ledow
Member
Just to announce that I'm working on a new GP2X game (Pandora really doesn't interest me and anything GP2X can be put on the Wiz easily anyway - always cater to the lowest common denominator! 
).
I've called it "Adsorb" (deliberately, before anyone points out that I can't spell "absorb"). It's an Osmos-clone / extension. For those that don't know Osmos (which I bought on Steam a few weeks back and think is *brilliant*), you are a circular blob in a large space of other circular blobs. You can propel yourself by pushing some of your mass in a direction (which makes you move in the other). When two blobs touch, whichever blob is the larger starts to "suck" on the smaller blob and steal some of its mass. The idea is to absorb all the other blobs until you are the biggest, while avoiding being eaten by the larger blobs.
At the moment, the game has working gameplay. I'm not saying that it's exactly like Osmos (I'm not trying for that) but it has a fun gameplay even at this primitive stage - too fun, because I keep wanting to play it rather than code it! It has 2d-only graphics (not the extremely fancy graphics of Osmos which use OpenGL shaders and all sorts by the looks of it) but you wouldn't really notice. The physics are in place, if a little "bouncy" (if you hit a small blob at high speed, it goes ZOOMING off, but not ridiculously so), but that can easily be toned down as I refine the gameplay (there's nothing like having a random "Kludge-factor" in your code for things like that!). It has a large play area, pans around it perfectly. It will need some optimisation before it's ready for the GP2X, though, but nothing too drastic I hope(the current code is floating-point-arithmetic- and blit-heavy but there's no reason it needs that).
I started the project mainly because I see good potential in the game - multiplayer is one idea (one player using the joystick, other player using buttons) and Osmos itself uses several gameplay types (where the blobs are planets in orbit around a gravitational sun that pulls them in, where the blobs are static in a field and you have to become the biggest, where some of the blobs are "intelligent" and avoid / chase you, etc.). It's nice to have a project where you can say "Oh, I could add this" and just make minor changes to a larger codebase to add totally new elements to the game. Ideally, I see some sort of cross between Osmos and other games, like Liquid Wars and things like that, but more and more modes and options are my main aim.
I've only been working on it for a few days of actual coding time but I have the basic game running - you can control one blob, which ejects matter, the other blobs roam the play area randomly, collisions are simulated physics collisions, mass will transfer between blobs when they contact, and it detects when you're the biggest blob. It only needed about 600 lines of C code to get that far, so I don't see any problems with being able to finish it. Already it just *feels* smooth. I'd call it "playable" in the cheap-Flash-game sense - something you'd pick up and play but nothing with any real depth just yet.
Someone was asking about GP2X games so I just wanted to get word out that, yes, I'm working on this new game for the GP2X (F-100 at that, so no touchscreen necessary!). I'd post a screenshot but it's still in debugging and a screenshot really doesn't do it justice - a movie might, though. Also, for the moment, I'm using an image file for the blobs that I can't distribute (but can be easily replaced). I can probably hack up a wireframe version for now if anyone really wants to see it, but it's not very interesting to look at yet.
I'll try to keep people posted as I progress.
).I've called it "Adsorb" (deliberately, before anyone points out that I can't spell "absorb"). It's an Osmos-clone / extension. For those that don't know Osmos (which I bought on Steam a few weeks back and think is *brilliant*), you are a circular blob in a large space of other circular blobs. You can propel yourself by pushing some of your mass in a direction (which makes you move in the other). When two blobs touch, whichever blob is the larger starts to "suck" on the smaller blob and steal some of its mass. The idea is to absorb all the other blobs until you are the biggest, while avoiding being eaten by the larger blobs.
At the moment, the game has working gameplay. I'm not saying that it's exactly like Osmos (I'm not trying for that) but it has a fun gameplay even at this primitive stage - too fun, because I keep wanting to play it rather than code it! It has 2d-only graphics (not the extremely fancy graphics of Osmos which use OpenGL shaders and all sorts by the looks of it) but you wouldn't really notice. The physics are in place, if a little "bouncy" (if you hit a small blob at high speed, it goes ZOOMING off, but not ridiculously so), but that can easily be toned down as I refine the gameplay (there's nothing like having a random "Kludge-factor" in your code for things like that!). It has a large play area, pans around it perfectly. It will need some optimisation before it's ready for the GP2X, though, but nothing too drastic I hope(the current code is floating-point-arithmetic- and blit-heavy but there's no reason it needs that).
I started the project mainly because I see good potential in the game - multiplayer is one idea (one player using the joystick, other player using buttons) and Osmos itself uses several gameplay types (where the blobs are planets in orbit around a gravitational sun that pulls them in, where the blobs are static in a field and you have to become the biggest, where some of the blobs are "intelligent" and avoid / chase you, etc.). It's nice to have a project where you can say "Oh, I could add this" and just make minor changes to a larger codebase to add totally new elements to the game. Ideally, I see some sort of cross between Osmos and other games, like Liquid Wars and things like that, but more and more modes and options are my main aim.
I've only been working on it for a few days of actual coding time but I have the basic game running - you can control one blob, which ejects matter, the other blobs roam the play area randomly, collisions are simulated physics collisions, mass will transfer between blobs when they contact, and it detects when you're the biggest blob. It only needed about 600 lines of C code to get that far, so I don't see any problems with being able to finish it. Already it just *feels* smooth. I'd call it "playable" in the cheap-Flash-game sense - something you'd pick up and play but nothing with any real depth just yet.
Someone was asking about GP2X games so I just wanted to get word out that, yes, I'm working on this new game for the GP2X (F-100 at that, so no touchscreen necessary!). I'd post a screenshot but it's still in debugging and a screenshot really doesn't do it justice - a movie might, though. Also, for the moment, I'm using an image file for the blobs that I can't distribute (but can be easily replaced). I can probably hack up a wireframe version for now if anyone really wants to see it, but it's not very interesting to look at yet.
I'll try to keep people posted as I progress.
