Put the toons in kilts and play bag pipe music FTW :p
Seconded! :P
"Caber-net sauvignon block"? Yeah, I got nothin'. :(
I agree with what you said earlier - if your mechanics aren't making for a suitable title, your theme or a major named character is the next stop. You've got fuzzy animalesque characters. Perhaps work off of that? Just going with the chicken character, "Colonel Cluckbeak's Crittercube Colosseum", for example?
Regardless, I'm looking forward to playing what's-it-called's next build! :D
Dropbears would imply that bears are dropping... So... The blocks are the bears... And 4 of a kind of bear will explode..!?
As much as I LOVE that (earlier on I thought the blocks were cats and matching cats caused a temporal distortion, causing them to explode, and it woube called Cat-aclysm), wouldn't it be better if it made sense?
... Gah who am I kidding, the less sense it makes the better, isn't it?? XD
So this is basically what I showed at the meetup - most significant changes:
1. You can select from control schemes on main menu (mouse vs controller, controller vs controller, mouse vs AI) 2. I included the basic AI to play against!
I'm currently working on some maintenance cos the code is getting out of hand... Whenever I make changes to mechanic it was getting way too confusing to track so I'm needing to consolidate... Next steps soon after I make my code less crazy...
Looking forward to see the Joburg talk vids for notes on how the peeps played the game :D (my back was turned from the screen most of the presentation XD)
Hell yeah :) That was entertaining , my girl enjoyed it too ! :D I look forward to seeing how this evolves ^_^
Thanks!! :D Any feedback?
> How did the controls feel? > Was it difficult to understand how the game mechanics worked? > Did you have certain expectations from the game when you first started it that turned out to be different? Like you expected one thing to work this way but it turned out to be another way? > Did you feel the blocks fell too fast/too slow? > Did anything feel unintuitive? > Was it fun? What do you think would have made it more fun?
Would be much appreciated if anyone who played would answer these questions for me! Thanks! :D
Sorry it took so long :3 Here's the feedback between the girl and myself :)
-How did the controls feel ?
I was quite happy playing with the mouse once I got used it it , the girl played with the controller and it took some time before she realized that there wasn't a jump button.
- Was it difficult to understand how the game mechanics worked ? It was pretty straight forward though we wondered what the XXX were for. Can they be matched like the regular blocks ? (I took the liberty of killing the girl with a few well placed shots :P)
- Did you have certain expectations from the game when you first started it that turned out to be different? Like you expected one thing to work this way but it turned out to be another way? I expected cute ,entertaining and pixely and thats what I got :)
-Did the blocks fall too fast/too slow? For an average difficulty setting the rate that the blocks fall at works well.
-Did anything feel unintuitive ? No so far as I could tell.
- Was it fun ? What do you think would have made it more fun ? It was a lot of fun. Power ups would be cool , things you can unleash on your opponant.
All in all I can't wait for the next build and neither can the girl , please keep updaing this ! :D
@Tuism - nice additions compared with earlier builds.
How did the controls feel ? Like the mouse. Not too fond of the controller. With the controller I had an issue where the chicken would continue moving left after I stopped pressing left. Also, found it hard to pick up blocks while playing with the controller. Maybe consider making it so that the block gets picked up when the player holds in a button (trigger would be nice) and thrown when released. That is what my instinct told me to do constantly and it was frustrating that it didn't work that way (but maybe that's just me).
Was it difficult to understand how the game mechanics worked ? No
Did you have certain expectations from the game when you first started it that turned out to be different? Like you expected one thing to work this way but it turned out to be another way? No, but then again I played earlier builds too.
Did the blocks fall too fast/too slow? Could be a fraction slower. Also a problem when a block you threw hit something and landed back on the player. This made the player "flicker" which i take is going to mean health loss at some point - this would be bad. Also had a game breaking bug where my character was lifting a block, but the block would be invisible?
-Did anything feel unintuitive see kamikazi falling block comment above, and controller comment
- Was it fun ? What do you think would have made it more fun ? Yes, it is fun. Would like to see AI improving (know you're working on it). Seeing the chicken cross the "blocks" is nice but does not really make for a challenging opponent yet :) I second powerups, but only if really well thought out and as long as it does not make the game unbalanced. I think the main barriers against a super fun time is the AI and improved controls.
