy, who carries stuff above his head. Thus, he cannot "hold" things below him. Therefore, it would be impossible, if, when releasing the bridge and only have it land where it was held, to place it below the hero. It would be problematic in situations, such as the Wharf, if you were trying to move downward across the maze, because as soon as you touched the Bridge, it would be lifted above the Hero, and you could not place it over gaps and cross the wharf southward.
It's hard to explain, but basically, if it only ever releases the bridge where it's held, you could never move downward across areas using the bridge.
The only solution I could think of was allowing the player to place it left, right, up, or down depending on which way they're facing. I think once you know this, it's very easy to navigate in up or down with the bridge, and I figure, it's better to be able to make navigation with the bridge easier than to seriously limit how the bridge can be used.
What is your opinion?
It's not too late to make it to leave the bridge where it's held when dropped, but I can assure you it would result in the inability to move downward across gaps (unless you placed the bridge from below, them went around another way and then down the bridge, which largely defeats the purpose of the bridge...)
Here's the youtube.
The reason I'm posting this is to explain what I mean about the bridge.
In the original game, if you wanted to cross some gap below you, you could grab the Bridge from any point, then release, then shift position, grab, move, release, shift, move, release, and put it beneath you to cross a gap below you.
With the Remake, the bridge is always grabbed and lifted above the player by his arms, else it would not make sense. But in such a case, if you pressed the button to release, and it set the bridge where it was in the hands of the Hero, then you could only ever place it above the Hero's head, upward. Thus, you could never cross gaps below you, because you could not place it below you.
To compensate for the problem, I gave the player the ability to place the bridge in the direction they're facing. That way, if they want to cross a gap above, they can look that direction and press Spacebar and release the bridge above. If they want to release it below, they can look south and press space to release it below. That way the player is not completely precluded from crossing gaps below their position, but not only that, the player does not have to 'fidget' with the picking up, moving, releasing, repeat, all the time to get the bridge where they want it. it's streamlined.
This sums it up I hope. I can place the Bridge below, or above, and cross easily. I also show how you can place it left, or right of the player. Then I place it below one more time for good measure as you'll see. Sorry about doing it in the Dark area but it was the most convenient:
The way I was going to implement it was a little different.
The bridge is magic, so if you grabbed the bridge, he lifted his arms, but the bridge *levitated" next to the hero. Basically, it bobbed in the air and followed you around. If you were on the bridge, you would actually ride along on the bridge, until you hit a wall. Dropping the bridge put the hero's arms down and the bridge landed where it was. I was contemplating making an "energy ball" over the hero's head when the bridge was levitating. The bridge wouldn't go "up"very far, maybe ~10 pixels with a drop shadow under it where the bridge would land when dropped.
There would be a few things to add...
1) A bridge drop shadow so that the bridge could 1) have the appearance of being in the air and 2) you can see where the bridge would be when you let go of it.
2) A "bobbing" animation for the bridge
3) Special code to bob the hero on the bridge if he's on the bridge.
Basically you start with
if grabbed_object == "bridge"
{
// do wacky bridge animation and movement here
}
That's a pretty good idea of implementing the bridge. But honestly I think either way the same ultimate purpose is served and that there's no real disadvantage to the way it is. It's not doing the same exact thing as the original game but I think it's a minor distinction. And perhaps that it's a little easier to control the bridge this way (not having to "dance" around it to move it into place :P)
Functionally I agree with you. However, you are going to have those old-school Adventure fans who are a little put off by the new behavior.
Me and my friends who were young enough to play the original noticed it right away. Functionally it gets the job done... it just... annoys us a little. :P
Functionally I agree with you. However, you are going to have those old-school Adventure fans who are a little put off by the new behavior.
Me and my friends who were young enough to play the original noticed it right away. Functionally it gets the job done... it just... annoys us a little. :P
Did you implement the dot yet?
I cant say that everything is going to be exactly the same as the original. My goal is to make it as close to the original as I can, and to make things play nicely, to handle nicely.
I dunno. I guess I don't see why it would be a big deal that you can place the bridge easily rather than having to play the fiddly grab/drop/move game. I thought it would be a benefit to have more control over where you want to put the bridge. I guess my best suggestion is to think of this as less of a direct port (plus graphics/sound) and more of a remix of sorts.
