Pioneer - a space adventure

Community Forums/Showcase/Pioneer - a space adventure

Aymes(Posted 2009) [#1]
Hello everyone!

After almost a year and a half of hard work I've finally got to the point where I can release my latest creation upon the world.

Pioneer is a top down shootem up RPG game (kind of like, asteroids but with a story). If anyone has ever played starControl or Starflight you'll understand what I've been trying to get at here.

It's my first completed attempt at writing an adventure game in BlitzMax (or anything for that matter!) and I'm quite proud of it, but I know it's not going to be everyone's cup of tea! So with that in mind I'm open to comments and suggestions as you feel are appropriate.

You can download the game by clicking on the following link: Download Link

Or have a look at the Pioneer site: Pioneer Home Page

And, as it should be, here are some screenshots (some of which were already in the gallery)



The full game only costs £10!

Thanks for looking :)


Damien Sturdy(Posted 2009) [#2]
YOU DID IT! YOU FINALLY RELEASED IT! :-)

I know how hard you've worked with this mate so- well freaking done!!!! Love it!

Oooh.. I'm splattered all over the credits. Neat :-) *blows own trumpet*

Right, I'll blame you for any lack of progress on my own work for today then!


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#3]
Nice! It's quite fun and addictive. It's the kind of game I could lose a lot of hours in. How long is the demo anyway?

I've got a few points though I think I should say. The font used for dialogs can be sometimes quite hard to read. As well as the dialogs (menu, shop, etc.). The colors used for the text don't match very well with the underground and makes it hard to read.

Also, at a certain point (first time to meet the stone guy) I got into a rather strange dialog. Where does the players response come from? The stone guy never mentioned anything about a migration.




Aymes(Posted 2009) [#4]
Hey thanks for trying it - yeah the GUI stuff is all my own work - obviously heh. It's one of the things I was going to get an artist to redo but I just simply ran out of budget so had to try and finish it off myself :(

The migrate comment is referring to how Gblik says they "passed through" so like they were on their way to somewhere else. I'll look into how I can re-word it to make it a bit clearer.

The demo can take anywhere from 40mins up to 2 hours depending on how good you are at these kind of games. It covers the first of 3 acts. The second 2 acts are longer though hehe.

Thanks again for looking!


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#5]
Well English isn't my native language so maybe it was just me for misunderstanding. The way I interpreted it was that a couple of guys passed through, not the whole group or something.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#6]
Ahh, well my wording probably doesn't help much! I'll reword this section when I get the next version ready so thanks for the pointer :)


jsp(Posted 2009) [#7]

I've got a few points though I think I should say. The font used for dialogs can be sometimes quite hard to read. As well as the dialogs (menu, shop, etc.). The colors used for the text don't match very well with the underground and makes it hard to read.



I am totally with Htbaa in this case.

And i found the speed of the ship a bit too slow, even upgraded with two speed amplifiers... :)

Beside that a really great work and yes the demo is huge. Even the mini games are nice ideas! Also the music are very good chosen, at least i liked it.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#8]
Thanks for looking jsp - yeah the demo filesize is huge - but that can be unlocked to the full game. (After the last game I did had a separate demo keeping the two codebases going was a nightmare in the end hehe.)

Glad you liked the music! A lot of that is my own :D


plash(Posted 2009) [#9]
I haven't tried the game yet, but you could cut down on bandwidth by not using so many large, unnecessary images.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#10]
It's not the images, it's the extensive soundtrack that makes up the bulk of the size. But thanks for the assumption ;)

I never realised having a 60mb download would be such a problem for people these days? As far as I know it only takes a few minutes to download depending on network speed?


plash(Posted 2009) [#11]
It's not the images, it's the extensive soundtrack that makes up the bulk of the size. But thanks for the assumption ;)
Last I checked images took longer to transmit then text.

Are we both referring to the same thing? (I am referring to the game page)


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#12]
Ahhh - I guess we're not talking about the same thing then.

