Playable Demos

Summary:

When you're ready and willing, upload a playable demo of what you've been able to accomplish!

Playable Demo's

PiscesMike 17 Feb 2014 08:16

The title says it all!
If you have something you're willing to share with us, we would love to have a look. You can send a link to a deployment executable or to source code if you like. I'll be upping an executable sometime today of my project in its current state.

P.S. 'Playable' is defined as something that renders. Maybe even with a nice cornflower blue. It's definitely not a contest, but more a snapshot of our collective history like a time capsule that we can look back on later.

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Last edited on 17 Feb 2014 08:29 by PiscesMike Show more

Re: Playable Demo's

Megabytte 27 Feb 2014 14:55

I just put up my new version. www.bitbucket(dot)org/Megabytte/space-intruders/downloads
If the link doesn't work, I'm sure you can still find it. :)

Last edited on 27 Feb 2014 14:57 by Megabytte Show more

Re: Playable Demo's

PiscesMike 18 Feb 2014 01:34

Greetings all! As promised, here's a link to a 'playable' version of where I'm at with the project. For now, it's just menus and such while I get more background work done.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5moEgyck5X5c01kWGFyYWZPYjA/edit?usp=sharing

Thoughts, comments?

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demo's

PiscesMike 18 Feb 2014 01:41

Just noticed a small issue. If you select a sector from the galactic map, go into the sector, and then back out to the galactic map, it doesn't allow you to select another sector…. well, technically, it allows you to, but when you hit enter again, it just goes back to the galactic map option. I really need to play around more with the running code, d'oh. It's been fixed, just not in this upload.

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demo's

Marcus42 20 Feb 2014 21:42

Sorry it took me such a long time to figure out how to download your game!

Anyways, there's obviously not a lot there right now, but it was very cool! I like the zoom in to each sector, and the random generation of the galaxies. One thing that I'll mention, though, is that the text could be pretty hard to read in the intro. Sometimes it was really thin, or even partially cut off. Otherwise, I have nothing to complain about.

Good job!

Re: Playable Demo's

PiscesMike 20 Feb 2014 22:37

Thanks Marcus!
I agree the font is not so good in this particular context. What adds to the suck, is that it's actually already BOLDED too! Guess it's time to hunt down a new one!

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demo's

rbwhitaker 18 Feb 2014 15:42

Here's my first release! https://bitbucket.org/rbwhitaker/space-invaders/downloads

I call it version 0.0.0.0.1. It doesn't do a whole lot, but you can select a column that you want to attack and then tell it the path to follow. Eventually, you should direct the pathway off the edge of the screen, which will end the path and send the attack wave in. They eventually return to their starting point.

I definitely feel behind schedule right now, and my code is a horrid ugly mess. I'll want to spend some time cleaning it up soon.

But I think it is meaningful for me to start putting out periodic releases, even if there's not much to show in it yet.

Re: Playable Demo's

Marcus42 19 Feb 2014 18:06

Hey, everyone! I've got my first release for you!

Now, there's not a lot to it at the moment, but I would appreciate some feedback. Here's some things I'm looking for:
- Does the player ship seem too wide (i.e. too hard to dodge enemy shots)?
- Do the enemies shoot too often, or not enough?
- Do the sound effects work well with each other and the artwork?

And, of course, any bugs that you may encounter. I've found one where ships will become invincible for ten seconds or so, but it's so random, I hardly have any idea where to start tracking it down.

Finally, here's the link: https://bitbucket.org/TheMazinTar/earthling-defenders/downloads

Thanks!

Re: Playable Demo's

Swatacular 21 Feb 2014 17:38

Hey Marcus, I tried out your game and you were looking for feedback/bug reports.. so here it is..

Does the player ship seem to wide = yes.. I feel like the ship should be smaller and move slower.. (read below)
On top of that, if the player moved slower.. these changes may also be good, NPC's move toward you slower..

Your badguy return of fire rate is very good if you include the above. (its to much for the current size of the ship)

Sound effects are good…

Other Notes:
1. You can make your particle engine shoot particles in a circle using raidians and such.. its not that hard and I strongly suggest it.
2. BUG! you wanted to know why they are invincible for ten seconds.. Well I know that when they start coming onto the screen they are all invincible and that doesn't seem right as the bullets obviously hit the target..
3. thats pretty much it..
4. your doing really good at programming
6. you didnt realize I just skipped 5.
7. you just checked
8. you are smiling..
10. I have no idea where im going with this..
11. I just skipped 9..
12. You think this is getting annoying.

