WIP - project codename "shadows"

Finally I'm posting my first WIP here

This is a game I've been working for some time, and only now I decided to put it together. The concepts and aesthetics are pretty well developed by now, but you won't find them in this first demo: Instead, I had to start with the code.

I programmed it all from the start, including:

- Key assignments and labels in portuguese, english and spanish
- Configurations stored in files.
- Basic physics and animation for actors, including blending
- A simplified lipsync system for cutscenes
- gesture mouse reading for melee attack combos/special
- Directional mouse reading for melee directional swings (swing left, right, diagonal at any angle etc).

I haven't had time to create all the animations. I created quick animation placeholders instead.

What you will see in this demo:
- An ugly playground
- An ugly green model
- Some debug numbers and a red cross near the model. Ignore them
- Blending between different animations
- Crawling, walking, running and jumping
(Use Z for crawling, X for walking and C for running mode toggle.
Also, SHIFT turns Walking into Running. Use SPACE to jump)
- Climbing on ledges automatically (hold SPACE to hold on ledges)

Other notes:
- A temporary STAND animation is being used for jump and for fall animation, so it feels very stiff.
- If the player falls from a certain height, it will have a 'landing' animation. It was replaced by the 'crawl' animation temporarily
- The Ledge climb feature is a first shot. I'm working on it right now. You will be able to go left or right with your hands when finished.

After I finish with this part of the code I'll proceed to the content creation. I wished to open this thread as a Progress Log for this project.

Download the demo here

Regards,
|Emilio|

The speed the character is moving seems a bit faster than the animation, try speeding up the animation or slowing down the character's movement speed. I think the stairs may be a little too big for the character if your using a regular walk animation to go up them. Other than that, this project appears to be off to good start.

Thanks, Sharx!

This is the kind of feedback that is useful indeed.

I'm working on the ledge climb right now, and after that I'll fine-tune the animations. I'll take into account your opinions on the animation speed.

Next update will include some art, too: a new model and better animations, most probably.

wow, it's nice. The character movement and animation looks already pro although it's still a WIP.

looks very interesting... the climbing is a cool feature.
looking forward to see the next update.

Thanks!
I'm rewriting the climb code. It will work the same, only better.

The animations are too ugly. I promise next update will have better aesthetics

Emilio

Just a small update.

I am writing all code from zero, and also creating and painting the models, so progress is not very fast

http://www.moscafilms.com.br/mgame/demo2609.zip

Now we have a couple models.

The main purpose for this 'demo' was to test the impact of stencil shadows on frame rate. I would appreciate some feedback on system speeds and how frame rate gets down when the FIVE shadowed models in some part of the map get into view. I get some 75 fps normally, and some 30 fps when the models are in view.

I have to improve the climb movement yet.. and I'm working on ROPES. They are prototypes, and they stick to the player if you are close enough (did this to test if I could make a rope that swings and sticks to player's hands).

ONe more test: I will implement rope swinging (Tarzan style!). I made a pendulum code. To test this code: look at the green models hanging around the level. When pressing F1, they will 'fall' and behave as pendulums (as if they were tied with a rope).

With the ARROW KEYS, you can test balancing the green dudes to the four directions. They all balance the same, only depends on which direction they face. Next step is to include this code in the actor (player) movement, swinging by using the movement keys and also climbing up and down the rope.

is it gouraud shading or do you use any shader on models?

Great WIP eleroux !!
The update really had his effect
Keep posting more updates

Cheers

Frazzle

Thanks!

innovater: just gouraud shading. No sun, but several light emitting entities placed around (invisible).

the artwork on the models is looking really good... good texturing.
i'm getting a framerate of about 60~70, dropping to about 40~45 when the shadows are in view (my machine: P4 3GHz, 1GB ram)...
there are some problems with the climbing, i got stuck when i was under a block and jumped. the character kept trying to climb onto the block, but he was directly under it, so he couldn't go up and wouldn't go down... i realize you're still going to change this part of the code...
i don't know if the character animation code is final, but it looks a little strange when you're running sideways and he's playing the 'run forward' animation... maybe it could have a 'run sideways' animation, don't know if you already plan on doing that.
about the camera, it could do a little better on avoiding obstacles... i believe you're doing one trace from the character to the camera and moving the camera forward if it hits. you could do some more traces, to points on the sides of the camera, and moving the camera forward a little, so the camera won't 'snap' to position so abruptly when it hits a wall. but i really like that camera style when you're standing still. the camera turns and the character stays put so you can take a good look at him from all directions...

well, this post got longer than i expected...

all in all, the work is looking really nice, both art and programming... of course, being a work in progress, there's a lot of room for improvements, but it shows a lot of potencial.

by the way, what is the game about?


abraço,
Filipe

No, no, please go on

Thanks for your comments. I'll try to improve the camera movement.
As you guessed, most of the code is WIP, including the climb code.
I am doing everything at the same time, and if I don't get crazy maybe I can finish the project code soon. At this very moment I am just making the Sound part of the code, then i'll go on with the climbing code.

