Next Gen Metroid

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Next Gen Metroid

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Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 04:35:26 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 04:33:44 pm

2010-03-02 04:05:03 pm

A tree is nothing new, like a wheel. It is more about how to make it quickly and intuitively accessible. I think your solution needs some fine-tuning since you always have to remember or watch what button to push, at least for some cases. Keep in mind your solution adds a button and complexity to return to the first stage for no reason since it can happen just automatically with other design.
If the selection-hack is serious about it feel free to watch for my solution.
It is possible to navigate quickly and intuitively with just one thumb or digital-pad in a two-stage-tree.

Edit history:

Gaius_4: 2010-03-02 04:24:41 pm

2010-03-02 04:23:18 pm

Quote from J_SNAKE:

I think your solution needs some fine-tuning since you always have to remember or watch what button to push, at least for some cases.

Yeah. I did have the thought (with what I described) that someone could make a mistake, say if you wanted to select or change a Missile type, but pressed the button for Suit types... You would need to go back somehow. Embarassed

Embarassed

I suppose you could go out without selecting anything, then go back in and retry. Hopefully there wouldn't be a reason to be in a hurry. Razz

Razz

But being able to change/select things on the fly does make for a more fun experience.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 08:02:03 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 08:01:17 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 07:21:24 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 07:18:01 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 07:15:28 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 05:03:36 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 05:02:47 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-02 04:50:36 pm

2010-03-02 04:36:05 pm

To be more clear because it can help:
Specifically for digital-pad it takes a bit more sophisticated programming if you want to deal with an octtree using my solution. But it is rewarding. The reason are diagonal-items in the first stage. Lets take the right-up for example: Most often you wont hit right and up in the exactly same frame so the system will navigate either to the top or to the right item. You will have to add a little time-tolerance so you can chose the diagonals precisely. After a node is chosen the system switches to the second stage automatically, here you can navigate to the desired item but you must hold at least one of the directions ( means you can only run in circles, but that is a small downside, it goes quick enough as you can see in the vid, I even slowed it down so that the demonstration is visible:) ). If no direction is hold the system switches to the first stage again. That way the navigation goes quickly and intuitively. You dont need the buttons to navigate.

There is a bunch of designs which are making the implementation of time-tolerance not necessary but they will be more indirect or less intuitive.

Might probably help if you still collaborate with the person doing the hack.
But probably a quadtree or something mixed will be enough, just according what he
wants to do. It is just an issue if you have diagonal nodes in the first stage.

The power of this system lies in no need to memorize the naavigation while still offering fast navigation-speed(if you want to be pretty quick you only need to memorize where your item is but not how to get there). It can be compared to performing some super-moves in fighting games. A good player can pull them off in an eye-drop. Lets take the left node in the first stage and then the right in the second. Thats where you want to get. It can be "left, left-down, down, right-down, right" and can be done in one flow. Thats exactly how to watch at the speed of this system, simply just like 0 - 180 degrees super-moves in a street-fighter.

To be more clear because it can help:
Specifically for digital-pad it takes a bit more sophisticated programming if you want to deal with an octtree using my solution. But it is rewarding. The reason are diagonal-items in the first stage. Lets take the right-up for example: Most often you wont hit right and up in the exactly same frame so the system will navigate either to the top or to the right item. You will have to add a little time-tolerance so you can chose the diagonals precisely. After a node is chosen the system switches to the second stage automatically, here you can navigate to the desired item but you must hold at least one of the directions ( means you can only run in circles, but that is a small downside, it goes quick enough as you can see in the vid, I even slowed it down so that the demonstration is visible:) ). If no direction is hold the system switches to the first stage again. That way the navigation goes quickly and intuitively. You dont need the buttons to navigate.

There is a bunch of designs which are making the implementation of time-tolerance not necessary but they will be more indirect or less intuitive.

Might probably help if you still collaborate with the person doing the hack.
But probably a quadtree or something mixed will be enough, just according what he
wants to do. It is just an issue if you have diagonal nodes in the first stage.

The power of this system lies in no need to memorize the naavigation while still offering fast navigation-speed(if you want to be pretty quick you only need to memorize where your item is but not how to get there). It can be compared to performing some super-moves in fighting games. A good player can pull them off in an eye-drop. Lets take the left node in the first stage and then the right in the second. Thats where you want to get. It can be "left, left-down, down, right-down, right" and can be done in one flow. Thats exactly how to watch at the speed of this system, simply just like 0 - 180 degrees super-moves in a street-fighter.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 07:37:57 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 07:36:18 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 03:03:15 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 02:36:52 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 02:35:57 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 02:34:04 pm

2010-03-18 02:33:17 pm

Actually I would appreciate it if some of you can help me to test out something:
I wrote a small (2-player) game to test the following things:
http://hotfile.com/dl/33474697/2e53a1a/Positron.rar.html

1. Does the installation process work correctly (internet-access most likely required)?

2. Is the movement-speed of the player with every refresh-rate of your monitor constant? It shall adapt to
constant speed while the other object (positron) will move faster at higher refresh-rate.

