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Magica (Development)

Started by reidrac, 16:16, 24 September 16

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Sykobee (Briggsy)

Don't worry about slow down if it's rare and because of something massive happening.


In gamer psyche, it's a reward to have that occur, it shows you've pushed the game to the limit.


[Yes, I read research recently about this, although the link was never saved.]

menegator

#51
Quote from: reidrac on 21:15, 18 October 16
Another update!

I've started with the level design, and it is really stressful seeing the memory go down; but it is worth it I think. 30 stages so far, I was aiming to 50 but I'm not sure.

[attachimg=1]

I've been playing with the time and the time bonus (the fairies) and I still don't know exactly how it will work at the end. It's about getting the difficulty right.


Hello,


What method do you follow to encode a level? The classic method of describing as a series of strings isn't memory friendly though if you are using a compressor it should handle it with ease.


When much much younger I wrote a platform game (mode 0, basic) instead of using 20 character string for each line I used a representative encoding, that works quite well providing there isn't a great variety of elemental shapes. Even better if there is only one kind of brick and only one kind of white space then 4 bytes are enough to describe a line of 32 columns, that means 80 bytes for a 32x20 level or at my case 1800 bytes since each line had 20 columns and u never bothered with the simple task of using 4 spare bits to describe the beginning of the next line.


...I never finished my game though.

reidrac

I went for a hybrid solution: part of the screen is generated programmatically, part is just level data.

Currently I'm using 2-bit per tile, so a 20 x 22 (440 bytes) screens is just 110 bytes, compressed with UCL that is on average 50 bytes (depending how many repeated patterns the screen has).

I tried different encoding schemes and a some compressors, and this combination (2-bit per tile + UCL) gave me the best result.

On top of that each map has a list of entities (uncompressed), that are 4-bits for type, 2 bytes for position and 4-bits for a parameter (eg. enemy is facing left or right), and one byte as terminator.
Released The Return of Traxtor, Golden Tail, Magica, The Dawn of Kernel, Kitsune`s Curse, Brick Rick and Hyperdrive for the CPC.

If you like my games and want to show some appreciation, you can always buy me a coffee.

reidrac

One of the last updates!

Some friends are helping me to test the game, so far the feedback is good and a couple of bugs have been fixed.

I got someone to kindly help me with the loading screen, and is looking really nice; so only the menu music and the intro are missing.

Of course I'll wait for the people testing the game, but this could be ready as soon as in two weeks I think (fingers crossed!).
Released The Return of Traxtor, Golden Tail, Magica, The Dawn of Kernel, Kitsune`s Curse, Brick Rick and Hyperdrive for the CPC.

If you like my games and want to show some appreciation, you can always buy me a coffee.

reidrac

Finishing the game

First the exciting news: Vanja Utne has kindly offered her amazing skills to make the loading screen, and is looking really good (see a WIP: https://twitter.com/PondSoftware/status/792415292190261249).

She has a quite distinctive style and I'm really happy she's on board.

I have a tune for the menu, so only the intro is missing now and testing seems to work as I've fixed a couple of bugs already.

I hope I'll have a first candidate for release in the next 3-4 days, so the game could be out in two weeks or so.
Released The Return of Traxtor, Golden Tail, Magica, The Dawn of Kernel, Kitsune`s Curse, Brick Rick and Hyperdrive for the CPC.

If you like my games and want to show some appreciation, you can always buy me a coffee.

||C|-|E||

Super lovely loading screen!! I am really liking this game!  :D

villain

Terrific screen!!!

reidrac

The game is finished!

I finally tackled the intro, so all the game content is done.

Next is reviewing everything. While making the intro I found a bug in the engine where I made a mistake converting a modulo operation to ASM and as consequence I was erasing and invalidating one extra tile to the right; meaning I was doing double of the expected work (horizontally) updating the screen. After the fix, everything is faster and smoother (I could even add some enemies to some stages, but I don't want to unbalance the screens after testing them).

So I want to be sure there aren't more bugs like this one!

Then I'll write the manual and, when Vanja finishes the loading screen, I'll prepare a release candidate. Hopefully I'll be able to run another round of tests, and it could even be released next weekend; still thinking about it though.

I'm tired but very happy with the results... and I can feel that thing when you're finishing a game after months of work :)
Released The Return of Traxtor, Golden Tail, Magica, The Dawn of Kernel, Kitsune`s Curse, Brick Rick and Hyperdrive for the CPC.

If you like my games and want to show some appreciation, you can always buy me a coffee.

VincentGR

Congratulations mate!

reidrac

Coming soon!

I have a release candidate now :)

[attachimg=1]
Released The Return of Traxtor, Golden Tail, Magica, The Dawn of Kernel, Kitsune`s Curse, Brick Rick and Hyperdrive for the CPC.

If you like my games and want to show some appreciation, you can always buy me a coffee.

||C|-|E||

It looks lovely!! Just tell me if you need some testing  :)

reidrac

Quote from: ||C|-|E|| on 18:21, 01 November 16
It looks lovely!! Just tell me if you need some testing  :)

Thanks!

I have three testers already and so far seems like things are pretty much OK; but I'll contact you if needed (actually you offered your help some time ago and I forgot, sorry about that!).

Also I can always do a re-release if something pops-up before any physical release etc.
Released The Return of Traxtor, Golden Tail, Magica, The Dawn of Kernel, Kitsune`s Curse, Brick Rick and Hyperdrive for the CPC.

If you like my games and want to show some appreciation, you can always buy me a coffee.

TotO

Quote from: reidrac on 18:19, 01 November 16
I have a release candidate now :)
Your program look to load in loop...  :-\ ;D
"You make one mistake in your life and the internet will never let you live it down" (Keith Goodyer)

ervin

Good lord, that is a beautiful loading screen!
It must surely rank as one of the best cpc loading screens ever.
Absolutely stunning.


ukmarkh

I need to play this now! :-)

reidrac

I've released the game, please go to the release thread: http://www.cpcwiki.eu/forum/games/new-game-magica/

I won't be updating this thread any more. Thanks for your comments and support while I was developing the game, very appreciated :)
Released The Return of Traxtor, Golden Tail, Magica, The Dawn of Kernel, Kitsune`s Curse, Brick Rick and Hyperdrive for the CPC.

If you like my games and want to show some appreciation, you can always buy me a coffee.

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