Game Dev Thread 2

Previous thread I released an early version of Cat Weapon for you guys to test out. A lot of it has placeholder stuff, so judge it for it is now than as a game in general.

mega.nz/#!yEZVyQ4K
Description key: !wpjmHofTlGdM4Nfp8QBugyh7ou7tJqNXja0VSeLtB4Y

Other urls found in this thread:

smwcentral.net/?p=viewthread&t=82116
bin.smwcentral.net/u/28099/SMW+-+OTM.zip
youtube.com/watch?v=cvpyLWf5X8Y
gamejolt.com/games/cat-weapon-early-prototype-version/160379
thetagames.itch.io/dienworlds
twitter.com/SFWRedditVideos

I remember your thread.

Again, your prototype is exactly what I feared for you. Even imagining that all the art assets were in place and finalized, your game is still an utterly generic platformer. That and your idea for a kid friendly game starring a cat person carrying a real ass gun in his belt buckle like some gangsta ass nigga will not go over well if you were serious about it.

I don't mean to put you down, but you have to give people a reason to play your game. In today's modern saturated market, being just "good" isn't going to cut it. Like, I played one indie game from a local dev that's on steam and mobile and it was also a one-life platformer channeling meat boy but with gadgets and items. At the very least it had the appeal of vertical-downward focused platforming and the narrative focus of a strong rival character that you often had to race against, along with a good story.

I don't really know what to say. You certainly got a prototype there. Technical issues aside which are obviously a product of being a prototype, I dunno what to tell you. I don't really see any compelling feature or angle as of yet.

Woo

Also are we supposed to be able to beat the giant red square or is that as far as you got up to?

The game needs to have a quirk or something interesting that'll keep people playing. If it's just a barebones platformer you're going to face a lot of criticism.

Quality should be first priority, and I suggest you to go to the amateur game dev thread on /vg/

If I want to advertise my musical and art abilities to indie devs but I dont know where to start

Somebody post the edit of OP's pic from last thread.

If you don't mind working for mobile indie devs, toucharcade has a forum called "Services for Trade" which is literally just that.

Wew lad

>legitimate criticism
>wew lad
Some real quality dialogue here. Not even him.

The one with the tits or the one where they turn into niggers?

Just expanding on what has been said about having a quirk, it doesn't have to be a gameplay gimmick. Drakengard 3 for example, has pretty much utterly generic PS2-esque gameplay. It's well known and regarded however for having really interesting and unconventional story/characters as well as good music. The platformer I mentioned largely sticks out because it does a kinda ham-fisted role-reversal thing with the story, the princess is the main villain and you startat the top of her tower and must escape from it downwards.

So remember, the most important thing is that you need to give us a reason to play your game. It can be an interesting or novel gameplay quirk, it can be good writing/story, it good be a really comfy art style/atmosphere, but it needs SOMETHING otherwise it will be forgotten and ignored among other games that might be worse than yours, but have something interesting about them.

I've decided that Steam should not be my first place to release this game. When I've finished with it on PC, I want to port it to IOS (maybe Android too) as that is the market you recommended to me last thread. Game Maker supports IOS and Android development, so that's a plus side to using the engine.

Other than that though, I managed to make the boss fight some what interesting. Instead of shooting him to death, you find another way of beating him. He's basically super easy if you know what to do.

Just release it on itch.io for PC unless you're some kind of faggot worried about people pirating your game.

Notice the blocks above?

I sat down and played this. I like that you can wall jump. I like that you can shoot while on ladders. Put in more weapons and variations on how you fire (twin shot for example).

Elaborate more on enemy behavior too. Blocks that just go from left to right are good but start introducing contrast. Enemies that jump, scary ass enemies that follow you around, etc. I'm seeing potential in the way this plays because I'm getting a Megaman feel from it.

blah blah if object is this close in the vicinity to player object, do some freaky shit

Can you release free games here? I'm planning for this game to be free.

