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Work in Progress / Cloud Ranger

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 21st Jul 2010 22:49 Edited at: 6th Sep 2010 11:49
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Heya, so really this isn't a WIP it's more of a WNLIP (work no longer in progress). Built most of it in 1 weekend, just as a challenge really.
******************************************************************
******************************************************************
UPDATE SEPT 4th
Early demo available HERE:



http://www.peanutbutterfingers.co.uk/CloudRangers/Cloud%20Ranger%20Demo.rar

Please hit F1 once you're flying to get controls help!
******************************************************************
******************************************************************

(from my website):

Born out of a weekend trying to make a 3D clone of MidWay's Classic 2D Shoot-em-up 1943, Cloud Rangers is an all-action-limited-story shooter, where players battle across the skies of an alternate world called Eriel.

In the world of Eriel, there is no land. People live of floating masses known as Atols. You join ace mercenary pilot Barrington Hawkfeather and his gunner Marmaduke Haypenny-Smyth on their quest against the Iron Fist Federation, who's regime threatens to take over the entire Northern Hemisphere! Your employer - the Northern Coalition - pays you for every IFF vessel destroyed. Use this money to upgrade your plane, buy bigger guns, and hire team mates, as you battle bigger, badder and more ..uh.. shooty enemies!

Cloud Rangers tries to capture the feeling of Old WW1 footage, with rickety camera work and washed out sepia fesnels over the lens.

Right now it's early days, and with other projects and real life on the go too, Cloud Rangers is a slow burner... it should see the light of demo in a few months.
Until then, keep your eyes peeled here for update videos... and here are some screenies to whet your appetite...



And theres a youtube video here!!

So, I'm probably not going to try and finish this one, but I'll get a demo up soon!

Sleep is over-rated.
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Dr Tank
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Posted: 21st Jul 2010 23:38
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Looks nice. Effect of moving through the clouds is great. I'd like to see some of the floating islands in the game.

Can you shoot the tail off your plane?
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zeroSlave
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Posted: 22nd Jul 2010 00:44
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I saw the pictures on the gallery, but didn't know where they were from. The clouds were awesome, as well as seeing the planes spiraling out of control. Super cool stuff, hombre!

Do you control the plane as well, or is it auto-piloted?

My green thumb grew the tree my Trojan War horse was crafted from. With roses in our pockets we rally round the tombstones. Ashes to ashes, we all fall down.
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 23rd Jul 2010 16:02
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Quote: "Looks nice. Effect of moving through the clouds is great. I'd like to see some of the floating islands in the game.
Can you shoot the tail off your plane? "

Thank you! Clouds took a long time to work out how to make nice. Sprites / flat plains just looked cheap and particles just killed the CPU, it's actually a terrain map, with alpha and a scrolling texture.
At the moment you can't shoot your own plane, although I'd love that to be in there!
Quote: "Do you control the plane as well, or is it auto-piloted?"

Thanks dude, You control both the plane and the turret!

I'm working on getting a demo out, but as any of you will know, the difference between having something that is playable and filmable by the developer, and something that is playable by other people is quite a big jump, so I'm going to put a bit more time in to do menus and so on!

Demo soons!

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JLMoondog
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Posted: 23rd Jul 2010 22:05
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Very cool. I saw this on the front page before you made this thread and I was thinking, "This game looks awesome, where's the wip thread and the demo?"

Your ability to turn out something quick always amazes me, and your projects are all different, it's not like your making a bunch of FPS games with the same template, they're all different in every aspect.

...I'm a little jealous.


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Satchmo
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Posted: 23rd Jul 2010 23:36
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This project is refreshing. A good break from the 3rd and first person games you see so much on this board.

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zzz
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Posted: 24th Jul 2010 02:06
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Looks great! Nice work!

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 26th Jul 2010 18:03 Edited at: 26th Jul 2010 18:06
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Quote: "Looks great! Nice work"

Thanks ZZZ, always heartening to have positive comments from someone with such a good project of their own!
Quote: "
This project is refreshing. A good break from the 3rd and first person games you see so much on this board."

