I know that there are quite a few people working on personal game projects here (this IS NesDev haha), and I'm wondering, how far into development of your game(s) are you?
I'm making decent progress on a mini-shooter I'm working on, though I'm not planning on it being anything mindblowing or anything. I'd say...mmm... I'm about 20-25% through of what I would LIKE it to be. It's still very early. Anyone else have a decent estimate on how far into development your projects you are? If you have more than one, feel free to post how you are doing on each.
I have a few projects, most of which are like 0% done, unfortunately. I'm currently working on my platformer, ChateauLevania, which is an intentional ripoff of Castlevania, it just takes place at a place called "Chateau Leveaux", which is somewhere I used to live. I'm writing a cheesy horror story about that place, and the game goes along with that story. I'm also working on an RPG with Bregalad. We are still planning a lot of stuff. I've made about 75% of the world map engine, so that's good. I was making a couple of other games which were simple platformers, and there was one that was a pacman style game that I haven't done anything for in a long time. But if I wanted to, I could probably start from scratch and make that game in like 4 days.
I've been planning a lot for ChateauLevania, which I plan to make completely amazingly awesome. There's going to be huge background bosses, tons of parallax scrolling, 3D cutscenes, (which we're talking about in the "Polygon Filling" thread) and over all just really good graphics. I HOPE it turns out that way. Yeah, it's going to be a huge ROM (Probably 512k MMC3). But I've been kind of pre-occupied, so I'm not coding too much, unfortunately.
Left: one screen is working in Nestopia.
Right: another screen is just a mock-up in GIMP.
Up until my latest polygon filling craze I was working on a shoot'em up, just like you, except for the C64 (other 6502 platforms counts too, right? ;). It has all kinds of exciting new technology (a new hacked graphics mode, level streaming from the floppy, lots and lots of simultaneous sprites and so forth) but there just isn't much of a game in there yet. It is playable though, with a few enemy types, some animation and this neat laser power-up thing..
The thing is I still haven't been able to find a new graphics artist willing to work on the damned thing, which is quite discouraging really. I always kind of assumed that if you had a solid demo then skilled people would automatically come out of the woodwork and come to your aid.
Here's
the demo and an old(ish) screenshot:
Your website seems to be down atm, otherwise I'd be happy to try it. I'd enjoy making graphics for a 6502 game, but I don't know if I could make anything you'd think was good enough.
Myself, my only project right now is to learn as much about NES game making as possible. I've been making little games all my life using various tools, and I think making a NES game would be sooooo cool. Making a PC bestseller wouldn't even come close. Unfortunately, learning how to program NES seems to be a tricky business, and I haven't found an easy way to learn how to do it yet, but am eagerly awaiting whatever blargg and tepples are cooking in the other thread.
Dafydd wrote:
Your website seems to be down atm, otherwise I'd be happy to try it. I'd enjoy making graphics for a 6502 game, but I don't know if I could make anything you'd think was good enough.
Oh I don't know.. It is quite impossible to be any worse at it than I am.
Tell you what, I'd be happy to send you the tools and describe the restrictions involved so you can try your hand at it.
However may want to wait until that damned host comes online first to see if it's a project worth working on in the first place..
tepples: What's the second screen supposed to be? Memory?
Yeah your site seems down and that's a shame because I'd like to see this (and the polygon demo).
I'm working on a game called Dragon Skill right now, it's an action game with RPG elements introducted. The game engine is 100% finished, and I have a couple of levels and enemies done, I still have quite some work to do until the whole thing is completed. Let's say the whole project is about 75% far by being optimistic.
I had another RPG project that is like 0.5% done, and I have a couple of ideas for other games as well.
Are there any really good homebrewn games out there? I mean, playable, finished ones that aren't just rom hacks?
Bregalad wrote:
Yeah your site seems down and that's a shame because I'd like to see this (and the polygon demo).
It was online just few hours ago, I don't know what happened. I'd be happy to put them elsewhere if you can suggest a decent free file hosting site.
Dafydd wrote:
Are there any really good homebrewn games out there? I mean, playable, finished ones that aren't just rom hacks?
