Winnipeg Fats

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Posts posted by Winnipeg Fats

  2. Posted

    I've been toying with the idea of a random seed for generating enemy patterns for stages in a shmup.  For me it would be pretty easy I'd probably work in strings of waves that I know work well together then assigning each string to a value in an array, generating the seed, and matching individual seed values to spots in the array for the spawn order.  I'd probably also pair the spawn wave with a random value to spawn along the X-axis, to increase the variation.

     

    ...of course first I need to create working enemy movement patterns.

  4. Posted

    The Unity video tutorials are pretty great because they come with files to follow along. Also the guy doing the videos has a delightful accent. I liked starting with JS and then going to C# because of the way I learn, mostly. I was able forced to apply logical thinking across two languages with different syntax rather than rely on cut and paste methods to achieve goals.  I think my coding is stronger for it, but ymmv.

     

    I can't speak to the individual quality of the Unity tutorials, because I've only done a couple. Though I think that the ones that are game/project specific, like the space shooter one, are better to start with than the general engine ones, like the 2d Unity one.

  5. Posted

    Does anyone know if any of tutorials that are suitable for absolute beginners? Unity probably isn't the best place to start for learning to code but I know my way around it and can easily add non-code elements to projects but of course I'm open no non-unity tutorials, preferable C# though so I can easily transition to Unity.

     

    If you're an absolute coding beginner then I would start with codecademy.com to get the basics of coding in general (I'd start with javascript, personally). 

     

    If you understand the basics of coding and thinking with that type of logic then grab a beginner tutorial from the asset store. I started with the space shooter tutorial, for example. I ripped through that quickly enough to get the basics of both C# and the Unity engine and rolled right over into my project.

  6. Posted

    Learning how to use the physics engine to move stuff isn't all that difficult, but just a warning: Box2D is deterministic, but only on a per-hardware basis. There's no guarantee the movements will be the same across different machines. This largely only shows itself in floating point errors, so in most cases it's so small that it's not noticeable, but it's worth keeping in mind if you're doing anything super complex. With lots of object interaction.

     

    For pure movement, if the ships/whatevers won't actually collide with anything besides the player ship and bullets, it's probably fine.

     

    Also for purposes of moving ships around in a shmup, I personally probably wouldn't touch forces. I'd just straight set the velocity and let it go, or change it based on what kind of pattern you want.

     

    Velocity is probably what I should have said, yeah.

  8. Posted

    I didn't think of this. I'm going to try that out.

     

     

    If I was doing this, my first thought would be to have off-screen attractors that the ships are moving towards. If those targets are moved around with some animations or whatever, you could probably get some complex patterns.

    Attractors is an interesting idea... I'm going to look into that I think.

  9. Posted

    I've been going back and forth and the three methods to move things around the screen in my 2d shmup.

     

    I could hand-animate every ship's path through the play area, but then I either have to do a ton of them and then I still limit the variation possible.

     

    I could move them mathematically, as in make is so X=Sin(Y) with a constant increase to Y, but that's difficult to get complex paths working, and when you only update Y every frame update, you can get screwy results when you increase your speed.

     

    Or I could use the physics engine and apply forces to the enemy ships to move them. I'd be into new territory on that, though, so I'm not sure what issues could crop up.

  10. Posted

    I played WoW for years and the whole time I said my headset was broken and couldn't afford a new one. I chatted with the guild via text, but never voice once. These were people I'd met exclusively online but just never got the courage to speak to "strangers" with my voice. It was just the easiest way for me to play multiplayer games that required communication without tripping whatever switch it is in my brain that gets anxious in social situations.

     

    Now I play LoL probably daily and if I don't have a friend in the game with me I communicate exclusively through pings and text. Even if the rest of the team has decided to get on a vent or skype call.

  11. Posted

    Finally, after years of being without an important core gamer experience, I have beaten XCOM: UFO Defence with the help of the OpenXCOM project. It's crazy good, and I can see why people were a bit annoyed with the mechanics that were left out of the new game. I ended up getting a bit lost toward the end, getting swarmed by UFOs a few an hour, until I realized that the aliens build bases on earth and I had one right next to my HQ. Once I figured that out and took care of business, it was smooth sailing.

    Holy CRAP I loved that game.

     

    Good for you!

     

    Somebody needs to play and beat Star Control 2 now.

  12. Posted

    I decided to start with the Space Shooter tutorial. I've now been trying to adapt the little bit I got from that into creating a space shooter of my own that has all the trimmings like bosses, multiple stages, etc. but using 2D instead of 3D.

     

    It's been pretty enlightening so far. I decided to work exclusively in C# since I don't know anything about C#.