Still love this concept and can't wait for more improvements of Super Battle Bear Drops vs. Tosser arena Caber Blocks :/
I have tested with one of the controllers I use for Toxic Bunny testing. It did not work. I am not sure if its a compatibility thing with Gamemaker. I have a whole bunch I will dig up and test more of them.
Do the menu's work with the controllers? I see it says press any key to continue and so on. Would be nice to be able to use a controller all the time if you have 2 installed.
I hope to get a controller working so I can test multilayer.
@Everyone I've finally stabilised the code again, been fixing up stuff for easier changes. Should be able to do an update this weekend. Progress is slow but steady enough as I learn :) Thanks again everyone :D
@tbulford Yeah the controller does work on the menu - up and down, and any of the face buttons (pretty much made all of them work). Not sure why it wouldn't work for you...!! I have tested with my PS3 controllers (with emulation) and Xbox360 controllers (which doesn't need emulation).
Do try the analogue and the dpad - maybe there's mapping issues? I'll have to look into it.
@MrNexy thanks so much for your feedback! :D The XX are markers for where blocks of that colour will land. I realise that they need to be redesigned to reflect that better, it's now between moving arrows down or dotted line silhouettes of the blocks. I thought X was good enough to look like targets, but apparently not :P
The lack of jump is to simplify the controls, but I admit that most people would want to jump. I'll make the control screen clearer later.
@FanieG The controls were raised by several people and I'm going to change it to exactly the way you say there - that was the conclusion I arrived at a while ago with a few other people. Because I'm used to it, I can play pretty fast with the control scheme now, but I can see how it is unintuitive for most.
It's interesting you saw that the block falling back on you didn't register as losing a life - you do indeed - but right now there's a bug where if you're holding something you don't flash after taking damage - That's something I need to fix. In fact I'm changing the whole damage dynamic - I feel that damage that kills defeats the purpose of matching and stacking. I'm gonna make hits stun for a short while (followed by recovery invulnerability) instead of having life.
@Tuism - just another note on the controller - I am using a Xbox controller, but still had to hit a key on my keyboard for the "press any key" prompts (as @tbulford also mentioned). I also tested a logitech PS3 controller, which did not work at all, so i think it is an issue with GM. Also, my wife played a few rounds this evening and seconds "hold to pick up, release to throw" idea.
Unfortunately there's a game called Boom Blox already :P A lot of my energy is going into the research while I think of names :P
@FanieG Thanks!! :D That controller change isn't a big one I'll have it done, but I'll update when there's more significant difference to see :)
And the face buttons should work on the 360 controller too... Unless they're mapped to different ones... >_< I guess I'll have to research and do controller detection and re-map controls with each device eventually... Oui >_<
I wonder how the gamepads aren't working... I'll have to do some research...
I throw boxes at my enemy and boom it explodes leaving him with cool collectables :( i want the cool collectables when I match blocks and make them go boom. Any thoughts on that? perhaps an explosion tossing the collectables around some to my side :D is there a way to determine witch player matched the blocks? Who was responsible ?
OK, so how it is right now: blocks exploding will always drop a single gem/thing. Collecting those = points. When 4 or more matches are made on your side, an attack goes to the other side (need to visualise that better, right now more Xs are added - need to connect the two concepts.
Whether the attack is yours (attacking the other side) or the opponent's (attacking your side) is dependant on where the last block was dropped - so you could end up stealing a match from the opponent if it's right around the centre line.
What I want to create is a tension between positive and negative aspects of matching stuff on your side: Positive: 1) get score, powerup your attack 2) clear your side (because the primary win condition will be to make the other side pile up too high, I'm dropping the life thing) Negative: 1) You could get hit (you'll get stunned for a while and maybe lose some of your gems Sonic-style so you could collect them back) 2) Give the opponent the opportunity to counterattack with more blocks on their side
Now I'm not sure whether this is too complicated, in which case it may have to be simplified, or it should be taught in single player taking players through basic concepts (in a non-boring-tutorial manner)...
(need to visualise that better, right now more Xs are added - need to connect the two concepts.
Great Idea, but an audio que would work just as well - think whistling of falling bombs?