May I recommend
Metal Warrior 4 for the C64? I can't think of anything for the NES but that game is just plain awesome.
doynax wrote:
It was online just few hours ago, I don't know what happened. I'd be happy to put them elsewhere if you can suggest a decent free file hosting site.
"Christmas Island"? Wtf? Anyway, how much hosting space do you need?
Dafydd wrote:
doynax wrote:
It was online just few hours ago, I don't know what happened. I'd be happy to put them elsewhere if you can suggest a decent free file hosting site.
"Christmas Island"? Wtf?
It's just a dynamic DNS domain thingy, the actual server is located somewhere in the basement of a friend of mine (which may have something to do with the less-than-ideal uptime..).
Quote:
Anyway, how much hosting space do you need?
For this? A megabyte would be plenty.
doynax wrote:
tepples: What's the second screen supposed to be? Memory?
Yes. On Wikipedia, see
concentration +
camp.
Dafydd wrote:
Are there any really good homebrewn games out there? I mean, playable, finished ones that aren't just rom hacks?
Is
tetramino finished enough?
Yeah, it's finished enough. Seemed really difficult too, until I realized I'd mapped both players controls to the same keys. Jesus.
Nice pun, btw. I don't think I'd dare to joke about something like that unless I was Jewish, but I admire your courage.
doynax wrote:
It was online just few hours ago, I don't know what happened. I'd be happy to put them elsewhere if you can suggest a decent free file hosting site.
I have a freewebs account. I have a ton of files uploaded on it, they haven't done anything about it even if it is against their policy. However, they do have an annoying "This site was created with freewebs" thing on the bottom of the page at all times.
If you choose to make a freewebs account, don't make an easy-web builder account, make a raw-coding account. Everything just seems easier with it, ironically.
Oh, Bregalad, I'm so envious of your finished game engine. I SO wish my ChateauLevania game engine was finished. I would be so happy. But I have a lot of work to do: making a non-constant palette system, making a scrolling engine that can scroll in two directions at once, making AI, making game mechanics (HP system, experience system, etc.), making a good map format (I've got a pretty good idea of what I'm doing, but I'm not all the way sure), making the sound engine, handling split-screen-scrolling, Heavy CHR RAM updates, and probably a bunch of other crap I can't think of.
I basically know what I want the game to be like. That's about it. I've at least made a sprite drawing routine and a 4-way scroller that doesn't scroll in 2 directions at once. Trust me, the scrolling engine is the most annoying thing to try and make. I was so annoyed with it. Applying 2 directions at once won't be so bad. I'm still planning though, and I have a lot to think about. And it's also taking so long because I'm not just going to have garbage graphics with crappy sprites and really monotonous colors. I hope in the end my efforts pay off.
The hardest part of wirting a game engine is without a doubt the enemies. Also, a hard thing is to make the player move smooth and confortably in function of what the player wants. Design enemies is hard. Code scrolling, etc... is overrated in difficulty in my opinion.
Also, if anyone wants to know which is the best homebrew on the NES, it's NESnake 2 without a single doubt. This game could easily be commercialized as it back then, and it absolutely rocks. When you think Heroes of the Lance was commercialized, it really look crap.
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When you think Heroes of the Lance was my mom, it really look crap.
Enemy design: you mean AI, or graphics?
If you mean graphics, do a bit of designing with pencil and paper first.
I'm trying out googlepages to host the demos. So here we go.
The C64 shooter:
http://doynax.googlepages.com/botst.d64
Play it in VICE (or some other C64 emulator) with true drive emulation enabled. Don't forget to set up the joystick controls.
And then there's the polygon demo:
http://doynax.googlepages.com/polynes.nes
Signing up and uploading the files went remarkably smoothly, what with already having a gmail account. Plus they seem to allow direct linking without any any annoying ads or waiting lists. If I'm lucky it might even be a bit reliably than my previous host ;)
hap wrote:
Enemy design: you mean AI, or graphics?
If you mean graphics, do a bit of designing with pencil and paper first.
Well, both. I know I almost always draw stuff first before pixelizing it (altrough I usually put few detail, because I suck at drawing), and usually the end result is quite different but I don't care that much. I now have a lot of enemies drawn, enough for a game. I just don't have converted them to pixel yet, as I want perfect AI for my first few enemies, and more specifically, for my first boss.
