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Work in Progress / Curse of the Four Towers - DEMO RELEASED!

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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 26th May 2003 06:07
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Nerdsoft Creations proudly annouces the Demo Release of the Adventure RPG: Curse of the Four Towers

You can find a link to the demo here.
In the Demo, you can fight monsters in the entire First of the Four towers. Gain Loot, sell, and upgrade your gear accordingly.

Beat the first MiniBoss, and unlock many new weapon and armor selections.

Controls:

Right Mouse Click = Mouse Look
Left Mouse Click (while Right Clicking) = Move Forward
"S" key = Move Backward
"Z" key = Strafe Left
"X" key = Strafe Right


Known Bugs:

In battle, sometimes you will not hear or see an attack by the mob if you interrupt his attack sequence by hitting him. But the attack still goes through, and you will lose hit points.


This will be corrected in the next release.

Please let us know what you think and how fast this runs on your system.

Thanks,
-Nerdsoft Team
Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
Machine Specs: Athlon XP1800+, ATi Radeon 8500 64mb, 1GB RAM, Windows 2000 AdvSvr
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indi
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Posted: 26th May 2003 08:11
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24 - 45 fps

pentium III 933 win98se


reccomendations


* add a key to move forward instead of both mouse buttons


* choose another font or bundle the intended font within the package.
(looked very blocky)


* when in combat display the players magic and hitpoints I couldnt see them I liked the spikey spell but i think i ran out of mana / magic to keep casting it.


* add some sounds to flesh out areas, eg birds and wind in castle
screams / water drops and chains in dungeon


* add a display screen to help the player understand where it leads or what is beyond in areas.



other than that its coming along well
good work

http://www.lunarpixel.com

http://www.lunarpixel.com/dt/
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 26th May 2003 08:23
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Thanks for the feedback.

The font being used is Trebuchet MS (which I think is packaged with Win2K, Xp and such. Sorry, I thought it was a standard Windows Font since I don't install font packages.)

Drop this in your Windows\Fonts directory.

The MP/HP will display with that font.

Ambient sounds are definitely on the list for the release.

Where would I put the help screen you are referring to? Like "Exit" over the exit doors? "Tower #" on the different towers? Not too sure what you meant by that.

Thanks for the feed back!

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
Machine Specs: Athlon XP1800+, ATi Radeon 8500 64mb, 1GB RAM, Windows 2000 AdvSvr
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 26th May 2003 08:25
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One more thing:

Kensupen would like if you would do a System Check and let us know what fonts you DO have, for reference so we know what stock fonts are out there.

(We probably will do a sprite/font system if we can't find a happy one.)

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
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Andy Igoe
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Posted: 26th May 2003 08:53
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I look forward to having a go of this later, in the meentime this is the code I used in Episode V: Battle for Hoth to install the game font - it's fairly rudimentary.



Pneumatic Dryll
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Whisper Wind
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Posted: 26th May 2003 08:56 Edited at: 26th May 2003 09:02
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You've got a great looking game engine there! Great work on that. I have a few suggestions though:

Please change the interface! It has a sort of kiddy feel to it and I think a simple rework of the interface, the window position and color scheme, could really improve this!

Your dungeons should be a little more interesting. You have a good smooth movement in there so I see no reason why it should be all perfectly cut corners. Make some rooms at least or add some models. You could just pop in some of those crates and barrels into the dungeon and make some rooms and it would be 200% better! Maybe you could make them lootable too.

You should really change the controls to the wasd keys or the arrow keys, I found the controls a bit confusing in the beginning. Uniforming the keys to what normal first person games have is a good idea.

A few game play balancing issues. I found that ice spike spell was really cool but was dissapointed at how much mana it cost! I could only use it once and that was it. Instead, I suggest that you lower the damage and mana cost together, so that it is still better than a normal attack but you will be able to use it more often. Also, perhaps give the player some extra starting gold?

Other than that I thought it was great. The combat was well done and the models and animations were awsome! So were all of the items and shops. Keep up the good work!
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 26th May 2003 09:14 Edited at: 26th May 2003 09:15
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Pneumatic:
Thanks for the snippet. I'll have Kensu look at that.

Whisper:
First off thanks for trying it!

The interface will get an extreme makeover from me. I used REAL simple images just for placeholders for the demo. I totally agree on the kiddy scheme, and I kinda hate it.

Dungeons are changing massively. Instead of a simple remedial maze, i'm going to make it more interactive I think. The towers will get rooms, keys, maybe a puzzle. And have more ambiance. (not only in sounds like Indi suggested, but in things like Crates, barrels, torches).

Controls for WASD and Arrows are going into the next build. -Everyone- that's tried this has mentioned that.

As for the spell: It's a placeholder. The magic system is on the drawing board right now, and the final version will use a 'percentage' of your mana instead of a set number. So at level 1, you will be able to cast more than just one spell.

