Err…what… err… who me?? : :o
cough
Luxor
Got “inspiration” after playing this game? 
Yup, that’s what I said in the first post. –
[quote]It’s not a clone, but it’s similar to Luxor/Zuma. Don’t be to disappointed in me. It’s 3D (which they aren’t) and I feel it has better potential for aciton (which is why I posted it in here instead of puzzles/casual). It’s along the same vein to be sure though. I am building this game with the hopes of selling it on the portal sites, and the users on those sites are pretty stuck in the kinds of games they like. Anyway, I like that kinda game. To me this is better though, because it feels more like a shooter.
[/quote]
There are lots of this type of game (dozen or more). It’s pretty much becomming a new genre. They are all based on (or clones of) the 90’s arcade game: Puzz loop
http://images.webmagic.com/klov.com/screens/P/wPuzz_Loop.jpg
Mine however, is the first one that is truly 3D so at least I am doing something different. Mine also has vertical play, which isn’t possible in the 2D variations. You can’t see what I’ll be able to do much in the first level, but the slope going down to the buried ruins will give you a hint. If you think about it some more, I am sure you can get all kinds of ideas on how that can be used
So… anyone have any comments on the game play? Find any new bugs?
PS: Mine is the only one that has side scrolling as well.
Since the topic has come up, and it certainly will again when I post this on the more critical sites for feedback (such as the Indie Gamer forums). I thought I would do a litle montage:
For reference, here is the grand daddy - Puzz Loop
http://images.webmagic.com/klov.com/screens/P/wPuzz_Loop.jpg
[tr][td]Zuma
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/puzzclones/zuma.jpg
[/td][td]BeetleBomp
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/puzzclones/beetlebomp.jpg
[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Luxor
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/puzzclones/luxor.jpg
[/td][td]TumbleBugs
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/puzzclones/tumble_bugs.jpg
[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Atlantis
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/puzzclones/atlantis.jpg
[/td][td]Pacifica
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/puzzclones/pacifica.jpg
[/td][/tr]
Tell me - Of all of these; which one looks the most different from the original Puzz Loop?
I feel guilty, but not to guilty
Hem… hem…
Must read first post.
Must not only look at pretty pictures in first post.
Yeah… I think I can remember that… :-[
As for the gfx, yes, 3d looks more dynamic, but 2d tends to be more slick, independant of specs. Still I’d go for 3d, as it feels less childish, I guess.
I agree somewhat that 2D can be made to look more slick, and it’s definetly easier on the specs (though 3 of those other games use 3D hardware as well, even though they are 2D).
That said, the main reason I went 3D is to make something different and expand the game play. Of all the other games, the only thing that really seperates them is if you rotate your player thing, or you move it horizontally along the bottom of the screen. They also all have the same top-down view, so the gameplay feels very similar, same angles to shoot for, same visibility, etc. With 3D, it has different angles (even if the board is similar), 3D can have slopes (my little hill…must show you guys the possibilities of that ) and I can scroll in any direction and provide different camera angles (like the target assist powerup does).
Of course, the graphics in my one little level are going to be completely redone (if not scrapped). Then I can bring my considerable 3D modeling and level design experience to play and provide something that may not be quite as slick as 2D, but pretty slick on it’s own.
Something more along this level of quality - It’s a level I did for the Elite Force 2 1.1 patch
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/mapimages/hm_ctf_exigent.jpg
I won’t stop until it’s the slickest, coolest Puzz Loop type game out there - With so much competition, I don’t really have much choice anyway.
If your curious, here are some other level maps I have made:
Concrete Combat
Odd I found this on a website while searching. I made this for EF1, but the site said it’s a map for Quake 4?? I also don’t remember it ever being released. Perhaps the guys at Wired Lamp recompiled it for Quake 4? I dunno, I’ll have to get in touch with them. I made it about 2 years ago.
Some old ones I could find on the net (about 5 years ago)
Nebula Clash
No new updates at this time, but here are two new screen shots of the first two completed (finally getting to the good stuff) levels of the game - only 18 more to go :
Level 1
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/images/pacifica1111a.jpg
Level 2
http://vorax.thebodclan.com/images/pacifica1111b.jpg
Thanks for viewing - feedback welcome
Well, screenshots look great and everything, but I regret to say it just won’t start on my computer (at least the one that I’ve tried so far). It’s the slowest of all my computers, but I figured I’d test if it’s playable there first.
