Bowling Babes - Proper Beta

Community Forums/Showcase/Bowling Babes - Proper Beta

Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#1]
I'm working towards finishing off a proper beta version as soon as possible. I could use a few people to help me test it though. No online testing would be required, so you can test whenever suits you. I do, however, want people who are serious about helping me test it and helping me fix or improve anything they find. If you know you don't want to or aren't able to help me test it properly, then please wait for an open beta, which won't be much longer anyway with any luck.

If you're interested, could you let me have your email addy and also the spec(s) of the machine(s) you would be testing on. I need to make sure I've got a decent spread of test machines. No point finding it's flawless on 10 nvidia test machines and bombs out on every ATI card when I release an open beta.

I'm happy with everything at the moment, but I may yet find something which causes me to put the beta off for a bit, so if you don't hear from me for a bit, it may just be that I got sidetracked working on something. Don't worry, I do that a lot.

Oh.. suppose I better include a screeny, though you've probably seen them all before. It's out of date now, but gives a rough idea :




jfk EO-11110(Posted 2004) [#2]
Looks great. I miss some lightmapping on the static stuff, or if it's there, it is way too subtile, compared to the dynamic shadows. Cute gal.


Shambler(Posted 2004) [#3]
jm.keay@...
PC stats in sig.

[edit] Did you solve the physics slowdown problem, if so how and what was the cause?


GfK(Posted 2004) [#4]
I'll give it a go.

info(AT)binaryzoo.co.uk

Specs: Athlon XP3000+ (Barton), 512Mb DDR, Radeon 9600 128Mb, WinXP, DX9.0b.


Avrigus(Posted 2004) [#5]
Count me in! Looks very inspirational and I love the french maid! ;-)

Email: simon[at]avrigus.com
Specs: 2Ghz P4 mobile, 512Mb RAM, GeForce Go 440 64Mb, WinXP, DX9.0b


Kanati(Posted 2004) [#6]
sure, I'll give it a toss...

kanati[at]gmail.com

:)

Kanati


Bot Builder(Posted 2004) [#7]
That's okay - I saw the last demo and I'm sure this is great as well.

I just want to add you might look into using convex bodies to more accurately approximate your pins. It's one of the cool new features in tokamak v1.20.


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#8]
@ All : No beta has been sent to anyone yet. I've decided to rewrite a whole bunch of stuff to make my life easier later, and that led to me adding some new stuff, and it'll be a while longer yet. I'm also trying to fix the last remaining Tokamak bug with yet another workaround.

@BB: LMAO, surely you jest? Seriously, I appreciate you letting me know, but Tokamak has been a huge pain in the ass throughout development of this game and replacing the pins with convex hulls would basically mean another three months of work, testing and retesting and finding workarounds to all the bugs and poor implementations that Tokamak would surely throw up all over again. ( No slur on Sweenie's wrapper.. I'm talking about Tokamak itself. )

It's taken me at least a month longer than it should have done to write this game, simply having to work, rework, fix and eventually workaround so many Tokamak bugs and problems. I've got it down to one nasty but non-game-affecting bug, and I'm not going to start all over again.

Besides, one thing I've never had problems with is the accuracy of the pins and how well they interract with each other. Possibly the only thing. ;)


googlemesilly(Posted 2004) [#9]
I like the graphics !


eBusiness(Posted 2004) [#10]
Whenever you got something, send and I'll test.

jma_polarforsker@...

Or maybe give a link or something, I havn't got much space in the mailbox.

P4 1.8 GHz, nV GF Ti200 64 MB, 768 MB SDRAM PC 133.


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#11]
Sorry, I should have been more specific. I'm not emailing the beta to anyone's inbox. Just the link. I'll be using some new webspace that I haven't used before, and I just wanted to make sure I had control over the number of downloads so that it doesn't cause any server problems.


*Equinox*(Posted 2004) [#12]
I'll test it (even though there aren't any blokes in it :P)

marie@...

Athlon 2400+, 512mb, Geforce 440mx 128mb, WinXP


Traci(Posted 2004) [#13]
yeah what about anime bowling blokes ;)


Rob(Posted 2004) [#14]
With huge cabbages and johnny depp looks.


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#15]
Everyone should receive their beta emails any second now. If you don't get one, holler.


Ruz(Posted 2004) [#16]
did you mean huge 'schlongs' Rob


GfK(Posted 2004) [#17]
Sybixsus,

Check your e-mail - found a few things that might need attention.

Fairly nice game on the whole though. To be brutally honest, I wasn't expecting much after that tennis game you did - I didn't like that at all. Pleasantly surprised though.


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#18]
Cheers, GFK. I got both your emails, and your input is appreciated. All but one of your suggestions is definitely fixable, and I'm gonna start working through them now.

There is a problem which I'm sure others will notice as well with the action replays being jittery. I don't quite understand why it happens. It seems to be a consequence of using an artificially low tweening rate to generate the slow motion replays. I've been playing with it for quite a while trying to find a fix and I eventually decided to just leave it for the beta and see if it was just a problem with my drivers, but evidently it isn't. I will go back and try something else though.

Again, thanks for the helpful input.


GfK(Posted 2004) [#19]
Perhaps its something to do with single precision float inaccuracy? Just an educated guess - difficult to say not having seen the code.

What happens if you just halve the target FPS?


Perturbatio(Posted 2004) [#20]
I'll test it too if you want :)

mail me@...