You could always let exploding blocks on the opponents side drop "poisoned gems" that subtract score. But that might be difficult to implement (as tbulford asked):
is there a way to determine witch player matched the blocks? Who was responsible ?
Your game's logic has such unique challenges. How do you sleep at night? This shit would keep me up trying to come up with the easiest/most efficient/laziest sollution.
Naming your game around the sounds that players would probably make while pwning their foes is probably not a bad idea. Does have a certain ring to it - like the "Sonic Boom" that Gyle chanted in Super Street Fighter during his roundhouse kicks. But I still prefer Dropbears
btw I can't see your Vine posts in Firefox... ? (I can in Chrome) Is this normal? (figured this out only now, so finally got to watch the Broforce Deathmatch Vine... I'm seriously wondering about a smooth jazz soundtrack option for Broforce now)
I dunno, I haven't used Firefox in a while, would be strange if they didn't get Vine to work on Firefox. Smooth Jazz for broforce works as well as those operatic crescendos in slow-mo explosion sequences :) Makes more epic :) Are you gonna have bullet time? I'm planning on putting slow-mo in Bear Chuck, because I can :P
@BlackShipsFilltheSky Yeah, Vine's been broken in Firefox for a while now. Not sure exactly who's fault it is but it's been that way for at least 2-3 months now.
With regard to Vine in Firefox, is the problem that the clip isn't showing as embedded in this page? I'm using Firefox, and I see it as a link, which, when opened in a new tab, shows a clip that seems to work. Of course, not knowing what the clip actually looks like, I'm not in a position to comment on whether it's playing correctly or fully, but I am seeing a brief, repeating clip of a cartoon bear throwing blocks, accompanied by some sound effects.
> AI that ACTUALLY BEAT ME. More than once. > A new menu worthy of the Bear Chuck name. > Brand spanking new gameplay video starring Bears! > Will be at rAge expo 2013 from 4 – 6 October!
19 Sep
> Settled on the new name Bear Chuck! Just too adorable :) > Updated the animation and upgraded the AI a bit more > Added a few more effects > The combo system now works! Chains will add exponentially more attacks to the other side – e.g. a match of 4 will be an attack of 2, and match 5 will attack 3. Each chain adds a multiplier to your attack – so at combo 2, the attack will be multiplied by 2. E.g.: First match of 4 creates attack 2. Then another match of 4 is the result of a chain reaction – and that attach will be multiplied by the combo factor of 2 for an attack of 4 (2 x 2).
I love that orb-trail thing that goes to the other side when you match four blocks. It made it so much clearer to me what was happening. Removing the lives was a great move too. :)
Do you immediately lose if your side fills up? What does score have to do with anything?
Comments
Interesting twist :)
And I'll put up the latest version with the dodgeball AI soon, out tonight so a bit later :)
"Caber-net sauvignon block"? Yeah, I got nothin'. :(
I agree with what you said earlier - if your mechanics aren't making for a suitable title, your theme or a major named character is the next stop. You've got fuzzy animalesque characters. Perhaps work off of that? Just going with the chicken character, "Colonel Cluckbeak's Crittercube Colosseum", for example?
Regardless, I'm looking forward to playing what's-it-called's next build! :D
Dude. Dropbears would be an amazing name :)
As much as I LOVE that (earlier on I thought the blocks were cats and matching cats caused a temporal distortion, causing them to explode, and it woube called Cat-aclysm), wouldn't it be better if it made sense?
... Gah who am I kidding, the less sense it makes the better, isn't it?? XD
Windows single executable:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/15257303/game_dev/battle_blocks_proto_06.zip
So this is basically what I showed at the meetup - most significant changes:
1. You can select from control schemes on main menu (mouse vs controller, controller vs controller, mouse vs AI)
2. I included the basic AI to play against!
I'm currently working on some maintenance cos the code is getting out of hand... Whenever I make changes to mechanic it was getting way too confusing to track so I'm needing to consolidate... Next steps soon after I make my code less crazy...
Looking forward to see the Joburg talk vids for notes on how the peeps played the game :D (my back was turned from the screen most of the presentation XD)
I look forward to seeing how this evolves ^_^
> How did the controls feel?
> Was it difficult to understand how the game mechanics worked?