Re: Playable Demo's

Marcus42 21 Feb 2014 18:18

Wow, I was all worried when I saw your long list of notes … My mind is now at rest! =D

Hmm … I'm not really surprised that you think the player ship is too wide. I'll see about trimming it down.

As for note #2, I did that on purpose. It didn't really seem fair that you could take potshots on your enemies before they've even finished 'spawning,' so you can't kill them during that time. However, they cannot fire during this time, so it's evened out. What I'm talking about is right in the middle of fighting with the last few enemies, and I'm shooting them and it's not registering.

Anyways, thanks so much for the feedback, Swat! It's appreciated!

Re: Playable Demo's

Swatacular 21 Feb 2014 18:48

Oh.. as for note 2. If anything you should change it so you cant shoot during that time as opposed to they are invincable.. it makes it easier on the player to understand whats going on

Re: Playable Demo's

Marcus42 21 Feb 2014 19:43

Hmm. Good idea! I'll try that!

Re: Playable Demo's

PiscesMike 22 Feb 2014 19:32

Hey Marcus!
Sorry took so long to get back to you with my feedback. The ship does seems to be a little too wide. Everything else looks great! I actually really like the particle effect, and would be interested in how that was done…. I haven't got around to messing with that yet!
The only thing I noticed that seemed a little off was the enemy fire scoring a hit when it is in the middle of the ship where it collides with the collision rectangle, but the ship itself is curved so technically, it shouldn't hit. In simpler terms, it collides in the empty space between the sides of the ship. Not really a huge deal. I imagine that will be much less noticeable if the ship size is reduced a little.
Other than that, both me and my wife thinks it looks great! Good job!

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demo's

Marcus42 22 Feb 2014 20:12

Thanks, PiscesMike!

Due to the feedback from Swat and thinking so myself, I reduced the size of the ship a couple days ago, so that's already fixed. As for the collision rectangle 'problem,' I've been meaning to get around to fixing that, especially now that you can actually block the enemies' shots by shooting them, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. I can try to prioritize it, though, because it should only take a few minutes.

The particle effect was almost entirely not my work, haha! It's actually one of RB's tutorials (here), and I just tinkered with some of the values. Of course, I made a couple of my own particles and used those instead. Here's one:

The hard part was tinkering with the velocity to get the look I wanted, since I wasn't entirely sure what everything did, but even that was very easy. It just took a little bit of time.

Thanks again for the feedback!

Re: Playable Demo's

Swatacular 23 Feb 2014 20:13

My game is Officially Playable, Winnable and has no known bugs in it..
Download Link

Im still a long way from being finished.. Im planning Graphical User Interface code among other stuff for easier play..

Next thing on my list:
Graphics to let player know section your supposed to play in next.
Start menu.. Rules Screen

Last edited on 23 Feb 2014 20:15 by Swatacular Show more

Re: Playable Demo's

PiscesMike 25 Feb 2014 08:01

Looking good Swat! Things were a little confusing for me, I've never played STTT before. After a little bit, I got the hang. So I'd say you right on track with your next steps!

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demo's

Marcus42 24 Feb 2014 03:27

I've got a second release now! Here you go!

The controls are pretty much common sense, but I probably should mention that you use the up and down arrow keys or W and S to change the type of weapon you have selected. There's not a limit on how much electricity you can have yet, so any thoughts on what's the limit would be appreciated. Other than that, there's nothing really in particular I'd like feedback on, but if you have something that you don't like, think needs to be fixed, or liked and wanted to let me know, please do! It's very helpful stuff, feedback.

Thanks!

Re: Playable Demo's

PiscesMike 25 Feb 2014 08:27

I've got to say, I was sucked right into the game. I don't know if the various weapons were available in the last release, but that made all the difference to the way I played. The game definitely has a rhythm and flow that is pretty awesome, and the only thing I could think to say is that maybe the view port could be a little wider and the space between the enemies and the fighter extended a little. This would have the effect of prolonging the battle without having to scale the graphics, which I think are great.
The collision detection you've got is remarkable as well. I love the fact you worked out the details to the almost U shape of the players ship.

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demo's

Marcus42 26 Feb 2014 00:03

Wow! Thank you!

