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DarkBASIC Professional Discussion / Retro Compo Results will be announced tonight 11.30pm GMT

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mamaji4
23
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Joined: 24th Nov 2002
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Posted: 23rd Apr 2003 21:45
Its true. I would really appreciate if I got some feedback from the other DBers about my game. What you thought about the 2 mouse concept, pseudo 3D, etc.
If all of us put our heads together and learn from ours and others mistakes we could be a force to reckon with. And may the force be with you all.

scribbley
23
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Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 23rd Apr 2003 21:47 Edited at: 23rd Apr 2003 21:50
I totally agree and let me know which is your game and I will go gie it a go and let you know what I think

Maybe we should all post our own top 10 with comments so people can get different feedback ? what do you think ?
Simple
23
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Joined: 28th Aug 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 23rd Apr 2003 22:15
Quote: "We actually had another 2 possibilities for entries, I let Simple choose which one, by the luck of the toss (which I never got to see, so he may well have cheated!). "


Shhhhh !! don't tell Van, But I have a double sided coin !! even if I didn't .... I would have just said "Heads I win - Tails you loose" !!

Spec - AMD Athlon 1000mhz - 256mb DDR - Gforce2mx 400 - 60gb HD - 19" Compaq - DVD rom

mamaji4
23
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Posted: 23rd Apr 2003 22:31
Oh jeeze, I forgot to mention scribbley. My game is titled "Heartache" and its second on the list of 95 games. Which ones yours so I can check it out??

scribbley
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Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 23rd Apr 2003 22:33 Edited at: 23rd Apr 2003 22:42
congrats simple a very nice little remake of jetpac and I look forward to playing the full version when you have finished it.

I have to say my favourite so far is bomb kid which I think is really really nice and captures the essence of the origonal perfectly. I think thats the game I have played most so far as well as diam diam which is also a very very cool little game (tres bien) I also enjoyed GF Zero as that seemed to have a real console feel to it. Joe pogo is fun but I felt myself feeling a little dizzy quite quickly with that spinny background

Ok time to play heartache. and mine was nikki nitro (but isn't happy unless you have a very good graphics card which is a shame.)

Ok played it now very relaxing but as I have no friends I had to play by myself but I did try to train the dog to play against me but he was useless. I could just imagine that game being played in an underwater type enviroment and with a few tweaks could really be a nice little game to relax to. Forget squeezy balls this is the way to chill I think I would have added a rotating camera just to make it little more interesting
David T
Retired Moderator
23
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Joined: 27th Aug 2002
Location: England
Posted: 24th Apr 2003 00:45
Quote: "What are the other prizes like? I hope there are some DB cardboard pyramids "


I've still got one sitting next to me

You are the th person to view this signature.
Programmers don't die, they just Gosub without return....
scribbley
23
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Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 24th Apr 2003 00:46
I'm suprised there were no dongles as prizes, that would have been cool.
Richard Davey
Retired Moderator
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Location: On the Jupiter Probe
Posted: 24th Apr 2003 02:04
mamaji4 - "I guess its my fault for reading too much into the "retroness" factor. I thought it implied that you could not deviate from the basic game layout of two paddles and a ball."

Here is the text from the competition page on this site that says what was required of your game:

"... base your game on the original and enhance it. We'll be especially looking out for innovative uses of 3D but above all - gameplay."

I've underlined the two key words here. "Base" in my mind does not mean totally re-create, it gives a large amount of room for expanation and deviation... "enhance" means do just that. Find the flaws in the original and enhance it so it doesn't have them any longer.

This has been the boundaries upon which you should work all along. The judging forms I've got here broke the game down into other key areas - out of 10 possible points each:

1) Playability
2) Lifespan (for how many minutes (or seconds!) did we play before we got bored and wanted to move on)
3) Remake Update (how much extra was added to the original game)
4) Use of Graphics (not how well drawn, but how well used)
5) Use of Sound
6) P4 3Ghz Specific speed rating
7) P3 450Mhz Specific speed rating

For example - Diam Diam scored only 5/10 for the "remake" section because most of those ideas are in the original. However it scored 10/10 for the Lifespan and 8/10 for playability.