Cheers. It's refreshing for me too, I've never done a game where you didn't control a human avatar.

[Sufficient warning... incoming rant]

Quote: "Very cool. I saw this on the front page before you made this thread and I was thinking, "This game looks awesome, where's the wip thread and the demo?"
Your ability to turn out something quick always amazes me, and your projects are all different, it's not like your making a bunch of FPS games with the same template, they're all different in every aspect.
...I'm a little jealous."


Cheers Josh. I'm flattered! I have to admit that I do have alot of template elements - I have a tile editor (that can export 3d maps) and a 3D editor that I use to build levels for most projects - these have been built over about a year, and have gradually gotten better and better (lightmapping, spawn points, mesh loading, etc etc). I also have a code template that can be used to easily create the bare bones of a game. Most of my time is spent of things like AI, Player control and the elements that aren't common to all games. i.e. my sound loading/playing/removing functions are sorted, as fast and efficient as they can be, and I re-use in everything.

In all the projects I try and keep every function and subroutine open ended, trying to think "if I added another enemy type to this game, would this function still work with them?"
I mainly use limbs, typed arrays and ini files to keep everything editable. Infact, with this project, you could literally make your own plane in a 3D application, and as long as you added the right limbs in the right places and set it up right in the "planes" folder, it would work fine in the game ... (hopefully)

ANYWAY!

Update:
*Main Menu
*Mission Select (with missions loading from external files)
*Plane select, plane purchase, shop
*Takeoff and Landing at start/end of mission
*Floating islands
*Improved hud
*Loads of tweaks and edits.
*consistent 60FPS.

Shot of the new Seiki Sunfire

(shameless cyberstorm reference)

I want robotic legs.

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JLMoondog
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Posted: 26th Jul 2010 18:13
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Quote: "Infact, with this project, you could literally make your own plane in a 3D application, and as long as you added the right limbs in the right places and set it up right in the "planes" folder, it would work fine in the game ... (hopefully)"

I'll take you up on that. If you want, can you send me an email with the specs and layout needed? Be some fun wiping up a bi-plane on the side.

Also...floating islands!? I've never played the original game so not sure what to expect.

The new full screen shader looks a lot better then the original. Good stuff.


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Butter fingers
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Posted: 27th Jul 2010 01:03
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Quote: "I'll take you up on that. If you want, can you send me an email with the specs and layout needed? Be some fun wiping up a bi-plane on the side."

That's so cool. Ok, well, I'll send you one of the meshes and the setup file and tell you how to do it

Quote: "Also...floating islands!? I've never played the original game so not sure what to expect. "

haha well..there are no floating islands in the original... I was only copying it in it's style.. to be honest the story/world are my creation.. just the WW1 style planes are from 1943..

Quote: "The new full screen shader looks a lot better then the original. Good stuff."

Ah, well spotted and thanks. I tweaked it a bit since the other post to be a little more sepia, as opposed to black and white.

sorry forgot this post and came back to it...(hope no-one posted in the meantime)!... I'm gonna send you an email Josh.

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PW Productions
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Posted: 27th Jul 2010 05:12
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Oh, that's what those screenshots on the gallery were (looks like others were wondering as well)! I wanted to see who did those, and turns out it's one of the best developers here! Not much of a surprise. I like the sepia style, always have and probably always will. It looks nice, like a cool shooter, and I can't wait to play it

My website: http://pwp-games.com/
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2010 15:19
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Hey PW, thanks!

OK, so I've been working hard on the game this weekend (45hours) to get this thing a bit closer to being demo-able!

Update List

- 4 Locations now visitable - 2 Aircraft carriers, Homestead Atol, Cork-Smythe Atol
- Each Atol has it's own set of missions.
- Player profiles with save and load
- Shop screen for buying planes
- shop screen for buying upgrades.
- 2 new player planes
- 4 new enemy types
- Wingmen!! yeah!
- Floating pieces of land in the environment.
- explosion system improved
- cloud system improved
- Powerup weapons and upgrades added.
- Money!
- Landing and Takeoff from locations.