So, what you're saying is that maybe I should make the screen both wider and taller … Hmm. Not a bad idea. I'll give it a try!

Thanks again!

Re: Playable Demos

PiscesMike 26 Feb 2014 01:18

Greetings again all! Looks like I'm kind of getting here late to the party, so to speak. Anyways, here's my latest playable demo version. The additions for this update are the star selector screen with HUD displays, and the free travel mode. Controls are pretty straight forward, Enter to make a selection, Esc to cancel out or leave a window, and arrow keys to navigate. There are a couple more that are mainly there for testing at this point. One is that in the star selection screen, you can hit 'R' to reset the screen and it will generate a new screen with randomly placed stars. There's nothing in place to detect multiple key presses, so when you do hit the R it is likely to scroll through several screens before stopping, or conversely, you can hold R down to watch it spit out new stars ad infinitum. The only other interesting non standard keys are in the free travel mode. Once you're traveling around, you can hit space to increase speed, and 'B' to apply braking. These are cumulative, so holding the key down will make things go faster and faster until its a blur, or slower and slower until you pass through standing still to going backwards!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5moEgyck5X5ZThpUnk2b3lKem8/edit?usp=sharing

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demos

Swatacular 27 Feb 2014 19:50

I got Another Update for you!!! I havent done much.. But I Built the GUI and made it much easier to understand the game..
LINK

Re: Playable Demos

PiscesMike 02 Mar 2014 04:58

About time for me to get out a new update as well, so here it is!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5moEgyck5X5bEVtOHVTS3F4NkU/edit?usp=sharing

Things for the most part work. Once you enter free travel mode, you will travel a bit and then run into a random encounter, which brings up the fight screen. You can either kill all the baddies, or fall victim to their relentless onslaught. Either way, when the battle is over you will be returned to the free travel screen. You can wander around running into and fighting enemies as much as you like. ESC takes you out. For now, that's about it. Of course, the plan is to add leveling and resource mining to allow you different weapons and shields and such but I don't know how far I'm going to make it before this competition ends. However, this is the basic framework of how I envisioned the game, so I'm open to input and suggestions. I know there is one little bug if you fight, then travel, and fight again. Namely, one of the enemy ships may already be destroyed. I actually know whats causing that little bug, and I'll get to fixing it soon. For now, one less baddie to kill. Let me know your thoughts on the random encounters as far as if they are too many, too little, or just about right. Sometimes it seems like the first one takes a bit to pop. Thoughts on the fight screen are welcome too - if the enemies fire too much, too little, how hard it is. etc. You'll notice that as your shield takes hits, it changes colors. Green is strong, yellow is damaged, red is severely damaged, and of course, when they're depleted, they disappear. Better watch out at that point, because even though your ship has health of its own, it can only take a few direct hits! If you do happen to get killed, you'll just appear back in the free travel mode. I need to set it up to at least tell you when you die or when you win the level, but like I said, it's just a game framework for now. I'll hopefully get some of these nice details worked in over the next week!

---

"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Playable Demos

Marcus42 02 Mar 2014 05:45

Nice job, PiscesMike!

I think that the enemy rate of fire is pretty good, but a tad too fast. I just gotta say, though, the first encounter was pretty intense, and in a good way, so you might want to keep it the same! As far as how frequently you encounter them, I'd say it's too infrequent right now, just because there's nothing to do in the meantime, and a bit too frequent once there is stuff to do. I'm not sure what things you can do in between encounters, though, so I can't say for sure.

I won't be able to finish what I wanted to by the 9th either, PiscesMike. We can just keep on programming after the competition ends, haha!

Re: Playable Demos

Marcus42 02 Mar 2014 05:30

Time for release #3! Here it is: https://bitbucket.org/TheMazinTar/earthling-defenders/downloads#download-320321

A and D and Left and Right to move back and forth, and W and S and Up and Down to select weapon modes and powers. Space to fire or use the selected power. It takes 25% Electricity to use the Heal power and 75% to use the Explode power. Just because I'm such a nice guy, I gave you all 25% Electricity at the start! The 'dashboard' is pretty easy to understand - green dots are health, blue are shield. If you get killed and the screen goes blank, press R to restart.

Any kind of feedback at all is appreciated! I'd really like to know what you think of the new screen size, and also the dashboard and powers, although everything is helpful. You're also welcome the let me know what you want me to do more - adding a new enemy, adding music, or adding menus.

Thanks!