forum.defence-force.org

The loading of Enola Gay is a firecracker compared to your game.

Hi guys! more news...

I have been adding a final boss! It is working now. Not exactly the best result I could have obtained, but it is a boss, you have to destroy it and it launches bombs at you, with some nice new animations. And it is quite challenging. I had to finish him several times and it took me an average of 2-3 lives to achieve that.

I also added the final text screen when you finish the game and all that stuff...

So another item from the list which can be deleted The end is getting nearer. I still have more than 3.5K free, so there is room for more nice things.

I'd like to add a loading screen... Need to sketch something. Let's see what I can do.

Wonderful, i'll be happy to kill the boss

I absolutely can't wait to play every new version you have to release, and I think its going to be an amazing release for the Oric. The kids will love it!

Hi guys. I spent most of my free time playing with my new Microdisc compatible controller (thanks again Silicebit ) so did not advance much on this game.

However, I have made some progress mainly with my TODO list. Tweaking the initial screens which now, for instance, show the current game keys, optimizing the sound engine a bit and other matters. Mostly internal, so I am afraid there is little new to show here.

Still did not attempt a sketch of my loading screen... That is hard for me. I have some ideas, but need time and inspiration (and a lot of patience) to come up with something usable.

Anyway I wanted to state I have not forgotten this game and I hope to have it finished before going on holidays!

Hi again.

After a conversation with Fabrice, he gave me an excellent idea I'd like to include in the game. A kind of beginner's mode where the game will pause and pop some messages to aid the player.

I've made a first test and I think this is quite possible. I still need to decide what text to print, what to say and when, but for instance it can guide the player explaining the effect of pressing a switch, what happens when he grabs a ball of energy or when he collects a retro item dropped by an exploding enemy.

This should be a different play mode, so once you know how to play, you can avoid all these interruptions. The thing is now how to set up this within the current program. An idea could be substituting the Instructions menu for a Beginner's Game. This will launch a normal game, but including the help messages, which will be printed only the first time the player does something and then behave as usual. As the first levels are easy, this might work without the need of having an specific simple game mode.

For instance: The Instructions screen (which includes two pages of text) will be split, so that the intro text is shown while the game is in presentation mode (as another screen similar to Hall of Fame or Power-ups or menu), and the second page which includes how to play the game will be printed when the user selects the Beginner's game before launching it.

Once the player knows how to play, he can proceed with the Play Game menu item, which won't include the in-game help messages.

Does this make sense?

This will add a little touch of modernity to the game, as well as remove the need to read an external instructions document.

Will it be some sort of a bubble that point to the thing you are explaining?

No. Unfortunately I cannot plot text on the play area. The game pauses and the message appears at the bottom three lines of text (where the radar is located). It remains there for some time or until the user presses a key. Then the radar is displayed again and the game continues.

It would be nice to have a bubble and an arrow pointing to the items, but cannot be done

Anyway, I think it would work and would be a nice addition.

At least if you can, make the thing (if possible of course) blink so that we now what the text is about

It seems to be a good idea.
Even if it isn't in a bubble

Well, I have finished a couple of things and added this kind of simple tutorial mode and I sent the beta to some volunteers... Now I am waiting for feedback.

If it is positive, I will clean up a couple of things and finally release this game... That is good news

Stay tuned.

Woo hoo! Can't wait for release! It'll be party time!

Wonderful, I can't wait to play it

Beta testing is almost finished. Really nice feedback with some issues detected (most of them already corrected too!).

There are a few details I'd like to polish, but it is almost there.

On the sad side I am unable to come up with a nice presentation screen. Made different attempts with horrible results. Definitely I'm not a good artist

Will try again, anyway.

I think it would be a nice idea to start preparing a webpage for the game... Dbug, can you give me room in DF as usual? I also want to put the sources of the game in the SVN as soon as they are quite definite.

Oh, and I will also include a small doc with basic instructions.

Cheers!

Chema wrote:On the sad side I am unable to come up with a nice presentation screen. Made different attempts with horrible results. Definitely I'm not a good artist

Will try again, anyway.

I (or other) can give a shot at, if you tell us what type of presentation you are thinking of

Chema wrote:I think it would be a nice idea to start preparing a webpage for the game... Dbug, can you give me room in DF as usual? I also want to put the sources of the game in the SVN as soon as they are quite definite.

Oh, and I will also include a small doc with basic instructions.

Sure, no problem.
Just give me some material (picture, some text, logo, etc...) and I will add a new oricium.defence-force.org page