> Did you have certain expectations from the game when you first started it that turned out to be different? Like you expected one thing to work this way but it turned out to be another way?
> Did you feel the blocks fell too fast/too slow?
> Did anything feel unintuitive?
> Was it fun? What do you think would have made it more fun?
Would be much appreciated if anyone who played would answer these questions for me! Thanks! :D
-How did the controls feel ?
I was quite happy playing with the mouse once I got used it it , the girl played with the controller and it took some time before she realized that there wasn't a jump button.
- Was it difficult to understand how the game mechanics worked ?
It was pretty straight forward though we wondered what the XXX were for. Can they be matched like the regular blocks ?
(I took the liberty of killing the girl with a few well placed shots :P)
- Did you have certain expectations from the game when you first started it that turned out to be different? Like you expected one thing to work this way but it turned out to be another way?
I expected cute ,entertaining and pixely and thats what I got :)
-Did the blocks fall too fast/too slow?
For an average difficulty setting the rate that the blocks fall at works well.
-Did anything feel unintuitive ?
No so far as I could tell.
- Was it fun ? What do you think would have made it more fun ?
It was a lot of fun. Power ups would be cool , things you can unleash on your opponant.
All in all I can't wait for the next build and neither can the girl , please keep updaing this ! :D
How did the controls feel ?
Like the mouse. Not too fond of the controller. With the controller I had an issue where the chicken would continue moving left after I stopped pressing left. Also, found it hard to pick up blocks while playing with the controller. Maybe consider making it so that the block gets picked up when the player holds in a button (trigger would be nice) and thrown when released. That is what my instinct told me to do constantly and it was frustrating that it didn't work that way (but maybe that's just me).
Was it difficult to understand how the game mechanics worked ?
No
Did you have certain expectations from the game when you first started it that turned out to be different? Like you expected one thing to work this way but it turned out to be another way?
No, but then again I played earlier builds too.
Did the blocks fall too fast/too slow?
Could be a fraction slower. Also a problem when a block you threw hit something and landed back on the player. This made the player "flicker" which i take is going to mean health loss at some point - this would be bad. Also had a game breaking bug where my character was lifting a block, but the block would be invisible?
-Did anything feel unintuitive
see kamikazi falling block comment above, and controller comment
- Was it fun ? What do you think would have made it more fun ?
Yes, it is fun. Would like to see AI improving (know you're working on it). Seeing the chicken cross the "blocks" is nice but does not really make for a challenging opponent yet :) I second powerups, but only if really well thought out and as long as it does not make the game unbalanced. I think the main barriers against a super fun time is the AI and improved controls.
Still love this concept and can't wait for more improvements of Super Battle Bear Drops vs. Tosser arena Caber Blocks :/
Do the menu's work with the controllers? I see it says press any key to continue and so on. Would be nice to be able to use a controller all the time if you have 2 installed.
I hope to get a controller working so I can test multilayer.
@tbulford Yeah the controller does work on the menu - up and down, and any of the face buttons (pretty much made all of them work). Not sure why it wouldn't work for you...!! I have tested with my PS3 controllers (with emulation) and Xbox360 controllers (which doesn't need emulation).
Do try the analogue and the dpad - maybe there's mapping issues? I'll have to look into it.
@MrNexy thanks so much for your feedback! :D The XX are markers for where blocks of that colour will land. I realise that they need to be redesigned to reflect that better, it's now between moving arrows down or dotted line silhouettes of the blocks. I thought X was good enough to look like targets, but apparently not :P
The lack of jump is to simplify the controls, but I admit that most people would want to jump. I'll make the control screen clearer later.
@FanieG The controls were raised by several people and I'm going to change it to exactly the way you say there - that was the conclusion I arrived at a while ago with a few other people. Because I'm used to it, I can play pretty fast with the control scheme now, but I can see how it is unintuitive for most.
It's interesting you saw that the block falling back on you didn't register as losing a life - you do indeed - but right now there's a bug where if you're holding something you don't flash after taking damage - That's something I need to fix. In fact I'm changing the whole damage dynamic - I feel that damage that kills defeats the purpose of matching and stacking. I'm gonna make hits stun for a short while (followed by recovery invulnerability) instead of having life.
