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Indie Game Development Discussion Thread | Of Being Professionally Poor

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D

DrNeroCF

Member
Mabef said:
Have any of you gone through the process of animating vector art (Illustrator) for Unity?

My team is using Unity 4.5 and we basically can't use plugins/extensions (weird educational reasons). So, my current method is sprite sheets: by hand, I'm arranging my vector art into a grid formation in Illustrator, hand-editing each "frame" of the grid, then exporting the image as a sprite sheet into Unity.

I really wish I could just move anchor points around, on a timeline. Please oh please tell me the easy solution I'm missing
Click to expand...

For Nefarious, we're using TK2D for sprite sheets in Unity, but animating everything in Flash. I'm exporting as video and using QuickTime to export as a series of images (exporting as images from Flash doesn't animate nested MovieClips). The workflow is a bit of a pain over just running the game in Flash, but I'm primarily a Flash developer so I have a very basic swf that runs the animations immediately.

I'd definitely recommend Flash over Illustrator, though the line work's not going to be as smooth. If you really want to be fancy you can try Toon Boon, but I haven't been able to wrap my head around the interface yet.
 
J

Jobbs

Banned
Ashodin said:
Let's learn together!
Click to expand...

talk to me when this is done, who knows what I'll be up for. I still have a lot to do.

think next time I do a game it'll be in a cell shaded style.

like, this project is a pretty big project, and it also spans a big learning curve for me, so I've learned and improved in some areas but I'm still stuck abiding to systems and setups and art styles I've already committed to. it'll be cool starting fresh next time.

you can look at the project and see all kinds of gunk and slop in everything from the coding to the art style and just peel back the layers and look back in time, because I started it a like a year ago when I knew so much less about just about everything. but it's all still there.
 
M

Mystic River

Member
friken said:
lol.... love it! I'd love to put in an easter egg for Shwip :)



----
Last few days I've been working on planetary battles. Pretty happy w the result. The camera system worked nicely for zoom/pan:

GrizzledLameBlackrussianterrier.gif
Click to expand...

I am thinking about easter eggs now!.. after looking at the screenshot if people here are interested we can put each other games things as easter eggs :) that would be fun to do, once I have more of my game completed and working, I am planning to ask people permission to add some kind of easter eggs from their games. Maybe the soccer game animation in one of my screen monitors will be nice once I have my bar working, that would be fun! and fricken's space game somewhere else too, and have a scarf guy in the apparel shop? hehe.. I will try my best to honor as many people as I can , since I will need a lot of characters when visiting planets I can add a lot of easter eggs there
 
F

friken

Member
Mystic River said:
I am thinking about easter eggs now!.. after looking at the screenshot if people here are interested we can put each other games things as easter eggs :) that would be fun to do, once I have more of my game completed and working, I am planning to ask people permission to add some kind of easter eggs from their games. Maybe the soccer game animation in one of my screen monitors will be nice once I have my bar working, that would be fun! and fricken's space game somewhere else too, and have a scarf guy in the apparel shop? hehe.. I will try my best to honor as many people as I can , since I will need a lot of characters when visiting planets I can add a lot of easter eggs there
Click to expand...

I love the idea of easter eggs from eachother's games. I think I'll sneak in an alien race who makes indie games and keeps showing you screenshots of the newest thing he's working on :)

---

Benev vs Krex at a Gas Giant:
CooperativeBleakHeifer.gif
 
P

Pehesse

Member
Mystic River said:
I am thinking about easter eggs now!.. after looking at the screenshot if people here are interested we can put each other games things as easter eggs :) that would be fun to do, once I have more of my game completed and working, I am planning to ask people permission to add some kind of easter eggs from their games. Maybe the soccer game animation in one of my screen monitors will be nice once I have my bar working, that would be fun! and fricken's space game somewhere else too, and have a scarf guy in the apparel shop? hehe.. I will try my best to honor as many people as I can , since I will need a lot of characters when visiting planets I can add a lot of easter eggs there
Click to expand...

I absolutely second that, I even think I had mentioned the idea at some point. If someone wants something from Honey to cameo in their game (or something from their game to cameo in Honey), I'm all for it!

Jobbs said:
you can look at the project and see all kinds of gunk and slop in everything from the coding to the art style and just peel back the layers and look back in time, because I started it a like a year ago when I knew so much less about just about everything. but it's all still there.
Click to expand...

I know the feeling... I've considered (and did, to some extent) going back to those earlier code segments to clean them up, but since it's working already, I'm not sure it'd actually be more efficient, or simply an opportunity to break more stuff, and then having to fix it all over again... so for now, I'm leaving all as is until it proves faulty - and as you say, it's a fun history lesson, too :-D

Rubikant said:
(snip)
Click to expand...

