Fun With Sound

Well, with all this free time I have recently, I've worked quite a bit more on some Wii stuff. Currently porting Alien Puzzle to the Wii, with a much, much better level editor, better sounds, and more types of in-game objects. On top of that, I've been playing with the Wii Remote's speaker recently, and am currently looking into playing simple little notes. After that I'm hoping to take a crack at how to get actual sounds loaded (which I can do, they just come up with lots of static, and are horrible sounding due to the quality difference probably). Also got my game development library to be able to get the Wii Remote's orientation much more easily with one command.

On the subject of the Wii version of Alien Puzzle, I'm currently in the final parts of it (Wii Remote speaker sound being one of the few things that I'm working on with it) and am currently needing levels for it to include with the game. I am so far lacking creativity for them and would be happy with level donations. The new level format is a bit different, however I find it much easier to create levels with. Here is an example level file:

And here is the outcome:


To create a level, simply create a 20x13 RGBA png, with a transparent background. Then, place a the following pixels where you want your in-game object to appear:

R G B Object
0 255 0 Main Character Starting point
255 255 0 End of level teleporter
255 0 0 A bomb
0 255 255 A gem
0 0 255 A wall

There are other types as well, but I will show those later as they are a bit more complex, and are still being worked on. After creating your level, you can simply post the picture link in a comment below, and I'll run it through my converter (which will be made public with the release) and put it into the game when it's released. All levels will be able to be loaded via a file system, so there shouldn't really be a limit on how many levels you can have :)

Long time no post

So yeah, I've been really busy for quite some time now it seems. Finally got the chance to update this blog again. Recently I've been working on an actual Wii Game Engine (sorta). I'm hoping to have it help me make a ton of Wii games in little time (good ones at that). I have a small tech demo that shows off some of the features of it.

The big one that I want to highlight is the home button menu. In most games, this is done within the actual game function. IE: if your playing a game, it is not only checking for in game things, but it's also waiting for you to press the home button at that same part. I don't know if everyone does it that way, but I changed mine around. Instead, I set it up to run on a separate thread. For me it means I don't have to add in the code to have it wait for the button to be pressed each time, which saves me coding time. For people who play these games, it means that each one of them will have a behind the scenes mp3 player built in! This means that instead of listening to my sometimes awful music skills, you can plug in a flash drive or SD card, and listen to songs off of that. It currently let's you choose a song from a folder titled "mp3" or mp3s" (without the quotes). It will then play it continuously when you press 1 and stop when your go back to the home menu and press 2. On top of that, it will stop all other in game music, but keep the sound effects working. That's the big highlight for noticeable features in the engine.

Among other small things, it has a small physics portion, wifi support, a pretty good font engine, and a nice 2D graphics system featuring sprites, backgrounds, and regular old images :D It also has mp3 support, mod support, and raw support as well. Then you have the fat file system for USB and SD, and I'm pretty sure DVD-R (although I haven't been able to test that out too thoroughly). It also has very basic 3D support, but the only sort of big thing there is md5 model support (with animations :) ).

Feel free to comment about the game below, and also feel free to suggest simplistic game ideas too. I really wanna try and get this engine (?) setup properly. Not really sure what to call it as it's not quite a game engine is it? Anyways XD leave your comments below :D

Snow Day Game Download Link: Download

Alien Puzzle Version 4 Final

Here is the final version of Alien Puzzle. This project is now done, and will not be worked on anymore. I know there are bugs in it, but at this point, it works pretty well still. If any major ones are found, I may fix them, otherwise, I probably won't. Also, please beware that the game is split into 12 rar files, sorry about that, but I had to upload it that way.

Game Files: Downloads
Level Editor: Download

Updates, Updates, Updates!

