Bro Force (prototype)

Comments

  • edited
    You're right @AngryMoose, sometimes, even with only two players, it was hard to find your character among the bloody corpses and flashing explosions. But I will say that all this chaos is actually part of the game.
    This game is about blowing things up, right ? :D in multiplayer, you don't really care about the exact place where your character is, you just want to have fun exploding soldiers and buildings. Plus, with 1, 2 or 3 other bros by your side, you don't have many things to fear ! The only thing that matters in that case are missiles and bullets. And I think we see them quite well, don't we ? :)
    Maybe the situation is questionable for GET TO THE CHOPPAH!!! mode, because the goal is not the same.
    Maybe also it's not the player's colors you have to change, but the enemies' ? for example, the continous flow of question and exclamation marks can be disturbing. Then you may have to remove the white speech baloons around them.

    EDIT: here a flash game with the same pixel-style and chaotic explosions.
  • I would actually like to see a traintop level.

    I mean hey, a giant speeding train with signs swooping at the top would be quite engaging. You could unlock wagons from the train by MacGyvering the small lock things at the bottom.
    Turrets and high-level enemies too perhaps?
  • A train top level will be awesome! Maybe also a sequence where you have to infiltrate some base in limited time. That'd be cool. Would it?
  • Hey, we're trying to get a functioning webplayer version of Broforce.

    There may be a whole bunch of errors, though I think we've found most of them. There are a few features to play with in this build that haven't been in any previous playable (like flying propane tanks).

    http://www.freelives.net/BROFORCE/BROFORCE_WEB.html
    Thanked by 2Douzeju epicfailnot
  • Too many crates stops the madness ! :O
    There are too many on your way, so the corridor are more little and you feel like being traped under a moutain.

    But, anyway...
    Graphics : AWESOME
    Physics : AWESOME (flying blood)
    Brominator : INSANELY AWESOME
    The bros seems also to be faster ?
  • @Douzeju Yeah, I might have put in a lot of crates because we don't have a lot of decorations in the game yet, and I wanted it to feel more full (and have more things to destroy... I really do like the rains of debri that sometimes happen).

    I'm going to think about trying to space out the levels a bit more, and see how it feels. It'll be easier once we've got more props (because I should be able to keep it visually interesting then without cramping the space).

    Thanks for the feedback!!!!
  • I really like the new brototype. However, after I beat it, the "Thanks" page popped up every time I finished a level.
    Also, I will like a background with something moving, if possible. Not just mountains and clouds that are in the same shape forever.
    But seriously. Brominator is REALLY AWESOME. Thanks for the update.
  • @epicfailnot Oh jeez! We'll fix that right away! Thanks!
  • Maybe this feeling of entrapment could be a particularity of one or two specific zone ? Then you may have more open areas in some zones (forests, plains, military bases) and closed areas in others (the actual jungle temples, cities, devil's undeground secret cave...).
    Skulls looks also to have a bit too much white pieces when breaking ^^
  • edited
    Might be just me but the web-Unity page doesn't load, and hangs the page I entered it from. Using Chrome on a x86(ish) Windows 7 Ultimate, any pointers?

    nevermind thank you ↓
  • edited
    @Navar0nius Chrome is nasty and runs applications in a specious way because Google hates developers, much like how Internet Explorer runs the whole internet in a specious way because Microsoft hates people.

    But if you haven't updated your Webplayer plugin you should. Chrome was giving us trouble in our office until we forced a webplayer update.

    @Douzeju Can a thing break into too many pieces? This is a deep question I'm going to have to ponder, while I kill more terrorists who appear to have about 3 times their body mass' worth of blood in them :)
  • edited
    @Douzeju I fiddled with some level design, trying to make it feel a bit less "trapped".

    There's a new level in this build (the build is just one level, but it's fairly large). It's a bit more open I think. There's also the beginnings of a scout mook, except they're really not very good (yet).