It's so close to demo I can smell it! I basically just need to write the missions for each location and I'll have a demo out!
Peace, and thanks for the comments/support

John

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baxslash
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2010 18:20
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Looking great, can't wait to try it!!

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LandShark
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2010 18:25
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This is looking great! Cant wait for the demo...
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2010 21:36 Edited at: 2nd Aug 2010 21:37
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Landshark, Baxlash your comments are much appreciated!

The demo will be out on the 14th. There isn't alot of coding to be done before then, just some testing (hands up testers) and gameplay tweaks, and I have to write the story and missions into the game.

Anyway... in the meantime.... Check out my first HD youtube video and trailer for the game!!


[/href]

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baxslash
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2010 22:27
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Awesome... one question/suggestion. Does it have sound or is it all done to the music backdrop? If it's music how about adding sound effects that mix into the music so when you fire the machine gun you get a snare that fits the music timing?

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Hassan
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Posted: 2nd Aug 2010 22:51 Edited at: 2nd Aug 2010 22:52
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awesome! really nice stuff, but i think you should work a little more on the explosion of the planes, now it looks like a plane with an image (even if it actually is a plane with an image, increase number of planes or something just dont make it look like it's actually a plane)

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Bizar Guy
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Posted: 3rd Aug 2010 01:04
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Awesome, man
This feels like an original take on the space sim genre.

Looks very cool, I'm very interested in this demo

Your signature has been erased by a mod because it's larger than 600x120
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 3rd Aug 2010 18:00
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Quote: "Does it have sound or is it all done to the music backdrop?"


Hey dude, the music thing is a wicked idea, but quantising the sounds so that they played in time would be a nightmare!! But, the game does already have full 3D sound, with the doppler effect (pitch bend according to distance). Its probably the best sound engine I've built in DB! Unfortunately the screen recorder I used totally distorted the audio, so I had to mix the music louder.

Quote: "i think you should work a little more on the explosion of the planes, now it looks like a plane with an image"

haha, I know I know. It's horrible isn't it! I've gone through about 10 different explosions, and thats the best I've done. It's dang hard dude! There is so much transparency in the scene (clouds, dust, full screen shader etc) that the Zdepth starts going freaking nuts, and the explosions go horrible. I need to sort it out, you're right. I'm just not sure how!

Quote: "Awesome, man
This feels like an original take on the space sim genre.

Looks very cool, I'm very interested in this demo"


Thanks man. There were 3 main aims with this project.
1) To make a game in a genre totally outside my comfort zone.
2) To actually finish it. To have a deadline and work to it, and not go over.
3) To write the engine in a new way, something able to handle large numbers of active objects at once, I want it to feel epic!

It's going well. I'm probably going to make my Aug14th deadline!

2 Things-

First...
I need some testers. Some people who are willing to give this a few plays before the demo goes out and find the bugs!!

Second...
(and this isn't a team request but...) If you are a 3D artist, and think you could make a cool flying war machine in a similar style to what you have already seen (and keep it LOW poly), then let me know. Making all the media AND doing all the code is killing me, and I'd love some creative inpout from others!!

Ok, that's it.
Thanks for the comments and the encouragement. I'm gonna finish this badboy and get the demo out!

I want robotic legs.
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baxslash
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Posted: 3rd Aug 2010 18:09
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Quote: "I need some testers. Some people who are willing to give this a few plays before the demo goes out and find the bugs!!"

I'll Help

I'd love to help with the 3D stuff too but first my 3D software has gone wappy and second I don't have the time (stag night this weekend and I'm the best man...)

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pictionaryjr
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Posted: 3rd Aug 2010 19:31
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i'll help with the testing. I have no idea what a flying war machine would look like tho lol



TEAM REQUEST FORUMS
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Diggsey
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Posted: 4th Aug 2010 00:30
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Those bullets shot by the floating islands are insane

As for the explosion, you could have a main explosion animation of a short flash followed by thick smoke on a single plain, and then spawn a number of pieces of burnt plane flying out from the blast leaving smoke trails. I think that could produce a good effect.