This game is about demons, planes, dimensions, reality and dreams. In my ambitious plans, you will be able to play the role of 3 different characters along the game. These three characters have even opposite goals sometimes, and they end up linked in the story.

This is an adventure game with a good deal of action. There's this thief-like spy girl ala dark angel who uses all kind of gadgets, then there's a old style detective, and this character, which is a half-breed human and demon.

What I intend to do is some kind of 'megaplaying' code base. Characters are able to jump, climb, balance when holding on pipes, jumping from one hanging pipe or pole to another, climbing up and down ropes and cables, swinging ropes to jump farther (like tarzan or spider man).

Also, characters will be able to hold different weapons with different hands, and use the left and right mouse button for the attacks. Even a melee and a ranged weapon simultaneously.

The player will be able to swing weapons freely in different angles, driven by the mouse force X and Y and the different buttons pressed. So you can swing two swords alternatively or try to hit the enemy with two swords at once. Or you can shoot your (left) gun right after a (right) sword swing.

Over it, there will be attack gestures for melee weapons. For instance, custom attacks when you draw a 'S' or an 'O' with the mouse, while holding any buttons.

This is limited by character abilities: the girl doesnt use fire weapons but a crossbow, including 'rope arrows', and has the ability to use about anything as a melee weapon. The detective is good with old style guns and shotguns. The demon doesn't use weapons at all.

The demon, however, has unsurpassed agility and strength so he will be able to reach some places without any hardware, and his claw attacks are powerful.


Ideas, ideas...
It may look like an overkill project.. but what encourages me is that I haven't found any real difficulty so far. I'm very pleased with C-script and I found a solution for anything I wanted. Everything I just said is in some stage of development.

I think I will eventually have to gather a team for this project, but I had no luck so far. Something tells me I'd better have a solid project before I can gather people that is really interested in working together.

So, onde você está no Brasil?

eu estou em campinas-SP, trabalhando na Délirus Entertainment (www.delirus.com.br). (na verdade, estamos fazendo um re-branding e logo vamos mudar de nome, mas isso ainda não foi divulgado...)
eu entrei no site dos links que você colocou (moscafilms.com.br), você está na bahia, certo?

Iéis

New update.

http://www.moscafilms.com.br/mgame/demo3009.zip


I left aside for now the improvements in the climb code and animation and spent some time in implementing... SOUND!

The code features:

Seamless scan of floor types in blocks, sprites, terrains and models.
Models and terrains can have soundmaps. Model soundmaps are not as accurate as terrains, but they work anyway. (It just takes more care to paint the soundmaps).

Each creature can be assigned to a 'sound_set'. Sound set is the collection of differents sounds, among them, left and right footsteps for 8 different kinds of terrain. Of course you may assign the same sound to all of them. In this case, I have only 5 sounds defined.

Other than that demo level is even more bizarre than before The content is not priority right now. For now, it's just a soundfest.


Emilio

epah epah! Façam um excelente jogo por acaso n me sabem dizer como encriptar os ficheiros dos scripts?
Obrigado.

i would actually really like to see some SCREENS before im going to download anything, thanks.

It's pretty good looking, the models, but the scripting could use some work to make it more realistic.

-He has no strafing animations
-The climbing part where he pulls himself up on a ledge is buggy. You jump, and it looks good to start, but then his arms go down and then you continue pressing w until he 'slides' up.
-Falling looks a bit weird, his clothes completely dont react to the air resistance and the just kind of is in a straight line... make him lean forward and put his arms out more, maybe make them go in circles to give the 'desperate' effect.

Towelie:
Thanks for your feedback! Yeah, I need to rewrite the climb ledges script. I just stopped my work on that because I wanted to work on the sound detecting code.

As for the animations - actually there are definitions for strafe and fall, but I just haven't animated the model. So I am repeating the walk animation for strafe and the jump animation for fall. But I'll work on all of this!

