View Full Version : 23: TF2 - Goldrush Puzzle Game
dammit
03-09-2009, 10:52 AM
Final Version (http://www.box.net/shared/u6f8c5arq0) and Sourcy Code (http://www.box.net/shared/hb04c0crcj)
Things that have been changed since the end of Comp 22:
1. 15 level backgrounds
2. Gazza hax level music
3. Sparkling new menu interface
4. Movement code was changed by Fengol
5. Most messages now not old popup type.
6. Help file updated
7. Spiffy save and load options
8. Achievements added
Things I didn't land up changing:
1. No new levels
2. No sound effects
Promotional Pages:
1. Twitter (https://twitter.com/TF2puzzler) <https://twitter.com/TF2puzzler>,
Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Team-Fortress-2-Goldrush-Puzzler/149885407118) <http://www.facebook.com/pages/Team-Fortress-2-Goldrush-Puzzler/149885407118>,
Blog (http://tf2puzzler.blogspot.com/) <http://tf2puzzler.blogspot.com/>
2. Steam Community Content Thread (http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?p=11237075#post11237075)
Yoyo Work in Progress Thread (http://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=447386)
***
Note: Sourcey Code has been sent to Fengol to do what he likes in the Pro-version of GM so the game may still get another update, however, I see this as my final update.
***
Fengol
03-09-2009, 11:28 AM
You'd be amazed at what a different some sounds can make to your game. Grab a microphone and record with Audacity or simply just use SFXR to make cute noises (there are links somewhere on the forum or PM Nandrew).
After a little bit of sound work I suggest looking at the backgrounds of your levels and painting them to look like levels from the game, instead of blank open space.
Nandrew
03-09-2009, 01:50 PM
I'm going to double-check the latest version of your game and see what sorta detailed feedback I can offer. I think you can wrangle some nice reviews after your polish phase. ;)
Nandrew
03-09-2009, 02:39 PM
Right, definitely work on the collision and movement bugs before anything else. Because you want to market this, you'll want to focus on player interaction: if they get frustrated by the controls, even the most intriguing puzzle situations aren't going to be appreciated properly.
Since this is your first project, I understand that fixing these bugs may be tricky, so what you should maybe do is rein in a more experienced dev to look at and tighten up that code. Maybe even post your GM source file on the forums so that we can give you feedback here. It'll free you up to focus on other fun elements such as the graphics, sound and - MOST IMPORTANTLY -- intriguing level design!
Fengol
03-09-2009, 03:15 PM
if you send me your souce, I'd be happy to help you on it.
dammit
03-09-2009, 05:16 PM
^_^ Thanks for the offers to help! Really appreciated since I'm not really sure what to do with it at the moment :P I'll add the source code to the first post.
Edit: Just in case it makes a difference, I am only using GM Lite so there are obviously some things I can't use/do. Dunno what it is that I can't use/do, but still! :P
Fengol
04-09-2009, 12:40 PM
You know, I'm very tempted to make make a single player TF2 mod based on this. All the tools are there in Source SDK and I just found how to setup a fixed camera in the wiki :P
dammit
04-09-2009, 09:19 PM
One other thing that's concerning me. I know Fengol has needed to ask permission for his game to be promoted as is, but I'm wondering if I may need to do the same at some point. As it stands now, I realise that's not necessary, but the image I plan to use for my menu and help pages, although completely my own work and not traced, is a copy of the actual TF2 artwork. When does one cross the line between fanwork and plagiarism?
dislekcia
04-09-2009, 10:25 PM
One other thing that's concerning me. I know Fengol has needed to ask permission for his game to be promoted as is, but I'm wondering if I may need to do the same at some point. As it stands now, I realise that's not necessary, but the image I plan to use for my menu and help pages, although completely my own work and not traced, is a copy of the actual TF2 artwork. When does one cross the line between fanwork and plagiarism?
No, Fengol doesn't need to ask for permission to promote his game, he just wants to. As far as I know, as long as you're not actively SELLING your game, then it's creative commons and all that.
Plus Valve is always cool with people doing rad things with their universes. Just look at Black Mesa Source and how CS got picked up... I'd advise not worrying about it and doing the best you can to promote and grow the game, then if it ever gets big and Valve sees it, they'll like it.
And if you get a cease and desist letter, then do that instead. But until then, keep going.
dammit
05-09-2009, 10:32 AM
Good to know, thanks ^_^
dammit
06-09-2009, 01:51 PM
First post edited with the shinier looking but shorter game now available. Comments welcome ^_^
Another note: I'm planning on putting this onto the steam forums at some point (community fanwork area sorta thing of the forums) but at least one person has suggested that if I do so, I should first remove the "scouts are dicks" type messages from the game? Other options would include a PG notice.