Thanks again for playing it. I wasn't sure if the models were too cheesy or not, but I persoanlly love the Ooze and the boss guy on the 5th floor.

ps: What FPS did you get Whispering?

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 26th May 2003 09:17
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Oh ya, one more thing:

There is HP and Mana regeneration built into the game. If you stand still, they will come back. (and you can't be attacked while not moving, so best to stand still and regen up if you're out of potions)

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
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indi
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Posted: 26th May 2003 09:45
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Some sort of indication would help to identify where u were or if a special event took place..

imagine a 5 second display perhaps of some info if you walked over an area.


I had a font crash recently and had to use the temporary fix to stop the gdi error.

it could be related to this..

You can bundle the font in the folder and call it from there if required with DBP from what i understand.

http://www.lunarpixel.com

http://www.lunarpixel.com/dt/
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 26th May 2003 11:01
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Font is going to Arial. It's not too distractingly different. And assures complete compatibility.

Hmm, regarding the indicator, will have to think of some way to implement it that's not too distracting or cheesy. (ponder)

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
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Eric T
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Posted: 26th May 2003 11:43
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yo,
nice game....reminds me of elder scrolls morrowwind

I always win don't you know that?
Programming RPG games in Dark Basic
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Eric T
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Posted: 26th May 2003 11:46
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btw runs same as it does on indi...i have same system...sept with a matrox g450

I always win don't you know that?
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Whisper Wind
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Posted: 26th May 2003 21:26
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I got 66 fps, ran very smoothly for me.
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 26th May 2003 21:49 Edited at: 26th May 2003 21:58
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New Version Available: Here
- Added Heal Spell
- Added WASD & Arrow Key Support
- Increased Mana Regen
- Fixed Gem Duplication Bug
- Overhauled entire battle system
- Added Heal/Cure at the Church
- Fixed attack bug where hit animations weren't being displayed
- Adjusted Spell costs so you can casts more than one
- Changed Font to Arial for added compatability
- Miscellaneous other bug fixes
- Added chance to Critical Hit in battle

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
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Ian T
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Posted: 27th May 2003 05:46
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Wow.

Well, I wanted to like it, but... it's so darn slow!

About 5 FPS on my system.



--Mouse

Famous Fighting Furball
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 27th May 2003 10:02
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What're your system stats Mouse?

I think our recommendations right now are:

PIII-750MHz+
Radeon 7500 or GeForce 2 (non MX)
256 MB Ram

With the above system stats, we achieved 60 FPS on a test machine.

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
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Sephnroth
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Posted: 27th May 2003 16:50
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hey, this is cool!

I got a solid 66fps out of it, sometimes 67, lol

Specs:

Intel p4 - 2.4ghz
Geforce4 MX 440
256mb DDR ram

What might be nice as a future thought would be if there was an option to choose your resolution. I tend to play all my games in a nice 1280x1024 but also those without a high spec'd system could turn the res/colour depth down a bit.

My only tip is if you wanna think about including that for a future thingy, code your engine in preperation for such a thing - ie, rather than draw a sprite at say 790, 10 (top right minus 10 pixels presuming that the screen res is 800x600) draw at screen width() - 10, 10 - that way it will work no matter the resolution ^^ Its just annoying to have to go around changing it all at a later date.

but yea, thumbs up! nice one

p4 2.4ghz, 256ddr ram, Geforce4 MX 440
Innovate, redefine, recreate whats in your mind. It isnt fate, you decide, only you can cross that line.
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hexGEAR
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Posted: 27th May 2003 18:06
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damn , wish i had your computer

everyday of life is a new chapter that has already been fortold but is up to the soul to capture.
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Ian T
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Posted: 27th May 2003 19:39
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1 GHz
384 MB RAM
GeForce 2 MX

The MX is my only failing, but it shouldn't be *that* bad.

One thing is that Fullscreen Exclusive runs about 5x faster on my machine. If I had an .exe that ran Fullscreen Exclusive, I think it might be playable .

Unless I really was cheated and I really do have a TNT 2 under the hood. Nobody seemed willing to help me find out though...

--Mouse

Famous Fighting Furball
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 27th May 2003 23:12
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That should be plenty fast Mouse. Really odd.

When's the last time you upgraded your nVidia drivers? (not for this game, but just in general).

I have noticed entire doubling of FPS when I neglected drivers for a few months.

Hmm..

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
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Kensupen
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The next demo will be in Full screen exclusive. NVidia cards seem to do better in that mode. I'm working on adding a bunch of new features and fixing a bunch of dumb issues. It's almost ready to download. I just have 2 more things to add in then a small test to make sure they all work.

Our big problem right now is trying to figure out why a level made in anything other than CShop runs soooo slow when it's only 1k-2k polys. It should be able to run at a solid 400FPS on my system, but it only goes about 150. I think it's the fault of my .X exporter or the auto conversion of loaded objects to DBO. Hopefully a future patch fixes this.

