valkyriegames
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Since a few people have made already made topics for their construct 2 game contest entries, I thought I'd do the same! Here I'll post my progress and any difficulties that I hit in to in case others may also learn from it.
My game "Music Fighter" will be a music action game, where players will have to play particular combinations of notes to perform attacks against enemies. I'm a little uncertain how difficult it will be to make this a fun game, but I thought it would be enjoyable to try something different and make a game like this so I decided I'd just have a go anyway to see how far I get
Hope you guys enjoy reading this topic and joining me on my journey as I work to develop my contest entry! :D
Planet Beat is a peaceful planet, full of fun and music, however recently s large number of bugs have appeared out of nowhere stealing musical beats and raising havoc. Musical Beats are the life of Planet Beat - they make everything work, they keep things alive. You could say everything on Planet Beat was made up of a little Musical Beat.
Being a peaceful planet, Planet Beat was defenseless, and could do nothing as it was plundered by the masses of bugs. But this moment was when a young mechanic would rise to be a hero. Her name is Chloe, and she had been working on a ship. A ship that could gather the power of the Musical Beats to fend off the bugs.
This is her story.
This game is all about rhythm and control. The aim of the game is to hit the beats that appear when they align over the flashing hit pads. Hitting Mana (Blue) Beats will give you mana to use to cast attacks. Hitting Enemy (Red Bug) Beats will allow you to prevent the enemy from attacking. If you miss an Enemy Beat your ship will be damaged by a small amount. If you cast a skill SKill (Green) Beats will appear. If you manage to hit them all, you will successfully cast your skill. Skills range from Bullets, to Energy Beams to Repair skills.
The aim of the game is to survive as long as you can, take down as many bugs as you can with your ship, and to get the highest score.
Tip: There are no penalties for missing Mana Beats (the blue beats) so if things get too hectic, aim for the other Beats!
Basic Attack
Mana cost: 5
Damage: 15
Description: Launch a simple shot filled with highly condensed Beat Energy to the enemy.
Launch Rockets
Mana cost: 10
Damage: 7 per rocket.
Description: Launch three rockets to bombard the enemy together.
Energy Beam
Mana cost: 50
Damage: 10 per second.
Description: Shoot a super charged Energy Beam at the Enemy.
Repair
Mana cost: 30
Heal: 30
Description: Repair your ship for 30 damage.
Summon Mini Fighter
Mana cost: 20
Description: Summons a Mini Fighter to fight by your side. Mini Fighter shoots mini bullets at the enemies for 1 damage per shot.
Speed Burst
Mana cost: 30
Description: Put your ship in to turbo drive to speed past enemies. The ship speeds up so fast that all damage dealt to the ship while speeding is reduced by 50%.
Yes there's an easter eggs! And not just because of easter! Can you find it? This easter egg was inspired by rosareven. Hope you all like it! :D
Click here for the code for the banner!
Small (350px x 19px)
Big (600px x 168px)
Day 1 (9/03/2012)
1. Thought out some design concepts and made a mock up for the game!
2. Decided it was time to sleep since it's 2pm, and to postpone any more work 'til tomorrow!
Day 2 (12/03/2012)
Because Music Fighter will require the player to play (improvise) music during the game I required musical note sample for the game. Today I spent the first few hours looking for guitar and music samples which were surprisingly difficult to find. When I did find some, they were not suitable for the style of game. I created my own midi music notes in the end - which I may replace if I can find something better eventually.
I worked on the music bar today, where half of the gameplay will take place. Pressing the designated keys on the keyboard will create "notes" on the board. Pressing a particular chain of notes at the right time, in the pace and in the right order will allow you to cast certain skills when you are fighting enemies. Red PowerLines will be significant when casting attacks (more on this in later posts). Graphics and layout not yet final!
I also played with particle effects a little, and plan to use it when special "Hyper/Overdrive" situations occur in game, but more on that later as well...
