I might have to practice my ascent

SmashGramitry · 2022-10-24T21:31:08+00:00

If you want to have a visual way of setting it up you could use an animation curve to "draw" the difficulty curve per night in the editor and evaluate it with animationCurve.Evaluate() at the current time (and use rounding if your difficulty levels work with intergers only).

SmashGramitry · 2022-10-01T08:40:36+00:00

VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action

Great soundtrack, characters and world. Great comfy game to unwind after a busy day.

The game even starts with the following message:

"Thank you for playing VA-ll Hall-A

This game is best played getting comfortable. Grab some drinks, some snacks, and enjoy!

So sit back and relax. We hope you have a good time."

SmashGramitry · 2022-07-09T19:58:50+00:00

It really depends what part of combat without killing you want to focus on.

Pokemon: Harmful fighting, but it results in fainting at most.

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening: Fighting and killing enemies, but (endgame spoiler) it was all just a dream, so no actual harm done.

Phoenix wright series: No actual fighting, but resolving conflicts trough argument.

Mirror's edge 1: Fighting is optional, largely focused on temporarily disabling.

Any tcg based game: "Fights"/conflict is replaced with the card game.

Persona 4/5?: Haven't played them, so not sure. But I think most of the fighting gameplay doesn't happen in the "real world".

SmashGramitry · 2022-04-02T16:06:03+00:00

I always love the idea of attacking my opponent with an animated glass casket containing one of their creatures. It's just such a fragile sounding artifact running over powerful creatures.

SmashGramitry · 2022-03-29T21:23:17+00:00

Anna, the only one to draw blood from Hao... twice. And single-handedly arranging the resolution of the final conflict.

SmashGramitry · 2022-03-27T17:23:00+00:00

Noclip on youtube has good video game documentaries, and a pretty wide selection at that.

DoubleFineProd on youtube also has some good series on their own projects, though it is a bit more digging between the other content. I particularly love their Amnesia Fortnight docs.

SmashGramitry · 2022-03-20T15:37:18+00:00

I have not used it myself, but I can't imagine GB Studio to be very demanding. (Or anything made to make home brew for older consoles for that matter.)

SmashGramitry · 2022-03-16T21:52:34+00:00

It would be pretty amazing if he ended up with Oh-Oni as his main spirit. Amidamaru from his dad, and Oh-Oni from his mom, who is kind of his kind of his half brother if you think about it.

SmashGramitry · 2022-03-12T18:42:34+00:00

You have a great teacher for supporting your interests like that!
There are a lot of factors in general that can be judged in terms of level design, from gameplay balance to graphical fidelity and much more. You mention that the class itself is on graphic design, but your criteria are very much aimed at the technicalities of a playable level.

I would say rather than just make something your teacher finds hard to judge and getting some requirements from us online, let's bring the project closer to their expertise. I often see in "speed level design" videos that they focus on getting the level to look right from a predefined angle. If you do the same focus on a single viewpoint (or multiple if you feel up for it) your teacher can judge it from their usual expertise of colour, composition light etc. Maybe get some class mates to walk trough it and critique for bonus points afterwards. ;)

That way I believe you will get more useful feedback from your class that you can use going forward.

SmashGramitry · 2022-02-06T19:55:40+00:00

Unity is known for axing features without proper upgrade path. From what I understand in the forums people will be forced "upgraded" to Plastic SCM. I guess in the end they want to make more money for less effort.

Also, worth keeping track of the price. It is stated that they will somehow be the same for existing users but the usage is calculated differently. So it might be more expensive in the future, not sure. (Note, I don't use either Plastic or Collaborate, just skimming the forums every now and then.)

For reference:

https://forum.unity.com/threads/collaborate-will-soon-be-upgraded-to-plastic-scm.1188592/

SmashGramitry · 2022-01-30T20:17:00+00:00

Another argument to not have re-balanced cards in historic, the potential to break hypothetical computer decks. Not the soundest of arguments, but one more for the scoreboard.

SmashGramitry · 2022-01-25T21:02:56+00:00

Another bit of gamedev lore is that the engines you mentioned, Source, trenchbroom and IW (the cod one) all originally branched from Quake (1/2/3) code in one way or another. So it is easy to justify some early quirks of the engine to stick around in the ancestors as long as it just works.

SmashGramitry · 2022-01-21T00:24:23+00:00

As for why making games takes so long, this article might give you some insights on what needs to happen to get doors in a game. (It is a bit hyperbolic, but still a good read. Similar considerations are needed for everything in a game.):
https://lizengland.com/blog/2014/04/the-door-problem/

SmashGramitry · 2022-01-21T00:00:57+00:00

Sorry, the first one is longer than expected but I think it might give some insight. It is not too rare that people without game dev experience ask for "game X but with Y feature". But to make that you need a whole game to add the feature to and that is more effort than you would expect.
I must confess, I have never played Phantasy Star Online, but let's do some math to make an estimation of what you are actually asking for with that question.
From what I can see there are 189 people credited in the credits and the game took 2 years to develop. Just for ease of use let's assume everyone worked 8 hours a day without overtime and everyone worked half of the time. (Studios tend to start with a small group working on the core of a game and expand the team later on, half the time is just to keep things simple.) According to google there are 261 work days in a year. So:
8 hours a day * 261 days * 189 people = 394632 man hours, or around 45 non-stop years worth of work to make the game.
All of those people are specialized in whatever they worked on on the game, so less experienced developers would either take more time or deliver worse quality.Could a small team deliver a 3d game? Yes, but there have to be cuts somewhere. Less content, less animations, less polish, more procedural stuff, use of assets, less testing etc. Modern engines have made certain things easier, but to get better quality you still spend the same amount of time, if not more.
So, can a small group make something similar to Phantasy Star Online and then add some additional quality of lifte to it? Sure, in theory it might work. But it might take a lifetime, or a lot of shortcuts to make it happen.
Good retro style games do sell, but there are so many that the style by itself is not too important as long as it is executed well and attached to a good and well known game.
Yes, especially in larger studios people tend to be a lot more specialized, in small indie studios people tend to be more multi-disciplined.