That's some very interesting info, thanks a lot!



I haven't been posting a lot lately, and progress has been slow since I'm having back pains again so I'm cutting on "sitting in front of CPU" time... So, yeah, don't forget to pick the right chair, sit right, take breaks and exercise those back muscles before it's too late. I'm hoping to finish the first grapple stuff today for SS... we'll see how that goes!
 
M

Mystic River

Member
lashman said:
well, here's the second (and last) part of my low-poly fruit endeavour :p I think they turned out pretty good ... what do you guys think?
Click to expand...

banana thought a little bit squared and lemon look very good, kiwi has something in the green portion that makes me think is not kiwi, but still looks delicious!
 
I

Ito

Member
Damn lashman now I want to slice fruit


JUOoWVy.png


When I'm done with the main character's new animations, the very first thing I'll do is finishing the animations for the horse, and implementing the mechanics.

Animating a horse is one of the most challenging things I'm going to confront for a while.
 
J

jimmythepage

Member
I hope it's not against the rules to post about a flash game on a portal like Armor Games, if it is I'll just edit or let the post be deleted.

Anyway, AG has published a small project I had in the works with my team, it's a retro style roguelike that has started as a university assignment on GBA,
since we had fun developing it and there were some nice gameplay features we decided to make it a "proper" game.

http://armorgames.com/play/16057/ars-tactica-prelude

LJ2mQFg.png

6SthWbl.jpg
Click to expand...

It's getting hammered bad because of the difficulty (which was specifically asked to be set like this, the game was easier originally) and the graphics (I think?),
and while there are few that liked it and we want to learn by our mistakes and hopefully some constructive criticism will appear from the players,
like this one that even made a play through video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30VdNc30Rac
 
M

_machine

Member
Pehesse said:
I know the feeling... I've considered (and did, to some extent) going back to those earlier code segments to clean them up, but since it's working already, I'm not sure it'd actually be more efficient, or simply an opportunity to break more stuff, and then having to fix it all over again... so for now, I'm leaving all as is until it proves faulty - and as you say, it's a fun history lesson, too :-D
Click to expand...
Me too, especially when looking at some older projects I feel like trying out and making a plan for finishing them. Usually I end up thinking I should probably make it all from scratch again and then just end up working again on my main project (not that it's a bad thing, but it'd be nice to finish at least one of my solo projects this year).

lashman said:
well, here's the second (and last) part of my low-poly fruit endeavour :p I think they turned out pretty good ... what do you guys think?
Click to expand...
Looks really, really tasty. I think I need to go grab some fruits from the fridge...
 
P

Pehesse

Member
tumblr_ned5rc3u421s5t3fko1_1280.png


So, got it done! The grappling idle, colored and put in. It also worked right out of the box, which is pretty rare, usually I have to fiddle with the animation's origin points and frame timings to get them right!
 
M

Mystic River

Member
Added inventory!, each character will have an inventory, the use of the inventory will allow for example a doctor to carry many medical kits, and medical kits do have a consumption level depending on the use, food also use space so be wise to choose your equipment when going outside , more weapons, armor, or other things to choose from.

Inventory.png


Recently I had my crew feed prisoners but found that they were actually picking only one food ration at a time so it was taking a lot of travel time spent when I had many prisoners, so an inventory allows them now to carry multiple rations and distribute them properly.
 
M

_machine

Member
So if anyone here reads Indie Game Magazine, we got featured in the Screenshot Monthly of the November issue. Feels really great to have our first real press mention, but hopefully it's just the first of many to come :)

Here's a little something for the #screenshotsaturday:
sss480sty.jpg
Click to expand...
We've just had some lengthy discussions on how we're going to be taking the graphics forward and with a new environment artist we should be able to improve it quite a bit in over half a year. I'll try to get some concept art for you guys view when we've settled on something.
 
J

Jacksinthe

Banned
As always, good stuff, folks. My new PC parts should be here Tuesday and I'm off Wednesday for post surgery checkup so imma be home all day after that building and installing things. In the meantime this thread keeps me drooling!
 
I

Ito

Member
I laughed when that poor dude got kicked. Why does that happen? Time over?



Also, since you like comparisons, Hibari idle animations: old vs. new.

GorgeousEqualKentrosaurus.gif
zfNyS4l.gif
 
S

Sizzerb

Neo Member
It's a round based game, you need to shovel pieces of coal into the furnace to keep it hot.

The better you do the more points you earn. The hammer is spring loaded, so everytime you make a mistake it moves back up and once you have made 20 mistakes its round over and it kicks you into the furnace!
 
F

Five

Banned
Ito said:
I laughed when that poor dude got kicked. Why does that happen? Time over?