I'll think about it. If I can think of an easy way to implement the floaty bridge, as an additional thing, then I'll add it. But if not, well, it'll just be one of those little minor differences.
Acting like graphics is the only aspect of game design that has advanced since the beginning of gaming seems like folly to me. You're doing an update here, so update.
part of the charm is giving the update the same feel as the old one... There have been some compromises already. The dragons are different sizes, and the sword doesn't articulate the same way. In the old game you could carry things around you, depending on how it was picked up. (In the new one, you carry them over your head) The bridge, however is very large, the particulars of that are different.
I'm not going to argue that the sword is a massive improvement, for example.
You can now go into the Options menu and select "Classic Bridge," and the bridge will behave exactly as the original game.
The default setting is "Off" so that if you immediately start a game, the bridge will be controlled by player direction. Going into Options and turning on Classic Bridge (to ON) will allow you to use the bridge as the original game.
Now I just have to make some art to make it look like it's floating. I think I'm going to give it a glowing border and put some glowiness around the Hero's hand(s) so that it looks like he's using telekinesis or something. I'll try and see if I can add a 'drop shadow' beneath the bridge too but I don't think it'll be necessary. We'll see.
OK, here's the youtube of the newly implemented "Classic Bridge mode." You'll first see me enter the Options to turn it on. (FYI, the options screen is a placeholder right now which is why it looks like shit. Also, you'll notice some oddities in game that are there for debug purposes so ignore those (colors around the edges of the screen, numbers in the top right, etc)):
Again, the youtube vid runs at a lower framerate and without sound than the real game. Hopefully you can see the glowing hands and glowing bridge graphics I put in.
Posts
I'm glad to know that the game's coming along nicely
Beta test?
I'm getting really close to fixing all the bugs in Quest 2, and I've managed to produce Quest 1 from Quest 2.
The next hurdle is getting the Medium and Expert difficulties working, but I'll do those once I've perfected Quests 1 - 3 on the Easy and Hard settings.
I'm also putting the final touches on the overworld art. Here's a screenshot of the Forest :P
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Khavall smash music
Google pages?
Hahah. Don't overwork yourself. This doesn't have to be a grand opus. Just something fun to listen to in each area
I might. Can I host Zip files there?
I also was thinking about having something that people can post comments/suggestions on. Any way to add that to Google Pages easily?
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
I've always fantasized what a modern update would look like. I must say, the pictures you have shared are far better than anything I could have imagined. The way you have conceptualized the blue maze and how the bridge functions in it is an inspired idea. I'm looking forward to (hopefully) trying this out someday!
Try MODDB, it might say mods, but they allow standalone games too.
Yeah, Adventure really was an innovative game, with a surprising amount of depth, and it really pushed what the Atari 2600 could do.
I'm glad you like the look of it. The appearance and audio will all be totally new, of course. But the gameplay will stick true to the original.
Hopefully fans of the original will enjoy this when it's done, as I hope players who have never played the game until now will be able to appreciate the gameplay of something originally created 30 years ago
Thanks for the tip, I checked out that website, it looks to be a pretty good place for something like this.
Hm... I'm not sure, I don't know anything about Google Code
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Those OpenTyrian guys used google code.
I'm still polishing graphics here and there, and I'm trying to make the User interface a little nicer and cleaner and more user-friendly.
But here's my next important step:
What is the "algorithm" for the Quest 3's random placement of items?
Does it just randomly generate a room, then an X and Y coordinate for each item? That seems a little too random. I'm going to investigate.
Also this means I'll probably need the Music and Ambient Sound pretty soon, because once I finish some polishing and create Quest 3, it'll probably be the ideal time to implement the Music and Ambient Sounds before generating the next 2 difficulty modes...
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Technically, this is bad because it relies on a properly working random number generator to avoid an infinite loop, but it really is the simplest way to place items randomly and avoid making the game impossible to complete.
Apparently the items' X and Y coordinates are not random. In Quest 3, the X and Y coords they acquire are the same X and Y coords they are set at in Quest 2.
The only thing randomized is which room they appear in.
Also, from what I've observed, all of the items and dragons and bat get randomly placed in Quest 3, except the Chalice, which I think is only randomly placed within the 4 rooms of the Catacombs (the dungeon of the Black Castle).