    Also, because of some of the network plugins (I think) this build WILL MOST PROBABLY HANG YOUR BROWSER when you exit the game. I can't fix that until Monday, so for the moment, if you are curious enough to try it out please close or save any important tabs first.


    http://freelives.net/BROFORCE/MakeLevelFriday/BROFORCE_WEB.html

    (Right Click to Go Fullscreen)

    If you do follow this link, I apologize if it crashes your browser. This level might be simply that badass :3


    [Edit] Fixed the hanging bug.
    Thanked by 1epicfailnot
  • The blood is looking pretty good (though it could be a lot less glitchy):
    image
  • Yay new stuff! :D The brominator grenade/special looks awesome!

    Some things I noted though:
    - Spotters are really annoying, which is good (they're really cool I think). However the binoculars seem to be glued to their hands because when they're dead they keep holding the binoculars :P
    - The sound that plays when you're walking is a nice touch...but do bro's necessarily have to tap-dance there way to the chopper? =/ I think the noise could be slowed down a little
    - There is no walking noise when running along bro cages or fall-able blocks
    - Yay you fixed the weird checkerblock background texture thing!
    - Some of the trees dont fit into the level very well, generally because the base of the tree doesnt fit the rest of the environment either before or after terrain has been destroyed

  • edited
    As D3zmodos said, spotters are a very good idea ! But... he didn't see the Bro-truck arriving ? Ok, perhaps heat-detection binoculars... why not.

    One annoying thing I realized is that ennemies ALWAYS run away from the grenades i throw at them. They are supposed to be soldiers, soldiers from the 70's, right ? x) they are just here to yell and die in dramatic ways. I understand their panic when they have to face the missile tsunami of Bro-something with blond hair, but when it's just about grenades... I mean, in most movies, they don't even see the grenade ! It can be funny if one out of 5 or 6 runs away, while the others wonder why he suddenly escapes like that. It can be a lot more fun if it's the big one who is running away actually :D Ow sissy...
    But is that the point of a grenade,bringing more chaos into the game ? or just exploding ? ^^
  • edited
    @D3zmodos Glad you think the Spotter mooks are cool. They still need some work to make them fit the game and function as players would expect, but I think there's promise.

    Gonna fix those walking sounds, and trees (eventually, that'll be left for polish). We'll see about the footstep rate, we might eventually redo the running animation, so it'll be timed to that.

    Thanks for the feedback!

    @Douzeju I'm going to definitely look into truck spotting for the mooks. Seems like a good idea.

    I'm going to have to see about the grenades. I like the extra advantage players get from frightening mooks, it can give some slight tactical advantages. But yes, I'd really like to make it more like you've suggested (which would be more in character), and I think I could make it keep the tactical advantage (by disabling the confused mooks who haven't yet spotted the grenade and are startled by their friends' panic). I agree that'd make for some hilarious action :)

    There's a bunch of other mook things we really need to do. Like other behaviours when they haven't spotted you yet. Like being asleep, or arguing with each other, and marching and saluting. And some other subtleties, like panicking in the face of a charging bro, and looking under rocks and things when they've lost track of you, and calling to others when they do spot you (and the others might not even listen to them always, because they're mooks).
  • Also, more bro ideas:
    Rocky Balboa (from Rocky)
    Chuck Norris (the UZI wielding mortal Chuck, not the glorified god Chuck)
    Bruce Lee
    Neo (The Matrix)
    James Bond (007 movies)
    Batman
    Han Solo (Star Wars)
    Harry Callahan (Magnum Force)
    Jason Bourne (The Bourne series)
    Man with No Name (A Fistful of Dollars)
    James T. Kirk (Star Trek)
    Martin Riggs
    Trinity (also The Matrix)
    Ash Williams (The Evil Dead)
    Frank Martin (The Transporter)
    Superman
    Dutch (Aliens)
    King Leonidas
    Ethan Hunt (Mission Impossible)
    ...and basically everyone on here
  • edited
    Is it possible to make the one level build let me change controls? Because my computer does something strange when I press alt.

    Also, I think, as a tutorial, there can be a sequence of the bros escaping prison. This can add variety to the game and make it intense right from the start.
  • edited
    @Navar0nius That's a super useful resource! Thanks for pointing it out.

