I have been pretty busy lately, but I might well have time to write a Windows version of LincolnB's An Exercise in Futility, the runner up in the last Contest. Basically, it will be ported to the computer with these improvements:

Obviously, I'll add color and sound, along with some fluid animations (although the ones that already came with Futility were great).

As a general improvement, instead of interacting with just your screen (and scrolling with your character), the changing game modes will interact with the whole field. I might also allow multiple monster types to coexist (such as the Pong ball and Avalanche spikes). The alternate physics and character sprites will still exist.

And then, here is the twist: a feature called Combat Scrolling! Essentially, Combat Scrolling is a technique that allows a player or monster to create an isolated border out of their viewport. Normally, your scrolling is nearly 1:1, with the camera moving quickly to put you in the center. However, when you activate Combat Scrolling, your camera stops moving, and everything on your screen (including you) is trapped within that area until you consciously deactivate Combat Scrolling or until you are killed. This is very useful for creating an ideal combat situation or stopping yourself from meeting certain death with hazards.
- The borders can have one of three functions, depending on a setting at the beginning of the game: Stop (which is useful for trapping an enemy or another player), Wrap-Around (the famous technique of shooting a portal at the ceiling and the floor comes immediately to mind), or Kill (which is useful for killing monsters on your screen that are rushing by).
- In Zero Gravity mode, monsters appear that are capable of initiating Combat Scrolling as well. You will see the borders that they create for themselves, and if you enter the border, you will also be locked in Combat Scrolling and cannot get out until the monster is killed. The same effect will happen with multiplayer when other players activate Combat Scrolling, and the same end result will happen when monsters enter your border from the outside.

In addition, to make keyboard control easier and also work better with multiplayer (which I'd also like to implement if I have time), your one weapon will be something I call the Pressor: Basically, when you press the Pressor button, you will generate a repulsive force between you and all other monsters and players in the field, the strength of which drops off sharply as distance increases. Although both of you would receive the same backwards force, the main purpose of this would be to force an enemy into a hazard, such as Avalanche spikes or a Kill border.

Well, I am excited to start this project. I am still waiting for permission from LincolnB, and plan to start as soon as I get notification.

EDIT: And I just got permission from LincolnB! Now I can start in style.

Also, I've been thinking more about the combat walls, and realize that a wrap-around border would actually be useless in this game, since its main purpose would actually be to get past impassable walls (by centering on the wall, and then going backwards to appear at the other side). But both Stop and Kill walls would be strategic in this game, and I would imagine that you could start with a Stop wall, and switch between them by collecting a powerup.

What calc and language will this be for?

*facepalm*

Don't know how i missed that.

wooh, Futility was really great, so this will be pretty good too! i wonder if lincolnB would let me make my own windows Futility; not releasing or for contest, just to get use to this new game engine im using. where could i contact him?


dont worry, i didnt notice that till i saw your post, too.

I just sent him a PM here on Cemetech. I'd imagine that you're writing a physics engine?

*bump*

I've been working hard on this. No screenies yet, but I have already added the physics engine, game input, Pressoring, Combat Scrolling (with locked cameras from other entities as well as death when you touch a wall), and the Pong ball, and am about to start on mode switching.

I also want to add sound effects soon so that it feels like I'm actually playing a game. One of the effects I wanted to add was the death effect from I Wanna Be The Guy - but I only want to add the grinding sound at the beginning and not the guitar riff, which I know is independent because different music plays underneath when you get beaten by Mike Tyson. Do you know how I can get to the sound effects the author used for that? And, for that matter, where can I find other good, free sound effects?

I've heard of a trick with Audacity, where you can record speaker output to an audio file. I haven't actually done this, but I know someone who claims it's possible. You could record the sound from IWBTG and edit out everything but the first second or whatever.

I know that trick and was actually attempting to use it. However, I was interested in getting just the death crash and not the music underneath - and, as I said before, I know that the sound is not part of the standard music because the same sound plays whenever you get killed, even when different music plays underneath. Is there a trick in Audacity that allows you to only keep the part of the wave that is common between two sound files (e.g. I get killed by one monster, then another with different music, then use the trick to get just the death crash)?

I'm sure if you look up the game music files on google, you'll find something. After all, the game used entirely open-source sprites and sound files.

There are some software packages that work as a virtual patch cable; I remember having a discussion with benryves about this several years back. One item of caution: if there's audio that you don't have a file for (or even if you do!), remember to consider rights and IP behind the audio you're trying to get.

That's probably the option I'll use. In fact, unless there's a point in the game where the sound is independent, I actually can't separate out the sound:

Code:

Basically, every time I add an equation to the system, I always have one too many unknowns, which means that unless I can obtain any one of the unknowns, I can't get the death crash sound by adding and subtracting waveforms.

* bump *

I actually did find an instance of just the death crash: in the Metroid level, you can be killed by these jellyfish creatures that only play the death sound and then mock you as you crumble to ashes. The rock and roll does not play (presumably because the death splatter doesn't happen either). However, I have chosen not to use the sound, simply because it doesn't fit, and I'll probably use a different sound for the same purpose, like a mix between a bomb and a crack.

* bump *

It's about time you guys had a screenie to look at:


As you can see, I have implemented the main physics engine, the tilemap engine, the Avalanche Spikes, Combat Scrolling and the Kill Wall therefrom, and explosions! What the screenie does not show is physics mode switching, the Pong Ball, and Pressoring (which, by the way, detaches the spikes from the top). Oh, and lots of sound.

Looks like you're making good progress! Can't say I'm a fan of the visual style, though.

I like this a bunch! yeah, i gave up on trying to make my version. just too busy to get to it.

What do you mean? Was there something about the grayscale or 8-bit from the original game that you liked? Because something I definitely want to add if I have time is some sort of motion blur.

Well, ultimately, visual design comes down to personal taste. And personally, I loved the visuals for the original, calculator version. Hehe But obviously the computer is a completely different medium and so calls for a completely different design.

I think the Avalanche Spikes look good. And the character's fine, too - I think motion blur or some other movement animation would be in good taste.

I'm just not entirely sure what to think about the tiles. They look kind of like green parchment.

That's very true. I think that there were some visual elements on the calculator that I could replicate on the computer, such as the motion blur. Also, right now I just use the default explosion for a Combat Scrolling kill, but I think that I want to do something fancy with primitives to create a sort of "liquid explosion" look, as if the object instantaneously dissolves into a green/blue juice.


I might improve the character design a little bit - if I have time, I want to create some sort of humanoid character, although that would require me to create a ton of sprites for the various physics modes.


That's because they're a default texture fill in GIMP that I threw together quickly for testing purposes. That's super easy to fix.

A liquid explosion would be frigging awesome. I'm sure you can make the tiles look good, too, so yeah. Good work so far.