Yes my web design skills are not best, and I went with a slower loading but better looking (than I could do in HTML alone) version. My webhost is not the best either (going to change it this year) which doesn't help too much. Thats why the actual game download is hosted elsewhere...

I thought you were saying the game download itself was too large ;) Appologies for the misunderstanding!


Retimer(Posted 2009) [#13]
A somewhat unreliable, but usually zip-fast, cheap host...great for just using as a download host is http://canaca.com.

I hosted an imagehost with them a while back, and it seemed like all of japan was on it, getting millions of hits per month without any real slowdown, and I still couldn't go over 10% bandwidth usage.

Needless to say though, service-wise, you get what you pay for. Just food for thought.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#14]
Retimer, yeah thats why I've hosted the actual download file at box.net for now - much much faster than my webhost :)

Problem is changing webhost right now when just releasing a game feels like a bad idea, there are bound to be problems heh - luckily most people are saying it only takes around 5-6 minutes to download the game now.


jsp(Posted 2009) [#15]

yeah the demo filesize is huge


No, I didn't mean the filesize (download was fast enough), i just meant the demo in itself (probably my bad English?). Most of the time you got a time frame of an hour or so, but your demo plays quite long!


Glad you liked the music! A lot of that is my own :D


Now i am even more impressed, i should come back to you when i need a song:)


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#16]
Ahh hehe, just my misunderstandings!

Yeah I wanted to put a fairly long demo in there, give people a real taste of the game :) It's the first of 3 acts within the game and is the shortest of all of them!

Don't they say "the longer the sell, the easier the sale?" :D Perhaps they don't but I do!


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#17]
Congrats with the game it's a great achievement! Good luck with it. Love those zoomed in screenshots - what a good idea ;-)

I agree that some of the fonts are hard to read, perhaps you could keep them but put a pixel of space between them if you are using a Bitmap Font and can alter the code (i.e you are not using DrawText). If you ARE using DrawText (it's slow btw), then I posted a modified version in the Public Domain part of the Framework that allows you to specify a space between each letter. It may be useful as several of us have mentioned it. This is assuming the game is BMax right?

How many characters do you have? If you have the budget or can find a helpful artist, I suggest getting them redone more professionally (hope I haven't insulted whoever did them, was it you?). I think that it will make the logo on the top of the page with the 4 chars look much more pro and encourage more downloads. Blaine really needs redoing too. There are other areas that could also be polished to look less like programmer art which would increase sales I'm sure as would adding mouse support. The actual game itself seemed fine (cool in fact), it was just the interfaces including the communication bits that weren't as good quality imho... If you are interested in more guidance along these lines, feel free to email me.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#18]
Hey, yes with the text spacer and other stuff, I'm doing an update soon and thats one of the things definitly going in, I guess when you know what it's supposed to say you don't notice how hard it is to read!

I didn't do the characters, I paid someone to do them for me - I thought they looked really good! :(

I would have paid someone to redraw the GUI elements and the other obvious programmer art, but I just ran out of budget. I've spent well over my saved £500 budget on this already, which included getting all the ships and characters done, but not the gui stuff.

Do we think I'm paying too much, or budgeting too low? :D


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#19]
Well of course my opinion on the characters is just that, a personal opinion, but they don't do it for me (they are not awful either, they just didn't strike me as "pro"). The ships are fine though. Some artists are better at characters and others at objects. Your characters certainly have "character" but there is something a little too quirky about them imho. An important factor in getting customers to shell out money on your games is to make them look professional throughout - this is perceived quality (even if the game is poop) and makes them more likely to see it as worth spending money on.

As far as budget goes, I've learned that the more you spend (providing you know what you are doing and aren't pointlessly p*ssing money away) the more you get in return. I spent over £1000 on Holiday Bonus of money that I didn't have (got a loan) but have made it back 10x over. Wish I'd spent even more now, lol (well actually I didn't have enough time to add any more in before Christmas). Also that game has a big target market and yours is probably more specialist so spending what you did may have been wise...certainly as you gain more experience and a bigger customer base it's worth considering spending more money if you are fairly positive about getting a good return. Just my $0.02


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#20]
I think it's true about him being better at the ships - it seems to me a lot of pixel artists prefer to do ships than characters, it took a fair bit of pestering to get some of the characters done:D

Thanks for the advice on budgeting - Like you said, it is a more niche market I've targeted and just couldn't justify a larger budget this time round - I was considering having another go at making a casual game soon...