That's a solid game plan and one that many indie devs do. There's certainly no harm in releasing it on Steam alongside other platforms, indeed in a very minor way releasing on PC first might increase your game's "credibility" as to some people there's a difference between "this PC game is a shitty mobile port" and "this mobile game is a decent PC port". I'd say it's fine to release on Steam first, but also aim to give it a decent port to mobile. When the mobile port is done, make a thread on toucharcade, there's a decent amount of anti-free2play people there that give feedback to devs regularly

Really? Well you didn't really communicate it since all previous enemies were only killed by bullets and I didn't see anything special about the boss arena. I assume in the finished product you'll indicate it more clearly.

Yes but since no other block in the game was anything other than a platform I didn't think to check there. That dog game guy had a similar problem in their game. In his second level you were supposed to avoid humans throwing rock and get to the goal, but the tutorial gave two ways of dealing with human opponents and the area you start looks like a fight arena. The third level was a puzzle where you were meant to use a dig spot to lure a human out then bark to scare the second, but the "diggable spot" texture was repeated in the same area as nothing but floor decoration and the tutorial didn't explain barking at all.

Your game is probably too early to worry about stuff like that but still, it's something you should keep in mind moving forward.

Yes it's essentially Bandcamp but for indie games. You can set up pay want you want or make it free.

Been making a shitty game where you cut out letters from magazines in order to make ransom notes. It grades you on your performance and there's a loose story going on in the background, but it's utterly shallow. It's basically let's play bait.

What else do I add to make sure I get maximum middleschooler lunch money?

Thank you for the critism. In the final game, all of what you just played in the early prototype is the tutorial stage. I will have messages popping up at certain points telling the player what they can in levels, as well as give hints during the boss fights.

I will also make those blocks more obvious. When I make a texture for the blocks, it will be a darker shade or might have a few noticeable crack in it.

...

sounds rad

make it funny, give it a nice presentation (doesn't have to be slick, it can just look like Papers Please), maybe has some sort of progression like said game. That's an idea, instead of managing an unseen family you... do something else? Maybe you get to see police report responses that are different depending on how nice your ransom notes are?

That sounds really cool. I can't wait to see free shots or gameplay soon.

Oh cool, thank you

Was AGDG mean to you guys or something?

Not that I'm criticizing, they're a bunch of salty cunts over there.

*screenshots

That's a really odd shape for a beehive

Nah we're just a bunch of v devs who avoid that cesspool

Yeah it's going to be completely humor driven.
It's been super easy to code, but the hard part is thinking all the ways I can make the game react to what people write.
It knows if you swear, it knows if you misspell, it knows if you don't follow the general idea of what the kidnappers want you to write.
It knows if you try to use random capitalization to leave a hidden message.. Not much else.

Is that cat a fucking gangbanger?

I think it's more just slow for these fellas. And the last thing that general needs is more shitposting to stir up conversation.

Good man. For maximum teaching, put those special breakable blocks or whatever in the tutorial stage in a very obvious and simple way. That way you know the player has learned that mechanic exists and has experienced it for themselves, so you can be a bit more confident with putting it in more subtle areas later. Players learn better by doing things than reading text prompts, especially when you look at shitty Let's Players. Among the ones that ignore text and cutscenes, if you make them perform an action then at least they'll know they can do it as opposed to only telling them about it.

Obviously don't go overboard like taking control away from the player for a long time and making them do the action x times before letting them continue, that might be too much.

They do a lot more shit posting than developing.

That looks fucking delicious

Ooh, you could do a branching story with that. Do you totally help the kidnappers and get a cut on the ransom or do you try to undermine them by sending hidden messages? Will the police make it publicly known that you're secretly helping them or not? Will the kidnappers catch? If you help them, will they turn on you anyway? Such suspense. You could make it a set storyline or like a randomly generated on each time with those ideas.

gamedev threads on Sup Forums have several advantages over agdg

firstly, Sup Forums is talking about video games for once
secondly, the OC you post has an audience of actual players

Bump

Well you can post some goddamn music for starters.

