Need a little feedback.
Monkey Archive Forums/Monkey Projects/Need a little feedback.
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  Hay all.. not really worked on this for months but starting to make a little progress on it again and would love some feed back .. Thing's to know. Loading times are horrid sorry at the moment none of the assets are in their final compressed form so they are all a bit nasty on bandwidth, if you have time open it go make some tea and it should be done by the time you come back.. Controls : W.A.S.D. essentially equate out to North South East and West. Left Mouse : Shoot. Right Mouse : Build Shield (protects the planet.) Debug Options ; 1,2,3...9 changes gun type and power for testing. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56777267/temp/html5/index.html What I want to know Ok, I would love some feedback on the art style, I keep getting in my own way and talk myself into changing stuff I suspect does not need changing(I'm the king of procrastination). Would also like to know opinions on the controls, their a little tricky at first but once you get the hang of it they are or at least seem to me to be very intuitive . No Music but if you would like to suggest a music track/style/type feel free, Music is not anything I am good at so its something I will need to get some where. Finally level 1 is a bit of a stress test I doubt I will have many more asteroids on screen that is on display there its a bit chaotic so framerate info on level 1 would be nice, sorry im not displaying it at all if your using chrome whack F12. thanks in advance. |
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| I like the basic concept. The controls are slightly awkward for two reasons.. 1. Mouse vs Trackpad. If I were using a mouse it'd be fine, but 99% of the time I stick to a trackpad, and I'm still not comfortable doing WASD+Trackpad. It's not exactly WASD+Mouse! 2. WASD vs "A-D Rotation" I personally prefer "object floating around circle" movement to be just left and right, with left ALWAYS being Anticlockwise,and right ALWAYS being clockwise.. ... But people regularly complain to me that that's "wrong".. Make it an option.. Options are good. As far as the mouse controls are concerned, the game doesn't feel like it would be amiss if it ONLY had the movement and fire buttons.. Spin around, always firing directly ahead.. And those controls would work just as well on keyboard, or a gamepad's analogue thumbstick, or even using just a mouse (Where left and right spin you around the circle, then first shoots) In fact, thinking about a gamepad, you could have left thumbstick and left trigger control ship #1, and right thumbstick and right trigger control ship #2.. In addition, the movement could probably do with a little momentum, instead of just a direct One-to-One approach, but that's more of a taste thing. Art style is "Large".. or rather, Art is too large for the server!!! If it were a one-time download, that'd be fine, but if you're planning on sticking to HTML5 then I'd seriously rethink the amount of art you have going on. .. All I can think of for now. |
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| Hi dude, thanks for the feedback every little helps. With regard to having the ship always shoot in a fixed direction I actually tried it and it kinda sucked, or sucked might not be the right word but it made the game far far harder than it should be as you needed to do a full rotation around the orbit to get into a fire solution on an incoming asteroid which takes time and eventually results in death, it's not something I am giving up on tho as its a control system as you say that would fit well with mobile/tablet so I will revisit it when and if I plan on building for those platforms. The Art being large I assume your talking about file size, that's not a worry as I mentioned above all the assets are still in their live edit form so for example the asteroids contain all their layer data as well as some other images which are stored in the file but not actually visible which makes them really large, once I get to beta I will start building the game with final versions of the art which will be far smaller in size than they are now. I like the idea of inertia and it will probably be something I work on in the next few days, will let you know how I get on. |
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| Sounds messy!! I have 4 main folders for each Monkey game. /data and /build you're familiar with, but I also have /extras and /IconBuilder. Once a project is nearly finished the IconBuilder exe makes all those bazillion sized iOS/Android icons and also does other neat things like scaling screenshots for various websites, creating "banners" and other bits and pieces.. In extras, I keep the in-Dev stuff. Art, sound, music, it all gets stored in here. I also have a number of BlitzMax tools in here, too. If I tweak the indev art, I can simply run the accompanying BMax tool, and it'll re-render my sprites to the required .png images, and copy them directly to the /data folder That way, I get to keep the high-Rez indev stuff, AND the low-Rez Ingame stuff, both together, but only the smaller files get used when it matters. Takes a few attempts to get the right Dev-flow, but.. ... I've had many attempts ;) |