<quick edit>Uploaded a new version which includes the spaces between the letters and a few other small improvements.</edit>


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#21]
Downloading the updated demo now :-). Hoping to try it out next weekend.

About the price, isn't it a bit too cheap? The demo so far gave me an impression of a big game with a story of decent length. Something I've read is that pricing too low can be negative on the amount of sales.


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#22]
Yeah if it's got good depth than a standard Indie price of $19.95 may be a good idea.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#23]
Decided to take your advice on this, changed the price to £10 :)


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#24]
How are you marketing it? Got a good plan? Maybe you can get GameTunnel to review it?


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#25]
I did actually make a marketing plan! It's not in full swing yet, I had 3 stages:

1 - a "soft" release (is that a real term?) where I put in on a site per day and make sure no one comes across any show stopping bugs. Thats where I am at the moment.

2 - a general release where I send out a press release using gamerelease.net and send it to places like gametunnel, rockpapershotgun, bytten, tigsource and such - also to try and get it on the pc gamer mag CD.

3 - depending on sales, try and get it on some of the non-casual portals such as impulse/steam. And if it hasn't sold too well I might wait for some kind of real life space related event and offer a discount when that happens (like a space shuttle launch or something).

What do you think? Any other ideas?


InvisibleKid(Posted 2009) [#26]
hey this is neat i like it. is it just me or do i detect a little hint of influence loosely based on the Andromeda tv show. i agree with Jake that mouse support would be nice.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#27]
Hey KingNothing, glad you like :)

Y'know, I only ever watched the first episode of Andromeda and I wasn't too keen! Big Firefly and Battlestar Galactica fan though :D

Mouse support will be coming soon (hopefully tomorrow!)


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#28]
Right well I've added mouse support to the conversations screens and also changed the communication selection screen a little.

When you said mouse support btw guys, did you mean with the ship too? (I did have a go with that but it didn't work out so far, would need more work)

I'm thinking of moving into phase 2 of my marketing plan tomorrow!


Damien Sturdy(Posted 2009) [#29]
I'll lend a hand with mouse support if you need be, you know i'm usually around.


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#30]
I meant mouse support in every menu + conversations screens. Adding it to the ship would be a bonus.

Marketing plan sounds like it has potential.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#31]
Right, well part 2 has been put into action - I guess I just need to spam the world now :D

I'll give you a shout about the mouse support soon Cyg, I think that would certainly be beneficial - but for now mouse support is in every ui part of the game.


Buggy(Posted 2009) [#32]
Website looks really, really nice - quick, polished, and with a bit of humor. Just a point of advice, though: I frequently won't even consider downloading a demo without seeing at least one gameplay video/trailer.


plash(Posted 2009) [#33]
I frequently won't even consider downloading a demo without seeing at least one gameplay video/trailer.
Putting up a gameplay video on YouTube goes a long way :)


Orca(Posted 2009) [#34]
Congrats and good job.

I got sucked into this for far longer than I thought I would. Usually the indy games I try out, I play for a few minutes, and then I'm done.

I don't know how much time I spent playing this one. Must have been an hour or 2? I got as far as the race( which I didn't stand a chance in ). Spent a lot of time chasing down asteroids to buy stuff from that rock dude.

I'll give it another go later....