Damn, just wanted to say props to this user for giving excellent advice and constructive feedback beyond the usual "lol ur game sux." And you're exactly right, every indie game needs a gimmick to stand out, something to make it unique and thus successful.

So, I'm the user who decided to make a fetish game inspired by the old OPs where you capture slutty monster girls and level them up along various paths in order to build up your invincible army/harem and take over the world.

Here's the latest version of the WIP sprite I last posted. There's also a non-thick base body and six separate breast sizes at the moment. I'm going to be adding in a full spectrum of thickness and muscle later. I think I'm going to move on to animations next (wish me luck).

How do you like it?

How do you all feel about looking at character designs? It's for a game I'm working on, but I'm still mostly in the outlining stage (basic conceptual shit and just laying out the thing in RPG Maker). I'm asking because I don't have anything as far as game assets to shill yet so I'm unsure.

Looks alright.

>greenskin
>black short bob with straight cut bangs
>thicc
You're pushing all the right buttons user.

I wouldn't mind seeing them.

I made this recently.

Are romhacks welcome?

Middle to end is a bit jagged.
Beginning is smooth and nice. Keep it up user

Don't see why not. Post them.

Are you the guy who's making that cute SMW hack?

post dev music

Alright.

Anyway this isn't exactly my best work not that my best work is good anyway but who cares as it's basically a rather fast sketch.

The character's a sort of dancer class, hence the wear. The second set is me messing around with a not very well developed theoretical, but I saw a backless design somewhere and wanted to try it out.

Most of it'll be lost being downsized to rpg maker sprite size but hey.

I'm working on a Super Mario World romhack called "Super Mario World: Over the Mountain". Mario has to climb a mountain to reach Bowser. The story is pretty shallow and is pretty much an excuse to have level diversity. It's nothing crazy and plays pretty much exactly like the original SMW, but I'm really putting a lot of care into aesthetics and level design. I have a short demo of it, and I'm releasing a slightly longer demo in a few days.

Hack thread: smwcentral.net/?p=viewthread&t=82116

Demo download: bin.smwcentral.net/u/28099/SMW+-+OTM.zip

Nah. It is an SMW hack, but I haven't ever posted it here.

It sounds like a pretty cool hack. I haven't played rom hacks in a long time, but maybe I might try playing more of them some time soon.

youtube.com/watch?v=cvpyLWf5X8Y

thred ded

why don't you go to /agdg/

y don't u asshole

Here's a fresh gobber. This is one of the positions you can bang in.

You're pretty good, user. Her left arm looks a little weird, but that probably doesn't really matter for concept art. It might really help in transferring it to sprite format if you coloured it first, since colour and shading is what really matters with really small sprites.

Is this new terraria gameplay leak

do you have a site?

i would love to play this game

> dress cat

Thanks for your interest, user. I don't have a site yet, but I might put one together once I've got a little more to show. In the meantime, I'm going to keep shitting up Sup Forums game dev threads and then probably move to /weg/ on /aco/ once these die off.

QUICK, GIVE ME SOME GAME IDEAS

You play as a millipede that has lost all but 2 of your legs. You have to travel the world at an excruciatingly slow pace, collecting legs so that you can speed up. When you collect all your legs you get eaten by a bird

A game where you inflate a blue bear.

An animal shelter where you get animals forgotten on the street, take care of them, do events to get donations and try to find them happy homes.

wHEN I THINK doBSON CAN'T DO ANYTHING MORE RETARDED HE STRAIGHT UP STEALS ANIMATIONS FROM sHANTAE

Also fuck caps lock

srpg about your farm and the animals you raise which you have to use to fight against other breeders.

a.k.a notpokemon srpg

I'm going to make an SMT clone, give me ideas.

too many of you guys these days

and every single one of you diss each other work

A game where you lose no matter what. Nice.

Ew pedo she's like 9 years old in the two day old canon I made.