Also, since you like comparisons, Hibari idle animations: old vs. new.
Click to expand...

The animation itself is much better, but why is the image blurrier? The lines on the left are much sharper. Is that just GameMaker being stupid or an artifact of the capture perhaps?
 
S

Sizzerb

Neo Member
Abe Bly said:
The animation itself is much better, but why is the image blurrier? The lines on the left are much sharper. Is that just GameMaker being stupid or an artifact of the capture perhaps?
Click to expand...

To me it looks like the aspect ratio is off on the character so it will get blurry depending on how its compressed? The before character looks a bit wider
 
I

Ito

Member
Abe Bly said:
The animation itself is much better, but why is the image blurrier? The lines on the left are much sharper. Is that just GameMaker being stupid or an artifact of the capture perhaps?
Click to expand...

Probably Game Maker. It sometimes gets blurry when I exit the full screen mode.
 
F

Five

Banned
Ito said:
Probably Game Maker. It sometimes gets blurry when I exit the full screen mode.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I trust GameMaker's pixel interpolation about as far as I can throw it. I figured that's probably what it was. I know this probably doesn't help because my art style is different and animating with Spine affords me much smaller sprite sheets, but I have all art that gets interpolated in-game doubled in size on the texture page and drawn at half scale at run time. Hopefully this doesn't become a big issue for you.

Sizzerb said:
To me it looks like the aspect ratio is off on the character so it will get blurry depending on how its compressed? The before character looks a bit wider
Click to expand...

I think what you're seeing is that she stands slightly taller with her legs straighter.
 
R

Ranger X

Member
Abe Bly said:
Yeah, I trust GameMaker's pixel interpolation about as far as I can throw it. I figured that's probably what it was. I know this probably doesn't help because my art style is different and animating with Spine affords me much smaller sprite sheets, but I have all art that gets interpolated in-game doubled in size on the texture page and drawn at half scale at run time. Hopefully this doesn't become a big issue for you.



I think what you're seeing is that she stands slightly taller with her legs straighter.
Click to expand...


Getting a sharp image with GameMaker sometimes is tricky. And the results aren't the same depending the graphic card you use. Some interpret GameMaker where some instances it needs interpolation and sometimes not.
You want something even funnier? I had pixel perfect display at all time in my game. Then I updated the drivers of graphic card ('cause it was since a long while, oh well) and then now my game was suddendly looking interpolated. lol (all of this is with gamemaker's interpolation function turned off!!!!)

The only way I could find to keep my game pixel perfect on any display was to scale my game by the "port on screen". (wich is often a "no-no" from the people in the community but to hell with them, it works fine when you know what you doing)
 
F

Five

Banned
Ranger X said:
Getting a sharp image with GameMaker sometimes is tricky. And the results aren't the same depending the graphic card you use. Some interpret GameMaker where some instances it needs interpolation and sometimes not.
You want something even funnier? I had pixel perfect display at all time in my game. Then I updated the drivers of graphic card ('cause it was since a long while, oh well) and then now my game was suddendly looking interpolated. lol (all of this is with gamemaker's interpolation function turned off!!!!)

The only way I could find to keep my game pixel perfect on any display was to scale my game by the "port on screen". (wich is often a "no-no" from the people in the community but to hell with them, it works fine when you know what you doing)
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm sure it's even more of a hassle when you're trying to do clean pixel art. I've never tried to do that, so I wouldn't know.
 
O

OldmanAndroid

Member
Ito said:
Damn lashman now I want to slice fruit


JUOoWVy.png


When I'm done with the main character's new animations, the very first thing I'll do is finishing the animations for the horse, and implementing the mechanics.

Animating a horse is one of the most challenging things I'm going to confront for a while.
Click to expand...

Looks great! I can only imagine how difficult animating a horse would be.

Hmmm, horse is showing a lot of skin though, can't you cover him up a bit more?
:)
 
D

Decider

Member
I've seen some highly variable timeframes from application to approval when applying to be an independent Wii U developer. I applied back in early September but have yet to hear back from Nintendo, although I've read that it can take up to six months to receive a response. Do they usually phone first, or e-mail if you don't answer?
 
B

Blizzard

Banned
Decider said:
I've seen some highly variable timeframes from application to approval when applying to be an independent Wii U developer. I applied back in early September but have yet to hear back from Nintendo, although I've read that it can take up to six months to receive a response. Do they usually phone first, or e-mail if you don't answer?
Click to expand...
I got called first. I don't remember exactly how long it took, but it may depend on how the demand is going or how busy they are, for all I know.

*edit*
Jobbs said:
made this change, since this sort of thing seems to be popular. plus, after I did it, it feels like I almost missed out on something totally obvious.

http://www.gfycat.com/LastWhichAfricanjacana
Click to expand...
Stupid question, is the change the damage number popups? I'm not sure I've identified the new feature.
 