I'm not 100 % sure that the Chalice is only random among the Catacombs though, but I'm fairly certain. And it would make sense, because, it would be too easy in Quest 3 if the Chalice were randomly placed, because the probability of it landing in an easily accessible room would make it too easy. At lesat by requiring it land in a random Catacomb room, you still gotta find the black key to get to it if nothing else.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
One aspect of the original game you should try and not recreate is the ability for quest three to lock all the keys inside castles (or one or more keys inside it's own castle.)
I posted this already, but here it is again
And here is the room list
By the way, when you dropped the bridge, did you fix it so it's dropped where it is. (In the beta I played it was cast in the direction the hero was facing). That needs to be fixed.
question: The Chalice can only wind up in these rooms?
13 - Black Maze #1
14 - Black Maze #2
15 - Black Maze #3
16 - Black Maze Entry
17 - Red Maze #1
18 - Top of Red Maze
19 - Bottom of Red Maze
1A - White Castle Entry
So you could start a Quest 3 game and end up finding the Chalice in the White Castle Entry, which is really easy to get to from the get-go of the game?
Er, I made it like that on purpose..
The reason being is that, if you only drop it where you're holding it, rather than where you're facing, you can't place it necessarily where you want...
In the original game, the bridge (and all other items) would be affixed to the square Hero at any point around the hero that he touched the bridge. Thus you could "hold" the bridge below you, above you, to the left, right, or at some weird angle. The point is, if you wanted to place the bridge below you, but it was held above you, you could drop it, walk around it, then grab it, and lower it into position.
In this game, the hero is an actual guy, who carries stuff above his head. Thus, he cannot "hold" things below him. Therefore, it would be impossible, if, when releasing the bridge and only have it land where it was held, to place it below the hero. It would be problematic in situations, such as the Wharf, if you were trying to move downward across the maze, because as soon as you touched the Bridge, it would be lifted above the Hero, and you could not place it over gaps and cross the wharf southward.
It's hard to explain, but basically, if it only ever releases the bridge where it's held, you could never move downward across areas using the bridge.
The only solution I could think of was allowing the player to place it left, right, up, or down depending on which way they're facing. I think once you know this, it's very easy to navigate in up or down with the bridge, and I figure, it's better to be able to make navigation with the bridge easier than to seriously limit how the bridge can be used.
What is your opinion?
It's not too late to make it to leave the bridge where it's held when dropped, but I can assure you it would result in the inability to move downward across gaps (unless you placed the bridge from below, them went around another way and then down the bridge, which largely defeats the purpose of the bridge...)
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
My goal is to finish it off this weekend.
OK, that would be awesome :^:
I'm still working out little kinks and polishing artwork and the HUD, but ideally placing the ambience and music in before creating Normal and Expert difficulties would be best.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Thanks for reposting the randomness Quest 3 code, Halkun, I'll look it over and have the inevitable questions in a bit.
question: The Chalice can only wind up in these rooms?
13 - Black Maze #1
14 - Black Maze #2
15 - Black Maze #3
16 - Black Maze Entry
17 - Red Maze #1
18 - Top of Red Maze
19 - Bottom of Red Maze
1A - White Castle Entry
So you could start a Quest 3 game and end up finding the Chalice in the White Castle Entry, which is really easy to get to from the get-go of the game?
Er, I made it like that on purpose..
The reason being is that, if you only drop it where you're holding it, rather than where you're facing, you can't place it necessarily where you want...
In the original game, the bridge (and all other items) would be affixed to the square Hero at any point around the hero that he touched the bridge. Thus you could "hold" the bridge below you, above you, to the left, right, or at some weird angle. The point is, if you wanted to place the bridge below you, but it was held above you, you could drop it, walk around it, then grab it, and lower it into position.
In this game, the hero is an actual guy, who carries stuff above his head. Thus, he cannot "hold" things below him. Therefore, it would be impossible, if, when releasing the bridge and only have it land where it was held, to place it below the hero. It would be problematic in situations, such as the Wharf, if you were trying to move downward across the maze, because as soon as you touched the Bridge, it would be lifted above the Hero, and you could not place it over gaps and cross the wharf southward.
It's hard to explain, but basically, if it only ever releases the bridge where it's held, you could never move downward across areas using the bridge.
The only solution I could think of was allowing the player to place it left, right, up, or down depending on which way they're facing. I think once you know this, it's very easy to navigate in up or down with the bridge, and I figure, it's better to be able to make navigation with the bridge easier than to seriously limit how the bridge can be used.