Wow, that looks like shit. He clearly does not understand the aspects of Shantae's design that make those animations work. The way he thickened the torso and changed the trousers to a fitted, non-genie variety make her like like a floppy, genderless thalidomide baby with two melons in its shirt.

Also why are her pants made of plastic and why is she still wearing genie shoes other than the fact that Dobson is a talentless unoriginal complacent hack.

...

> 9 year old

MOOODDDS

Updated link for Cat Weapon: gamejolt.com/games/cat-weapon-early-prototype-version/160379

>9 years old
>which is over 50 cat years

>Quality should be first priority, and I suggest you to go to the amateur game dev thread on /vg/
/agdg/ is shit. i mean, people started to make game dev threads on this saltmine of a board because the shitposting was THAT bad on /vg/.

I know people hate that place, but reddit has a few good places to discuss game development.

YOU AGAIN?

Yes me again.

She's the equivalent of a 9 year old girl

truth spoken
quarter of the /agdg/'s content is /r9k/-tier memes about girlfriends, never finishing games and daily exercise, another quarter is some e-celeb drama, yet another quarter is memes about nodevs, enginedevs and other worthless shit and the final quarter is actual progress display
i really wish that general wasn't as shit as it is, reddit pisses me off even more and i don't know where else to go other than trying to get into some twitter/tumblr circles

all amateur game dev communites are cancerous narcissistic circlejerks, the best you can do is find a group of developer friends

Would you play a game where you're the chosen hero who shall lead your army to victory, and you use your body to encourage your troops?

Is it a good game?

depend on how good the art is.
and also how fun the gameplay is first.
If 3D, hell no though.

Stop shilling your memegame as Devthread and fuck off already holy shit

If you're gonna make dev threads, please for the love of god at least ACT like its not just so you can promote your own game. Use this OP, or ANYTHING that isn't related to exactly 1 project, PLEASE.

Not him but personally I don't have an issue with that. I would probably rather these threads have OPs like you said, but at the same time, they're still posting a game, and Sup Forums is about video games right?

That said, how do you guys feel about someone shilling their game on Sup Forums? Is it a cheap way of trying to market games, or is it an opportunity for feedback and actually talking about the game itself?

I finally decided to take a break on sprites and focus on coding again. Progress is finally being made.
I might have to find an artist someday.

Shilling is bound to happen, but if you're gonna shill, just do it outright, dont act as if dev threads can be used for that with "Dev thread: just about MY game, edition"

Posting your demo in a dev thread is perfect, everyone will have a chance to try it and give feedback, but that's because the thread is an "every dev's thread" and not "hey check out my game" It's just retarded that OP is making 0 effort to hide that he's made the threads solely for the purpose of posting his own game

remember to have a lot of ready dosh to lure them out, user.

good to hear. I think the coding is the most important part of game development since it leads to the actual game part of the game. I recommend just using programmer art honestly, and deciding/focusing on the art style later, to match the game.

That said I think it is possible to develop different aspects of a game at the same time. I think the issue is it's a balancing act that's much harder to balance when you're a one-man team.

My team is of 3 people, but I pretty much do all the heavy lifting myself by coding and spriting (the other two are a modeller and a designer/writer)

The main issue with my game is that the battle skills are tied to animation since you need timed hits, so I need to draw at least really shitty placeholders to code the attacks, the issue is that I feel like my art is rusted because I spent 4 months on hiatus due to life/classes.

So I'm just coding UI stuff and other smal things while I get back my drawing drive.

I see. Are you making a demo/prototype or are you making the full game? I can see why you might want an artist. Might be difficult though if you need to find someone who can do specific animations that match the gameplay.

Someone on /egg/ made a nice gif of my freeware game

thetagames.itch.io/dienworlds

not pixel art.

jej

>pixel platformer
I'm not interested

That first post was a great one and explained why. Even if it had a strong hook to get me interested, it'd STILL be a pixel platformer which is probably the last thing I'd want to play.

Now that looks interesting.