    And yes, Chuck Norris is cooler when he's a regular dude kicking ass, rather than when he is invincible (although that is cool too, just not great for Broforce).

    @epicfailnot I'll make sure future builds, even small tests, have the keyboard menu, no good reason why not to.

    A breaking out of jail sequence is exactly how we plan to start Broforce :) Reading our minds! Hannibal's intro in the A Team movie is a little like we're thinking,

    Although when we have a final game we'll also need a demo, we might start the two games differently (because the demo will need to be much tighter).
  • There also is a bug: it seems the bros in your lives counter just cycle through the last two obtained as they die.

    To be exact, for example let's take these: Snake Broskin, B. A. Brobacus and Brambo in that order. Brambo dies, I get Brobacus as expected. But when Brobacus dies, instead of Broskin I get... Brambo again. :(
  • edited
    @Navar0nius Cool, we're going to have to look into that. You're right, that's not the way it's meant to work. Thanks for the feedback!
  • edited
    There's some slight changes to the explosions. http://www.freelives.net/BROFORCE/BROFORCE_WEB.html

    But we'll update the alpha properly only in a week's time or so.
  • edited
    Hmm, the explosions are less impressive than they were before. :| if you make the little inflammed things last much longer, enough time for them to bounce for example, it may look better.

    With my brother we've also seen some unexpected bugs... for example, flaming floating and shaking crates, about to fall but which will not. The jars also seems to have a strange hitbox, little and close to the ground - very frustrating when you want to destroy everything ^^
    We made also some experiments on a new way to travel we choosed to call "Haldon-collider moonwalk". It's a very dangerous maneuver. Keep going ot the right, then jump, and in the air, press and hold the left button. When touching the ground, your bro will accelerate while moonwalking - and you can repeat this move indefinitely ! your bro will go faster and faster... till he encounters a wall. It also works with going left, jumping and holding the right button, but the bro will not do a moonwalk.
  • edited
    I'll see what I can do about the explosions. They're certainly not quite there yet. Though personally I like them more with the flame trails than without. Though the rest of the team hasn't seen them yet, maybe I've been staring at it too long O_O

    And I'll tighten up the destroying the props a bit. That was bugging Bevis as well ^^

    "Haldon-collider moonwalk" <- nice naming!

    And eventually I'll fix the floating crates. Right now I've got to work on a boss fight!
  • BlackShipsFilltheSky,

    Do you still need to reproduce freezes of BroForce? It reproduces at mine machine every time I play the game for about 15 min. I tried every accessible versions of Broforce!

    btw thank you sooooo much for this game!
  • edited
    @dgeynisman Is it freezing for you in the current webplayer build? http://www.freelives.net/BROFORCE/BROFORCE_WEB.html

    If it is that'd be great to know (because I'm hoping that maybe the Webplayer version won't freeze). We've never had a machine here freeze so we're working a little blind (which is terrifying).

    If it freezes at all please do let me know... I can try some other things (like upgrading to Unity 4). If you'd be prepared to to try a couple different versions that would be an immense help to us.

    As I understand it, just letting the program run in a level, without even doing anything, can produce a freeze. So you don't have to spend hours playing it each time. Running Broforce while you're not around should test it (I believe @D3zmodos figured that out). Though I'm not 100% certain.
    D3zmodos said:
    Ok well I certainly don't think it's bro-specific because I got 3 freezes today alone and all of them with different bros (MIB Agent J, Mr T, Sniper), they were also all on different levels and all while doing different things (climbing, running, and just standing).

    I think it's memory related because as far as I know, every time I've seen it freeze its been using at least around 300mb of memory. However earlier this afternoon I was busy trying to get it to freeze and it didnt want to and I had to go do something, however when I got back it had frozen (at the very start of a level) so I dunno...
    dgeynisman said:
    btw thank you sooooo much for this game!
    Thanks for playing it! It was always my dream that I'd one day be making a game that people enjoyed playing, so in a real way you're helping my dream come true.
  • I think the new explosions do make things more natural, beacause the trails are randomized. But it does it in a rather unnatural way. It feels that the flame and smoke is somehow cramped up in a small trail. I remember I've seen something like this some time ago, in the HD art. I think you shoud also work on explosions that are different from the start. Like more kinds of explosions that are appear randomly each time. But keep up the good work!

