Bleh, homework, yet yay, other things coming up to compensate for my lack of a finished Mini-LD #3 entry. Look forward to…
And also, going back through things, Towlr is awesome. I emailed it to my friends. Buahahaha!
Since the mini LD started, I’ve been filling my time with diablo, TF2, C&C3, amusement parks, and other non-coding activities. However, I have been sneaking in coding time here and there, and am making progress on my tool, despite being well outside the ‘deadline’. I posted a gui shot to IRC, but forgot to put it here, until now!
People’s biggest complaint seems to be that it is rather dense. Well screw those people. 😀 Seriously though, it is a semi-heavy tool, but I’m hoping I’ve put it together logically. I’ll be writing instructions on how to use each part and I’d like to think that, with a little tool-tip help, each section is pretty self explanatory.
Since I haven’t really discussed it here yet, my tool, codenamed Chronolapse, creates time lapses. Right now the only working webcam library I have is windows only, but that might be addressed later. The goal is to make it a snap to make time lapses like the one below. Here is an overview featurelist:
I decided to make each of these features a seperate entity to give the user as much freedom and functionality as possible. It will add a little bit of time on the backend as you go through each ‘phase’, but it really enhances the value of the tool. Here is a picture in picture example: First, you capture your images. Instead of allowing you to pick PIP at the beginning, it just saves the two different sets of pictures. After you’re finished capturing, you can run it through the PIP section, selecting size and position (and sources). This gives you a new folder of pictures with the PIP effect. Now, if you want to go back and change where you put the PIP, it is as simple as tweaking the settings and re-doing the PIP. If PIP was built into the capture, you couldn’t change it at all. It also means you can use any program you want to do any of the steps, and CL will fill in the rest. You can capture with CL and create video with virtualdub, or capture with something else and add PIP with CL, etc etc etc. You have da powah!
Example Goal Timelapse – This wasn’t made with CL; it required 4 different tools to put it all together, plus the youtube annotation. Being able to make this using just one program (well, need to add sound separately) is the end-result goal of CL.
Anyone know of a good direct-linking free file hosting thing, or could help me with one? I need a place to put my stuff…
Tags: file hosting, stuff
Well, I didn’t get a tool done for Mini-LD #3, but here’s some Flash movies instead. A total of four: FireSim, Run Around, Yayguy, and Yerfworks.
I didn’t find a direct-linking file hosting thing, but I did find a really nice non-direct-linking one. Get the compensation here!
Source code is included.
Hello everyone!
I was hanging out on IRC with some pals when Bleck, DrPetter, and I decided to have a fun little “microLD”, where normal LD rules apply, but you get only 6 hours to develop your game. It’s quite flexible in that you can choose which 6 hours you want to use. (Hooray for the honor system)
There is an added twist that I announced the theme at least a day before everyone started, so you got to think about what you wanted to make.
The theme is/was ‘Utopia’.
Here are the final entries: (From what I’ve heard, I’m still waiting on entries from philhassey and mjau)
Bleck – Snowtopia – http://www.omnisu.com/files/snowtopia.zip
DrPetter – Utopia – http://www.cyd.liu.se/~tompe573/drpetter_utopia.zip
Fydo – Paradise Gone – http://fydo.net/programming/ParadiseGone-fydo-microLD1.zip
I certainly had a lot of fun making my entry. I had about 2 hours to kill on a busride a few hours before I started developing the game, so I planned it all out on paper. It worked out surprisingly well, in my opinion. Post your comments! 😀
And of course, it’s not too late to participate. Since this isn’t really an official compo by any means, feel free to set aside 6 hours of your choice to make a game and put a link in the comments. Hooray!
In the min-LD3 theme description, one of the suggestions was to write an article. I decided to spend my 48 hours figuring out how to use free tools to build flash applications. I didn’t actually get the article written over the weekend. But now, two weeks later, I finally finished it. Here is the link if you are interested:
Tags: flash
Finally, my time lapse tool (Chronolapse) is ready for some serious testing.
Windows users can grab the exe here: http://code.google.com/p/chronolapse/downloads/list
Linux/Mac: I haven’t done any work on your versions yet, but everything but the webcam ‘should’ work. You’re next!
When you find bugs, please either comment here or send me an email to the address specified in the manual.
Tags: time lapse, tool
In case you still care, I found a solution to mrfun’s problem with requiring a wordpress template (http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2008/09/07/where-is-the-world-are-you/). You need to insert Javascript that adds an event listener to the document’s onLoad and onUnload events. I’ll explain in more detail and in a cross-browser way in just a moment…
— EDIT —
Ok, first get core.js out of this archive: core.zip
Use a <script> tag to load it into the page (this can be anywhere on the page)
After the load/unload functions have been defined, add this code:
<script>
Core.addEventListener(window, “load”, load);
Core.addEventListener(window, “unload”, GUnload);
</script>
And you’re set.
Make sure you all can access the specific RGB values of all of the pixels in a picture like this, in code, for this weekend. So for example you could tell me that the far bottom left pixel is #000000. That is all.
Alright! Mini-LD 4 has start and the main theme is
MSpaint: Best Level Editor Ever
Ok, that may sound a bit silly but here’s the idea: A while back I was talking with some people about how it’d be cool if we had a bunch of games that all had the same save format so you could play one game, save, open up a different game and it would affect your status in that game. It seemed impractical but then I had a simpler idea. What if every game used the same file as the level data? It’d be so cool to see how everyone could interpret the same data in different and crazy ways.