[b]
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 4th Aug 2010 14:44
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Baxslash and pictionaryjnr

If you drop me an email to my peanutbutterfingers@gmail.com address I'll get you a link to the latest version!
Quote: "
As for the explosion, you could have a main explosion animation of a short flash followed by thick smoke on a single plain, and then spawn a number of pieces of burnt plane flying out from the blast leaving smoke trails. I think that could produce a good effect."

Diggsey, thanks for the concept! As you can see from the current version, the explosions are made up of the explosion plains and then the moving smoke trails. I had originally intended to do it so that when a plane blew up it would spray bits of plane everywhere, but when you think about it there are 15 different craft, and it'll be alot of work to model 4 different debris bits for 15 different planes - that's 60 individual pieces! I'll definately work on getting the explosions a bit crisper, but, as much as I would love to do the debris I think it might just be too much!!

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Diggsey
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Posted: 4th Aug 2010 14:53
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I wasn't thinking of having specific debris for each plane, I think that a few randomly shaped lumps of charred metal would be enough. You could then colour the plane model black and rotate a few limbs randomly, and have it drop out of the sky.

[b]
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Butter fingers
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Posted: 11th Aug 2010 22:15
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Hello all,

I'm affraid that since the announcement of the Intel competition I've been flat out designing my entry for that, so a demo on the scale I was hoping is not going to be out on the 14th, BUT I will be releasing a demo on the 14th... just not as long in gameplay as I might've hoped. Hope y'all understand, and I promise you'll enjoy my Intel Comp entry too!

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AlanC
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Posted: 12th Aug 2010 00:44
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I'm sure they will both be very good. It looks very impressive, will look forward to hearing more updates.

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 4th Sep 2010 17:07 Edited at: 4th Sep 2010 17:08
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Hello all! Just thought I would get some bits finished up this weekend and I've now got a very early-look demo of Cloud Ranger together for you to try!

It's still got alot of bugs and things that need tweaking, and until it's optimised some of the levels get a bit CPU hungry..

But give it a try, I'm pretty please with what I have so far.

Hit F1 once you're in the air to get help with controls!

Demo download here:

http://www.peanutbutterfingers.co.uk/CloudRangers/Cloud%20Ranger%20Demo.rar

Sleep is over-rated.
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zzz
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Posted: 4th Sep 2010 17:44
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Wow, this game is starting to look really good! Downloading now...

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 5th Sep 2010 00:05 Edited at: 6th Sep 2010 11:49
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I'm bumping my own demo... (see first post!)



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zzz
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Posted: 5th Sep 2010 13:58 Edited at: 5th Sep 2010 14:02
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What a great little game! The old movie effect fits the game perfectly, the enemy ai and movement is really good, the world the game is set in is very interesting(The floating islands are really cool) and the missions are quite diverse.

The game feels pretty polished and I couldn't spot any major bugs, these were the only ones I found:
*When completing a mission, sometimes the crosshair would remain mid-air as your plane landed.
*When the mouse was outside the screen and I fired a shot I lost focus of the window and had to switch back to the game from windows.
*The zeppelins on the minefield level would stop mid-air when shot down and not fall all the way to the ground.
*The mouse aiming wasn't very smooth at all, it would be nice with better precision(I don't know if this is intentional or not, but it struck me as a little annoying ).

I really enjoyed this game, keep it up!
@Everyone else; what are you waiting for? Download!

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 5th Sep 2010 16:07
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Quote: "What a great little game! The old movie effect fits the game perfectly, the enemy ai and movement is really good, the world the game is set in is very interesting(The floating islands are really cool) and the missions are quite diverse."