    Also. Can you make the helicopter bigger? It gives it more... bad-assery. At last, can you, at the start, make the bro that a player will be using somehow cling to the truck? So he will really seem like he is about to get off.
  • edited
    Did some playthroughs today, some things I noticed:
    1) The fact that you only have web player builds now makes screenshots lame, because you can't printscreen from fullscreen (it just gives a blank web page), like so:
    image

    2) Crouching broke again. In the image below I am standing on a block that had fallen from just above where I'm standing, yet as you can see, when standing on that block (which now has ample space above it), my character crouches as if there were something just above him. I also can't jump off of it (presumably because it thinks that it is still falling or something)
    image

    3) Enemies can shoot through walls. Below you see an image with a single enemy highlighted. In a previous playthrough of that level, that enemy (in shooter form) was standing exactly there, and I was climbing up that wall to his left. In the midst of all the explosions going on in the left half of the screen, he got excited and shot me...through the wall....and I hadn't been in his sight at all before that so it's not as if he'd seen me and was alert/aware of my position nor was there an open space for him to shoot through...
    image
    (I guess theres always the possibility that this isn't really what happened and I just *thought* I saw this happeneing...but ye...fairly certain that I got shot through a wall...)

    4) Heavies are ghosts (or at least have noclipping set to 1). The image below should explain it pretty well... (that guy was shooting by the way, and moved in and out of that position a few times (going between appearing normally when not behind the block, and appearing as in the picture when he was behind the block).
    image

    5) On one of the levels (no idea which, I wasn't counting), the truck that brings out in goes through a wall and kills 2 guys. If you hold down up/right as this level starts and you guy jumps out of the truck, you can get up onto the ledge as shown in the picture below. This then allows you to completely skip out the level by just running up the wall all the way to the end. I know you'd like to encourage speed runs but given that you took out the ability to completely bypass the 2nd-last level, I figured you might want to know about this one (if you didn't already).
    image


    EDIT: Oh, and nothing's gone wrong/crashed/frozen for me yet
    Thanked by 1EvanGreenwood
  • edited
    Thanks for the feedback!

    1) yeah, that sucks, but I couldn't take screenshots with prtscreen before? I'll look into a solution for it though.

    2) Thanks, there are some bugs surrounding falling blocks in weird circumstances that we are aware of. In that case the falling block likely didn't clear itself from its previous position.

    3) that is quite odd, I will see if I can get a repro case. even if he wasn't that shot you, there is still no way he should have been alerted. it's feasible that a raycast might be done from slightly too far to the right when vision checking but I don't know how a bullet would pass through that wall. edit: Managed to reproduce and fix the shooting through wall - thanks

    4) Yep, they don't have crouch frames so they go partially invisible.

    5) we are aware of it :)

    Good to hear that you've had no freezes on this build. Thanks again for playing & giving some feedback!
  • edited
    Someone uploaded a pacifism run! Might also be the first speedrun that's been uploaded.



    The speed run is badass, but I'm not sure that we want pacifism to be so easy (it's been a concern for a while). I'd still like pacifism to be possible, just a lot harder and MORE badass, like seriously dodging bullets and having to pull off parkour maneuvers to just stay alive.

    What do you guys think?
  • I think BroForce is probably the only game in the world in which a pacifism run STILL ends up with everything blowing up and everyone dying ;P

    I think having the option to pass the level in that way is great. It seems the only problem now is that the enemies take a long time to fire back, which is probably great for when you're shooting at them, but not so great when you're running by quickly.
    This is a bit weird, but if there was a way to have them ramp up their responsiveness if they "detect" you're running by them without shooting, it might help - ie. effectively finding a way to adjust the difficulty for speedruns.

