Second playable demo

Cosmologicon on 2009/09/03 09:57 of Universe Factory 9

It's only three screens, but I'm pretty happy with how it's coming along so far. Get it here. Controls at this point are: move with the keyboard, fire with the mouse. Give me any feedback or bug reports!

I need to improve what happens when enemies hit you, because right now it happens too fast. I also need to draw more walking sprites for the enemies. But one thing I don't plan to do is implement path finding. If aimless wandering was good enough for the moblins in Legend of Zelda, it's good enough for my critters. They're scorpions, by the way. I changed them from red to brown, but they still look like lobsters. Whatev.

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Comments

nitrofurano on 2009/09/03 11:22:

Loved that bullet ricochet on the wall! :) - and the game seems very pleasureful to play

It recalls me the very first coin-op arcade game i even played in my childhood - it's a black&white 70's game, made before Rally-X, also with orthogonal streets, some trees and pools, very look-alike, but i don't know its name (i can't find at wikipedia (like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:1979_video_games and before ) or from any arcade database, even from mame... )

Otherwise, i got surprised you also draw one sprite in each picture file... my surprise is because since my AmigaOS time i always used spritesheets...

nitrofurano on 2009/09/03 12:16:

(sorry - found the game - it's SuperBug, from Atari, 1977 - i named this game as similar to Rally-X, jesus...)

Cosmologicon on 2009/09/03 12:39:

You know, nitro, I used to feel unoriginal whenever something I made reminded you of an old or indie video game. But now I realize: everything reminds you of an old or indie video game. ;-)

nitrofurano on 2009/09/03 14:56:

@Cosmologicon - SuperBug were the very first arcade game i even played, i were around 7 or 8 years old - i think the next racing video games i knew were MonacoGP and PolePosition (all very inovative that time) - delicious memories from childhood! :) - anyway, all video game history is really fascinating, and we can really learn a lot from them - as it's important every movie director knowing cinema history, and all artist knowing art history, i think all game developer should know the most possible about video game history - of course video game history is not so documented as cinema and art history - for example, today i created the Super Bug page at Wikipedia (hoping no funny guy will do a speed deletion there...) because this message post - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Bug_(arcade_game) - it's important people played Playstation in their childhood knowing more about 80's and 70's videogames, ocidental people knowing more about oriental games (like those on X68000, PC88/98, MSX, etc.), and vice-versa (most asian people don't know games for Amiga), etc. - of course history culture should be not for copycat, but they show clues on which ideas were missing that time...

saluk on 2009/09/03 16:06:

It's scary how often games are released that claim to be new, when there is actually some obscure game that did it first. There are no new ideas, just new cocktails of old ideas, so if you can make something that feels fresh, it doesn't matter if it evokes something else (in fact you probably want to evoke the past and feel fresh at the same time - hit the nostalgia AND the innovation at once).

Wizardo is pretty fun! It is bad when your shots bounce off and hit you, but pretty cool when you set up a good shot. It feels a bit too easy at the moment, because you can just sit in one place and keep firing if you are aiming right.

nitrofurano on 2009/09/03 16:21:

That's why having some historic game culture is important - it keep us saved of some 'surprises' - and even knowing there are more old games from 90's using both mouse and keyboard (like 'Walker' - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzmEJWjcwms - this is from the same people did 'Shadow of the Beast' ) - and anyway, the @Cosmologicon game idea seems to be very unique, anyway! =)

And for example, i cited 'Shadow of the Beast', which game were maybe the most popular on Amiga (late 80's and early 90's) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHU2guYH7Og - most of the people thaught this game were original, but their authors assumed 'Tir Na Nog' had a main influence on it (zx-spectrum ) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bj0_-vaO3I (forget that music - this game has only some beeps as sounds)