@FanieG Thanks!! :D That controller change isn't a big one I'll have it done, but I'll update when there's more significant difference to see :)
And the face buttons should work on the 360 controller too... Unless they're mapped to different ones... >_< I guess I'll have to research and do controller detection and re-map controls with each device eventually... Oui >_<
I wonder how the gamepads aren't working... I'll have to do some research...
I throw boxes at my enemy and boom it explodes leaving him with cool collectables :( i want the cool collectables when I match blocks and make them go boom. Any thoughts on that? perhaps an explosion tossing the collectables around some to my side :D is there a way to determine witch player matched the blocks? Who was responsible ?
Whether the attack is yours (attacking the other side) or the opponent's (attacking your side) is dependant on where the last block was dropped - so you could end up stealing a match from the opponent if it's right around the centre line.
What I want to create is a tension between positive and negative aspects of matching stuff on your side:
Positive:
1) get score, powerup your attack
2) clear your side (because the primary win condition will be to make the other side pile up too high, I'm dropping the life thing)
Negative:
1) You could get hit (you'll get stunned for a while and maybe lose some of your gems Sonic-style so you could collect them back)
2) Give the opponent the opportunity to counterattack with more blocks on their side
Now I'm not sure whether this is too complicated, in which case it may have to be simplified, or it should be taught in single player taking players through basic concepts (in a non-boring-tutorial manner)...
Thoughts?
You could always let exploding blocks on the opponents side drop "poisoned gems" that subtract score. But that might be difficult to implement (as tbulford asked): Your game's logic has such unique challenges. How do you sleep at night? This shit would keep me up trying to come up with the easiest/most efficient/laziest sollution.
Battle Blocks
Skydrops Arena
What do you guys think of Fling Fight?
Seemed a bit generic, didn't really get very good feedback on it. Tempted to call it
Super Fling Fight
and be done with it...
Then thought of Chuck Duck, which has a bit more personality... And would dictate the theme a bit...
Dropbears I do like but there's a preconceived idea from Aus that it refers to Koalas falling out of trees...
I'm going nuts here @_@
OK! Imma give it a try...!!!
Thanks for the input guys XD
Something that came up was Chuck Chuck Boom - How does that sound? XD
Chronicles of the Bears of chuck
Done!!!
How much beer dare a bear chuck chuck if a bear chuck dared chuck beer?
And I can even put a vlambear in there :P
A biggish update should be coming this weekend, as I work my way towards rAge...!!!
Though I have to ask, will there be a bear named Chuck, or Charles?
I dunno yet, I guess "why not" if it fits :)
Though I do know that there's one thing I need to have - a Dutch flaming bear ;)
Schizophrenic bear AI... Is getting there slowly :)
https://vine.co/v/hvidhwW9d7d
btw I can't see your Vine posts in Firefox... ? (I can in Chrome) Is this normal? (figured this out only now, so finally got to watch the Broforce Deathmatch Vine... I'm seriously wondering about a smooth jazz soundtrack option for Broforce now)
A new gameplay video!
The *official* Bear Chuck page!
http://www.tuism.com/bearchuck
Playable build! With GOOD AI!
Download Bear Chuck Windows Playable build RIGHT NOW
25 Sep
> AI that ACTUALLY BEAT ME. More than once.
> A new menu worthy of the Bear Chuck name.
> Brand spanking new gameplay video starring Bears!
> Will be at rAge expo 2013 from 4 – 6 October!
19 Sep
> Settled on the new name Bear Chuck! Just too adorable :)
> Updated the animation and upgraded the AI a bit more
> Added a few more effects
> The combo system now works! Chains will add exponentially more attacks to the other side – e.g. a match of 4 will be an attack of 2, and match 5 will attack 3. Each chain adds a multiplier to your attack – so at combo 2, the attack will be multiplied by 2. E.g.: First match of 4 creates attack 2. Then another match of 4 is the result of a chain reaction – and that attach will be multiplied by the combo factor of 2 for an attack of 4 (2 x 2).
I love that orb-trail thing that goes to the other side when you match four blocks. It made it so much clearer to me what was happening. Removing the lives was a great move too. :)
Do you immediately lose if your side fills up? What does score have to do with anything?