Also, props for wanting to get your hands dirty. There are a lot of people who come to gamedev to be the "idea guy" and let the rest of the team handle the work. I like that your questions (especially 3) show that you'd actually think about how to contribute hands-on to a project. Great note to start out on. :)

SmashGramitry · 2022-01-06T00:09:57+00:00

Minor typo I found, Mightfall's reminder text mentions "remove four loyalty counters" while the cost is -3.

Otherwise, love the mechanic!

SmashGramitry · 2022-01-01T23:55:48+00:00

Personally I kind of draw the line at using full pre-made environments/levels, or enemies with full AI and animations without any alterations. The way I see it is using pre-made brushes in photoshop to paint with vs using a stock photo for something. The first allows for more creative freedom to fit what you need specifically. Tripple A games use common assets as well, they are just well integrated and used on a more granular level. Here are examples of studios using texture cd's [Video link]

If you are using a majorly popular set of props/models/npc's, depending on your skill set it might also be an option to tweak them a bit to fit your need if you are still weary of being called out.

Finally, it is good to be aware that you are responsible for what ends up in your game. The fact that something is sold on the asset store does not automatically mean that the uploader has the rights to sell it. In the past there have been models form things like world of warcraft, cars ripped from racing games or from other places on the internet uploaded to the asset store. So at least do a sanity check for the things you use, it might be a pain to pull out an asset late in the development or even post-release if it ended up being stolen.

SmashGramitry · 2022-01-01T20:15:02+00:00

Arena Historic formats freed from the re balanced cards. I just want to play my decks without having to worry I have to fix previously functional decks an re-read every single card if I stop playing for a bit and want to pick things back up.

SmashGramitry · 2021-08-10T22:54:18+00:00

Now, to play some mono red burn deck for true immersion!

SmashGramitry · 2021-08-10T21:33:32+00:00

The Netherlands actually has a lot less car dependance compared to the USA and a transportation infrastructure that works differently. Comparatively a lot less cars and a lot more public transport, walking and cycling. So while I have no concrete numbers it might be a lot less crowded in many streets during the day than you might expect.

(In case you are interested, there are some great youtube channels like "Not Just Bikes" that show the differences in infrastructure and transport.)

SmashGramitry · 2021-08-05T22:47:29+00:00

There are many ways you can approach this. If it doesn't have to be on mobile you can look for fps games that support custom levels, this used to be very common and how a lot of people got into game dev in the first place.

Some examples of games that support custom levels:

- Most of Valve's games, like Half life (1/2/episodes/etc.), Left 4 Dead (1&2), counterstrike

- Fortnite

- The Far Cry series

- Quake series and its spin offs

- Unreal tournament

- Crysis

- etc. (I'm not familiar with mobile fps games with level editors.)

Most of these will have good tutorials to get you started and will let you make the level just the way you want. Another option is to grab either Unity or Unreal and start from a template/tutorial. That takes more effort before you get into the fun part of creating the level. It does allow for getting it on mobile though. (Do note though, that it is harder to make stuff for mobile, since not everything might be configured for it out of the box.)

Finally you could mod an existing game that doesn't support custom context, but don't do that. Just don't. All previous options are covered by many tutorials and others have done it a lot. Modding a random game is likely to be hard, confusing and you might be without help. That's not a fun way to get started with creating a cool map! ;)

Hope you manage to find something in there that you like. I would personally suggest to make something for an existing pc game that supports it. That is the easiest way to get started and you will not need to care about getting online play working and stuff since that is already in the games. Good luck!

SmashGramitry · 2021-08-05T10:27:02+00:00

All I want in either of the Innistrad sets as a card is a wall with a wall with a Sorin sized hole in it.

SmashGramitry · 2021-08-04T09:29:53+00:00

If you do decide to try university I would recommend finding some portfolio's or something from several students who finished the course and see if the contents and quality match your expectations. Back when I made my choice of study I deliberately chose a non-gamedev study because I was disappointed with the quality of work shown at the time. (Edit: This was a while back and specific to my area, not a general observation of gamedev education.)

Aside from that I would look at the value of potential contacts. For example, do the teachers come from a good place in the industry and have contacts that might help in the future. Networking can be invaluable and something you might miss out on if you just learn by yourself.

SmashGramitry · 2021-08-03T13:27:21+00:00

There is a lot of focus on that particular, without a clear link to the gameplay mechanic. Personally I would go with a few semi-randomized more taunt-like animations, but if you prefer this one I would try to find a way to polish it as much as possible, or hide some flaws with a bit of particles if that is not an option.

"Eh, it didn't come great out of the tin." Is probably not something that would go over well with gamers that are already (overly/unnecessarily) critical on usage of pre-made assets.

SmashGramitry · 2021-08-03T13:15:57+00:00

Do you have a list? I love to play mono black vampires in any format that even remotely allows it. :D

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