The polygon demo looks quite cool and promising, and is really fast. However, I'd say 2 polygons aren't enough to hope any 3D graphics yet. 50 or so of them are needed for very simple scenes, I guess (I'm not an expert). So while nobody say it's impossible, I think chances are that this will end up a bit slow but who knowns ?
NESnake 2 is pretty nice, yes.
Bregalad wrote:
The polygon demo looks quite cool and promising, and is really fast. However, I'd say 2 polygons aren't enough to hope any 3D graphics yet. 50 or so of them are needed for very simple scenes, I guess (I'm not an expert). So while nobody say it's impossible, I think chances are that this will end up a bit slow but who knowns ?
You're probably right, and it was only meant to display spinning polyhedrons and such in the first place.
Luckily the overhead lies more in the number of tiles covered by the lines than the number of lines, so there is hope.
I agree that NESnake 2 is really awesome. Really great music, and overall, a very professional game. I love the detail in that game. Like how the screen shakes when you hit the wall, and the word "Crash" (I think) comes on and the letters are all shaking. It's all very cinematic.
It seems most of us are still in the process of making our games. I have yet to see someone come out with a homebrew that tells a long and epic tale (Like an RPG or an action RPG). Most homebrew games I've seen are minigames, but they're all pretty good.
We can't lose hope about cutscenes. It's obvious that wireframe is possible, and to tell the truth, filling is just one step further. However, doynax's demo seems a little complicated, since the triangle appears as if it were colored glass. It's slightly transparent. But doing solid polygons may not be too hard.
I've done two games.
Geminim - Based on the logic game of Nim. It's in cartridge form
Siamond - Clone of Simon. Will be in cart form.
I have a third idea for something bigger, but I haven't really started.
I have slowly been working on a few things for the hell of it. i doubt anyone would want to play them but oh wells, it keeps me busy when i am not working (i work ALOT). anyways, these are all the concept images though the games are further along than this.
the first is part of a 5 year long project.... coding and recoding.... recoding again.... and again... and again.... I am currently in the middle of the last rewrite... after this the game will be complete. anyways, here is the current, new crap for hotlogic (it now doesnt suck as much)
here is the old version from the minigame compo.... it looks better now huh
another one i have been working on, is a clone of Gyromite done the way i think it should have been done (no R.O.B. though... sadly
).
and the last one i have been working on, is just a card game... war. i have the engine all done with the exception of the drawing routines. it randomly generates the deck and i can run thru the game by watching the memory. here is what it will look like when it is done
@WhoaMan: That first one looks interesting. Is it a puzzle game? It looks like it. Can you jump in the lava and die?
Man, I'm so jealous of you guys. I still don't even know how to display text, unless I edit someone else's code that already does it...
i've been playing with the idea of a game that is similar to lemmings. instead of little walking men with distinct abilities, you have a set number of different logic gates to place on the current IC and have to produce the desired output to advance to the next one.
not sure how many people would want to play a game like this though.
never-obsolete wrote:
i've been playing with the idea of a game that is similar to lemmings. instead of little walking men with distinct abilities, you have a set number of different logic gates to place on the current IC and have to produce the desired output to advance to the next one.
I seem to remember playing that on the Apple II, where it was called
Rocky's Boots.
Quote:
I seem to remember playing that on the Apple II, where it was called Rocky's Boots.
thats pretty cool. guess it's back to the drawing board for me.
never-obsolete wrote:
Quote:
I seem to remember playing that on the Apple II, where it was called Rocky's Boots.
thats pretty cool. guess it's back to the drawing board for me.
Why? Nothing wrong with writing a NES port.
I can just imagine being given half a dozen NAND gates and 5 minutes, then being asked to construct a full-adder. Sounds like an excellent logic puzzle to me :)
The real question is how to design a decent user interface for such a beast..
It would be weird to be playing with something other people are paid for doing the exact same thing.
However you just have to build a karnaugh table and everything clears up in 2 minutes, unless you have more than 4 inputs.