-Kensupen
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UberTuba
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Posted: 28th May 2003 16:18
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this game needs and compass and/or map soooo badly, it nigh on impossible to find your way around.

Life is a terminal disease.
You never survive it.
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 28th May 2003 23:04
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We had a cheesy compass at first, but we removed it because it looked pretty tacky. Didn't accomplish a whole lot anyways.

But more to the point, we're working on axing the "Maze" towers, and making them more puzzle-based.

The next patch (0.03b) that Kensu's working on will change a lot of things for the better, we think. Keep an eye here, i'll be making an announcement later when I post it.

-Loki

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 29th May 2003 09:15
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Curse of the Four Towers - Demo v0.03b Updated!!

Changes

-Mana regeneration increased
-Changed the "blocked" message to "can't run"
-Made ESC key ask to Save (doesn't work in battle)
-Increased Run Speed
-Fixed Mouselook from jumping if used too soon after a battle
-Regen works when not in battle, no longer have to be standing still
-Monsters tuned to hit more in line with your gear/level
-Getting hit no longer flashes green every time after you get poisoned
-HP goes down and Poison occurs when red flash occurs
-Monster's HP bar scrolls down when it gets hit
-Space key now acts like clicking on attack in battle
-"I" Key opens and closes the inventory window
-ESC key in the Inventory now closes it
-Added drinking sound for potion
-Added casting sound for heal
-Added new UI graphics (cleaner)
-Only up and down arrows work while viewing inventory items, not spells
-Colored beam shoots out of the fountain after you beat the miniboss
-Can cast spells more times per level
-Heal spell now heals for 7% of max HP for 10% MP cost
-Added hidden cheat codes (go find them!)
-Buying upgrade items auto equip if they are better
-Fixed a top floor to load the bat model instead of the rat
-Full Screen Exclusive mode now used for compatibility with some systems.
-Start with more potion types
-Fixed Savegame and Loadgame adjusted for Rauken defeats
-Fixed the Attack Bar use modified SPD not base SPD (woops!)

As always download here.

And thank you all for your continued support and feedback. Everything we get helps.


In the works:

-New towers models
-New quests
-Storyline implementation
-The Other 4 Towers with content


Thanks,
-Team Nerdsoft

Loki D'Cat - Modeller, Composer, Animator
Nerdsoft Creations
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Ian T
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Posted: 30th May 2003 01:47
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Hey, for whatever reason the new demo runs considerably better with me . It's pretty cool.

I have a few recommendations:

1- Make sure you're clipping offscreen objects. The following code in the main loop helps my FPS rate considerably:

`Clipping
for t=1 to 500
if object exist(t)=1
if object in screen(t)=1
show object t
else
hide object t
endif
endif
next t

Of course, where 1-500 is actually your objects. No need to make the loop bigger than it has to be.

2- If you can, use a portal or similar system. In the dungeon, the game is obviously rendering WAY too much. Also, if it's a dark dungeon, you can prolly get away with setting the View Range to, say, 1000 or lower (make sure to set the fog to be right under that value). That would help the performance a lot.

3- Mouselook! I dunno about you but I can't immerse myself in a game without mouselook... perhaps a right-click could switch between cursor and mouselook modes ala Morrowind?

Altogether it's quite good so far ^_^.

--Mouse

Famous Fighting Furball
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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 30th May 2003 04:19
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Glad it's running better.

1 - A reason we can't use the offscreen objects, is the dungeon is one object. The town is one object. So that'd be moot. We're currently working on a system that we've just discovered to splice a mesh into several objects and load them dynamically based on position. It should increase FPS dramatically.

2 - Portal system is definitely needed. One thing we added that I forgot in the release notes is a Warp spell. Just takes you to the entrance of the dungeon so you can go sell.

Right now, the fog isn't in because the way i've optimized the polys make them too big and fog (being just a colored light) doesn't react correctly to the zone data.


3 - Mouselook is in. Hold Right Mouse button to mouselook. Clicking left while holding right allows you to move while mouselooking too.

Thanks for keeping with it. I'm glad to get the feed back like this. We're learning through this process, so it helps to get ideas of what people like. (For instance, neither Kensupen or I use WASD, yet it was the #1 requested thing I got.)

-Loki

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RisTar
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Posted: 30th May 2003 21:01
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i actually dont like this kind of games , but the 3d work is great , all the town looks so cool , GREAT JOB ! o and i got a question , wich program did u used for creatin the inside of the buildings ?

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LoKiDeCaT
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Posted: 30th May 2003 21:58
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Which insides? The shops are just PaintShop images, the Tower is Cartography Shop.

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Benjamin
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Posted: 4th Jun 2003 15:41
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Cool, thats one nice game. keep up the good work and update it when you can!

Always has, never will
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