Group Game Project

[Dzz]

Hello everybody!

Partially in response to the recent post by 'thebooboo', I would like to explore the possibility of a group project whose purpose is the development of a good GP2X game. Basic parameters of the project:

1) Open source under GPL license for all materials (code, art, music, etc)
2) "Open process" -- that is, all communication related to development of this game will take place in a thread on this forum. Doing so will be entertaining for onlookers, will help with motivation and recruitment, and will provide an easy way for any interested party to assess what does and does not work in a project such as this by simply reading the history.

I nominate myself as primary coder and principal organizer. I would be happy if somebody else took the role of principal organizer, but if you want that job be aware that lots of people will be counting on your constant attention for a long period of time.

First order of business: what type of game should we build?

Simultaneously: who is interested in participating? I strongly believe that the bottleneck on this project will be art, so graphic artists can make the largest impact.

I would like to set a goal to get the basic organizational structure ironed out (although not necessarily all the participants, as I imagine that roster will unfortunately change over time) and have a rough idea of the game type by May 7.

A rough target for the completion of the game at a feature complete level would be the end of the year.

Comments? Ideas? Flames? Volunteers?

 

[Draken]

Posted in the General GP32 section.

Sound cool though, hope people are interested in this.
Don't have a lot of artistic abilities, can't help.

 

[Dzz]

Posted in the General GP32 section.

For which I apologize. If a kind moderator could move it that would be helpful.

 

[Yod4z]

realy good idea, i thinks an adventure game or rpg game will be the more exiting thing. Good luck

 

[Paradox]

an RPG doesnt seem very appropriate for a group project over a forum, maybe a shooter or racing game, puzzle, or something more simple?

 

[ingrin]

This sounds like a great idea. Alas I don't think I'm strong enough in any one talent to assist.

I think a solid RPG or action game might be the best bet. Although I'd think it best to shy away from 3D, why excentuate the negative?

Actually, while I was waiting for my GP2X to arrive (Pre-DaveC cap) I envisioned my idea of the killer app. A puzzler to rival Lumines or Meteos for the GP2x designed to minimize use of the infamous joystick. It was sort of like Lunar Lander meets Tetris and Arkanoid. I'm just doubtful it will be as great in the real world as it is in my mind.

I need to learn Fenix and mock it up sometime...

 

[Dzz]

This sounds like a great idea. Alas I don't think I'm strong enough in any one talent to assist.

I think a solid RPG or action game might be the best bet. Although I'd think it best to shy away from 3D, why excentuate the negative?

Actually, while I was waiting for my GP2X to arrive (Pre-DaveC cap) I envisioned my idea of the killer app. A puzzler to rival Lumines or Meteos for the GP2x designed to minimize use of the infamous joystick. It was sort of like Lunar Lander meets Tetris and Arkanoid. I'm just doubtful it will be as great in the real world as it is in my mind.

I need to learn Fenix and mock it up sometime...

I don't think it's necessary to learn Fenix; if you can and are willing to just do some quick sketches (they can be horrible as long as they communicate the concept) and some description, it seems like it could be a possibility.

 

[PokeParadox]

realy good idea at i thinks an adventure game or rpg game will be the more exiting thing. Good luck

http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?showtopic=26679

We are already trying to put together an Adventure RPG. I currently have too many coursework projects, which are consuming my programming abilities. And bigtrouble is working hard on a site for his work... this is why things have slowed down, but anybody is welcome to help out. I will pickup again over the summer since I should have a looooooot of time off.

 

[Aimless_E]

I offer my services as a 3d artist. just give me a topic and Ill give you the model

 

[ingrin]

necessary to learn Fenix; if you can and are willing to just do some quick sketches (they can be horrible as long as they communicate the concept) and some description, it seems like it could be a possibility.

OK first stab, haven't really written the idea down before now...

Stoked​

Basic Setup:
You are the stoker operator on a spaceport power furnace. The spaceport captures asteroids that are determined to be mineral rich. The asteroid is brought into a chamber next to the furnace, and a mining-drill is deployed to the surface and a drills to the core. Unrefined ore is then shunted to the stoker furnace via a low power tractor beam.