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| I have a WIP folder where I have the assets that are not yet being loaded into the project but aside from that the rest is all in data, I tend not to show off my work all that often so using the dev art while I'm working is not really an issue, I might try and switch my method over tho and do something like you describe I mean I can see the benefit of it when sharing builds for people to try out. |
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| It definitely takes some time to load but not nearly as long as I was expecting based on your description. lol Timed it and takes 42 seconds here to load everything. Anyway, the game has a fantastic presentation. Colorful interesting spaceships and asteroids and FX. The play speed is very good as in your ship movement and overall game speed feel really "dialed-in". And I really like dual objective games like this. Not big on 1D game design ideas. Being able to not only destroy the aliens and asteroids but also repair the planet shield is excellent. Gives the game some added depth. Well done! I don't have any real complaints about it. I suppose the controls could be tweaked slightly offering a choice of the current move control and the rotational move control. That being said, I think after playing the game a few times I would be able to control my ship like an ace pilot. |
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| GerBenjamin thanks , the shield thing is not fully implemented yet but ultimately each planet will have five waves which constitutes as one level, or the planet, in older builds as soon as you fully built your shield the level/planet would warp out to the next stage but I'm now thinking that it might be more fun if the player needs to maintain their shield, the basic idea is that as well as Score which I track the player will be given a 1 , 2 or 3 star award per planet, these will be awarded base on having a full shield at either level 1,2 or 3. I think with this change it will add some replay value to the game as players struggle and fight to keep up a full green shield to get that 3rd star. Time will tell I guess. |
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| Did you make this using just straightforward Mojo and HTML5 export or are you using the Mojo 2 Canvas etc HTML5? |
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| I'm using diddy and mojo and that's about it. I was thinking about porting it to mojo2 but diddy's not there yet and I'm in no rush. |
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| I had fun time with this game. I see where you were getting at with the controls, but for some odd reason i get the sense i would rather have two directional buttons only, rather than WASD. I wasn't sure when i actually got any the items though as it didn't signify when i did - unless i got a weapon change. I didn't make any use to the shield at all. Some of the later levels were a bit odd as I wasn't sure until i figure that i was suppose to shoot at those tiny asteroids. Some of them were actually still left over and wasn't obvious as to where they were. I would like to play a desktop version of this game, with dual stick controls :). |
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| Left and right for clockwise and anticlockwise is not an option? A single axis controller would also be good to consider for swipe / drag on touch screens. |
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| I need to get my Xbox controller charged so I can mess with it and see how to best control the ship and its aim as there are a few options, like wasd/d-pad for the ship and then a thumb for the aim, or left thumb for the ship and right thumb for the aim .. only time will tell. As for the simpler left/right or clock/anticlock as of this feed back it's now bumped further up my list so will be an option at some point. |
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| Oh yeah, @Neuro the levels are just test levels the first level wave 1 is a stresser, waves 2,3,4,5 just show a different asteroid as they all have different properties, so far I only have a few asteroid types in so only need level 1 really the other levels are just copy & pastes of level 1 so you could blast your way through to the end but there isn't really an end yet or anything special to see. Oh yeah at the moment I don't have any item pickup noises but there will be at some point, probably some little effect as well just to make it really clear, some of the power ups dont do anything and one or two others have subtle upgrades, the little lightning bolt for example might look like its done nothing but its actually made you charge shields a little faster, most of that will be more clear in future tho either through a help screen/tutorial or I duno I will sort something. AGAIN!.. thanks all, feed back is essential and helps a lot. |
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| Ok, the same URL as above, but the Left and Right Arrow keys now allow you to go either clockwise or anticlockwise, I would love it if those of you who did not like the wasd controls could try the arrows and let me know.. Personally I have come to the conclusion that I actually HATE the clock/anti-clock controls my Brain just cant handle it lol, but it's always good to give the player the choice so unless you peeps spot something wrong with it I will be leaving it in for those who hate wasd. |
