Match3D

Community Forums/Showcase/Match3D

SLotman(Posted 2007) [#1]
Hi!

I just finished this game, Match3D... which is and isn't exactly a match-3 type of game ;)

The game was made in Blitz3D, and it's basicly a cylinder that you can rotate. Left click to remove blocks (must be groups of 3 or more), right click (or drag) to rotate the cylinder.

Here's a screenshot:


Since the "pieces flying out of the screen" looked cool, I also implemented some "red-cyan glass" filter, to give it a somewhat 3D effect (of course it can be enabled or disabled)

You can all have a look at the demo here: http://match3d.icongames.com.br

Cheers!


degac(Posted 2007) [#2]
mmm...just seen something like this around http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=72207
nothing wrong in your game...downloading it now

edit: no, I was wrong, the games are 'similar' but slightly different in the game mode...I'm trying to find some 3d glasses :D

Very good game indeed!
Shame I can't use the rockets to see the effect on game!


Ked(Posted 2007) [#3]
Cool. I like the idea of being able to use 3D glasses!


jhocking(Posted 2007) [#4]
That was a lot of fun, I might buy this. I only wish you could adjust the controls in options; I kept clicking on the side where I wanted to see more tiles, which is the opposite of the direction it rotates.


SLotman(Posted 2007) [#5]
An 'Invert rotation' option? Sure, I might do it this weekend - shouldnt be hard to implement it's done :)

Thank you guys for the positive remarks :)


SLotman(Posted 2007) [#6]
...and I just added a "bomb" block that appears after level 11; remove some blocks around it, and the bomb explodes, taking all blocks around with it :)


AJirenius(Posted 2007) [#7]
Even though the gameplay is actually pretty different it does feel aqward with such a similar game :/ whoops you added bombs as well? and they trigger the same way??

:/


EmerGki(Posted 2007) [#8]
Hey SLotman, Very good game!!!


Mortiis(Posted 2007) [#9]
It looks like "Cryptex of Time - Kid Mode" haha. Just kidding.

Congrats SLotman!


Grey Alien(Posted 2007) [#10]
It certainly does look like Cryptex of Time (which came first), and I've never seen anything else like these two games. But hey, someone cloned my Holiday Bonus game recently (and didn't quite admit it) but I figured it was a form of flattery.

Anyway, if good, there's no reason both can't suceed, although it looks like Cryptex is further along...


Qube(Posted 2007) [#11]

But hey, someone cloned my Holiday Bonus game recently (and didn't quite admit it) but I figured it was a form of flattery.



Good God! get over it already will ya. Match-3 is not your idea, festive games are not your idea. I guess everyone that does a shoot-em-up is cloning your ATOMG too. Look, match-3 is not exclusive to you and neither are festive variations. What the hell do you expect a festive match-3 to look like anyway?

You seem to have your nose out of joint over this for some silly reason, so if you want to keep bringing it up email me direct.


xlsior(Posted 2007) [#12]
Just tried the demo. Interesting game, but I did run into a few problems.

- When I play in a hi-res mode, the game often doesn't respond to any mouse clicks. I can rotate the cilinder without problems, but not click on any matches. Then after maybe 30 seconds or so, it will all of a sudden process a whole bunch of these clicks and things will start disappearing left and right

- In 640x480 mode, the bottom 3rds of the 2nd line of text is off the screen

- The 3D glasses are a very interesting idea for this game, but you may want to add the ability to specify the glasses you want to do. currently it automatically assumes you have Red/Cyan. I 'only' have Red/Green and Red/Blue myself, so couldn't actually see the 3D effect.


Grey Alien(Posted 2007) [#13]
Qube: Whose nose is out of joint? Plain text has never been a good medium for conveying emotion, so please don't read too much into it (even if other unhelpful forum members attempt to incite trouble just for the hell of it). /end of off-topic, sorry SLotman.


Ked(Posted 2007) [#14]
I sense conflict. :/


Terry B.(Posted 2007) [#15]
Sweet looking.
Dunno if its my type though.

*shrug*
downloading now


SLotman(Posted 2007) [#16]
xlsior (Posted 13 hours ago)

- When I play in a hi-res mode, the game often doesn't respond to any mouse clicks.

What resolution exactly? Let me know, so I can try to reproduce it here...

- In 640x480 mode, the bottom 3rds of the 2nd line of text is off the screen

Are you on a widescreen monitor? Because here I can play it on 640x480 just fine...

- The 3D glasses are a very interesting idea for this game, but you may want to add the ability to specify the glasses you want to do.