Hey thank you so much, it's nice to know that some of the aspects I put alot of time into get recognised!! Glad you enjoyed it. I would like to make the missions more diverse, with a greater variety of win/lose conditions - protect a certain ship, destroy a set enemy, bosses, ones where you're carrying cargo etc. We'll see how it goes...

Quote: "
*When completing a mission, sometimes the crosshair would remain mid-air as your plane landed."

The crosshair is a naughty little guy! He's determined to pop up whenever I don't want him!! I'll look into that though.. same bug if you pause when on the runway right?

Quote: "*When the mouse was outside the screen and I fired a shot I lost focus of the window and had to switch back to the game from windows."

Interesting... Are you on a dual screen BTW? I have that problem on my work PC, but it's ok at home on 1 screen.

Quote: "*The zeppelins on the minefield level would stop mid-air when shot down and not fall all the way to the ground."


Thanks. The zepplins are made of like 4 different pieces, and they are the buggiest of the enemies... thinking of taking them out altogether... they should be bigger, more threatening...

Quote: "*The mouse aiming wasn't very smooth at all, it would be nice with better precision(I don't know if this is intentional or not, but it struck me as a little annoying )."


Hmm, Can you elaborate? I know that it's iffy when you aim too high or low, but was it bad at other times? Also, out of interest, did you play REAL or ARCADE? The aiming on real is supposed to be quite tricky...

Thanks so much for playing and feeding back zzz, I was pretty dissapointed to only get one download after there being quite a bit of interest!!

Quote: "@Everyone else; what are you waiting for? Download! "

haha yeah!

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zzz
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Posted: 5th Sep 2010 16:50
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Quote: "same bug if you pause when on the runway right?"

Yeah, it seems to be.
Quote: "Are you on a dual screen BTW?"

Yes, I am.
Quote: "The aiming on real is supposed to be quite tricky..."

Yeah, ok, tried arcade now and it's smoother. ^^

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baxslash
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Posted: 6th Sep 2010 10:38
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Can't wait to try this! Downloading now...

I don't know where you find the time BF!!

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 6th Sep 2010 11:31
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@zzz

I have some trouble with dual screens because I don't lock the mouse to centre screen. I'll fix that before the next release.

I'm glad Arcade worked out a little better for you. I can't decide if it makes the game too easy on Arcade. Right now, Real is probably a little too hard and Arcade is a little too easy... need to develop something in the middle.

Quote: "Can't wait to try this! Downloading now...
I don't know where you find the time BF!!"

@Baxslash
Yeah, let me know what you think... guessing you're probably passed out right now, what with downloading it at 2.30am!!
With regards to finding time... see my sig?!

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baxslash
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Posted: 6th Sep 2010 11:57
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Quote: "guessing you're probably passed out right now, what with downloading it at 2.30am!!"

I posted at 8:38am UK time!
Quote: "Posted: 6th Sep 2010 08:38"


By the way I like the pic, "...by clicking this ruddy picture!" LOL

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 6th Sep 2010 12:11
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LOL. My clock is all messed up.

Glad you like the pic. I've had like 2 downloads, so I thought I'd make a massive button so Everyone will know theres a ruddy demo!

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Virtual Nomad
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Posted: 6th Sep 2010 21:01
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good fun. i played for 30 mins or so on arcade mode before i received error 7008: object does not exist at line 3005 (iirc, it was object # 61-ish, if that helps). ~55+ FPS (specs in sig).

the old film effect i like except the occasional "bands" on top/bottom. i think they might last too long and maybe "a frame or 2" jitter is more appropriate.

great demo!

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 13th Sep 2010 12:04
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Quote: "good fun. i played for 30 mins or so on arcade mode before i received error 7008: object does not exist at line 3005"


Thanks VN, that's not bad going, 30mins is a while!

I'm really glad you enjoyed it, and sorry that your play got cut short by a crash. Error sounds like one with the enemies (they're in the object range 1-100), bummer that it hard crashed though, I thought I'd found all those bugs.

Good to hear the FPS held up. I realise some of the levels are a bit OTT!

