GalGen Tech Demo/Prototype Game: Alpha Test

Oct 31, 2010 at 1:06 AM
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I'm writing a game-y thing. It's going to be ÜB3R-1337awesome. At some point.

It's in the alpha stage right now.

CURRENT VERSION:

http://71.58.149.156/GalGenTrader
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 3:36 AM
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Begin logging: 30 Oct 2010 23:33:53
Took 3046 ms to generate galaxysize 50000 galaxy with 10000 stars.
Took 12898 ms to load galaxy from disk.
Took 73 ms to save galaxy to disk.
Took 75 ms to save galaxy to disk.

loading seems to take excessively long...

I couldn't figure out what my fps is; how do you do that?

I would recommend making zooming more gradual; right now you just barely tap the + key and everything just flies off the screen. Also, the little red box that selects stars seems to become glitchy when you zoom in.

Also, out of curiosity, what language are you programming this in?
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 4:08 AM
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I might take the zoom feature out alltogether. It was more intended for games where you're playing as a little spaceship flying around. I haven't tied any of the new features in to it. Working As Programmed I think is the term, it isn't supposed to work right.

There should be an FPS counter. What's your screen resolution?

Loading is a complete mess and will probably need to be rewritten from scratch before it'll work at all.

I'm writing it in Blitz Basic Plus. It's a sort of hybrid between C and BASIC. I like it because the syntax is really simple. No screwing around with every non-aphabetical character on the entire keyboard.
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 6:14 AM
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There's no FPS counter on mine, either.

However, it does run extremely smoothly, and I think it's pretty neat to have such a huge world thing without any lag.
Also the zoom function doesn't seem to work (the game only displays stars at zoom 1)

Anyway it saved two logs, one for October 30th and one for October 31st

(30th)
Begin logging: 30 Oct 2010 20:54:02
Took 1208 ms to generate galaxysize 50000 galaxy with 10000 stars.

(31st)
Begin logging: 31 Oct 2010 02:08:55
Took 1116 ms to generate galaxysize 50000 galaxy with 10000 stars.
Took 24 ms to save galaxy to disk.
Took 26 ms to save galaxy to disk.
Took 24 ms to save galaxy to disk.
Took 40 ms to save galaxy to disk.
Took 25 ms to save galaxy to disk.
Took 25 ms to save galaxy to disk.
Took 1415 ms to load galaxy from disk.
Took 985 ms to load galaxy from disk.
Took 981 ms to load galaxy from disk.
Took 986 ms to load galaxy from disk.
Took 1001 ms to load galaxy from disk.
Took 1001 ms to load galaxy from disk.
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 9:32 AM
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Yeah, in fact I think it can actually make a much bigger galaxy without lag. I wrote everything so that it would run well with the B+ debugger enabled without realizing how much it slowed down the program.

How big is your screen? What's your desktop resolution?
You probably just couldn't get to any stars at the higher zoom level. For some reason the zoom functions make your viewpoint move, I think it's because of all the funky math the drawing functions do.

I have a 1600X900 screen, so if you're using a smaller screen you might not see anything at all. The game sets itself to your desktop resolution. That might also be the reason noone can see the FPS counter. Post a screenshot with the F1 key down so I can see where it gets drawn on the screen. The help texts should be inbetween the middle and right edge...

EDIT:

New version.
http://www.filedropper.com/galgendemo_1

No zoom, you can view star descriptions (though they're all placeholders), and saving and loading works. If the game detects a galaxy.sav in the same directory as it it'll load from that. It actually takes less time to load than it does to generate now. You'll have to delete the old galaxy.sav, old saves are incompatible.

EDIT:

Oops, forgot to update the F1 thingy. Press enter to view the description of the selected star. They all have the same description though.
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 10:40 AM
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Schilcote said:
I'm writing a game-y thing. It's going to be ÜB3R-1337awesome. At some point.

Right now it's just a stupid-ass tech demo. A pretty-looking tech demo, but not exactly a game. It's just showing off the engine that I will later use to make an actual game with.