Noted... I don't know if extra stuff is needed to support different colors, or just rendering with different colors would do? (I guess the second is the answer, but you never know heh)

As for "Cryptex of Time", I didnt know the game - I do remember seing an screenshot of it here or on gamedev's image gallery - but I was developing Match3D already when I saw it a long time ago (as I also have a lot of games in development), so rest assured, any similarities are not on purpose.


xlsior(Posted 2007) [#17]
1) 1280x1024
2) It was 640x480 in windowed mode. It plays OK, just some of the 2-line text goes off the bottom of the screen
3) yeah, should just render with different colors


SLotman(Posted 2007) [#18]
Strange... what's you video card/system/Os specs? I just played the game with 2048x1024 (geforce fx 6200, 256mb ram on XP) with no problem at all... the errors appeared on normal gameplay or in the "3d glass mode"?


xlsior(Posted 2007) [#19]
Strange... what's you video card/system/Os specs? I just played the game with 2048x1024 (geforce fx 6200, 256mb ram on XP) with no problem at all... the errors appeared on normal gameplay or in the "3d glass mode"?


Core 2 Duo E6600 (2.4GHz), ATI X1650XT video card, 2GB RAM, WinXP.

Playing in normal mode.

(If you're not familiar to with the X1650XT -- it's roughly comparable to the nvidia 7600GT)


Chroma(Posted 2007) [#20]
First off, this game looks VERY cool! I'm gonna try it out later tonight when I get home.

Secondly, cloning is the nature of the beast. Love it or hate it, it's what the casual game market revolves around. Making it similar but with a different twist. I will say though that this one looks more colorful and enticing to play. The Cryptex game look a bit bland and dark.

Good God! get over it already will ya. Match-3 is not your idea, festive games are not your idea. I guess everyone that does a shoot-em-up is cloning your ATOMG too. Look, match-3 is not exclusive to you and neither are festive variations. What the hell do you expect a festive match-3 to look like anyway?

Lol, I was thinking the same thing Qube. GA, you can't complain about people cloning your game when you're cloning peoples games yourself. That screams Hypocrite.

Qube: Whose nose is out of joint?
GA, yours is clearly out of joint.

Plain text has never been a good medium for conveying emotion, so please don't read too much into it (even if other unhelpful forum members attempt to incite trouble just for the hell of it).
You're the one clearly trying to incite trouble here by taking a cheap shot at Qube. It's childish and out of line imo.

You should be supportive of other people but all I see if you putting everyone elses games down. Relax and continue the March of the Clones!


Grey Alien(Posted 2007) [#21]
Chroma: Dave and I have clarified matters with each other by email and NEITHER of us have a nose out of joint.

even if other unhelpful forum members attempt to incite trouble just for the hell of it
Did you actually understand this bit? What are you doing hmm?


You should be supportive of other people but all I see if you putting everyone elses games down
Amazing, apart from Aquaria, please email me a list of games I've been putting down recently versus all the posts I made giving people helpful advice i.e. positive feedback. Perhaps if you attempted that task you'd realise that your assertation is in fact not based on the truth. Perhaps you should try that task for your *own* posts, you might learn something.

You just made it into my mental list of people who aren't worth replying to, congrats! It takes a lot of work to get onto that list because I give people a lot of chances. So long and thanks for all the posts.

Once again SLotman, I apologise. It seems I inadvertently started something bad here, but I couldn't let that last post lie...sorry.


Ked(Posted 2007) [#22]
I wish I had Red/Cyan, Red/Blue, or Red/Green glasses. All I have is the Real D pair of glasses. :(

Screenies look good though!


Grey Alien(Posted 2007) [#23]
This has been sitting on my desktop a few days but I finally got round to checking it out. I like this game, it has good potential and I wish you good luck with it.

I have some observations as follows:

- The icon needs to be made clearer.
- When you minimise and restore windows mode the music goes full volume. Or when you loose the focus and regain it.
- Ideally you should have sliders in the Audio Options.
- The main logo and title page needs work. I like the rotating objects though, cool!
- Love the way the blocks fly out towards you!
- Using the right mouse button is pretty much a no no in casual games so you might want to rethink how you do the rotation...
- The font needs work.
- The in game time/score/level/bar etc all need work to make them more exciting.
- After my time ran out I say the "Want to Play More" screen but Time Over was transparently drawn over the top of it. Woah and then it just exited. So I only played one level and it chucked me out. Probably best to let them try several times and only show that screen when they properly exit after playing. OK tried again, and this time chose relaxed but after a short time it came up with the same screen. To have to keep loading the game up just to try it our for a decent amount of time is annoying.
- Your tiles are nice and colourful and different but really you're going to need some kind of theme to sell this.
- I paused when +1500 was on screen and it appeared over the Resume/Exit menu instead of under it.
- The mouse over for the magnifying glass is not it the right place.
- What about some kind of penalty for clicking less than 3 to stop random clickers?
- When I clicked the rocket (which has a funny mouse over area too) my mouse cursor was sliding left!
- I filled the bar up and was then clicking on more shapes but nothing was happening.
- It would be much more fun and fast if you could click on groups rapidly one after the other without waiting for the new shapes to fall in. The best match-3s do this.
- I actually found the time limit a bit too harsh. For the proper game it should be hard to loose for a few levels at least so the player doesn't feel punished.

Hope you find them useful.