What is your opinion?
It's not too late to make it to leave the bridge where it's held when dropped, but I can assure you it would result in the inability to move downward across gaps (unless you placed the bridge from below, them went around another way and then down the bridge, which largely defeats the purpose of the bridge...)
Here's the youtube.
The reason I'm posting this is to explain what I mean about the bridge.
In the original game, if you wanted to cross some gap below you, you could grab the Bridge from any point, then release, then shift position, grab, move, release, shift, move, release, and put it beneath you to cross a gap below you.
With the Remake, the bridge is always grabbed and lifted above the player by his arms, else it would not make sense. But in such a case, if you pressed the button to release, and it set the bridge where it was in the hands of the Hero, then you could only ever place it above the Hero's head, upward. Thus, you could never cross gaps below you, because you could not place it below you.
To compensate for the problem, I gave the player the ability to place the bridge in the direction they're facing. That way, if they want to cross a gap above, they can look that direction and press Spacebar and release the bridge above. If they want to release it below, they can look south and press space to release it below. That way the player is not completely precluded from crossing gaps below their position, but not only that, the player does not have to 'fidget' with the picking up, moving, releasing, repeat, all the time to get the bridge where they want it. it's streamlined.
This sums it up I hope. I can place the Bridge below, or above, and cross easily. I also show how you can place it left, or right of the player. Then I place it below one more time for good measure as you'll see. Sorry about doing it in the Dark area but it was the most convenient:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IstheK3m_ug
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
The bridge is magic, so if you grabbed the bridge, he lifted his arms, but the bridge *levitated" next to the hero. Basically, it bobbed in the air and followed you around. If you were on the bridge, you would actually ride along on the bridge, until you hit a wall. Dropping the bridge put the hero's arms down and the bridge landed where it was. I was contemplating making an "energy ball" over the hero's head when the bridge was levitating. The bridge wouldn't go "up"very far, maybe ~10 pixels with a drop shadow under it where the bridge would land when dropped.
There would be a few things to add...
1) A bridge drop shadow so that the bridge could 1) have the appearance of being in the air and 2) you can see where the bridge would be when you let go of it.
2) A "bobbing" animation for the bridge
3) Special code to bob the hero on the bridge if he's on the bridge.
Basically you start with
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Me and my friends who were young enough to play the original noticed it right away. Functionally it gets the job done... it just... annoys us a little. :P
Did you implement the dot yet?
I cant say that everything is going to be exactly the same as the original. My goal is to make it as close to the original as I can, and to make things play nicely, to handle nicely.
I dunno. I guess I don't see why it would be a big deal that you can place the bridge easily rather than having to play the fiddly grab/drop/move game. I thought it would be a benefit to have more control over where you want to put the bridge. I guess my best suggestion is to think of this as less of a direct port (plus graphics/sound) and more of a remix of sorts.
I'll think about it. If I can think of an easy way to implement the floaty bridge, as an additional thing, then I'll add it. But if not, well, it'll just be one of those little minor differences.
As far as the dot, yeah, the dot's done.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
After you're done, you should email a link to Warren Robenett himself and see if he likes it
I just hope you guys (people that visit this thread) like it okay.
I'm doing my best, after all. Playing it in its current state I think it is approaching what I set out to do.
Making a game is hard work. Even a "simple" one like Adventure takes many months and some serious dedication.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Thanks for this.
I watched the youtube you uploaded, and they way you're doing it is the way people would expect it to work if they had never played this before.
Its not a bad thing to take frustrating things away.
I'm not going to argue that the sword is a massive improvement, for example.
You can now go into the Options menu and select "Classic Bridge," and the bridge will behave exactly as the original game.
The default setting is "Off" so that if you immediately start a game, the bridge will be controlled by player direction. Going into Options and turning on Classic Bridge (to ON) will allow you to use the bridge as the original game.
Now I just have to make some art to make it look like it's floating. I think I'm going to give it a glowing border and put some glowiness around the Hero's hand(s) so that it looks like he's using telekinesis or something. I'll try and see if I can add a 'drop shadow' beneath the bridge too but I don't think it'll be necessary. We'll see.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLuK078KZ-Y
Again, the youtube vid runs at a lower framerate and without sound than the real game. Hopefully you can see the glowing hands and glowing bridge graphics I put in.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games