Here it is:
http://www.filedropper.com/galgendemo

Tell me what your max and min FPS is, and post a copy of the logfile. Loading saved galaxies doesn't work yet, I know exactly what the problem is but it's not really that important anyway at this particular moment. ALSO tell me your desktop resolution.

The next thing I'm going to do with it is allow you to actually interact with the stars. I'm thinking of making a Masters Of Orion-type game with it.

As I said, it's not really even a game yet. So don't yell at me because it's boring. It's still in alpha.

Uhhhh wait, why did you join a cavestory forum and post this?
Someone please tell me if im out of line if i am reguarding this.
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 11:02 AM
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xristosx said:
Uhhhh wait, why did you join a cavestory forum and post this?
Someone please tell me if im out of line if i am reguarding this.

'Cos there was a section for it.
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 3:24 PM
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Nothing wrong with it really. Just don't feel constrained to staying in this part of the site :)
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 3:32 PM
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Any screenshots?
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 3:36 PM
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WoodenRat said:
Any screenshots?

Well, there isn't a hell of a lot to see. You might as well just download it and take a look (and post log details) :).

Hmm... I guess at some point I'll have to introduce actual game elements. I don't think I'll be getting any coding in today, I haven't eaten in a day or two and that's never conducive to long-term concentration. Maybe I'll just have some sugar water or something.

But anyway, game elements. I dunno, what would everyone here like to see?
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 6:13 PM
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Why didn't you eat lol?
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 6:17 PM
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Yeah, don't starve yourself... :)
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 7:32 PM
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have a hearty meal, then we'll talk about what we'd like to see in your project
 
Oct 31, 2010 at 10:48 PM
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Jeez, stop being so sympathetic ;).

Anyway, I've eaten now.
 
Nov 1, 2010 at 12:23 AM
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DoubleThink said:
Nothing wrong with it really.

Alrighty then, Sorry OP.
 
Nov 6, 2010 at 2:33 PM
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Split off GalGen Tech Demo and the actual game today. It's at a stage where really is a game now instead of a tech demo, although you can't actually play it quite yet.

We're going to need a name.

EDIT:

http://www.filedropper.com/galgentrader

It's actually playable now. Fly around, interact with planets. It's not very much fun quite yet, but it's a game.

TODO:

Make raw materials (ore,food,metal) cost more on high TLevel planets
Make the ship eat up fuel
Allow player to upgrade ship
Make passage of time actually do something
 
Nov 13, 2010 at 4:33 PM
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New version! Yaaaay! Same link.

Ore Metal and Food now cost less on low-TLevel planets, and you can upgrade your cargo bay (and your ship speed, but that's buggy and doesn't do anything yet anyway).

EDIT:

Also going to get more permanent hosting.
 
Nov 16, 2010 at 12:49 PM
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Here's a question for y'all. I'm about to implement the away team system, where you can beam down to/land on a planet and screw around and get your blueshirts shot at and your redshirts shot.

Two things:

Which would be better, a graphical top-down or isometric system, or a text based system like we have now? Like in X-COM UFO Defense. Perhaps a combination of both, isometric in battle and text outside of it? It'd take a lot more work to use the isometric system, but it'd also look cooler. I'd also need someone to do the spritework, since I can't sprite worth crap.

Should away team events be in a scripted language or hard-coded? If it were scripted you could mod in your own events, but again it's harder to code (though I'm reasonably certain it's within my ability, and I'm not so sure about the isometric bit).

Or should I work on a different thing altogether? Fuel costs and all that?

EDIT:

Also, TRIPLE POST COMBO: 25000 POINTS
 
Nov 16, 2010 at 9:49 PM
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I don't like triple posts ]:

Anyway, graphics is generally preferred to text-based in my opinion, it's not called a video game for nothing. I think perhaps a near-topdown view (like LttP) is a good format, since I always find that with diagonal motion and arrow keys there's always a bit of intuitiv-ity loss. On second thought, I don't want to make it sound like that's my only gripe with iso. I think it's shitty overall.
 
Nov 20, 2010 at 2:14 PM
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Erectin' a new version!
*bash bash bash*
*awesome music*

New version has music, courtesy of KeygenJukebox.com. You can also generate train and fire crew members, but you still can't do anything with them.
 
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