Any thoughts?
dammit
07-09-2009, 01:32 PM
Finished the artwork for the first 10 levels now, 5 remaining (of the originally created levels). Planning on eventually having 20 complete levels before the month is up.
In the mean time, I'm brainstorming some achievement ideas. Not exactly sure how to work them into the code, but I'll worry about that later :P
Sounds good :) for the achievements you can use an ini file to store the information? I can give you my ini storing code for Pea Adventures to reuse?
dammit
07-09-2009, 08:08 PM
Sounds good :) for the achievements you can use an ini file to store the information? I can give you my ini storing code for Pea Adventures to reuse?
I'm not in the habit of turning down such nice gestures ^_^ thanks.
dammit
10-09-2009, 10:44 AM
I've been unable to fix the recurring popup messages in room 13 (meet the engineer). Any suggestions?
EDIT: Bug is fixed if I simply move rooms so that 13 and 14 follow from the meet the spy room. Its definitely a problem in my looping structure, but at this stage, I'm not sure how to fix it. Perhaps it works better this way. Gets all the "meet the team" stuff out the way before hitting into the random levels.
I am working on a completely new message system, but i won't have that done by tomorrow (i don't think) which is when i plan to update all my promotional websites/pages.
Nandrew
12-09-2009, 08:49 PM
What's your ETA on the final version of the game, you reckon?
Also, some nice marketing buildup going on, I'm impressed by the attention that's going into it!
dammit
13-09-2009, 11:04 AM
What's your ETA on the final version of the game, you reckon?
Also, some nice marketing buildup going on, I'm impressed by the attention that's going into it!
No idea on the final version ETA, but I'm working on a weekly Friday update. Considering that there is a lot that needs to be done to this game, my bet is I won't feel any of the updates are the final one anyway.
Thanks. Working damn hard on networking, which makes this whole comp an interesting social experiment. I'm also quite surprised at who on my contact list is taking interest and who is stopping to ask me all about the game at random social gatherings.
dammit
18-09-2009, 11:46 AM
Okay, so big plans and big ideas mean more time is needed:
With more bugs and issues turning up than expected, and actually having to go to my real day job to earn the monies that keep me fed, the update is being delayed until Monday. Having the whole weekend free to fix this game is only going to be beneficial for all of us, so hang in there!
What is planned for the weekend:
* Complete Achievement coding
* Complete sprite images upgrade (including the bullets)
* Music implant
* Dealing with any other bugs
It'll be worth the wait, I promise, so look out for the update come Monday morning bright and early.
dammit
21-09-2009, 10:18 AM
Update the first post with the latest and greatest version of the game as well as the source code for it. Unless some major bug is discovered in the next hour, this is the final version that will go up on the blogs and such :)
I thought it might also be interesting at this point of the competition to add my thoughts on what I've learnt so far in trying to promote a little game like mine.
Firstly, I rediscovered how unbelievably helpful everyone on this part of the forums can be. The amount of collective hours spent by various devs explaining all sorts of things to me is amazing and priceless. You all rock :)
Another thing, Facebook turned out to be the most successful of the three social networking type promotional sites. Twitter worked reasonably well, but it is just not as easy to get yourself known. The blog was/is hard work to maintain and even harder to get a following for. I would suggest anyone who devs regularly to maintain a blog for this purpose over a long period of time so that when one wants to promote a game, there's already a long standing blog with dedicated followers.
Posting on the Steam Forums, I was expecting loads of criticism and exceedingly unhelpful "LOL" replies. Quite surprisingly, the response, though minimal, was fairly constructive in its criticism. Yoyo game forums, on the other hand, was fairly useless. Not least because it signs me out constantly.
The most interesting thing I discovered, however, was the fact that outside of this forum the main suggestion was not, in fact, to add more levels but rather just to polish those I already had. I had expected people to complain the game was too short, but most complained about the sprites and other image related issues. Hence I never did get to build the other 5 levels I had planned.
Oh, and the final thing: I discovered I still have a major mental block in recording my own voice for the purpose of making sound effects. While SFXR is pretty cool, the sounds just didn't seem right for this type of game.
Nandrew
21-09-2009, 04:57 PM
Nice report, time to download and par-tay!
Nandrew
22-09-2009, 09:31 PM
Awesome, the game seems clean, the movement is smooth and the overall experience is pretty darn neat. :)
If you're still hunting down bugs, however, I need to mention that the engineer's introductory level has a bit of a problem: colliding with the engineer himself generates several repeated messages before you're finally allowed to die and respawn. Thought I was stuck for a moment, though it went away after a few frames.
Overall: it would be nice if there were more levels, but I'm glad that you chose to refine what you had. It's good that Game.Dev are pushing forward more projects that are focusing on completion and polish, and I think you can be pretty stoked at where you've gone for your firstest game ever.