Ok, I've been working pretty consistently on a better version of Alien Puzzle with sounds, sound effects, options, etc. etc. Thanks to North_McCormick over at palib, there is now an actual level editor program. It will be released with a different download link when the game is released. Currently, I am putting more levels into it, tweaking things here and there, etc. etc. so it should be released today, that is, if nothing comes up. This will most likely be the final release of the game, other then any to fix bugs and stuff, but this release will definitely be worth downloading. It has a ton more stuff then version 3 did (the one from neocompo) and makes me kinda disappointed that I couldn't get it all in before neocompo. Either way, keep your eyes peeled, there are some huge new changes coming to this game :)

-GEMISIS

Alien Puzzle

I took a chance and decided to enter neocompo with a DS game I made called Alien Puzzle. It's has a fairly basic concept: Navigate the level and collect as many points as possible, then get to the end of level teleporter. The catch? You can't stop moving, at all. If you hit a wall, you bounce right off it. The current version (Version 3) includes a settings saving feature, with settings made up of: preferred screen (can be switched in game by pressing start, then select), overall high score, username of the person with the high score (acquired via the Nintendo DS name), and some other saved settings that will be revealed later. On top of that, if you don't like the built in levels, you can make your own, but beware, currently there is no editor. The level format is as follows below in the description of the game. The neocompo post can be found here: http://www.neoflash.com/forum/index.php/topic,5731.0.html

Installation

Place the data folder in the root directory of your flash card, then run the game.

Level Format

Example(Included with the game):

pgg.txt:
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 -1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 0
1 0 3 1 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 1 2 0
1 32 0 2 1 1 0 2 2 2 0 0 0 1 2 0
1 0 0 0 1 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 0
1 0 0 0 1 1 2 0 4 0 0 0 0 1 0 0
1 2 5 1 0 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 0
1 1 1 0 0 1 2 0 2 2 1 0 0 1 2 0
1 0 0 0 0 1 2 0 0 2 1 0 0 1 2 0
1 0 0 0 0 1 0 2 2 2 1 0 0 0 0 0
1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 3 3 1 2 0

How to make a level:
Put the corresponding numbers in the corresponding area and then save it to a .txt file in data/pgg/custom/levels and it will appear in the file browser. You can use notepad to make the levels, and maybe other text editors (haven't tried any others). Picture those numbers as the DS screen, with each number represent an 16X16 spot on the screen. The definition of each number is below.

Custom Level Number Definitions:
-1 represents the player's starting position
Limit per level: 1
0's represent blank spots
Limit per level: none
1's represent walls
Limit per level: 60
2's represent points
Limit per level: 60
3's represent bombs
Limit per level: 60
a 4 represents the 1st portal
Limit per level: 1
a 5 represents the 2nd portal
Limit per level: 1
a 32 represents the end of level teleporter
Limit per level: 1

List of stuff:

Points: the brown fossils, these give you points
Bombs: the white bomb sprites, these will kill you
Blue Polygons: these are teleporters, the one with the F is the end of level teleporter, the other two you can use to move. But only one works, and you have to figure out which one.

In-game Objects

Points:

Bomb:

End of level Teleporter:

Other Teleporter:

Main Character:

Wall:

Download

New Computer?

So I've been dealing with tons of issues on my computer for about two years now, and after getting my wisdom teeth pulled, finally could not take it anymore. I went ahead and backed up all my projects, and reinstalled everything. But first, before I go into what I'm doing now, let me explain the whole story.

I had originally started with Windows XP about 3-4 years ago. It started as a family computer, until we each got our own, then it became mine. I was not good at all with computers at the time so when I hear about a new Operating System (Vista) I foolishly upgraded to it as soon as it came out. That's when all of the major problems started, such as programs using too much memory, general lag while online, etc. etc. I even had one program that would open up automatically at start up, and would just suck up memory and grow. It would eventually get so big as to prevent me from opening new programs.

Now back to the main topic: The fix. I have just spent the last two hours finishing up fixing my computer. I also spent about seven hours fixing it up yesterday. The fix: backup all my data, install XP over Vista (which wiped my hard drive clean), then installing Vista on top of XP. After that, I simply went online, reinstalled all the programs I needed for homebrew, movies, music, etc. So far, I am not experiencing any of the problems that I had before. No lag, no memory issues, just a cleaned up computer.

Now I'm not saying that this is guaranteed to work, I'm just saying that it worked really well for me. The main reason for this post is to just show how getting cleaning your computer like that can be a good thing. I'm also posting this to let you guys know why this upcoming week is going to be a bit slower, and to let you guys know that those previous issues were the main thing from keeping me from making more videos of those programs I make. Hopefully this will fix all of my problems, and I'll be able to do a lot more now, but I guess we will have to wait and see, now won't we?

-GEMISIS

"Webcam Fun" Video