Project

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 11, 2006

Due to the fact the last thread I made was derailed, that's a kind asking to folks to not spam this thread(thanks in advance).

Anyways, pictures of the prealpha version of the engine I am working upon.

Hades, yes I need a rules system...

Kraften, we were talking of texturing?

Any comments are welcome >_<

Please find attached, images of the engine.

Kaftan Barlast · January 11, 2006

A texture is a wonderful thing.

Im just doing 2D work right now, heres a test screenshot of some wall, door and floortiles for our Flash game thats due friday 19th. Its entirely 2D isommetric and all the level graphics are constructed in PS. We thought a bit about using 3D renders but we couldnt get Maya to render in Isometric view, so that was dumped. Working with tiles is also very limiting but Flash isnt exactly the ideal enviroment to make games in.

Edited January 11, 2006 by Kaftan Barlast

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 11, 2006

A texture is a wonderful thing.

Im just doing 2D work right now, heres a test screenshot of some wall, door and floortiles for our Flash game thats due friday 19th. Its entirely 2D isommetric and all the level graphics are constructed in PS. We thought a bit about using 3D renders but we couldnt get Maya to render in Isometric view, so that was dumped. Working with tiles is also very limiting but Flash isnt exactly the ideal enviroment to make games in.

I can certainly understand the limits and frustration flash must be causing... but the effect of the tiles is atleast pleasant, I like how they look.

I'm pretty sure you know how a texture works in 3D, are you firmiliar with specular mapping, and bump mapping? If you have questions then I'm pretty sure I should be able to answer them.

Currently the engine generates textures on a pixel to quad basis, the lighting is actually pre-calculated, to generate a shade of the said colour. This is a temp solution and purely for the basis of playing a visual aid, at the time I required speed of production and not quality.

The texturing technique i eventually plan on using is a texture blending technique.

Example A:

Example B:

A & B can be combined to provide some rather interesting results, infact any said number of textures can be combined upon the edges, or even togeather.

Example C:

^ Kinda result possible.

I'm always happy to use peoples actual artwork in conjunction with my own work.

A friend of mine in canada has created 2D artwork for me in the past, but that is generic 2D art such as:

Would you like to give it a shot?

Kaftan Barlast · January 13, 2006

It would be fun but we're crunchig right now so Im not really in disposed to start any new projects until we're done with this. The game is due the 19th this month, then well start new classes and then I will have some free time :rolleyes:

Judge Hades · January 13, 2006

The Rules System.

The Rules System can be as simple or as intricate as you can make it but it also very dependent on what type of game you wish to make with this engine. Of course you could make a fairly intricate rules system that could work in nearly any genre and game engine if you are looking for versitility.

It is very much dependent on what sort of tasks will the player be able to do. There is no pointin putting in a Computer Use skill if there is no siginificant need for one.

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 13, 2006

It would be fun but we're crunchig right now so Im not really in disposed to start any new projects until we're done with this. The game is due the 19th this month, then well start new classes and then I will have some free time

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Naturally I can imagine your project is a priority right now, and I understand why.... I'm not in urgent need of any textures so after the 19th if you wish, I'll outline requirements, and then you can decide .

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 13, 2006

The Rules System.

The Rules System can be as simple or as intricate as you can make it but it also very dependent on what type of game you wish to make with this engine. Of course you could make a fairly intricate rules system that could work in nearly any genre and game engine if you are looking for versitility.

It is very much dependent on what sort of tasks will the player be able to do. There is no pointin putting in a Computer Use skill if there is no siginificant need for one.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I've already taken into account ideas such a general sensory information, and terrain traversal difficulty.

The idea is simple enough, one group of boars, the human player, and a wolf pack.

The player is hunting the boars, the wolves are hunting the player.

So a wolf would have information such as sight, sound, & smell. Also they've the ability to communicate via howling.

The player has obviously sound and sight.

The boars have sound, sight, and smell to an extent.

Different terrains have different speeds at which the PC & NPC can traverse.

So the idea rule wise is basic, there is no point have'in an intricate rule system until I can proove several concepts I have are workable, which they should be... After which I would most certainly add in much more.

Judge Hades · January 13, 2006

Okay then. Lets have three basic stats then.

Physical

Mental

Movement

For simplistic aproach these values could be from a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the best.

Physical will be the basic physical power of the character and would determine use of weapons and damage scale. Also a good gauge for the critter's overall health.

Mental would determine the intelligence gauge of the AI as well as determine the sensory capabilities and how well they are awareof their environment.

Movement would just determine how fast the character involved is.

Skills involved should be simple as well, also ranging 1 through 10.

Melee (Physical): How well one uses melee weapons.

Range (Physical): How well one uses range weapons.

Track (Mental): How well one will be able to track its prey.

Senses (Mental): Measures how well one can see and listen things around him.

Sneak (Movement): How well one can sneakily move around.

Basically add the skill rank level to the stat level and that is the overall bonus of the character to do that act. Now you can have a static system which has no random factors and just have it be raw skill and stat, like Bloodlines, or add in a random value of an additional d10 then add in stat and skill.

Armor can give a damage reduction, stronger the armor the less damage the critter takes. Also stronger the weapon the more damage you do. Also range weapons should have a penalty to the hit or damage chance as one is farther away from its target.

For each critter killed in this scenerio one can get a single improvement point. One Improvement point could be used for a skill, or use 2 improvement points to raise a stat.

Sorry about the randomness here I am kind of in a rambling mode.

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 13, 2006

I like the general principle, would you like to flesh it out a little bit? make it workable, provide a few examples... I know how you are with rules .