I like it very much but jumping and falling shouldnt have the same animation (maybe its jsut me but to me it looks like its the same animation) I really like the footstep sounds if you walk over certain object you have a nice moddel to
I really like
Regards
Aztec

New demo here

http://www.moscafilms.com.br/mgame/demo0210.rar

The good:

Fixed the climbing code! now the character can climb up a wall (when there's enough space above the ledge) or simply hang by and strafe left and right.

The strafe can even follow curved ledges. Try the 6-sided 'tower' somewhere in the messy level

I also fixed an error in the model-floor 'reading' of the kind of floor. Now if you try walking in the colored models you will hear a more accurate floor 'sound', the same as the terrain. Red is wood, white is water...
(Of course the sound map doesnt have to be visible.) I posted the sound detection code in User Contributions.

Also, added sounds when falling on a surface. Added a 10% pitch variation on footsteps.

The bad:

Sorry, the climb 'strafing' animation is crap, and the fall animation is still the same as the jump animation. And no run/walk strafe animation yet - I'll do that later.


I know the level is more chaotic than ever.. but I have the politic of testing my code in BAD levels, so they work better in GOOD levels. But the real reason of course is that I haven't took the work of creating a nice level yet.

Coming soon: climbing up ropes.

Emilio

XD much better, however...
-Shouldn't have to hold down SPACE the whole time, maybe for the frist second.
-When you start to climb, if you stop halfway holding SPACE he floats in front of the ledge.
-When climbing the tall, poitnless stairs, look down. You'll notice he has two shadows, one on the staires and one on the ground.

Thanks for your feedback!

Well, the shadows aren't my fault. That's the way stencil shadows work. However, I will take care with dynamic lights when I really build a level.

The spacebar behavior was my choice for the kind of control... while you hold SPACE you are grabbing on things.. but I may change this according to suggestions. What do you and people thing it would be the best way?

btw, it shouldn't float in front of the ledge. If you stop holding SPACE, the player should fall. But this is because the new OBB collision system that makes the collision spheroid 'stick' at ledges sometimes. I'll look for a solution for this.

{Emilio}

Updated the "demo"

http://www.moscafilms.com.br/mgame/demo0710.rar

Now you only need to hold SPACEBAR until you have managed to take grip on a ledge. I think it is way better...

also optimized the climbing strafe animation (but it's not a new animation! it's still crap )

and the slope detection code. Player is not able to go up steep slopes anymore. This was harder than I thought. I posted the code for this in User Contributiions

{
Emilio;
}

Great update eleroux !!
Your WIP is comming along very well

EDIT: I tested your demo and it's great but I've got one remark for
the edge grabbing, you should make it possible when the player is hanging on the edge and sliding across the edge and when he encounters a corner, he needs to turn 90 degrees and be able to grab the other side edge. The explenation may not be clear but this picture should make it clear:


Cheers

Frazzle

Ha, nice! Thats what I'm talking about, you've fixed all the problems I found originally. Nice work, and after some new animations are put in there, itll look great.

Wait... two things:
1) The 90* Angle problem frazzle just stated.
2) When hes up on something, and he walks to the ledge and stands on the ledge, he slides off it.

thanks for looking!

It's great to get this feedback. It truly leads to improvements...

I was thinking on leaving the 90 degrees thing as is, but I gave a second look and found an easy way to make the player turn around the corner. So, the more details I can take care of, the better!

Maybe I can also detect the end of a holding ledge, so the player won't fall when strafing - just stop strafing, and decide if wants to fall or to strafe the other way.

I don't understand very well the thing number TWO. You are talking about a narrow ledge, right?
the player can hold with his hands on narrow ledges, but can't climb on them because there is no room. Inversely, he can't walk on them because he'll fall. I think this is right. Althought these situations (when a ledge narrows) should be avoided in the game design.

Nope, number two had nothign to do with the grappling. What I meant, was when your just standing on any block, with plenty of room, go towards the edge (in any driection, forward, back, strafing) and once you have a foot off you slide off like your rollign off a ball.

Solved!

http://www.moscafilms.com.br/mgame/demo0910.rar

Now the player can turn around corners, and also he will stop strafing when there is an obstacle. (when the ledge is over)

Thanks for your feedback!
To me, the wall climbing/running/crawling/jumping/grabbing part is done

Now I need to move to Rope Swinging, and then to enemies and 'NPCs' behaviors.

Emilio;

Great !!
This really gives your little demo, of what you're trying to accomplish, a great + point !! Just look at Tomb Raider game series

Quote:

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Rope Swinging, and then to enemies and 'NPCs' behaviors.

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I hope this will be as good as your demo up to now


Cheers

Frazzle