2007-02-04 20:53:54

Dark, better fill in a space before it gets too late. chuckles. I think we've got the base for a team here already. hehe.

Discord: clemchowder633

2007-02-21 22:49:39

To quote Destiny's Child: Question!

What do you prefer: Avoiding objects with certain properties or fighting with moving enemies?

2007-02-22 01:09:18 (edited by dark empathy 2007-02-23 01:39:14)

Call me a psycho if you wish, but fpor me destruction wins every time.

Quite seriously, I think that more scope is given to a game if there is a way to destroy the enemies as well as avoiding them (of course games where you must pick up amo or other resources or which have unkillable enemies will involve avoidence stratogies as well).

adding destroying enemies to a game gives the developer a hole lot more choice over what to put in the game and more scope for creativity. for example, take power ups. In an avoidence game the developer may add speed ups, shields or enemy slowdowns. Where as add the ability to destroy the enemies, and a hole range of power-ups become possible, from nuke style ones, to invincibility (I'm thinking of the Packman power pill here), to a hole range of weapon power ups and amo.

Of course there is much more to a game, layout of the environment (3D open, 3D maze, 2D maze, scrolling of various kinds etc), other collectable itemms, time factors, stats and item management, player health, and probably tthousands of other things, any of which might produce a great game if handled right, however as far as enemies go, I'd always plump for killable over non-killable.

Btw, my production is the end of next week, and after that I'll have plenty of free time, so if your still on the hunt for testers then, please let me know.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2007-02-22 10:39:51

My game is still in (early) alpha-stage, because I've been fighting with volume and panning issues as well as the question how to control a soundcard. But now that stuff is all fine, so I can go on with the game itself.
BTW, don't expect too much of it, because it's a freeware learning-project. For really big games, I'd like to be paid. I don't want to be rich, I just like to buy audiogames for my own collection. smile

Then on enemies... I'm fed up with that things that just go from left to right, or reversed, which you have to shoot when you have centered them. So I really need to think of some more exciting intruders. Any suggestions?

2007-02-22 23:39:03

Now a huge problem pops up. It's even worse than the whole source code that has been destroyed without a back-up. Yeah, I believe it's even more awful than been killed by a talking robotic microwave.

I'll tell you what problem appeared today right now:
What name should I pick for my "game production company"?

2007-02-23 02:28:41

Wel, as reguards enemy suggestions, i certainly agree that we've had enough games where you must simply center an audio targit, or wait for a panning sound to be centered, as in games like Crazy darts or ten pin alley.

while lots of work has gone into designing loads of different targitable objects in those sorts of games, it always strikes me that more could be done with the player's position.
One suggestion might be to allow the player the ability to move vertically as wel as horizontally, As is being done in torrent  Creating a game similar to the old Atari classic galaxians.
Another might be to create a continuous vertically scrolling shooter, where you must also have to keep away from walls at the sides (or maybe even in the midle), of the playing area, rather like a track in a racing game (though obviously the controls and game emphasis would be very different).
You could also have accellerate or decellerate functions in this type of game if you wish (though it's by no means neccessary).
another idea might be to scrap the hole 2D perspective idea, and do something in the same perspective (though on a smaller scale), as shades of doom. Imagine a game with similar perspective and controls to Superdog's bonehunt, but instead of just collecting items, you had to shoot and avoide enemies who gradually come into an open arena, or even have a set number of enemies in each arena who have to be destroyed to advance to the next level. I deffinately think this style of game, closed arena shooters like Berzerk, Robotron 2084, or Smash Tv (to name a few main stream examples), would work extremely wel in audio.
Of course, all of these ideas might be more tricky in the coding department, even if kept to symple, rack up the score style games, but then again, I suppose that's the price you pay for trying to be original.
I personaly don't mind paying for games at all, but I'm afraid I do have standards these days. For example, I'm not certain if I wil buy torrent when it's released, sinse it's just an infinite levels rack up the score style game. It wil al depend upon how many special features, modes of play and such it has.
then again, if a game is comparatively cheap, ten pounds or so, I might make an exception, as I did for pirate memory game because I liked the audio (plus, it came at a reduced price when bought together with Haunted factory).