The display:
The furnace takes up most of the screen, shaped like a Tetris well.
There is an ionizer ( an arrow shaped pointer) located in the bottom left of the screen.
There is a red line located 1/3 to ½ if the way from the bottom. This represents the trigger sensor.
(Optional)A representative of your character is located at the control panel in the top left of the screen.
Your stoker is represented by a ‘Arkanoid’ style bar with a left and right thruster. It resides within the furnace.
(Optional)To the right is a graphic display showing the drill going to the core of the asteroid. This server to set the pace of the game and inform the player how far along they are in the Wave.
The tractor beam between the drill and furnace is used to preview the incoming pieces.

There needs to be a score and fuel indicator located somewhere….

The keys:
Left shoulder – left thruster on stoker
Right shoulder – right thruster on stoker
X - stoker magnet
A – flips direction stoker is heading
Y – impurity cannon (not enabled at startup)
Joystick Up and Down control Ionizer (only on levels when the sensor is disabled)


Gameplay:
You control the Stoker. You move it around within the furnace. Your goal is to load the ore in such a way as to avoid empty spaces and impurities. The ore has different properties(non-magnetic, extra-rich,etc…) and (optionally) loading like ore next to each other increases the energy gained when ionized.
Initially, your only tool is to engage a magnet to hold onto the ore and place it at the bottom of the furnace. Without the magnet engaged, you merely ‘push’ the ore with your stoker. You can also ‘push’ impurity laden ore (or any other unwanted ore) out of the furnace into space.
Once the ore ‘snaps’ into place (a la Tetris) at the bottom, it fuses with the rest of the ore and cannot move. Once any piece of the fused ore gets above the red sensor line, the ionizer is engaged and cycles upward, ionized each layer of ore. This feeds the station, increases your score, and increasing your fuel supply. If a layer is not complete or contains impurities, it will not be ionized and stay behind, again similar to tetris. On levels with impurities, a blaster will need to be installed on the stoker to blast away offending material. If you miss your shot and hit the fused ore, all of your fuel store is destroyed.
Run out of fuel, Game Over.
Get caught below the red line by the ionizer Game Over.
Fill the furnace Game Over.

Each stage can introduce new challenges. On some stages, the ionizer could be broken and needs to be manually controlled. You may encounter ore with impurities or which cannot be magnetizes. Ore may have increasingly difficult shapes etc…

Each stage is a spacestation. Lots of variety in design I hope…
Each wave is an asteroid. May have different kinds of ore in each.

And here is my real ugly (and oddly phallic) mock-up

Anyway, just getting the idea out there. Like I said, I'm not sure it will work, some of the gameplay mechanics, I suspect, will simply not be as fun as they should. However, if anyone likes the basic idea and wants to improve,m they are welcome...

 

[rokdcasbah]

i may be able to contribute some artwork, i'll watch this thread i guess.

 

[Mr.Jabberwocky]

How about the game play of Atic Atac with an isometric viewpoint. Atic Atac is a good fun game. It has a map element, a shoot'em up element, you have to manage your energy level, you use specialised objects against 'Bosses', yet from a programming aspect it would not be too challenging. For a first group project I think a fairly simple game would be best to increase the chances of it being completed.
An isometric view would be a real novelty in a homebrew. Why is it that there are no homebrew isometric games ? It has to be my favorite game format.
The most important aspect is going to be selecting a team that are not otherwise committed, so the project does not go the same way as the bigtrouble77 one. At least Dzz has demonstrated that he is active in developing for the GP2X and always seems to be available.

 

[Rekelon]

In reply to ingrin

When you say impure do you mean like it will be grey in colour and so you will have to blast the dirt off to reveal the colour?

The only fault with this project is that it is to similar to tetris (and about 50 other games that copied it) but i like that project layout.



I have two ideas for project



Has anyone anyone heard of the game sneech for the amiga? http://www.shoecakegames.com/sneech/
This was an 2d snake that had upto 10 ai on screen at a time, this was interesting as you had to eat the food to grow and if you hit someone elses tail you would start to shrink and had to quickly move away from the tail else death would occur. You picked up three main types of items, food (to grow) black dots to speed up and money. You also gained money and points for hurting someone else.
At the end of the round you had to head to the home portal where your size and items would be translated into points.


At each round you could buy power up items such bombs (to blow through someone tail) extra speed, extra size, reverse, extra life and other such items.

This game would be excellent to play and very addictive

I inclose a good picture of the game in action

-------------------------------------------------

When i was younger, my brother used to write programs for his computer club at school (even released games on the acorn for people to buy)

A few years back we got a copy of dark basic and we rewrote some of his games however due to time we canned it after a few weeks.