That's it for now. Back to more development tomorrow! :D
Day 3 (13/03/2012)
1. Implemented an infinite path for the player to move on.
2. Player scrolling working.
3. Note positions tweaked.
TODO:
1. Calculating combos.
2. Initiating combos.
3. Combining keys to make combos.
4. Enemies.
5. Movement (up, down).
6. Random path spawns.
Until tomorrow!
Day 4 (15/03/2012)
I have discovered some fatal flaws today in my game concept after experimenting with the way players will play the music notes. As it turns out, playing combinations of notes in a particular order repeatedly becomes very tiring very quickly, and having 7 different keys for 7 different notes made it difficult to remember which key was for which note. In addition to this, it makes it difficult to have any interesting background music because of the clashing of the tunes. One final issue was that key combinations that initiated moves had to be memorized by players which may make it difficult to play, and too much effort for the average player to memorize - even with them only being 3 or 4 notes long.
To address these issues will assign skills to particular trigger keys, and once triggered a flow of notes will appear. These notes can then be tapped by pressing the arrow keys use the traditional arrow key controls for hitting the notes. When all the keys are hit, a skill will trigger (some skills will partially activate during the hitting of the notes). This should hopefully make it more fun, with less boring memorizing and fiddling with the keyboard going!
Day 5 (18/03/2012)
1. Partially implemented the new beat system.
2. Made a nifty little banner for my project for my sig!
3. Picked out some awesome music for the game!
Day 6 (19/03/2012)
1. Finished implementing the beat system today.
2. Started on the skill system and half the skill patterns are done. Actual skills are yet to come though.
Once actual skills are completed I will be posting up a very basic playable demo! I'm quite happy with the progress that I was able to make today
Day 7 (20/03/2012)
1. Finished making the skill patterns.
2. Implemented restrictions on player movement (to stay on the road).
I didn't get so much done today, but hopefully will get more done soon! ...after Wednesday because I'll be at work again those days! Hope I get everything implemented on time by entry date! >_<
Day 8 (22/03/2012)
1. Finished the Skills Processor module - when all the correct beats are hit for a skill, a skill will be flagged to be spawned.
2. When a beat is missed, the rest of the beats in that skill are destroyed (TODO: grey them out or fade them out instead).
3. Created the stub for the Skills Spawner module - soon actual skills will appear in game (next update, I promise!).
We're almost there to a demo! :D
Day 9 (24/03/2012)
1. Implemented Simple Shot, Rocket Launcher, and Energy Beam Skills.
More to implement tomorrow! Also, 78 events down... running out of events! D: I might have to remove some skills that I was planning to implement :/
Day 10 (25/03/2012)
1. Finished Energy Beam skill animation.
2. Finished basic Summon Mini Fighter Skill, and Speed Burst Skill.
3. Fixed minor skill bug.
4. Added a background to our WIP forum topic
More to come tomorrow!
Day 11 (26/03/2012)
1. Lots of little tweaks today with the graphics, animations and skills. Also added a little polish to the game.
2. Implemented the damage module for damage dealing, monster removing, and damage animations.
The game is almost ready for a tech demo! For now, some eye candy! :D
Day 12 (27/03/2012)
1. Did a whole lot of tweaking today and fixing image sizes etc. so that it's compatible with all computers.
2. Created the instruction graphics for the game.
I finally did enough to get a basic tech demo up and running - it's very basic right now so don't expect too much, but it should show a little of how gameplay will be! Press the skill keys and try out some of the skills. It's not quite a game yet because you can't die, the player has no HP or Mana, and there's no end goal yet, but hopeully I can get something more proper up soon. The GUI also needs tweaking quite a bit. If you try it out though, let me know what you think about the skills and the process you need to go through to trigger those skills! Also let me know if there's any lag issues, and if there are what kind of browser and computer you're using. Cheers!
Try out the demo here! [Click Me]
Note: If the beats are out of sync with beat of the music, reload the webpage to put it in sync. This will be fixed once we have a title screen going!
Controls
* Note: Enemy Attack and Heal Skills do not yet work. Mana Beats do not yet add mana, only points.