Windows 98
850 mhz Athlon processor
192 mb ram
TNT2 graphics card (recently updated drivers, got the newest ones possible)
Console log:
[quote]Console log started - Pacifica Version 0.2 (alpha) - October 22, 2005
Creating new Engine instance: com.vorax.VoraxEngine@18d107f
Attempting to set display: 1024x768 @60Mhz
[/quote]
Error log:
[quote]Error log started - Pacifica Version 0.2 (alpha) - October 22, 2005
Could not find suitable display mode for: 1024x768 @60Mhz
[/quote]
Don’t have to look far to figure out what the problem is. What I don’t know is why this is the only LWJGL application that can’t find a “suitable display”. :-\
I’ll be swittching the default to 800x600, hopefully that will resolve the problem.
I’d advise you to not choose a fixed resolution, because it will fail on a number of systems. Pick the best from an array of displaymodes. If even that fails, choose the current resolution.
Yea but my default resolution is 1024x768. The Hz I’m not sure about, but when I press the menu button on my monitor it tells me “H:68.6KHz V:84.9Hz”… so one would think 60 Hz might work? ???
I really wanted to play too (played Zuma and thought it was pretty good). I’ll probably install it on another computer and see what happens.
Edit: Did an Everest report and I got this out of the monitor section
[quote] Supported Video Modes:
640 x 480 140 Hz
800 x 600 110 Hz
1024 x 768 85 Hz
1152 x 864 75 Hz
1280 x 1024 65 Hz
[/quote]
Does that say anything?
Sorry for double posting but this really is a separate post.
I installed it on a better computer and it worked perfectly (except shadows, that crashed it, but I’m not sure if my card supports those shadows anyway). I got about 120-180 fps… plenty
Game itself was really fun, great job on the music and models, thought the swirling ball texture looked nice as well. Got to about 190k points. It does get to keep up with the incoming flow eventually.
One thing I really liked was it starts of very quickly, and seems to have a minimal loading time. And again, the music transitions well with the starting up and beginning a new game. It really seems to be getting close to a commercial quality. Maybe a few difficulty tweaking issues (seemed a bit fast at the beginning and slow at the end maybe?) but it’s getting there. One thing you might want to add is optionally higher quality textures or sphere detail (number of polys), since it seems a bit on the lower end, but you’re probably already planning to do that.
Good work… especially for one person. You are one person, right?
Sounds good - I definetly need to expand that block of code with some more smarts.
Great - I assume your new computer is using an ATI? (I have a bug with shadows with ATI cards)
Thanks - glad you liked it - there is still more to do for the game play, but the foundation is there.
Yup - needs tweaking
Thanks - Yes I am one person
Geforce 4 Ti-4200, 64 mb version.
And I can run the demo at
http://www.java-gaming.org/forums/index.php?topic=11418.0
perfectly with extremely high framerates.
Btw I noticed I made a typo, I meant to say “it does get difficult to keep up…” on the gameplay comment.
Oh and… computer is actually a few years old, but still reasonably good. Windows XP Professional, 640 mb ram, 2 ghz, if that matters.
Note: Just ran it again, I get a window that pops up with the title “Java Virtual Machine”, with the message “Fatal Error Occured.” That’s about all. This occurs what appears to be right after it has finished loading and it wants to start up the game.
Hmm…that’s odd - so far only ATI cards have been having problems with the shadows - are your drivers up-to-date?
Either way, it doesn’t really matter - I have decided to disable shadowing for the final version due to the fact that it requires high-end cards and computers (or at least higher end then I would like).
I just tryed this game on my crappy TNT2 and it was playable (20-30fps), its a really nice game. It crashed when i enabled shadows / window mode tho (and then when i had restarted it it crashed again until i reinstalled it). Also a pause button would be nice. Also it is just my personal preference but i prefer indie games to start in window mode.
This is going to be one of those reference “good games made in java” games! ;D
Thanks for trying it out. I’ll be releasing another test version with the new goodies and improved graphics in a couple of weeks. Then I’ll go into silent mode (no releases - just screenies maybe) until it’s finally in full beta.
You can pause the game by pressing the escape key (also alows you to quit back to menu).
I do hope it’ll be a reference worthy game for Java when it’s done. Glad you think it will be
Just a note to anyone that was following this thread, it has been moved Here with new updates and a new name.
- Vorax