    It's a really interesting way of playing, humanitarian bros everywhere would be proud!
    :)

  • It very interesting to see other people trying to transcend the game's rules, not killing soldiers :D though he does kill some...
    The hardest way to beat a level is to do it the Ninja way : don't be spotted, don't kill anyone, or if you do, get rid of the corpses.
    I would have liked to show you how I do it, but unfortunately, I've tried many programs to screen me playing and none have worked... :( plus it would be usefull to show you the Hadron-collider Moonwalk glitch :p
  • @Doujezu: i'd like to see someone try that on the Last Mook Scout level
  • Ow by the way, there is a new level on the Mook Scoot brototype ! :)
  • The mook scout build also changed enemy reaction time and they also shoot before being alerted.
  • The mook scout build also changed enemy reaction time and they also shoot before being alerted.
    mooks are alerted if you touch them now - what do you mean they shoot before being alerted?
  • edited
    The scout mook does alert mooks in a fairly wide radius... I think he can alert mooks one floor below or above him in fact.

    @Paperscythe could that be what you experienced?
  • I kinda forgot, is LAN multiplayer already implemented?
  • Yeah, that explains why I get shot the second I land on the floor below.
  • If they made the pacifism run without actually shooting/slashing the end satan dude and let the other enemies shoot/blow him up? Is that possible? :)

    I think there needs to be an achievement for completing levels like that. No shots fired, period :)
  • edited
    @Doujezu: i'd like to see someone try that on the Last Mook Scout level
    Challenge accepted!


    EDIT:
    Yeah, that explains why I get shot the second I land on the floor below.
    Fixed!
    Thanked by 1Merrik
  • @raithza : how do you record your playthrough ? Which tools do you use ?
  • how do you record your playthrough ? Which tools do you use ?
    I used fraps (and the standalone build)
  • Navar0nius said:
    I kinda forgot, is LAN multiplayer already implemented?
    I'm currently working on the online/lan multiplayer.
    I'll need to start alpha testing soon :)
  • edited
    Here is the glitch I told you about ;)


    We've also seen that the F1 touch made the game run waaaaaaay slower. Is it normal ? Anyway, it's very cool to admire the way soldiers explode :D
  • I just played through few of the levels and its very impressive and good looking game! Haven’t played a side scroller shooter in a while! Reminded me of the good old days hehe. Now, just a few suggestions from my part.

    Something that seemed to bother me throughout the play through is a lack of melee. I got close to enemies and just had this urge to knife them, but couldn’t! Blade was fun when I got to play him but then again the opposite problem there(especially with the suicide enemies). Perhaps a knife function could be fun to add.

    Secondly, although the game is very fun to play it has a risk of getting repetitive. Both gameplay and environment wise. Perhaps a basic narrative to run throughout the game with some parody plot of your typical action game would be a fun exercise and give the game a bit of depth. Some narrative from the characters could be fun as well, as you end the level for instance.

    Oh and a last idea I had when the MIB guy came. How about a (possible bonus) alien level. Would be refreshing change and add to the games style I think. Could be a plot twist somewhere in there as well :D.

    If you need someone to write up some ideas… wink wink :P

    All in all though, awesome game, can't wait to see the final version!
  • edited
    Oh and a last idea I had when the MIB guy came. How about a (possible bonus) alien level. Would be refreshing change and add to the games style I think. Could be a plot twist somewhere in there as well :D.
    I think we have to be aware not to get that close to the Metal Slug series :|
  • edited
    @Adonais Hey thanks for playing! At the moment we have no real narrative, but that's something we're trying to rectify (very much like the way you've suggested... though it's going to be a bunch of work producing the content).

    If we do aliens though (and I hope we do) it's probably going to be closer to Aliens than MIB. Probably referencing Contra pretty heavily. Contra which is basically a game about Rambo and Dutch (from predator) set in the Giger / Aliens universe.

    image
    Thanked by 2Merrik Tuism
  • @Douzeju I never really played Metal Slug so I am not really familiar with its storyline.

    That aside, congrats Blackships with what you guys have done so far, will definitely be watching this space :D

  • @Adonais I think the knifing idea is rather good, but it kind of defeats the purpose of Brade. I think every bro should have a set of assasination moves, maybe two to three, or more, and can be performed if his existence is not noticed by any enemy.
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