I'll put a mention of this on Dev.Mag now that it's complete.
dammit
23-09-2009, 08:01 AM
Awesome, the game seems clean, the movement is smooth and the overall experience is pretty darn neat. :)
^______^
If you're still hunting down bugs, however, I need to mention that the engineer's introductory level has a bit of a problem: colliding with the engineer himself generates several repeated messages before you're finally allowed to die and respawn. Thought I was stuck for a moment, though it went away after a few frames.
Ooops. I was messing around with the engie when i noticed that he wasn't actually harmful to the player himself but I guess I forgot to test it. Sorry, but thanks for bringing it to my attention :)
Overall: it would be nice if there were more levels, but I'm glad that you chose to refine what you had.
I was actually looking through my code on monday morning and I realised that sometime during comp 22 I'd already started the coding for more levels where other enemies would be killed by other friendlies. Pity there just wasn't enough time.
It's good that Game.Dev are pushing forward more projects that are focusing on completion and polish, and I think you can be pretty stoked at where you've gone for your firstest game ever.
I'll put a mention of this on Dev.Mag now that it's complete.
\o/ Thanks :D
Bonezmann
25-09-2009, 09:10 PM
The player seems to move through the cart when you move too much. This screws one over quite a few times. Other than that, superb game!
Fengol
26-09-2009, 08:03 AM
Personally, I like the fact that you can walk over the cart. It keeps the cart moving and since player can stand on the cart, it doesn't break original game accuracy
dammit
26-09-2009, 10:14 AM
The player seems to move through the cart when you move too much. This screws one over quite a few times. Other than that, superb game!
You're not the first to say you dislike this aspect of the game. In fact I had at one stage changed it so that you couldn't walk over the cart, but much discussion with the various people helping me out on this project I decided to stick to my original gut instinct and allow the player to walk over the cart.
My reasoning is this: in game you can stand next to the cart and it still moves, but you don't actually physically push the cart. There are also times in game when you are trying to move the cart and actually race ahead of it, leaving it behind, and so you have to go back and "fetch" the cart. Also, forcing one to push the cart would mean on certain levels you have to be behind the cart, whereas now, you could be on top of the cart instead (making it easier to actually solve the problem).
Achievement Unlocked: Realising it's impossible to please everyone. ;)
Edit: Got a complaint that the game is incompatible with Windows 7. Can anyone confirm this? And would anyone know how to fix this?
Bonezmann
26-09-2009, 11:45 AM
Very well, I understand now. Once again Kudos on an excellent game dammit! :)
dammit
26-09-2009, 05:58 PM
Very well, I understand now. Once again Kudos on an excellent game dammit! :)
^__^ Thanks.
dammit
29-09-2009, 05:37 PM
Okay, since I doubt anything dramatic is going to take place between now and rAge (and if it does I can always update this thread), there's no better time than now to take stock. I'm not entirely sure by what standards this month's comp is being judged (and besides, we already know who's won ;) ) so I'll just add all the data I have:
Twitter - 27 Followers
Facebook - 55 Fans
Blog - 3 Followers (though, these probably don't count :P )
Steam and Yoyo games forums threads got little attention
Other forms of press:
http://i279.photobucket.com/albums/kk157/dammit62/29September2009.jpg
Also scored a mention (http://www.indiegames.com/blog/2009/09/update_onslaught_of_the_electr.html) on indiegames.com (thanks to Nandrew :D )
And total downloads:
http://i279.photobucket.com/albums/kk157/dammit62/data.jpg
Nandrew
29-09-2009, 07:00 PM
Was stoked to catch that update on your blog, nice one!
Bonezmann
29-09-2009, 08:34 PM
Not only did that article publicise your game, but it publicised Game.Dev in general as well. I hope you get some serious browny points in Comp 23 for that. Also, you're 21?
dammit
30-09-2009, 08:24 AM
Not only did that article publicise your game, but it publicised Game.Dev in general as well. I hope you get some serious browny points in Comp 23 for that. Also, you're 21?
Well, I was under the impression that part of Comp 23 was to also publicise Game.Dev :P Also, yep, 21.
Edit: Also, thanks to Nandrew for getting both Fengol's L4D Card Game as well as my own TF2 puzzler mentioned on Indiegames.com. I'm guessing this is behind the boost of downloads (I'm at 80 for the current version now). :D
dammit
11-10-2009, 05:16 PM
I just hit 89 downloads. No idea where these are coming from since I've stopped all efforts at promoting. :P
dammit
31-03-2010, 09:25 PM
23 March: 100 Downloads. I don't know where people are getting the links from but it's apparently not completely dead. Interesting!
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