Day 13 (29/03/2012)
1. Added polish to the game.
2. Found a way of saving myself more events but then hit a bug in Construct 2 which does not let me change the Bullet.AngleOfMotion independant of Angle. Now I can't save myself approximately 12 events
3. Added attack arrows.
4. Tweaked the GUI and some game variables.
5. Uploaded new version for everyone to try!
Day 14-15 (30-31/03/2012)
After 19 hours of solid work over the past 24 hours, I'm finally done! There's too many changes to list down right now. Why don't you go ahead to the final project and just have a look yourself? Oh by the way, there's an easter egg awaiting you if you can find it! :D http://www.valkyriegames.net/musicfighter/final/
Also, just finished beautifying my thread! Did you know it was Day light savings just today in Australia? The time's got me all confused now! But I'm done! :D:D:D
Day 16 (2/04/2012, Post Submission)
So for the past day I've been busy catching up on sleep and playing everyone's games. I feel like I've become addicted to these forums and keep checking for new posts. Having finished reading everything so far I thought I'd busy myself again and share some statistics for my project with you all for the fun of it. Enjoy~
Statistics for making Music Fighter
Time spent: Approx 15 days. (Est 85 hours).
Number of events used: 100
Number of layouts used: 2
Number of layers per layout average: 3
Number of ternary operators used: A bazillion. ... Okay I just counted, and I used about 64!
Time spent on the forums during the contest: Way too much! (At least 2-3 hours every day!)
Fun had throughout this contest: Just way too much fun.
If anyone else had any statistics like this to post, I'd be really interested to see them.
Cheers!
1. Thought out some design concepts and made a mock up for the game!
2. Decided it was time to sleep since it's 2pm, and to postpone any more work 'til tomorrow!
Day 2 (12/03/2012)
Because Music Fighter will require the player to play (improvise) music during the game I required musical note sample for the game. Today I spent the first few hours looking for guitar and music samples which were surprisingly difficult to find. When I did find some, they were not suitable for the style of game. I created my own midi music notes in the end - which I may replace if I can find something better eventually.
I worked on the music bar today, where half of the gameplay will take place. Pressing the designated keys on the keyboard will create "notes" on the board. Pressing a particular chain of notes at the right time, in the pace and in the right order will allow you to cast certain skills when you are fighting enemies. Red PowerLines will be significant when casting attacks (more on this in later posts). Graphics and layout not yet final!
I also played with particle effects a little, and plan to use it when special "Hyper/Overdrive" situations occur in game, but more on that later as well...
That's it for now. Back to more development tomorrow! :D
Day 3 (13/03/2012)
1. Implemented an infinite path for the player to move on.
2. Player scrolling working.
3. Note positions tweaked.
TODO:
1. Calculating combos.
2. Initiating combos.
3. Combining keys to make combos.
4. Enemies.
5. Movement (up, down).
6. Random path spawns.
Until tomorrow!
Day 4 (15/03/2012)
I have discovered some fatal flaws today in my game concept after experimenting with the way players will play the music notes. As it turns out, playing combinations of notes in a particular order repeatedly becomes very tiring very quickly, and having 7 different keys for 7 different notes made it difficult to remember which key was for which note. In addition to this, it makes it difficult to have any interesting background music because of the clashing of the tunes. One final issue was that key combinations that initiated moves had to be memorized by players which may make it difficult to play, and too much effort for the average player to memorize - even with them only being 3 or 4 notes long.
To address these issues will assign skills to particular trigger keys, and once triggered a flow of notes will appear. These notes can then be tapped by pressing the arrow keys use the traditional arrow key controls for hitting the notes. When all the keys are hit, a skill will trigger (some skills will partially activate during the hitting of the notes). This should hopefully make it more fun, with less boring memorizing and fiddling with the keyboard going!