Judge Hades · January 13, 2006

Okay, it will give me something to do over the weekend. I'll make a full rules system and pair it down to what you need in this scenerio.

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 13, 2006

Thanks dude

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 18, 2006

Hades?

Shadowstrider · January 18, 2006

Mental would determine the intelligence gauge of the AI as well as determine the sensory capabilities and how well they are awareof their environment.
<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If I were reading this, it would indicate to me that a wolf has a higher "mental" stat than a human, which shouldn't be the case. The description needs to be changed to cognition and precognition, otherwise you need to rename "mental" to "instinct." Mental should be things like "rubbing myself with dirt can throw off a wolf's sent."

In fact, I would suggest you add an "Instinct" stat, with boars being the lowest, humans being in the middle and wolves being the highest. 1 = excellent survival, 5 = survive and hunt, 10 = excellent hunting. There is no "best" on this scale, instead it would provide queues based on the score. The closer the score is in relation to survival vs. hunting, the better the clues are on each. A 10 would get proactive hunting tips like "there is a valley ahead, valleys are good for traps." While a 0 would get "there is a valley ahead, staying out of valleys helps me to survive."

Just some food for thought. Just because a game was simple does not mean things should be overly simplified. Otherwise you get things like Hades got above, wherein wolves appear to be smarter than humans.

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 18, 2006

Mental would determine the intelligence gauge of the AI as well as determine the sensory capabilities and how well they are awareof their environment.
<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If I were reading this, it would indicate to me that a wolf has a higher "mental" stat than a human, which shouldn't be the case. The description needs to be changed to cognition and precognition, otherwise you need to rename "mental" to "instinct." Mental should be things like "rubbing myself with dirt can throw off a wolf's sent."

In fact, I would suggest you add an "Instinct" stat, with boars being the lowest, humans being in the middle and wolves being the highest. 1 = excellent survival, 5 = survive and hunt, 10 = excellent hunting. There is no "best" on this scale, instead it would provide queues based on the score. The closer the score is in relation to survival vs. hunting, the better the clues are on each. A 10 would get proactive hunting tips like "there is a valley ahead, valleys are good for traps." While a 0 would get "there is a valley ahead, staying out of valleys helps me to survive."

Just some food for thought. Just because a game was simple does not mean things should be overly simplified. Otherwise you get things like Hades got above, wherein wolves appear to be smarter than humans.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

True that would have made any expansion upon the rules a bit odd, but you have to bare in mind that it would all be hidden.

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 20, 2006

So how did your project go Kraten? and how did you find the crunch?

(w00t)

Kaftan Barlast · January 21, 2006

We presented it today, it went fine and I might even get a really good grade for my graphics. The real pressure of the crunch lay on the programmers who worked nonstop wednesday morning to thursday evening. By that time it was too late to implement anymore graphics so I was just on a standby in case something needed correction.

But despite all the work, the game is little more than a tech demo of Isometrics in a Flash enviroment in its present state. I would post it on the boards but I dont think it is presentable to be subjected to the scrutiny of the masses

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 21, 2006

We presented it today, it went fine and I might even get a really good grade for my graphics. The real pressure of the crunch lay on the programmers who worked nonstop wednesday morning to thursday evening. By that time it was too late to implement anymore graphics so I was just on a standby in case something needed correction.

But despite all the work, the game is little more than a tech demo of Isometrics in a Flash enviroment in its present state. I would post it on the boards but I dont think it is presentable to be subjected to the scrutiny of the masses

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

yeah that sounds about right, but wednesday morning to thursday evening isn't that harsh, problem is that if you don't have any sleep at all simple things take much longer to implement, you make a hell of alot more mistakes atleast that is what i have found.

Longest I've crunch was friday morning through to tuesday morning the next week, I was basically sleeping for 2 hours then coding for the rest... Took me a week to recover.

anyways I'm glad it went well for you!

Kaftan Barlast · January 24, 2006

The **** in the game design faculty decided it was a swell idea to put us artists in the advanced math for graphics class with the programmers. Its very annoying since its very demanding but ultimately completely useless as it is only needed when programming an engine from scratch (and we dont program)

But I do have a question, are you using Quaternions or Matrices in your engine?

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · January 24, 2006

The **** in the game design faculty decided it was a swell idea to put us artists in the advanced math for graphics class with the programmers. Its very annoying since its very demanding but ultimately completely useless as it is only needed when programming an engine from scratch (and we dont program)

But I do have a question, are you using Quaternions or Matrices in your engine?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

:mellow: Artists doing math! WHAT IS THE WORLD COMING TO!

Matrices are pretty much standard in 3D graphics programming, I haven't as of yet found a need to do Quaternion rotation in the engine.

Here's the irony - Our degree doesn't even have a math module, we have to learn it ourselves, how great is that!

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · April 18, 2006

Opinions anyone?

Kaftan Barlast · April 18, 2006

Well its more than any of the first-year programmers have succeeded in making

Is the sky and mountains just a flat backround image or part of the skybox?

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · April 19, 2006

Well its more than any of the first-year programmers have succeeded in making

Is the sky and mountains just a flat backround image or part of the skybox?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Skybox textures but it all adds to the effect, considering

It's looking Good:

Diamond · April 19, 2006

A lot of progress since last time. :wacko:

Why is skybox unfiltered though?

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · April 19, 2006

A lot of progress since last time.

Why is skybox unfiltered though?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Because it's temp

$@\NightandtheShape/@$ · April 20, 2006

Seems I managed to get the lighting just right...

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