Sorry your browser is not supported!

When I first started using FPS Creator after purchasing it last November (I think) for myself, I realized that so many of the model packs and things are wonderful for creating "A game that feels like X".

For example, I stumbled upon the Fantasy enemies, weapons, and environment packs. Sadly, it appears that those enemies have difficulty walking over hills, down ramps, and things... and that's a "deal breaker" when it comes to using FPS Creator to develop a fully fleshed out Fantasy FPS title. Plus the complex models do a lot to bog down the game engine's resources. My thoughts went towards recreating the same kinds of fantasy environments, but in a way that's perhaps "easier" on the game engine.

I'd like to simplify things a bit all around, for the engine's sake and for my own sanity: Rather than go for custom segments that try to "break free" of the grid-based level building tools, how about some basic assets that mimic the 8-bit style of the Nintendo Entertainment System?

Specifically, "I'd like to try and make a First Person 8-Bit Style Title". For the sake of not getting the pants sued off me, I don't plan on calling it anything similar to "Legend of Zelda", only attempting to call together the "simplest possible" assets that together, create a first person NES-era title.

If you're having trouble picturing it, take into consideration THESE images of "Megaman 8-Bit Deathmatch":

.









Ideas:


Everyone should know this screen. There is a flat-colored ground texture that we can call "Dirt". There are potential green wall segments here which can be known as "Rocks". Stacked together, in this case, they form green hills or grass-covered mountains. There is a black square which is a "Door"... of course, we can be a bit more enterprising and actually make a small selection of doors that are basically "large rectangles"... think like a book. You open it, and the door swings open. Minecraft doors are a good comparison too.



In this example, we see the flat surface has changed to include a few dark specks... we can safely call this floor segment "Sand". Notice that the green wall segment "rocks" are here again, only this time colored brown to better match a the desert landscape. This means that the same model can be used, just have its color shifted around to match the environment its placed in.



Ah look, water. Using FPS Creator 9, I'm a little murky on the details on how to include water in a level though I'm under the impression it IS possible. However, in The Legend of Zelda, you couldn't swim through the water, so it's effectively another flat floor tile. Animated or not. This floor tile can also be made red to simulate lava, or green to simulate something a bit more poisonous, perhaps. Invisible Wall segments could be used to block the player from crossing over into the water... or maybe, just maybe, there might be merit in allowing the player to swim through the water, though I see this as opening up "holes" in the world layout... unintended shortcuts and so on. Also notice for the first time we have trees... they are round balls on a stick, basically. In this game, the trees also act as walls, so those invisible wall segments will come in handy with enforcing the trees as a "natural boundary".



Both the trees AND rocks make a reappearance, along with some gravestones. Note that the trees and rocks are identical to all other portions of the game, only here they are white to reinforce the ghostly effect of the area. The ground is grey too...



Ladders. This is the main way we'll go from one floor to the next in the game. Plain jane staircases (to match the plain floor coloration) may also work. Note that this section of the game actually plays out in "sidescroller" style, meaning this particular perspective isn't top-down like the rest of the game. It shows "enhanced" brick detail... showing that the wall segments of the game, at least, stand to be a bit more detailed than the ground you move on. The same could be said of doors and the like, which while they look like basic rectangles with flat, textured details, the doors in the game can be classic wooden doors with brass ring handles, or prison bars, or anything else you can think of that'd fit in with the theme.



Here we are in a dungeon. Tile-conforming assets everywhere, tile-conforming obstacles, dungeon doors, you name it. Although not pictured, sometimes these dungeon walls appear to have cracks running across them: A bomb blast or just "shooting the hell out of it" could cause that wall segment to breakaway revealing secrets/shortcuts. The Dungeon Tile assets change color all over the game as well...



The dungeons have a distinctive entrance design, and are typically surrounded by statues, or stone heads, etc. Pretty open to interpretation here.