The good:

-The game has some serious old school charm. Reminds of something I'd have played on c64-amiga-dos.
-The dialog is well written, interesting, humorous.
-The music is awesome.
-I did feel compelled to keep playing-- which like I said, alot of indie games don't do for me.
-Has a variety of gameplay ( asteroids type play, then a race, and also the planet landings from what I've seen so far )


The bad;

-The ship is awfully slow. I realize its about upgrading it, and I probably haven't seen enough to see how good it gets--- but by the time I wanted to buy the second item from the rock dude, chasing down asteroids was a chore just due to how slow the ship moves/rotates.( Even after I got the rotational upgrade )

-I did find a visual glitch/bug while landing on a planet. A large portion of the amoeba like things, and even a column of rock, all ended up stuck to the left side of the screen. I'll try to get a screen shot later if you want.

-The gui and ui could use a little polish.


Nate the Great(Posted 2009) [#35]
hmmm the mouse really messes up. or is it supposed to be a flickery box?


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#36]
Buggy/Plash - thanks for the reminder, it had been mentioned to me recently and I'd put it in my "todo" list but seems it's quite a popular request!

Orca - glad you liked it! Nice to see the comments regarding the dialogue, I ahd to re-write large portions of it after early negative comments! Not sure about that bug with the planet lander though, never seen that! Was it a certain planet this happened on or any planet?

Nate - not see that problem before? Maybe it's because I'm not using a custom pointer and just relying on the windows pointer being drawn on top. I'll look into that.

Thanks for looking everyone - I really appreciate the feedback!


Nate the Great(Posted 2009) [#37]
ok well it is a really nice game despite the mouse problems (only on vista btw)... GOOD WORK MAN!!! its really fun and addictive


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#38]
One more thing, it may well be worth considering improving the graphics of BLAINE as it is the first character you see and the most badly drawn...


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#39]
Nate - thanks for that, I'll let you know when I've put an updated version out that fixes the mouse prob. Glad you're enjoying it!

Grey - Thats a fair point, I'll have a word with my artist chappy


Orca(Posted 2009) [#40]
Funny thing is, the character portraits work for me. BLAINE looked a little pixelated, but a minor point compared to the rather bland GUI, imho.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#41]
Hey guys I've finally finished some other stuff I'm working on so about to look at redoing the GUI and was hoping you could eloborate on exactly what needs improving; Ie, is it the layout or the actual graphical style?

Personally I really loved my main menu for example (not the panel, but the galaxy selection stuff), do people like that or does it need replacing too in favour of a more traditional menu?


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#42]
The galaxy selection stuff was cool, but confusing. I though I could use the mouse to choose my option, which I couldn't.

The problem with the in-game GUI is that texts are unreadable on the backgrounds due to badly chosen colors. If you improve that, and maybe make the GUI look a bit more slicker it would be ace.


Defoc8(Posted 2009) [#43]
very nice.. needs a little polish here and there - but its plays well..
i have to admit i thought it would be boring..buts its actually quite
addictive.. :) - well done!

makes me want to start work on my 3d space shooter/trader again - very
much a "in limbo" project..

anyway goodluck + hope you make buckets of cash..


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#44]
Thanks for giving it a go Defoc8! And you should go back to your project - there should be more indie versions of space games around!

Htbaa - thanks for the clarification! I'm hoping this next version of the gui will look a lot tighter since it won't be drawn by me! :) Yeah really I should have finished off the mouse controls in the menu screen (clicking either button will just take you to the next option), I'll get it all sorted soon!


jsp(Posted 2009) [#45]
Placed an order - now i want to see the rest:)


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#46]
Whee! Thanks jsp! I hope you enjoy the rest of the game! :)

Please keep letting me know what you think!


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#47]
I intended to continue the demo this weekend where I had left off last week. But didn't get to it. I really hope to continue next weekend as I really enjoyed my first playtime.

I liked Freelancer a lot as well and Pioneer has similar gameplay.


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#48]
Htbaa - ah I really liked freelancer! Makes we want to play that again :) It probably is one of my bigger influences. Let me know how you get on the next time you play - I might have the new GUI stuff in place by then!


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#49]
The galaxy selection stuff was cool, but confusing.
Yep me too. Was cool technically but was a pain and slow to use (if you want to move to other options). I also clicked the mouse on something and it failed.

GUI colours didn't work well together (poor contrast) I agree.