3. Thats an issue that bothers me a lot using the XNA-technology: Is your framerate always smooth? Sometimes you
likely might experience a frame-drop. In final products I want it to be approximately perfect.

But lets see how the actual program runs first(watch readme for controls):
Thanks in advance for reporting me your results.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 07:49:46 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 07:45:57 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 07:45:00 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 07:44:09 pm

2010-03-18 07:43:46 pm

For the case someone already tested the last program. I acutally made a small 2-Player game for the quick so that you are rewarded a bit for your effort(readme for controls), if the opponent lets you(keyboard-bridge-problem).
http://hotfile.com/dl/33474697/2e53a1a/Positron.rar.html
Just want to repeat, the only thing I want to know is: Does it install and overall run well?

2010-03-18 08:25:19 pm

Super Secret Area - Dead Ahead!

Install, yes, but I had no choice of location for any real install. It just placed a folder in the start menu.

Speed is fine throughout. I moved both players, used both positive and negative charge, and it seemed fine.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 10:43:44 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-18 10:43:07 pm

2010-03-18 10:41:56 pm

Thanks Quietus, thats good to hear. What is your max monitor refresh-rate, can you try at max setting? You should notice same player-speed but increased positron-speed, right?

btw. since I know some of you might understand it wrong. The smooth framerate-issue is not performance/system-ressources-requirements-issue. It is just a tricky technical synchronisation-issue. So no worry about the integrated large-scale complexity of something like SMTac. The performance of all my games is top-notch. Even my netbook is running it:)

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-20 09:42:05 am

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-20 09:31:58 am

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-20 09:30:58 am

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-20 08:42:39 am

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-20 08:41:43 am

2010-03-20 08:40:45 am

How does this example look in comparison to positron. Are there some frame-drops from time to time noticeable? The top camera is conroled using w,s,a,d. The bottom camera is controled with direction keys.

Try first this:
http://hotfile.com/dl/33715264/f19074e/camera.rar.html

and here the "improved" version:
http://hotfile.com/dl/33721671/18fcf17/camera.rar.html
In this version, using higher than 60 Hz monitor-refresh-rate the bottom camera should translate faster

Do you notice the difference between this two versions. Both of them have intrinsic flaws. Could someone please test it?

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-26 09:47:11 pm

2010-03-26 09:39:11 pm

This is probably how the SMTac Samus is going to look like since I dont want to change much. How do you like it?

2010-03-27 09:46:06 am

Super Secret Area - Dead Ahead!

Looks fine to me, but the white / light parts on the bottoms of her feet look a little too bright.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-27 09:58:55 am

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-27 09:58:19 am

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-27 09:48:56 am

2010-03-27 09:47:45 am

Quote from Quietus:

but the white / light parts on the bottoms of her feet look a little too bright.

They are supposed to emit light, will look cool while running:)
btw. how doy you like the new weaponarm? If it looks too realistic I will scale down the level of detail a little bit, but I hink it is cool to see a weaponarm made of solid high-quality metal.

2010-03-27 10:03:40 am

Super Secret Area - Dead Ahead!

Nah, it looks OK, and you probably won't notice in-game when you're doing stuff anyway.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-27 09:17:02 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-27 09:15:40 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-27 08:58:31 pm

2010-03-27 08:56:26 pm

Any objections, guys?:). I might chang the level of detail of the weaponarm, just dependent on how good and fitting it all looks overall and in motion.

2010-03-30 02:09:01 pm

it looks like you put a pixel filter on in the snes, then turned off all of the layers , then copyed samus into paint brush and made 2 white lines on her feet.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-03-30 10:15:35 pm

2010-03-30 10:13:44 pm

The main change is the weaponarm (hope you will like it). I will also apply some color-grading to make Samus appear more fresh (removing green and adding a bit of yellow and red) and probably add some new sprites for morph-animation and landing on ground. Thats all to it. I am not going to make some deeper operations on her. It would have to be done for every single sprite since Samus is not physically developed from a model.

I am developing original concepts for original games and SMTac as a sideproject will live good enough with my quick solution for the first. Samus-look can be changed by talented fans any time later on in collaboration with me.