J

Jobbs

Banned
Blizzard said:
Stupid question, is the change the damage number popups? I'm not sure I've identified the new feature.
Click to expand...

The numbers have always been there, and are easily toggled if you don't like them. What I changed is I made it so the big spiker can crush the little spikers. Enemy-enemy interaction seem popular with people.
 
A

Ashodin

Member
Jobbs said:
The numbers have always been there, and are easily toggled if you don't like them. What I changed is I made it so the big spiker can crush the little spikers. Enemy-enemy interaction seem popular with people.
Click to expand...

If only there was an animation change as he runs into the others, like a "swipe away irritating things in my way" anim.
 
B

Blizzard

Banned
Jobbs said:
The numbers have always been there, and are easily toggled if you don't like them. What I changed is I made it so the big spiker can crush the little spikers. Enemy-enemy interaction seem popular with people.
Click to expand...

Ahh, cool! And yeah, if you need buzzwords for advertising you can check the "emergent gameplay" one now. :D
 
F

Five

Banned
Jobbs said:
The numbers have always been there, and are easily toggled if you don't like them. What I changed is I made it so the big spiker can crush the little spikers. Enemy-enemy interaction seem popular with people.
Click to expand...

Have you considered having the gibs take attack direction into account? Having the big spiker charge through the little guy and having the little guy explode backwards feels off to me. I would think that the blood would mostly spurt that way since the disruption was first there, so air pressure would cause it to eject backwards, but then the chunks with more mass would be pushed in the same general direction as the impact mass (big spiker in this case).

I had to program directions into the hitboxes in my game so they could be properly blocked with directional shields, but it's still a fairly simple system. The direction options are up, down, left, right and omni (for explosions and similar). So if an object is destroyed by a LEFT hitbox, the gibs generated might for example pick a direction between the 135° and 215° range.
 
J

Jobbs

Banned
Abe Bly said:
Have you considered having the gibs take attack direction into account? Having the big spiker charge through the little guy and having the little guy explode backwards feels off to me. I would think that the blood would mostly spurt that way since the disruption was first there, so air pressure would cause it to eject backwards, but then the chunks with more mass would be pushed in the same general direction as the impact mass (big spiker in this case).

I had to program directions into the hitboxes in my game so they could be properly blocked with directional shields, but it's still a fairly simple system. The direction options are up, down, left, right and omni (for explosions and similar). So if an object is destroyed by a LEFT hitbox, the gibs generated might for example pick a direction between the 135° and 215° range.
Click to expand...

you've actually identified a bug, where the creature's gibs were spawning as if the player had killed it. :)

Ashodin said:
If only there was an animation change as he runs into the others, like a "swipe away irritating things in my way" anim.
Click to expand...

It's a nice thought but unlikely, I have to settle for "good enough" sometimes when there's so many things left to do, and animating things like that is pretty difficult/time consuming.
 
D

Decider

Member
Blizzard said:
I got called first. I don't remember exactly how long it took, but it may depend on how the demand is going or how busy they are, for all I know.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I gave them my mobile number when registering but I get all sorts of missed calls on it and I can't really check it when I'm at work, so I've been concerned about potentially missing them if they phoned.

I've been thinking about e-mailing them to check in, as someone on the Unity forums seemed to believe that this helped to expedite their approval. I suppose I just don't want to spent the next three to four months wondering and waiting for a call that mightn't come!
 
J

Jacksinthe

Banned
Jobbs said:
talk to me when this is done, who knows what I'll be up for. I still have a lot to do.

think next time I do a game it'll be in a cell shaded style.

like, this project is a pretty big project, and it also spans a big learning curve for me, so I've learned and improved in some areas but I'm still stuck abiding to systems and setups and art styles I've already committed to. it'll be cool starting fresh next time.

you can look at the project and see all kinds of gunk and slop in everything from the coding to the art style and just peel back the layers and look back in time, because I started it a like a year ago when I knew so much less about just about everything. but it's all still there.
Click to expand...
I started a Devlog on the company's site. Haven't put much time into it for this project but have a bunch of Unity related topics lined up for the next project. Not teaching how to code, that's on everyone else, but there are a lot of unknown tricks and misunderstood components I will be going over. Unity now has a few more editor customizations you can script for to help with workflow. I intend to cover these, as well. Even something as simple as orthographic camera size gets people confused, which I already covered. I'll be doing a ton more after the new year. Feel free to pick my brain when ready. I dont have time to teach C# but any questions will also help me choose which topics to cover in future devlog posts: http://absinthegames.com/category/devlog/
 
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