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#21]
Mail Sent Perturbatio.

If anyone is having problems download it ( specifically that the download hangs on "retrieving file info" then right click / save as on the link. It must just be a quirk of the server, because clicking on the link doesn't work and right cick / save as does work. I've tested the download and it is definitely working.


eBusiness(Posted 2004) [#22]
Game close with no errors when the 3D graphics are about to begin (right after choosing lane). Could it be something about my 8 MB ATI RAGE PRO, or the 300 MHz K6 2 processor? It would be nice with some sort of error message, even though my system might not be supported. I'll be back whenever my new computer is working.


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#23]
The game shouldn't close at all. Probably some kind of debugging code that got left in there. It probably won't run acceptably on that setup though. I'm sure I'm using more than 8 meg of vidram and AGP paging will slow it down badly. Also, I'm not sure a 300mhz k6-2 will keep up with animating a 4,000 poly character and Tokamak Physics.

However, it should not just close like that, even so, so I'll look into it and see what I've left in that I shouldn't. I do often use If Then End's to test out code, but I usually remember to remove them before releasing something. :(


What type of game were you selecting? Challenge? Practice? Exhibition? Arcade? Sim?

EDIT: Thinking about it, pin selection should come directly after alley selection. You didn't have shaders turned on, did you?


Shambler(Posted 2004) [#24]
Tried to download over the last couple of days but I can't get the download to start -.-


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#25]
Tried to download over the last couple of days but I can't get the download to start


I did mention this earlier, but it may have got lost in the thread.

If anyone is having problems download it ( specifically that the download hangs on "retrieving file info" then right click / save as on the link. It must just be a quirk of the server, because clicking on the link doesn't work and right cick / save as does work. I've tested the download and it is definitely working.


eBusiness(Posted 2004) [#26]
1 month beta has expired
That month passed pretty fast.

I tried a couple of game modes that all stopped the game, don't remember the exact combinations.


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#27]
Beta expired?? That's old code, from before I added the feature limits. I'm still running the same beta I sent the rest of you and mine hasn't expired. I'll email you when I figure out what to do about it.

If anyone else gets anything about an expired beta, email me. Hopefully by then I'll have figured that out.

Note to Self : Don't time limit the final version until you learn the Julian calendar.


GfK(Posted 2004) [#28]
Right.... how the hell do you get past round 3 of the "Lucky Sevens" challenge?

I've taken over 200 shots at this and I'm still no nearer. I'm pretty sure its impossible, and its only level 3!


Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#29]
Some of the challenges are hideously difficult, and they're probably not in order of difficulty. At least I found some of the latter challenges easier than some of the earlier ones, but I have only played through most of them once to ensure they were possible, so I may have just lucked out on the latter ones.

The problem is, if you don't make the challenges hideously difficult, they're ridiculously easy. It's remarkably difficult to find a middle ground, or in this case 100 middle grounds.

I have playtested them all the ensure they're possible, but I do admit that it took a long time to get them all. Having said that, I found a lot of bugs with the most recent version of Tokamak ( 1.2 ) and had to revert to 1.1, and I'm fairly sure I was using 1.2 when I tested the possibility, so I will have to go back and play through them all again < sobs > to ensure they're still possible.

I've just playtested 3 and I almost got it third time. Eventually I got it after about 70 attempts, and even then it was luck, because I managed to bowl a straight ball around 25% from the left edge, dead straight, full power and it took down six pins directly, one of which rebounded off the wall, spun around on the alley and took out the remaining pin with it's last breath.

The "correct" or intended way of solving that challenge is to bowl the ball from right of centre, slanted a little left, with around 1/3 to 1/2 power and a lot of right spin, so that it just catches the left pins before spinning back pulling out the middle pins, which in turn drop and knock over the right pins.


GfK(Posted 2004) [#30]
OK, just a suggestion...

Perhaps, after you've made, say, 25 failed attempts, a 'helper' of some description appears showing you where to bowl from, and in what direction?

That would at least give you hope, and take the agony out of relentless failure.

One more thing - in the practice game... I'm kind of starting to think it might be a bit too easy? 9 strikes and a final score of 258?!




Gabriel(Posted 2004) [#31]
RE: Challenge Mode Helpers : That's not a bad idea, but there's a big drawback. If the way I solve the challenge is not the easiest, I may actually be hindering more than I'm helping if I make the helper show the method I used. Most of the challenges, I'm quite certain, can be beaten in multiple ways. Plus it doesn't really address the bigger problem, which is that they're just too hard. I'm toying with the idea of making the challenge game playable in Arcade mode as well as Sim. The extra speed that arcade mode generates, coupled with the ability to steer the ball after release ought to make the levels a bit easier, without reducing the difficulty of the challenge itself.

RE Difficulty : Hard to say. I've also had a couple of complaints that it was too hard. It's basically dependant upon how fast the bars move, at least for control method #1, and i was using a faster speed, more difficult setting before I released the beta. I figured the fact that I'd been playing it for four months straight had probably given me a skewed perspective on the difficulty so I easied it up a bit. It's trivial to make it harder if the general thrust is that it's too easy.

BTW, the CPU players on the hard difficulty setting regularly score around 230 and are capable of scoring 300. They also have some simple learning AI in there, so technically they'll keep getting better if you play well.


GfK(Posted 2004) [#32]
Fair enough. Should probably add I have played it quite a bit before I started getting scores like that, although I did start off getting scores of 140+.