     

    First thing I did was spawn a random set of stars at random move speeds to give the illusion of depth in the star field. Now I have a player ship that shoots, a single enemy that comes down in 3 different movement styles (simple sine wave, stepped straight path, and straight at the player), and they shoot as well. The difficulty increases in 30 second increments by increasing enemy speed and enemy fire frequency. And every enemy that gets past you does damage to the Earth in 5% increments, with a game over screen when the planet dies.

     

    I want to figure out the 2D animator next. The player ship (which is totally just an F14 Tomcat) should launch into the screen on a new life, then have the wings move out to the ready position as it settles into the player's origin position.

     

    After that I will probably work out a couple more enemy types so it's not just one purple circle moving in 3 different patterns, and maybe the first mini-boss. If I go as far as the mini-boss I will also want to do some basic power-ups.  That's more just putting in the hours, though. I think I know how to make them all work.

     

    I also need to figure out an art style and do some permanent art assets, but that will be nearer to the end of the gameplay loop being finished.

     

    I've been blogging a little bit about it, though I think it might be more interesting to talk specifics about the code and how it relates to the gameplay. I'll tackle that in my next post this weekend, I think.

  13. Posted

    Ryan's passing was the first time I was really affected by a 'celebrity' death. It was the oddest sensation. I devoured Ryan Davis content for days until the next bombcast, which I listened to several times. Things became more 'normal' again, months later, but after yesterday it's all back again. What a tremendous dude. Stupid to say but stupider not to, but he will be missed.

  17. Posted

    I started Injustice: Gods Among Us last night at midnight and didn't stop until I was done around 5 am. Trying to decide what my next game should be, now. I need to get through the rest of Kentucky Route 0, but I have but have still never started Metro 2033 or Last Light and those are becoming increasingly interesting to me.

  18. Posted

    Since you asked:

     

    My little guy and wife woke me up at 9:30 with some McDonald's breakfast, a box of Reese's Pieces for later and a gift card to the other love in my life, Wendy's (it's not just a name). We hung out and watched Frozen for the 18 millionth time until he took his nap, and I took mine, and then my parents and her parents along with some uncles and aunts (of his, my brothers) came over and we had some dinner and too many desserts. My wife made pulled pork and apple pie and blueberry pie and my mother in law made some out of this world cherry and chocolate trifle thing.  

     

    Now I've just finished watching Fringe with a good friend, who is also an uncle to my son, and I'm trying to decide between getting some more work done, or ditching any work for the day and playing League of Legends before I turn in.

     

    Pretty fantastic day, honestly.

  19. Posted

    Gah, please don't. Reddit and Steam are FULL of posts like this.  The director said they weren't considering DLC in a single interview, and then literally just a few weeks later, clarified that they weren't designing the game to be eventually fleshed out with DLC to "finish" it, but would consider expansions if DS2 did well enough and it was worth adding content. 

     

    Yeah I'd always read that as if they were saying they wouldn't be doing it like Asura's Wrath or other japanese games that have an ending in the game and an epilogue that makes the ending satisfying come out 3-4 months later for $8.

  20. Posted

    For the parents concerned about violence, I wonder what your experiences as a child were like with violent media. I had full access as a child and enjoyed DOOM, Quake, and the like. I could always distinguish real and imaginary violence. I suppose games in that era had much less fidelity to actual gore, but I'm still not sure if it's something worth "protecting" our children from.

     

    Yeah I was a product of that era of marketing Robocop, Rambo and Aliens to kids. I wouldn't let my son watch ANY of those now. I am okay with things that are thematically violent, while not graphic, if that makes sense. Like he loves Dragonball, and LOVES to have beam battles with me where we pretend to throw Kamehamehas and Special Beam Cannons at each other, but he knows hitting is bad. Like I'd let him watch Dragonball day and night, but never Fist of the North Star or Akira or Ricky-Oh. I don't necessarily need to protect him from the concept of violence, because we can talk about that and use it as an example. More than once we've watched DBZ and he's gone "CELL! DON'T HIT! Daddy, tell him it's bad! Time out, Cell!" (which is also adorable), but I think graphic violence would just rattle him with no benefit or discussion coming from it.

     

    He also doesn't really have a concept of death, which I am totally okay with and want to protect for a little while.

     

    That was really ramble-y.  Sorry.

  22. Posted

    My son is almost 3 now and he loves to play on my arcade cabinet with Raiden II and Halley's Comet. He also likes some Ms. Pac-Man and games like that from a 256 in 1 board I put in. Lately he's enjoyed playing with The Black Knight pinball machine I recently got mostly working. Playing those together is a blast.

    He grew up with an iPad. Mostly curious George type games which aren't so much games as interactive learning.

    My favourite though, is he LOVES Spelunky. He doesn't play at all, but he calls it "puppy" or "save the girl". I play on my big projector screen and he runs around in front of the screen looking for the damsel, and when I save her, he kisses her after the character gets his kiss. It's adorable. I should really shoot a video.