Quote: "the old film effect i like except the occasional "bands" on top/bottom. i think they might last too long and maybe "a frame or 2" jitter is more appropriate. "

Cool, alot of time went into making that effect. I know what you mean about the bands, TBH it's an issue I'm having with the exporter from Premier Pro, that particular effect seems to be really quite unfriendly on export...


Anyway, no-one else interested?!

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Bizar Guy
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Posted: 13th Sep 2010 17:54
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Oh wow, amazing game! Was very fun, I and had some great fights, fell, etc.

A few minor things, I think the wasd and arrow keys should be able to do the same things, as I didn't encounter a time I needed to use both at once. Also, it would be nice to have the option to have some sort of tune you might hear to those old war movies playing that went from silence and slowly got louder as the fighting got more intense, and died off as you finished the mission. I hope that you make the locations vary more, and possibly add something that would make the player care more about the game world. Maybe street views or something, or in some way see the people you are trying to protect.

And I assume the missions will vary a bit more later?

I have one wish, and I separate it from minor issues/possible additions, as you don't need to do this (and I really would not expect you to), but it would be cool. the game is very much on rails, and even though you fly between locations, you always leave a place in the same direction even if the destination is different. I guess I would really like the idea of an open ended sort of game in this world. Sort of similar to the space sim genre only in this awesome world. Of course I'd also want to hope out of my plane and explore the islands, but that's even more off track.

Great work, can't wait to see how it goes after the compo's over.

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Hassan
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Posted: 14th Sep 2010 16:12
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played the demo, i must say that the game play is awesome, but one thing i hated is the WALLS OF TEXT!, alot of text, no HUD, i mean when selecting mission/configurations/planes, it's really annoying, how abbout some GUI made up of some boxes with titles indicating what you are actually gonna read in it, rather than re-reading the whole wall of text over and over after every selection change?

other than that its really nice!

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Butter fingers
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Posted: 14th Sep 2010 17:28
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Quote: "Oh wow, amazing game! Was very fun, I and had some great fights, fell, etc."

That BG, I'm glad you enjoyed it.
Quote: "
Also, it would be nice to have the option to have some sort of tune you might hear to those old war movies playing that went from silence and slowly got louder as the fighting got more intense"

I've got some great 1930/1940s tunes in there, but they're not licenced so I had to take them out of the demo. booooo

Quote: "I hope that you make the locations vary more,"


yes, and i want to vary the weather and sky as well.

Quote: "And I assume the missions will vary a bit more later?"

yes, definately, current ones are quite rudimentary, I'll add more varied objectives and tasks in the next version..

Quote: "I guess I would really like the idea of an open ended sort of game in this world."

Totally agree with everything you were saying in that paragraph. BUT I was aware that I rarely get things to demo, let alone complete, so I realised that if I tried to make it open world, I'd never get it done, and it'd end up going to waste! In the future, with infinite money and time and a dedicated team of 20 this will be open world... lol.

I'm glad you enjoyed it though dude, and thanks for the decent feedback.

Quote: "played the demo, i must say that the game play is awesome,"

Cheers Hassan, much appreciated!

Quote: "i hated is the WALLS OF TEXT!, alot of text, no HUD, i mean when selecting mission/configurations/planes, it's really annoying, how abbout some GUI made up of some boxes with titles indicating what you are actually gonna read in it,"


simple, honest answer?!.......

The only way to do a GUI in DB is with sprites. It's long, and boring, and DB doesn't automatically account for differences in screen resolution. Then add to that the fact you have to clog all the GPU with loads of images.. I couldn't be bothered. BUT! By just doing the hud as text, I saved so much time that I actually got the demo out!

PLus theres the issue that sprites are always over text, so the only way to get a score on the screen is by having sprites with numbers 0-9 on them and calculating and positioning them and yawn yawn.

Sleep is over-rated.
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baxslash
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Posted: 14th Sep 2010 17:48
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Quote: "The only way to do a GUI in DB is with sprites."

Not true You can do a pretty imressive HUD using only the D3D plugin by cloggy.