Now, I'd like to point out again that I'm not strictly looking to remake "The Legend of Zelda" 1:1, The Legend of Zelda is a good example of what I mean here, because it was one of the earliest examples of an "Exploration and Environment-Heavy Title". I'm simply interested in collecting a set of enemies, segments, weapons that will remind players of the 1980's era of gaming. Even if those weapons aren't particularly well animated (Static sword model slashing left to right at the bottom of the screen, an arrow shooting out of your face, fireballs coming out of your face or the end of a static magic wand).

Other games to consider for 8-Bit World Ideas:

Faxanadu (NES)
http://www.mobygames.com/game/nes/faxanadu/screenshots

Legacy of the Wizard (NES)
http://www.mobygames.com/game/nes/legacy-of-the-wizard/screenshots

Zelda II: The Adventures of Link (NES)
http://www.mobygames.com/game/zelda-ii-the-adventure-of-link/screenshots

Blaster Master (NES)
http://www.mobygames.com/game/blaster-master/screenshots

...and the list goes on and on. I'd like to hear all possible feedback on this, including things like pricing (if it comes to that) though, I'm deliberately trying to keep the detail level of the models and environments "simple". In many cases, repeating tile texturemapping will likely do the trick.

Maybe you should take a look at this, it's a game called Wizard Scroll done in FPSC: http://forum.thegamecreators.com/?m=forum_view&t=191752&b=25

It shares the same kind of characteristics that you are looking for in a game. Unfortunately, development on Wizard Scroll seems to have discontinued.

Excellent contribution! Yes, that's EXACTLY what I'd like to go for. Me? I've got the time on my hands to finish it of course. I agree with one of the posters in that thread, "the texture size/pixel count could stand to be a bit higher", but not by much.

Is there anyone interested in helping put together such a thing? I'm up for discussion as well on wether it should be a single player or multiplayer experience.

There's some kind of mod now that lets you put multiple levels into a multiplayer game now, isn't there?

The only real way to do something like this is if there was a way to turn off texture filtering in fpsc (which to my knowledge currently is not possible). You'd have to make reasonably small textures as well (16x16, 32,32, etc.)

If you put some small textures in fpsc the pixels will not have hard pixel edges but they will be blurred quite a bit.

I'm kind of disappointed with the lack of response here... can't decide if people are using this forum more as a means to ask questions on HOW to do/troubleshooting modeling or if people have simply turned their backs on FPS Creator 9. Sigh. Really beginning to regret spending the money on the software now... I thought between it and the bulk of model packs it came with I could come up with -something- but man, when those INCLUDED model packs don't work as designed... it's a real slap in the face.

What do you mean that the included model packs don't work? If everything is correct with your FPSC installation then things should work perfectly.



Give it time... people don't respond instantly. There's a lot going on behind the scenes at TGC. With the release of FPSC Reloaded scheduled for October, Lee is hard at work getting things sorted.



I'm keen to work on something like this, a fantasy FPS with the 8-Bit look would be awesome to work on. Do you have a storyline planned? I can create artwork and 3d assets. Would be awesome. I just need to finish off my game Robolegs first. I'd be really keen to participate in something like this.



There is a mod called FPSC-IP, which is a REALLY REALLY cool addition to FPSC. Check there site http://main.fpscip.com/



Trust me, you won't regret it. It makes game making FUN. And you can produce quite a solid game. Practice makes improvement.

If you're keen to create a game together, pop me a mail: landman.chris [@] gmail [dot] com. What would you be willing to contribute?

Landman

I've been searching for something like this stuff and it was odd to find this thread about it. I was just thinking how cool it would be to do something in the style of the original Wolfenstein 3D or the original Doom.

I can easily create segments in this style and static objects. Basically just be creating a standard grid size of the "pixels" and just use that size throughout while creating textures and even when creating the edges of models so they are pixelated.

I just did a test of this using walls and floors and it reminds me of minecraft lol