So here are the requirements:
So, I’ll explain each of these in detail. The first is that I’m going to upload 3 24-bit bmp files that your game has to be able to run as levels. Now the requirements on this are pretty lax. The file is just an abstract representation, a yellow pixel could be a randomly generated badguy, or a lift or a forest or whatever. For example if you wanted to make a simcity clone and use the file as the base for some terrain generation that’d be fine. The biggest requirement is given two levels, A person can tell which one is being used given your derived “level”. So you can’t just feed in the bits as the seed of a random number generator and use the generator to make your “level”
Now making the level was taking quite a bit longer than i had hoped so I’m going to post the drafts right now and when I get a chance, before I go to bed, I will post the final versions. So here are the drafts:
I’m going to have at least one more level when I’m done that might be slightly different. All of them should support a platformer type game. If you decide to make something that ISN’T a platformer then you aren’t required to support more than one of the levels.
Now, as the theme implies, one can make a level in MSpaint. The allowed color pallet is the defaults in MSpaint. And everyone has to make at least one level like the one provided. That level has to be a 64 by 64 bmp like the examples. For that level please try to make it platformer friendly so we can play it on other peoples games. Now, you are encouraged to make levels other than the one required. These levels will hopefully suit your game better and can be any size. Same filetype and pallet are strongly encouraged as the whole idea is to try different games on the same level. Here is a file for all of you non windows users that should have the correct colors.
Finally, for those who still want more of a theme than just the technical restriction, the optional theme is Robots and Kittens.
I have something of importance to take care of for the next few hours but hopefully, I’ve provided enough specific information for everyone to get started. Before I go to sleep I’ll have the final version of the files and answer all the questions anyone has so feel free to post a bunch.
EDIT: General LD rules apply unless otherwise contradicted or they don’t fit in. Let me know if any rules should be changed.
Tags: Add new tag
Well, it’s pretty late here so I’m going to go to bed and finish the levels in the morning. Based on what someone said, I’m probably going to make something like the cave level but more interconected so it would be suitable for some sort of top down game.
Keep in mind that the final levels will make use of a bunch of the available colors. This will encourage some consistency in how you all use the colors in the levels you make. Also, there’s probably going to be quite a bit of tweaking of the levels so that they work for a platformer( right now some of the jumps are too big and such, however the current examples should be sufficient for the moment.
Another thing, If it’s easy to do, add png support in addition to bmp. This would allow people to give awards that are also playable levels. To be clear, png support is not at all required. Also be aware that it is perfectly fine to have context based level loading. For example, if you find a large patch of red together, you might load it as lava, but if you find a single red pixel, you might make that into a fire bat or something.
Alright the two main levels are done!
I’ll finish level 3 tomorrow. It’s going to be basically the same as level 1 but it’ll use use light teal for it’s big block of color.
Here is a guide on how all of the colors are used so you can make your game accordingly. The color usage listed is final. Remember, you don’t have to follow any of these descriptions. They are more for describing in what context you’ll find certain pixels. So, just because dark red says flying badguys doesn’t mean you can’t amke that color be powerups or swamps or whatever.
Here’s a screen! You can’t actually get hurt yet, but I can tell it’s nearly impossible so far. Kitty is a ninja in the shinobi style – that means he can teleport dash through the air freely. And he clings to walls and ceilings and throws stars. The only controls are left mouse to dash to cursor, and right mouse to throw stars.
Nukebots, of course, contain nuclear explosives inside. So killing one will cause an explosion that will hopefully help you, but might kill you too. And all those yellow blips are the absurd amount of firepower the robots currently have. They also have way too much life, or you do way too little damage. The color of the Nukebot tells you its abilities. The less green it has, the faster it moves, the less red, the more life, the less blue, the faster it shoots (I know less is weird, but there’s logic to it, I think).
This design supports absolutely any colors you want, not just the official ones! Of course, black=walls, white=space, and FF00FF=player start. But other than that, it’s all robots. And those big colorful blocks make for an awful lot of robots.
I’ve randomly titled my entry PaintWorld! So far everything but the gameplay works.
The level selection screen, my first-ever real GUI!
Gameplay at the moment – nothing really.
The winnerdom screen is to remain a secret!
And you may or may not be playing as a robot/kitty/both.
Yay, i actually have something working. Next task, add a hero.
General laziness prevented me from making an actual game, but here are a couple of levels I made, inspired by some games I’ve been playing lately. See if you can guess which ones:
Tags: level
Well, my game is approaching what might be called completion. The only thing left for it to be playable are sound effects/music. To be totally honest, I didn’t start 100% from scratch — I used the chimp.py example from the pygame 1.8 documentation as a starting place. I’ve never done this before, and didn’t feel like mucking around for hours to get the most basic things working. Later, I also grabbed pymike’s ezmenu to build my menus, though I made a few changes, and I’m considering rewriting with my own menu to add a nice background and stuff.
Sadly, my game doesn’t really work well with any of the included levels from eugman, but I’ve built three levels myself in the meantime. Here’s some screenies:
Tags: Gilvado, Micro Racers, mini ld 4
I’m still working on my game, but in the meantime here’s my level, which I have finished.
A small cave-type thing. You start in the top-midsection, and have to get under the lava by going through the water. Something like that.
I think I want my game to work a little like Hamumu’s. There will be black for walls, white for open space, start/end goals, and some other things, but if the color doesn’t match those, the properties of the open space are modified, such as slowing you down or speeding you up, that kind of thing.
My entry for miniLD 4. Find Jesus. Apply Chainsaw. Yes, it’s terribly offensive.
http://jemgine.omnisu.com/2008/10/05/chainsaw/
Timelapse : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-ZAR8iBMVI