As to your name, firstly, is it actually possible to be a company of one? ;D.
You could go with something that reflects your real name, Kagergames, Kagersoft, Kage interactive, Davy software or Dk games to give a few examples, though personaly I wouldn't recommend choosing a name that's just a couple of letters and the word games, sinse we already have so many! Pb games, usa games, Tdl games, Bsc games, Bpc programs, Pc games, Gma games, L-works, Vip gameszone, and probably a couple more I've forgotten about.
Alternatively, (and imho more interestingly), choose something you like or that means something, as has been done by Draconis entertainment, Lighttech interactive, Dragonslayer games and probably other people as wel.
btw, when the Audio game maker comes out and I can have a crack at creating my own games, I already have a name picked out, --- as a clue, think of Zork, and what my signature is on the audeasy list.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2007-02-23 10:56:46

What does BSC actually means? I guess I know the meaning of PB-Games, thus I don't like DK-Games (try to pronounce that a few times quite fast). Then I prefer DKames, but hey, I don't produce kames! I think I'm too small for that, so I'd better invite some people into my "company". Well, maybe that's a cool idea. I mean a game where you are able to create kames.

And now I'm wondering what I wrote there... It's a bit offtopic, isn't it? To jump back on that topic (another nice game): You can move both horizontally and vertically in my upcoming game. There're also objects that don't move, but you must avoid them to survive though. You have to worry about a streaming river too, so don't think that you stay at one place when you don't press any key (to continue). The volume of sounds is also a bit tricky, because it strongly depends on your position.

Alright, that's enough, I'd better stop here.
Oh wait! I didn't mention that the name of the game (also a song by ABBA) is going to be Rude River.

2007-02-24 05:22:19

Personally I think this game idea of yours sounds too much like level 5 of BSC's Hunter, where you were sailing down a raging river attempting to avoid rocks. Now a game like the old tari title Rivr Raid might be a lot of fun, where your goal was actually to race a boat down the river and ty to get to the finish line before the other guy did. You could add challenge tby allowing mutiple opponents, computer controlled, mind, that you'd have to try to outdistance.
  Then we come to one of my most favorite games, the Nintendo classic Excitebike. You might not be able to incorporate a track editor in an audio version (at least not if youwere doing it with Audio Game Maker), but if you wre actually coding it you might be abe to. After all, Dan Zingaro's Maze Craze game has a maze creator, so an Audio Excitebke style game could conceivably have a track creator.
  But anyway, Excitebike, fo those that don't know, was an old Nintendo game where you raced a motorcycle on one of five default tracks or any that you created Your goa was to try to beat your best time or, if you selected to have computer opponents, to beat them to the finish line without crashing your bike. The thing about Excitebike was that you could crash as many times as you wanted and you'd just lose time while you recovered. The bike also had a turbo feature, but you could only use that for so many seconds before the engine overheated, at which point it would freeze for a second before yu could use the gas again, even on normal speed. I think an audio motrcycle racing game would be neat, especially if it included a track editor. Guess that'll be oneof my projects if and when Istart to learn programming. And i've still got Mower Man simmering in the back of my brain.

But wait, what's that? A transport! Saved am I! Hark, over here! Hey nonny non, please help!

2007-02-24 08:30:27

I don't know who that sounds worse for Brian, you or mower man, ;D.

I have no idea why, but I seem to have an intrinsic block with racing games and end up crashing more times than the average install of windows, however, I stil like the idea of a motorbike game with editable tracks.

As reguards the river game, it sounds as if the game will feature a good bit more movement than the hunter stage, which only has line up panning sound style targiting (for the rocks), and 'pressing another button at random times with no targiting for the crocodiles. I am however worried that the game will end up being a water themed mod of something like Sonic zoom or light cars, if all you do is go along avoiding objects in sterrio.

the multiple opponent's idea sounds cool! or even just one opponent, which I'm guessing would be easier to program.

I'm not sure about the name Dkames, but then again, your incharge of this hole thing Davy, so whatever name you choose is up to you.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2007-02-26 20:17:04

Small update: I have to choose either to use the game development library that I'm currently using or switch to DirectX. The last one is quite more work to learn, but it's really powerful stuff too. And if I'll switch, I think I won't develop my little freeware game anymore.