However we had a working exe of the project that i will search the pc for now (just checked, it isn’t there any more )


Basic concept
Basically the project was a typical space rpg however once you have completed a certain section, you would have to fight in ships against your opponent. (AI)

Now the Rpg will be to complicated and long winded to encode however I think that the space ship part might be an interesting and simple project to achieve.

Gameplay
You would occupy the bottom of the screen whilst your opponent would take the top of the screen and you would have to fire lasers at each other until one person died
There will also an upgrade shop for you to buy bombs and shields.

(if the programmers are up for it, the 1d limit of the game could be removed to allow the ships to move around in 2d space however this will cause the ai programming to be a lot harder) other modifications could be as exotic as 5 verses 1 or 2 verses 2

Picture
I have included a picture which I threw together in about 2 min so don’t laugh at the terrible paint skills

much larger picture

http://img135.imageshack.us/my.php?image=s...ipdesign2ay.gif
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Personally I would love to see both game being made but as a choice I would go for sneech any day as no snake game has ever managed to replicate this little beast.

 

[Dzz]

Why is it that there are no homebrew isometric games ?

I think the primary reason is the artwork, which takes a lot of skill to get looking good.

Keep the ideas flowing everybody! I don't want to make any comments yet, so don't misinterpret my silence as disinterest.

 

[Tobriand]

Is it just me getting deja-vu with the Community Game Project here? Not that that exists anymore, of course, but nonetheless. Hopefully this will go further than it did!

However, Dzz, if you're after a complex game to attempt to make, I believe a lot of planning did go into that, though I can't find the place where all of it is stored. Ask Rico, or wait until someone manages to dig up the info.

 

[cakey]

3 words.

Tic Tack Toe

 

[racoon]

Even tough this might be too big to handle, I would like a epic RPG most... sure, there are many of these games for emulators out there, but that would be my favorite, I think the fighting system from Grandia2 would be a great base (I just loved it) . It would be best if we would get a sophisticated battle system and a cool story, I could probably contribute to both of these points... (a friend and me worked out a huge roleplay-world, which is basically a fork of many, many different worlds/films/games and some cool new ideas thrown in; atm it's still under development, planned to be used as an alternative ShadowRun world, but it has got a fantasy setting)
I do not know if 3D is appropriate at all, somehow it seems to me as if most (if not all) open-source 3D games (which do not use already existing engines) don't look "really good". And, too bad, I guess we will not be able to use the CrystalSpace Engine.
Furthermore, and no matter what game it's going to be, I will be able to translate it English<->German(<->French if not tooo complicated).

 

[techFreak]

As I have my own music and sound effect studio http://www.studyosmart.com I can contribute this project with live music and sound effects if needed. B)

If we are thinking about a game that rocks anyone who has GP2X, it should be an action game. 3D or 2D but it should be awasome looking and sounding. A RPG game is easier to develop but I think it should be something different to embrace all GP2X users.

Translation of texts and speechs from English to Turkish is another thing I can do at the moment. My coding is not very good in C/C++ but i can give a hand to algorithms if needed.

 

[racoon]

This might sound kinda stupid now, but I think, if we want it really good looking, the menu both in and "out"game should look really cool, eventually with all these eye-candy fade effects, and probably some animation...
I do not know what type of game would be suitable to most people, I guess we won't be able to hit everyone's favorite type.

 

[Mr.Jabberwocky]

This might sound kinda stupid now, but I think, if we want it really good looking, the menu both in and "out"game should look really cool, eventually with all these eye-candy fade effects, and probably some animation...

Me too. I always judge a book by its cover. But we really need a game first.
Would not snake or tetris be too small for a group project ?
One of the reasons I suggested an isometric game is that each room can be a separate puzzle. If a small room builder utility could be released anyone would be able to design puzzles to be included in the project. This would open it up to the whole community. The editor can just use plain blocks with different characteristics to allow puzzle design. These could be replaced with artwork by the team's artist/s for inclusion in the game.
Also a room by room layout allows for an open ended map size depending on the level of contributions.
When it comes to a story line I would rather have a simple 'avoid the bad guys to achieve the objective' than wrap it in some hackneyed Indiana Jones type story-line unless it is truly relevant to the game play.