Also all the GUI stuff is like basic square panels with a shiny texture that looks like the one I used in AOTMG (the texture is OK but the plainness of everything says "cheap". They need more embellishment as they look very much like programmer art at the moment. That combined with better colours and maybe even a rethink on the font totally.

Hope you find this useful as it sounds kinda negative and I don't want it to be, I'm just trying to offer my honest opinion. It's GREAT that you are a) asking for feedback and b) taking the common consensus (not crazy feedback) and applying it. That's how to make better games for sure!


TaskMaster(Posted 2009) [#50]
Yeah...

Nice that he isn't angry at the criticism and telling us how his game is the best Blitz game ever and we are all jealous...

Where is Xylvan anyway?

Just kidding around...

I think this game is great. Similar to the vision I have had in a game, except I want multi-player...


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#51]
Yeah I've had good feedback from you guys here - had some weirder feedback on other forums though! (someone said there should be cinematics?!)

Well the GUI stuff is in progress, going to try a few styles out with my artist and see what works and looks best. It's going to take a bit of time since there's quite a bit to do (I'd forgotten how much!)

TaskMaster, thanks for giving it a go :) I considered multiplayer for Pioneer, but couldn't think of a good way to execute it at the time. I've had a bit more time to think about it recently and have come up with an idea for a 2 player deathmatch thing but not sure how well it will work :D Might give it a go after the gui stuff...

Also not much luck on the video front, I've got Fraps and some movie editing software but the fraps videos just seem to have terrible quality even at huge filesizes. Probably need to do some more research...


SabataRH(Posted 2009) [#52]
Fun game, nice work on this one.


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#53]
OK. So I started playing again today... And I believe I hit the end of the demo now, as I suddenly got a screen asking if I was thinking about buying it. Very cool battle at that point. Not hard though after I had fully upgraded my ship :D.

When you get the gun for the lander harvesting resources for credits become really easy :-). The sector with the lazy aliens has a particular nice planet of where you can harvest.

Darn, I'm off to order me a copy!

Edit: And now I'm stuck... The professor has sent me with Nova to the Vodstar sector. I need to find something and she said in which direction to look, but I pressed enter too fast. I can only find the beginning of the line back in the log. I've searched anywhere but can't find what I'm looking for. Any hints?

Edit 2: Never mind. I got further.


jsp(Posted 2009) [#54]
Not absolutely sure atm, but try position -10000 +4000 to find a gate
And find NOK and talk to her(?)


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#55]
I already passed that point. I was searching and she was following. I eventually found it all of the sudden. I'm now at a point where I have to follow about 10 waypoints to deploy some gass bomb :P. But those stations are a pain in the butt.


jsp(Posted 2009) [#56]
I used the missles to shoot the stations while outside the range of their weapons :) (all your weapons have an higher range)
Have fun!


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#57]
Yeah I tried that but got too close :P.

@ Aymes: When you fire a missile it should have the current velocity and force of the ship that fires it. How it is now is a bit weird and not very usable in dogfights.


Damien Sturdy(Posted 2009) [#58]
...You're all still using the missiles? :-D


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#59]
Hey guys!

Glad you're enjoying it! Htbaa, thanks for buying a copy!

The missles, yes I was going for a kind of distinction between those and the normal projectiles, mainly because they're station killers.

I originally had homing missiles in for dogfights but coming up with a system to set the target didn't fit in very well.

Perhaps a slightly less powerfull missile type, called rockets or something, that works like other projectiles would be an idea? Any thoughts?


Damien Sturdy(Posted 2009) [#60]
Just make them chase the nearest target in front of the player. :-)


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#61]
How many acts are there by the way? The story is compelling enough and it currently gives me the idea that I'm not very far into the story yet.

On the other hand, Gblik has nothing more to sell to me and looking at the galaxy screen it looks like I've discovered all areas, except for area 11... (and 10 I think?)

How many weapons and ship upgrades are there?


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#62]
Okay time for some stats then! This contains spoilers for those who don't want to know!