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| Love the art work, great to see that you are working on this again! :) The controls are better with the clockwise/anticlockwise system. Inertia needs to be in the game when controlling the ship! |
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| Yeah I'm having fun with it which is nice my healths getting to the point where I don't have to spam painkillers which is brilliant because when i'm on them I hardly want to move never mind code or actually use my brain. Will be adding a little bit of inertia tomorrow at some point, then that will be me for updates and feedback and I will put my head down again and just get on with all the other stuff on my list. |
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| Automagicalise the "clockwise" setting.. On the very first play, set it to be the clockwise setting, but watch what the player does.. If the player holds up/down for >X Millisecs, assume they're trying to do that, and change the option on the fly. |
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| OK.. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56777267/temp/html5/index.html Thing's to know. Spacebar apply breaking thrusters. Ship now has *Some* Inertia which makes control of your ship a little more skilful specially when you have a lot of speed. Also added some feedback to the player on collecting powerups via a little effect and some sound. known bugs this build. the sound for the green fire is shit, i'm working on it atm so its just a place holder, also the collecting of a speed or "S" gives the player to much of a boost not sure why but will fix it .. Providing there is no other major bits of community feedback this will be the last build I post in this thread, got tons of stuff I just need to drill through now that does not really require a lot of player feedback.. Thanks again all. |
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| James I might just do that, but having both is just as easy. |
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| i think, he needs no more feedback after 2 months :D but i want test it too :( |
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| I will throw up another link shortly, just need to make sure it builds and there are no mojor issues. |
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| OK, same stipulation's as before, nothing is compressed so the asset's are, well shall we say LARGE lol so it might take some time to download / load everything specially from dropbox which wont be as fast as a normal download anyway so bare with it until it loads everything up. Also, syncing this now so it give it a few mins before you try it. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56777267/temp/game/MonkeyGame.html Trying to think of what's changed since the last build............. Controls WASD or LEFT/RIGHT Arrow. Left Mouse Shoot Right Mouse Build Shield around planet. Left Shift Activate Player Shield to deflect alien bullets.(shield level top right in the UI) Debug same as before, there is some extra power levels this time tho, once you gain your fourth power up your ship will gain an exterior gun turret, this can happen two times, also I made it better when switching power types, the game remembers what your magma level is, so for example if your shooting blue at level 4, pick up a green you will be shooting level 1 until you pick up powerups for green, if you then pick up a red you will be back at what ever power level you had for that fire type, I am planning asteroids and aliens that might be immune to specific fire types so swiching could be a needed thing. All three fire types are fairly well balanced at this point in terms of damage its blue>green>red but in terms of total bullets on screen they all have about the same, still needs work tho. I'v taken a pass at the mid stage section where you leave one planet and goto another , this is done through the ship warping into subspace and docking with a mothership where you offload or count up your score, 1 star per full level of planet shield. [EDIT : Final thing, still no structure to the levels I'm still just throwing things in to shoot at and test so there may not be many working levels beyond level 2] Feed back always welcome. |
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| Gameplay is frantically good fun! After timer went below 8 mins the screen would 'freeze' briefly, with ' 6 molten rocks' in the debug at the bottom. Very addictive gameplay, really good work ! |
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| Will look into that can u reproduce it and screenshot ? |
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| Thing is - I don't think a screenshot would illustrate the problem - when the game does (briefly, talking 1-2 seconds most) freezes it is when there is a LOT going on. I'll try and screen grab when/if it freezes again. |
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| I am having trouble replicating it, is it locking up with lots of things on screen and you are in-active or with lots of things on screen and you moving or shooting. Might be the collision code if your shooting loads, could be your browser, who knows, my PC is 10 years old and it runs fine for me in chrome so without more info might be hard for me to fix. |
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