TankZone 4k

Contests 4K Game Competition - 2007
#1

http://www.stratzone.net/4k/splash.gif

TankZone takes place in a jungle/forest enviroment. You are a renegade tank pilot that is battling your way to freedom. Beware of the guarding enemy tanks which are there to destroy you. Make your way to the “Black Hole Portal Device” (which is a black circle) which will teleport your to the next mission. It may be very hard to find it.

Health regenerates (slowly).

Use mouse to target, and left-mouse-button to shoot the enemies. (It may be better to take them out before they take you out!)
Use W, A, S, D keys to pilot your tank around.
Press ‘N’ key for new-game (when you’re dead or started the game).

4 missions to complete! Last mission is ultra-hard. No time limit. Good luck! :slight_smile:

Java WebStart: http://www.stratzone.net/4k/tankzone.jnlp

#2

Very impressive! I love it, graphics are entirely awesome. I’d rather see slower, interpolated bullets from the enemies though. So that they’ll actually hit you if you don’t turn around, but they’re not fast enough to be unavoidable. Will try the game more later as I get the time. :smiley:

Great game!

#3

greatness.

that is all.

oh, and this is my 800th post. :stuck_out_tongue:

#4

The trick to avoiding the bullets is to keep strafing… but be aware that the closer you get to the enemy tanks and they hit you, the faster they shoot + the faster you die. You need to approach the enemy tanks by circling them… you can take em out pretty quickly that way.

#5

I realized all that, but then again, I think merely strafing them get either too easy or too hard. That is, at close range, it’s virtually not possible. At maximum range, it’s too easy - they’ve got no chance of hitting you as long as you keep moving. This is a bit dull, I’d rather see them shooting ahead of you, forcing you to turn back and forth :smiley:

Again, thoroughly awesome game!

#6

I wanted to add more AI into it, make the enemy tanks chase you or something… but there was no space left for it. I’d probably need at least 500 bytes at least for some movement.

You have the same range as the enemy tanks, and yes, it’s easier to take out one tank from distance… but as the missions get harder, you don’t have much room to move around, and there are often 2-3-4 tanks grouped together making it ultra-hard to take em out.
Btw. I haven’t been able to finish the game myself :slight_smile: I made it to the last mission, but that’s it.

I’ve spent too much time on this game already, so I decided to wrap it up and move to something else… seems like it’s finished. Unless something serious comes up I won’t make any changes.

#7

brilliant game, love how the tanks camouflage with the trees. You ran out of space? theres always more space, you just need to look harder :slight_smile:

#8

i’m noticing a bit of a flaw in logic here. they shouldn’t be able to re-fire as soon as a bullet has disappeared. they need to have a constant limit between shots. this way when you’re 10 pixels away from the enemy, they don’t turn into a machine gun…

#9

Yes, that’s a value point.

But I’ve thought about this, it perhaps it makes the game a bit more complicated/difficult. If you get hit, chances are that you’ll get hit again.
So, yes, perhaps it’s a “logic flaw”, but I decided to categorize it as a “feature” and leave it as it is :slight_smile:

Too tired anyway to try to squeeze more code into that game :slight_smile: Hours spent on it already.

#10

it should be capped at least :wink: as it is right now, close combat will get you killed before you can think about clicking the mouse. it’s a good challenge to have the enemy shoot faster as you move in closer, but there needs to be a limit, imo.

something like not allowing 250ms between shots or something. even that is wicked fast though.

#11

Well, the game is only 4 missions (couldn’t include more because of space). I figured, since the first 2 missions are easily accomplished, the last 2 should be pretty hard. It seems to be balanced fine right now.

Mission 1 = Very easy
Mission 2 = Medium
Mission 3 = Hard
Mission 4 = Very hard

If you finish mission 4, let me know :slight_smile: (btw. if you want to take a screenie to prove it, you need to take it before you hit the black circle as you will be spawned to the first mission).

#12

will try to beat level 4 and let you know :wink:

question, would it be possible to have bullets NOT shoot through trees? that would give levels like level 2 some strategy at least :stuck_out_tongue:

#13

It is possible.

One thing that would be difficult though… the ai tanks would need to “know” when to shoot, so they just don’t shoot at the trees when the player is behind them. Not a big deal to do, but considering the code I would have to add then I’m looking at at least a whole day trying to squeeze it in. :slight_smile:

I did find one bug though that I might fix… once you’ve killed a ai tank, your bullet still collides with the area where the tank was. Just a matter of fixing some simple nesting stuff in my code.

Let me know of more things you would like “changed”. If there are enough things people would like changed then I might revise the game.

#14

Not sure if you used the utility i put together ( http://www.java-gaming.org/forums/index.php?topic=15497.0 ) but you may achieve better compression with it.

To give the best chance of compression feed in an normal jar. that is, a jar with the class file which has not gone through any 3rd party optimisers.

#15

Hey you made it!

Cool how much you managed to cram in! Happy that I finally got to shoot somethings :slight_smile: Really nice with the trees and how the tanks can hide under them. One thing that I really liked with the sqarious was that I didn’t have to start from the very start when I died. Think that would be really nice for this game as well, or at least a few lives. Sort of a drag to have to start from scratch just to try level 4 again. The regeneration of energy is also a bit slow, and a bit odd when you aren’t chased. At the last few tanks I had very little shield left, so I had to do something else for 15 min or so to get the shield up again.

Cool and nice looking game! And I really look forward to play the full multiplayer game that I know is almost ready :wink:

#16

[quote]I wanted to add more AI into it, make the enemy tanks chase you or something… but there was no space left for it. I’d probably need at least 500 bytes at least for some movement.
[/quote]
AI is the hardest part to fit into 4k. You don’t think it will be but there are always a bunch of if statements.

Nice game, I found getting near the enemy tanks and driving around in a circle was pretty effective.