There are 3 acts - the second 2 are slightly larger than the first
There are 5 ship hulls (the Mathlur being the final and largest)
There are 8 modules (not including the planet lander)
There are 5 weapons not including missiles.
There are 11 sectors (not including the starting one)
There are 14 characters to interact with
There are 7 levels of minerals you can collect from planet surfaces


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#63]
Cool. Perhaps you need a forum for customers to discuss the game in? Helps to build a community. Wait did we already discuss this?


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#64]
I don't think we've discussed it so far?

I had a forum ready from day one - it's linked at the base of the pioneer homepage:

http://www.thephorse.net/aeforum/index.php?fid=6

Perhaps I shouldn't have called it a support forum originally! (changed it to support & discussion now)


Defoc8(Posted 2009) [#65]
homing missiles solution!

- you could have the fire button activate a laser.. the laser would have
to maintain contact with an enemy for a couple of seconds before lock..
at which point the missiles would be released - this would allow the
player to release the fire key if the laser was targeting the wrong
object..

perhaps not the best solution.. but workable..


Grey Alien(Posted 2009) [#66]
@Aymes: cool. The link at the bottom of the pioneer page could also say support & discussion.


Damien Sturdy(Posted 2009) [#67]
Sidenote: i've completed this like 5 times now. X-D Rockets shmockets. *hint*


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#68]
5 Times already? I just freed those slaves :P.


Amanda Dearheart(Posted 2009) [#69]
@Aymes

Say Aymes, I just ran the demo of your game on my tablet laptop? and it ran just fine! It seems you have solved a problem I've been having with Blitz3d for the last four years!!. I've asked before how to solve it, but I got no response from other Blitz3D users.

Check out this link
and this one too!

Yes, your game ran on a tablet pc with Tabtip.exe running in the background. I didn't have to right-click the compatibility tab to get it to run. I wanted to know how to do this in my own programs for the last four years, but no one answered.

If you let me know the secret, or code involved in doing this by this coming March 5th, I'll buy a copy of your game!! I'll pay through Paypal!


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#70]
Hello Miss Dearheart!

Unfortunately this was written in BlitzMax and not B3D! So it's unlikely I've done anything to solve that particular issue, unless you've been having the same problems with BlitzMax too?


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#71]
Finished it. I expected it to be a bit longer to be honest. I never got to Sector 11 and had hoped for some more weapon / ship variation. Other then that I really enjoyed it as it's a good game that had me addicted, which is quite something because I normally don't play PC games... (yet I tend to create them myself... :-))

I also missed data discs 2 and 6 I think. What happens when you get all of them?


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#72]
Hey Htbaa,

If you get all the data discs you get the largest ship in the game. Not sure which ship you were using in the end?

Glad you enjoyed it but sorry to hear you thought it was too short! I do plan to add a couple of extra side quests in once the GUI update is done.

Getting to sector 11 can be a bit of a challenge - you have to talk to 4 different people near the end of the game. Hint: How much of the code did you get? (you can see the code in the cargo screen)


Htbaa(Posted 2009) [#73]
I only needed 1 section of the code. My latest quicksave was at the start of the final battle so I can't get back to try and visit sector 11.

I believe I was still using the Trickstar or something like that?

Also, you said there were 5 weapons, excluding the missiles... I only got to choose form green laser, and a MK1 and MK2 or something like that. Where do I find the rest?


Aymes(Posted 2009) [#74]
Can't remember where everything is off the top of my head, but the Neon Laser (the most powerfull non-missile weapon) is on the planet surface of the only planet in sector 6.

I think I must have been going mad when I said there were 5 non-missile weapons, there are only 4 (even though the code is there for 5, not sure how one got missed - I'll have to get it in there for the next release)

There are also some modules and a ship hull hidden on different planets. To save endless searching there is a message displayed when you first press p on a planet. It says something along the lines of "Pioneer technology detected on planet surface" I think!

How long did it take you to finish by the way? If it's too short I need to look at that as a matter of urgency!