Sprites are not so hard to resize and position either but you could very easily add some semi-transparent boxes behind your text (it does boxes with rounded corners too).

It really wouldn't be that much work but it's up to you of course. Check out my game "Soma", it uses a very basic GUI using d3d.

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Hassan
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Posted: 14th Sep 2010 18:15 Edited at: 14th Sep 2010 18:16
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to draw text over sprites use dbDrawSpritesFirst ( ) (in DBP i think its DRAW SPRITES FIRST) but i think this will make it draw even under 3d stuff (facepalm @ the system..), well that's in GDK you can try it in dbp and see how it goes (if you havn't tried already)

this method might screw up your 3d scenes, well at least, if you're not gonna make a GUI, make some simple un-filled boxes (well..lines..) around each category of text, e.g. when selecting the plane, make a box for plane name, box for weapon, box for price, etc, arranging is up to you

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Andrew_Neale
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Posted: 15th Sep 2010 10:31 Edited at: 15th Sep 2010 10:31
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Well there is the alternative of creating the sprites off screen (e.g. 'sprite 1, -1000, -1000, 1') and then using 'paste sprite' as this will allow you all the functionality of sprites whilst keeping control over draw order. I believe so anyway!

[Edit]Typo![/Edit]

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baxslash
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Posted: 15th Sep 2010 10:55
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Quote: "Well there is the alternative of creating the sprites off screen (e.g. 'sprite 1, -1000, -1000, 1') and then using 'paste sprite' as this will allow you all the functionality of sprites whilst keeping control over draw order. I believe so anyway!"

That's right I forgot about that too! Don't know why as that's how I always use sprites!!

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Plotinus
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Posted: 17th Sep 2010 18:15
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This is what I've come to expect from all of your WIP threads - total brilliance!

Everything about this is great, from the fantastic original setting to the execution. The clouds are incredibly impressive - I think one of the best special effects I've seen in DBPro. I think you have got the feel of what it would be like to be in that sky down perfectly. The planes and floating atolls loom out of the mist in a very convincing way. And the atoll models are great - very domineering.

I agree that a free-roaming flight game set in this world would be brilliant, but even the gameplay you have here with the fixed routes is still very good. It's incredibly satisfying to blast those planes out of the sky. The first time I saw one of the zeppelins go down was truly awesome. Don't take them out - they are magnificent. Although of course some giant ones in addition would be a lot of fun. I think the explosions look very good, and the way the planes spin out of control or the larger objects do a slow plummet is really impressive.

Gripes: very few given the stage that this is at. I like the close-up view of the gunner that you get by holding down the right mouse button - it would be good to have an option to have this as the default (without needing to hold down the button). Firing at one of the zeppelins as it passed really close, from this viewpoint, was truly thrilling. In fact it would be good to be able to zoom in and out towards the player plane in general.

Also, moving around while in the close-up view could get glitchy, with the camera jerking around all over the place.

The homing missiles didn't seem to home at all, as far as I could tell.

I couldn't work out how to use the Sun Cannon.

The glitches and flickers are great, but I think you'll need an option to turn them off for those who find them distracting.

I got an "object not found" error - it was in the "enemy aces" mission (with just one friendly AI plane).

Definitely finish this! It would be an absolute ambassador for DBPro.
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Dr Tank
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Posted: 23rd Sep 2010 04:17 Edited at: 23rd Sep 2010 04:18
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This is totally awesome. I could list all the awesome things but that would take too long.

Criticisms: I agree that the mouse control seems a bit jerky. The mouse can be moved small amounds and the crosshair doesn't move.

I'm not sure whether the grainy filter is supposed to be like a silver screen or film grain. If it's the latter I think you should shift the uvs by some relatively large amount each frame so that it appears to be random for each frame.
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AmbulanceGames
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Posted: 27th Sep 2010 06:02
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Oh man, I've been waiting for a demo of this. Saw the youtube vid a while back and was blown away. Downloading...now!
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