Grey Alien(Posted 2007) [#24]
Oh and when I tried to uninstall via the icon in program files it said "cannot find install.log". Note that I didn't use the standard install path, I used E:\games\Match3D, could that be it? I'm going to have to use control panel to remove it now which is a bit annoying. Damn, that doesn't work either...this should be fixed.


Torrente(Posted 2007) [#25]
This looks neat, Slotman!

Also, I just had to back up Grey here. The game that he mentioned being a clone was nearly an exact copy of Holiday Bonus -- graphics and all. It's not as if he were pointing out a sports themed match3 game and claiming it was his idea.


SLotman(Posted 2007) [#26]
The icon needs to be made clearer.

I know, it's on my to-do list :)

When you minimise and restore windows mode the music goes full volume. Or when you loose the focus and regain it

That's strange, since I don't touch the volume at all - I just send a MCI commando to pause/resume the music... but I will send also a "set volume" to force a correct volume and see if this fixes it (although I don't get it here)

- Ideally you should have sliders in the Audio Options.

Ok, another one in my to-do list :)

- The main logo and title page needs work. I like the rotating objects though, cool!

Well, I do like the logo :)
The menus screens are very simplistic, I know that :P~

- Love the way the blocks fly out towards you!

Heh, and some people complained about it :)
But I like the effect too :)

- Using the right mouse button is pretty much a no no in casual games so you might want to rethink how you do the rotation...

Why would it be a problem? If the game was for Macs I could understand, but I never saw a pc-mouse with just one button...but I could add some "arrows" on screen to be clicked to rotate the view, I guess...

The font needs work.

Also in the to-do list :)

-The in game time/score/level/bar etc all need work to make them more exciting.

I'll see what I can do about it...

- After my time ran out I say the "Want to Play More" screen but Time Over was transparently drawn over the top of it.

Ooops... that one probably slipped on the demo, I'll check it out - fixed!


So I only played one level and it chucked me out. Probably best to let them try several times and only show that screen when they properly exit after playing.

I just didnt want to give more than 5 mins in the demo - I thought that would be enought to evaluate if someone would like it or not. In the full version, that doesn't happen :)


- Your tiles are nice and colourful and different but really you're going to need some kind of theme to sell this.


Hmmm... I hope not :P
I just don't want to redraw every tile (unless someone makes a commercial propose heh)


- I paused when +1500 was on screen and it appeared over the Resume/Exit menu instead of under it.


Checking that out now! - fixed!


- The mouse over for the magnifying glass is not it the right place.
- When I clicked the rocket (which has a funny mouse over area too) my mouse cursor was sliding left!


Those are strange, I'll check to see if I can reproduce it here...


- What about some kind of penalty for clicking less than 3 to stop random clickers?

Wouldn't that demotivate the players? I though of something like that, but didnt included it because I was afraid people would hate it... is that a "common feature" in match-3s?


- I filled the bar up and was then clicking on more shapes but nothing was happening.

?!? You didnt went to next level, and pieces were not removed anymore?!?!?


- It would be much more fun and fast if you could click on groups rapidly one after the other without waiting for the new shapes to fall in. The best match-3s do this.


Yeah, but unfortunaly this I cannot change without a completly rewrite :(
I may be able to do this, but first, I prefer to iron out other problems in the game...


- I actually found the time limit a bit too harsh. For the proper game it should be hard to loose for a few levels at least so the player doesn't feel punished.

Heh, and I tought it was already too easy ;)
I'll see if I can give some seconds more at each level... :)

Oh and when I tried to uninstall via the icon in program files it said "cannot find install.log"

I thought I removed that problem... Maybe you just got the first installer... but I found that problem fast, and fixed it... yes, I found other minor problems as well, and fixed them, and re-uploaded the demo several times ;)

Hope you find them useful.

Wihtout a doubt those are! And thank you very much for taking the time to point the game flaws! Input like that is priceless!


Grey Alien(Posted 2007) [#27]
You are welcome.

Yeah other match-3's don't have penalties you are right. Maybe I've been playing too many hidden ojevt games recently...

?!? You didnt went to next level, and pieces were not removed anymore?!?!?
Correct. This was after messing around testing the rocket.


Geehawk(Posted 2007) [#28]
Played it. Great fun.

Found the time limits to be fine, and had no problem with the controls. Although maybe allowing keyboard control of the rotate function would work?

Only thing I would say is at times I could actualy complete a level without having to rotate anything, which sort of makes being able to rotate stuff superfluous.

I like it though.


Ginger Tea(Posted 2007) [#29]
i like the idea of rmb for rotating
although i rarely rotate ... i end up just focusing on what i can see till all i can see is just pairs or threes then i go looking on the other side to see what ive been missing

where as a 2d one its all there ... its just the way i play though thts all

oh and i got the "it goes all twonky when i set the 3d glasses on in high rez bug" too but i forgot what res i was on ... and my gfx card sucks big time


Grey Alien(Posted 2007) [#30]
I guess the way to force rotating as important would be to introduce some Jewel Quest/Holiday Bonus mechanic where you have to make a match on all background pieces, but then the bar becomes irrelevant.