When I am done with the final Samus-look and animation-stuff I will provide you playable content. You will have to test the controls and so on. SMTac will be optimized for an xbox360-arcade-stick, xbox360-fight-pad and for the custom xbox360-analog-controller(most intuitive solution). Keyboard-freaks can also use keyboard for one player. it will feature two control-styles if you are not going to use the analog-xbox360-controller: "alternative" and advanced "sm-style". The game can be played on a serious level with all these input-devices. It is designed that way.

The main change is the weaponarm (hope you will like it). I will also apply some color-grading to make Samus appear more fresh (removing green and adding a bit of yellow and red) and probably add some new sprites for morph-animation and landing on ground. Thats all to it. I am not going to make some deeper operations on her. It would have to be done for every single sprite since Samus is not physically developed from a model.

I am developing original concepts for original games and SMTac as a sideproject will live good enough with my quick solution for the first. Samus-look can be changed by talented fans any time later on in collaboration with me.

When I am done with the final Samus-look and animation-stuff I will provide you playable content. You will have to test the controls and so on. SMTac will be optimized for an xbox360-arcade-stick, xbox360-fight-pad and for the custom xbox360-analog-controller(most intuitive solution). Keyboard-freaks can also use keyboard for one player. it will feature two control-styles if you are not going to use the analog-xbox360-controller: "alternative" and advanced "sm-style". The game can be played on a serious level with all these input-devices. It is designed that way.

2010-04-01 07:07:10 am

I made one animation out of it so you can see it in motion, I give also a short information about the targeted input-devices on the way. Feel free to comment on the new look and related issues (for example I might keep the original look optional) so I am ensured to go for this style:)

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-05-05 06:52:46 pm

2010-05-05 06:51:00 pm

I assume most of you have a 60hz compatible screen since I want to adapt everything in SMTac for 60hz. So please state your facts here. If there will be too much complain about not having the right refresh rate I will make a compromise to satisfy all needs.

The thing is just that dealing with sprite-animation is a time-discrete operation and you have to treat it that way to get perfect and consistent animation (in literature often ignored and treated like time-continuous nature). For example it means when everything in animation is optimized for 60hz then mathematically there is no transformation that produces same results for 70hz.

Edit history:

J_SNAKE: 2010-05-30 05:46:52 pm

J_SNAKE: 2010-05-30 10:22:04 am

2010-05-30 10:20:48 am

A small bit improved SM-Sprite-transitions and similar stuff, looking better than I expected on youtube (not many frames are cutted out):

Besides you see a great example how versatile and fast an xbox360-analog-controller input can look like if the controls are properly designed. In certain situations it can mimic even frame-perfect input.

2010-06-03 03:34:50 pm

I hope some of you will like it:

2010-06-04 04:59:53 pm

pretty good. very smooth movement. id like to see a super metroid multiplayer game on the xbox live arcade XD

nice dance at the end btw.

2010-06-05 07:22:30 am

Quote from Blarget2:

id like to see a super metroid multiplayer game on the xbox live arcade XD

Oh boy, me too, but I doubt microsoft would let it through and Nintendo will interdict (except there is a way how both of the companies could take profit of it). So it most likely will be for PC only. In addition I might replace the visuals with something else, rename the game and send it to xbox-live as a game with original content and see what happens, hehe, dunno.

Edit history:

Kharay1977: 2010-06-05 08:17:58 am

2010-06-05 08:17:29 am

Quote from J_SNAKE:

In addition I might replace the visuals with something else, rename the game and send it to xbox-live as a game with original content and see what happens, hehe, dunno.

Not a bad idea at all actually. Seriously, you could consider generalizing the engine you're building as a basis for, say, a series of games.

2010-06-05 11:46:46 am

Yes, that is actually what I am doing. I am developing something like an original "next-gen"-Metroid, fully featured with analog controls (I intend to finish it in this decade). The engine is designed especially for side-scrollers. I intend to do at least two other games with this engine. SMTac is something like an high-end oldschool-version of my gameplay idea that is done in addition with it. By oldschool I mean it strictly features digital input only, only 8-way aiming and no analog features, so you are able to play it also with an arcade-stick. I see certain beauty in this oldschool-style, that is why I am doing it in addition.

2010-06-05 05:28:12 pm

could you release a beta of that multiplayer game? :3 ( i buged you about this 2 years ago)

2010-06-05 08:57:41 pm

Yes there will be soon a demo:), but just to correct your view on the thing:
SMTac is not just a simple jump shoot and run thing made out of the blue:

What you have seen 2 years ago was not a game or a solid software-technology approach. I just showed some implemented results in theoretical study about new gameplay-concepts to meet a new gameplay-standard. Now the main software-technoloy (engine) and game-design aspect is brought up. So the game is being build from ground up now. I also want to modify the SM-Sprites a bit before I bring out the first demo. I want first provide you a demo where you only test basic movement and give me your feedback about it.

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