Megabyte This!!
Feb/100
I’m proud to announce the development of a fully-fledged multiplayer FPS – “Megabyte This!!”
We’re using the superb Cube 2: Sauerbraten engine, so hopefully we can tear out all of their content and perform a complete conversion into what we’re doing. I’m working on it with a great group of guys, and we hope to have it done and dusted by April at the latest.
At the moment we’re doing level plans and generally getting our stuff together so we know exactly what assets we have to make before we can start churning out ‘real’ content. Personally I’ve been really enjoying just diving into the engine innards and, as well as tossing out all the (admittedly marvellous) content the Cube 2 guys have put in, fiddling with configuration and generally making the game our own.
The game concept is pretty simple – arena deathmatch (although we’ll also have CTF and perhaps a domination-style mode). Originally we had this enormous, sprawling idea about a computer virus that gradually gains sentience as it battles through various systems, avoiding anti-virus and destroying data and the outside world without really knowing it. It’s a great idea that we still really want to use, but for now time constraints dictate that we don’t spend time on AI and scripting. So multiplayer-only it is.
The backstory is still in there and flavours the whole game (virus vs anti-virus), but the context is now a sort of sequel to the un-made game, where the virus has multiplied to the point where it is in all-out war. Hopefully next year we’ll get a chance to revisit the original plot and make a prequel!
Content/previews coming soon!
Enlightenment
Jul/090
I’m feeling particularly pleased with myself after discovering a ‘magic trick’ for better-looking background art. Once I’ve exported the background from Flash, I drop it into The GIMP and open up the fabulous ‘Lomo’ colour correction filter (found on GIMP’s plugin pages).
Normally this would render the image in a manner which makes it look like it was taken with a cheap camera (motion blur, warping, colour changes etc), but it also has a purpose of very quickly creating a good looking vignette and highlight – much faster than doing them ‘by hand’. With this in my arsenal, I think the existing backgrounds are looking even more atmospheric.
See what you think.
Mysterious planet surface
Marvin's Room
In other news, writing dialogue for each area is a pain. I think I’m going to leave it until I’ve finished drawing all the background art, so I know exactly what is in each room.
Fun, Fun, Fun
Jul/090
I’m quite enjoying the transferring of my drafts into digital images, although I’m never quite sure of the final result. From what I’ve had said to me, no-one particularly loves their own work, and they certainly seem to look better if I leave the computer and come back a little later.
I hope others aren’t as prejudiced against them as I am.
Docking Bay
For those of you wondering what the hell that ‘P’ stands for, Marvin works for the ‘Pioneer Project’. And yes, this is the shuttle has had a little ding on the way in there. Unfortunately for the poor thing, it’s only the first of many.
Reception Area
There’s a quite elaborate system of colours to show you where things are (inspired by a similar thing in Half-Life). I think it looks quite good.
At Last!!
Jul/090
The background drafts are finally all done! It feels nice to put that behind me for now and get on with something new – not that I don’t enjoy designing background art, but things get very dry when you do them on their own for a long time.
Step two of my ‘master plan’ is in three parts – character design, item design and GUI design.
I’ve made a great start on the character design already today, doing seven of what I worked out to be thirty-one in total. It isn’t easy, given that my inability to draw people is in serious need of attention, but hopefully the more I do the better I will get, and I can go back and redraw the earlier characters later.
I never seem to have a problem with drawing cartoon heads and faces, so that is where I’ve been starting each character; the issues arise with drawing the bodies in a way that I’m happy with. I have to find a way to show a good amount of personality in each character but also make them simple enough that I can animate them with ease, so I’m going to be relying heavily on instantly recognisable body types and exaggerated features.
I’m glad I decided the game would have a cartoon style to it; having to draw one realistic character, let alone thirty-one, would leave me very flustered indeed.
On a final note, I haven’t yet named Marvin’s assistants. I’ll be posting a topic to Draglide nearer to production-time to see if anyone would like their name in the game, but if you’re reading this and I haven’t made an announcement about it, feel free to drop me a line.
A Good Way In
Jun/090
If, as I suspect, you haven’t been privy to my everyday comings-and-goings, you might be forgiven for thinking I’ve been slacking off a little. I’m glad to say that, if anything, it’s been quite the opposite.
I’m going to be piecing together the room plans for the last section of Marvin Cooper over the next two days, and then it’s full speed ahead once again – a light at the end of the tunnel, if you will – after spending so long doing backgrounds.
I have also decided very firmly that once the final background is drafted, I will put the game into feature lock as far as storyline and gameplay is concerned. I’ve noticed more and more that I’m adding in puzzles and extra bits and bobs where I feel the game feels ‘thin’, and it’s only making more work for me.