Day 5 (18/03/2012)
1. Partially implemented the new beat system.
2. Made a nifty little banner for my project for my sig!
3. Picked out some awesome music for the game!
Day 6 (19/03/2012)
1. Finished implementing the beat system today.
2. Started on the skill system and half the skill patterns are done. Actual skills are yet to come though.
Once actual skills are completed I will be posting up a very basic playable demo! I'm quite happy with the progress that I was able to make today
Day 7 (20/03/2012)
1. Finished making the skill patterns.
2. Implemented restrictions on player movement (to stay on the road).
I didn't get so much done today, but hopefully will get more done soon! ...after Wednesday because I'll be at work again those days
! Hope I get everything implemented on time by entry date! >_<Day 8 (22/03/2012)
1. Finished the Skills Processor module - when all the correct beats are hit for a skill, a skill will be flagged to be spawned.
2. When a beat is missed, the rest of the beats in that skill are destroyed (TODO: grey them out or fade them out instead).
3. Created the stub for the Skills Spawner module - soon actual skills will appear in game (next update, I promise!).
We're almost there to a demo! :D
Day 9 (24/03/2012)
1. Implemented Simple Shot, Rocket Launcher, and Energy Beam Skills.
More to implement tomorrow! Also, 78 events down... running out of events! D: I might have to remove some skills that I was planning to implement :/
Day 10 (25/03/2012)
1. Finished Energy Beam skill animation.
2. Finished basic Summon Mini Fighter Skill, and Speed Burst Skill.
3. Fixed minor skill bug.
4. Added a background to our WIP forum topic
More to come tomorrow!
Day 11 (26/03/2012)
1. Lots of little tweaks today with the graphics, animations and skills. Also added a little polish to the game.
2. Implemented the damage module for damage dealing, monster removing, and damage animations.
The game is almost ready for a tech demo! For now, some eye candy! :D
Day 12 (27/03/2012)
1. Did a whole lot of tweaking today and fixing image sizes etc. so that it's compatible with all computers.
2. Created the instruction graphics for the game.
I finally did enough to get a basic tech demo up and running - it's very basic right now so don't expect too much, but it should show a little of how gameplay will be! Press the skill keys and try out some of the skills. It's not quite a game yet because you can't die, the player has no HP or Mana, and there's no end goal yet, but hopeully I can get something more proper up soon. The GUI also needs tweaking quite a bit. If you try it out though, let me know what you think about the skills and the process you need to go through to trigger those skills! Also let me know if there's any lag issues, and if there are what kind of browser and computer you're using. Cheers!
Try out the demo here! [Click Me]
Note: If the beats are out of sync with beat of the music, reload the webpage to put it in sync. This will be fixed once we have a title screen going!
Controls
* Note: Enemy Attack and Heal Skills do not yet work. Mana Beats do not yet add mana, only points.
Day 13 (29/03/2012)
1. Added polish to the game.
2. Found a way of saving myself more events but then hit a bug in Construct 2 which does not let me change the Bullet.AngleOfMotion independant of Angle. Now I can't save myself approximately 12 events
3. Added attack arrows.
4. Tweaked the GUI and some game variables.
5. Uploaded new version for everyone to try!
Day 14-15 (30-31/03/2012)
After 19 hours of solid work over the past 24 hours, I'm finally done! There's too many changes to list down right now. Why don't you go ahead to the final project and just have a look yourself? Oh by the way, there's an easter egg awaiting you if you can find it! :D http://www.valkyriegames.net/musicfighter/final/
Also, just finished beautifying my thread! Did you know it was Day light savings just today in Australia? The time's got me all confused now! But I'm done! :D:D:D
Day 16 (2/04/2012, Post Submission)
So for the past day I've been busy catching up on sleep and playing everyone's games. I feel like I've become addicted to these forums and keep checking for new posts. Having finished reading everything so far I thought I'd busy myself again and share some statistics for my project with you all for the fun of it. Enjoy~
Statistics for making Music Fighter
Time spent: Approx 15 days. (Est 85 hours).
Number of events used: 100
Number of layouts used: 2
Number of layers per layout average: 3
Number of ternary operators used: A bazillion. ... Okay I just counted, and I used about 64!
Time spent on the forums during the contest: Way too much! (At least 2-3 hours every day!)
Fun had throughout this contest: Just way too much fun.
If anyone else had any statistics like this to post, I'd be really interested to see them.
Cheers!