As far as Dr. Oddwobble is going, Mr. Blake has been hard at work animating that pepper pot, and I’m pleased to say it looks very good indeed.
Colours yet to be added
It’s been tweaked here and there since the above image was exported, but you get the idea.
David said he enjoyed doing that animation; which is handy, since there’s plenty more where that came from.
Check out his new blog over at http://david-blake.co.uk/blog/.
Finally, A Name!
Jun/090
I had a discussion with David at last about naming the heroically creamy dessert of Dr. Oddwobble’s Snack Shack. After a rally of options (including the hilarious-yet-unusable ‘Jon Long Dong’), we settled on Peter Pudden. At the very least it means I no longer have to refer to it as ‘the protagonist’, which is nice.
I drew up a draft of the friendly pepperpot who will be assisting Peter in the quest, and gave some suggestions to Mr. Blake about how to animate it – I’m looking forward to seeing how it comes out.
No, it doesn't have a name.
All this talk of Dr. Oddwobble might lead you to think I’m letting Marvin Cooper sit out for the moment – but don’t be fooled. I still spend a good amount of time each day scribbling room plans in, and I’ve now worked my way through a comfortable half or so.
Inside a mysterious temple
The scribbles underneath all my plans usually denote a general colour scheme to use and/or ideas for the music to accompany the room – but more on that later in development.
All this drawing of backgrounds for Dr. Oddwobble has got me thinking, though. Originally I planned to have Marvin Cooper as a retro-looking game, with aliased lines and a level of detail reminiscent of the old LucasArts classics, but now I look at the smooth, cartoon style of the rooms I have done and wonder if I should do that instead. On one hand, old-skool graphics are getting a bit clichéd, but on the other hand animating characters and objects in that style is so much easier.
I suppose the only thing to do is carry out some animation tests in both styles and see which I can more feasibly do.
I’ll keep you updated.
Back to Work
Jun/090
Well I had a lovely restful weekend, and I’m back and eager to get on with my project(s), so it’s time to put my nose back to the grindstone.
I had a good time today sitting in the sun sketching out some room drafts, which join the few I managed to get done on Friday night, although it is sometimes a challenge to get what I put to paper looking the way I want it to in my head. Nowhere is this more true than in the earlier rooms in the game, where I put – I admit – a little less detail into everything. As a result of my own haste to get the idea onto paper initially I’m left with very vague descriptions of these early locations, which is a problem.
Where the player should start the game and be greeted with a memorable location, I’m now a little worried that these first areas are going to lack that special something that makes the difference between a good adventure game and a great one. With this in mind, I’m definitely going to spend a little more time on these rooms than the later ones; certainly at the beginning of the process to convert the drafts to ‘real’ computer graphics.
In terms of workload for this coming week, I’ve spoken to my partner for my other project (Dr. Oddwobble’s Snack Shack), David Blake, and decided that we need to get things really moving for that. As a result, I’m going to be spending hopefully a couple of hours a day on that, and then whatever is left over on Marvin Cooper.
The top of a kitchen worktop
David and I already agreed that I would do the room backgrounds while he did the character art, meaning I’m going to be pushing to finish the major locations this week so that I can hand that over and the character designs can be made to fit them (by ‘major locations’ I mean the screens where the characters are going to need entire animation sets done, so different angles etc).
Getting Things Down
Jun/090
“Must get flame-retardant undies from assistant. Next area has even more elaborate flame traps.”
I think a key aspect of writing this blog is going to be my overcoming of an innate fear of revealing things.
I am generally a private person, and revealing what’s going to happen in my game is quite a difficult thing for me to do, but hopefully I will find a way of showing you what’s happening without also spoiling the game too much.
“Fall into deep pit. Land on head, but get up anyway.”
The whole game concept began on a nice sunny day; I sat outside with a pad of A4 paper and a pen, watching the ducks on the lake, and was experimenting with ideas for various space exploration themed games. Out of that came a character, nearly fully formed, who was a very British explorer. I have since described the game as the illegitimate love child of Indiana Jones and Red Dwarf.
I suppose I was heavily influenced by having fond memories of playing Space Quest as a child, and greatly enjoying the mixture of whacky humour and the kind of epic feeling that can only be conveyed by space exploration.
“Use hammer on button.”
I managed to write out a good 6 pages of plot, gradually getting a little more detailed as I went on. This, unfortunately, left the first page or two a little sparse on details, but I have since gone back and added them in with footnotes (scrawlings fitted in wherever I could around the page; often with a mess of arrows denoting where it should fit).
In one case, the 'note' was actually a small sketch.
So now I have this story all set out in front of me, I can start getting on with the real work.