Incidentally, don't ask me to post all these forms up, I don't have the time. They are summed up in the reviews I wrote.

Cheers,

Rich

"Gentlemen, we are about to short-circuit the Universe!"
The Darthster
23
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Joined: 25th Sep 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 24th Apr 2003 02:45
Have a look at Sphong! for some top quality improvements to the pong gameplay! Yes! I suppose it took you so long to get round to playing it (92nd entry) that you were totally bored with pong games and only spent a few seconds considering the novelility of the gameplay.

Duck Hunter 3D on the other hand has hours of gameplay available, many of them spent shooting the dog alone. And the ming vases, and watching my ace explosion effects.

Rich, would it be possible to add a user comments section to each review, allowing other people to rate/comment on the games?

Once I was but the learner,
now, I am the Master.
Andy Igoe
23
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Joined: 6th Oct 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 24th Apr 2003 02:49
I'd like a rating feature so peeps can score the game. A value of 1-5 and it displays the average.

It's a lot of work for Rich to implement though, so I guess we'll live without it

Pneumatic Dryll
Matto
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Posted: 24th Apr 2003 03:25
It would be a great help to the people who entered to have a user report forum or message page to get feedback from the community but infact thats asking alot from DB after they have housed the games own web page on their servers already.

I do think if people want a responce from the community to their creations to concider if not already present adding a website of your own for the game/s that can be linked to from DB's generous offering and you can always get a temporary forum from somewhere to add to it or at basic levels leave an e-mail for people to register their thoughts and interest about your game.

I must add it's a shame that some people feel badly towards the judging of the competition I know you worked hard on the titles that didn't make it, but there were extra prizes awarded which shows DBS's commitment to you/us the community and in fairness with an entry base that large for a competition there will always be ones that don't get picked, this is part of the theme of a competition, it would be gentlemanly to just except your report and take in what DBS have offered in the way of further advise for improving the game, you would be hard pushed to recieve such help with your creations if they were not in this competition.

1ghz Cel,512 sdram 133,Gf2 MX 400 64,SBL 5.1,Win98
Best Upcoming MMOG - http://WWW.Atriarch.com
Project: Card Game with No Name
Danmatsuma
23
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Joined: 2nd Mar 2003
Location: Australia
Posted: 24th Apr 2003 11:58
hehe, well I'm just happy I managed to knock my entry into some semblance of a game by the time I uploaded, I literally passed out twice during the uploding
I didn't expect to place at all, 'cos my enhancements to the original concept didn't make it in, I struggled just to get a basic game together in time, quite comical are the reasons:

First I managed to break my right wrist (I'm right handed) falling down some stairs (yes I'd been drinking...)

Then I had a huge argument with my girlfriend and impetuously decided to move out, no easy task with one arm...

Then I caught a rancid flu, which severely messed with my concentration..

So I modelled/textured/coded everything in my game lefthanded, as well as the sound/music, sick as a dog and sleeping on various friends couches and slinging 'em $20 here and there for electricity and phone connections for the pc!!!
It's something I can laugh about now, (and of course I went crawling back to my girlfriend too) So this whole compo experience is one I'll never forget

Overall I think I did as best as I possibly could under the circumstances, and once finished I think it'll be a good game. I thought the comments were all fair. I've since written the code to make the enemies spawn in their correct places, and improved the ai so they evolve and stay on platforms correctly

The major improvement I wanted to include before the deadline though was to have a fusing bomb explode if you didn't get to it in time.

In the original BombJack you could collect bombs in any order, the only consequence being lower scores per level. The only incentive to collect the bombs sequentially was a 20,000 point bonus. Once finished, my version will force you to try to collect the bombs in order, you will of course be able to pick up non fusing bombs, but if you take too long the fuse will burn out and the bomb will explode, you'll have to restart the level from scratch. In later levels, I plan to have more than one bomb lit at any one time, so thing's'll get really hectic

I'm downloading and playing all the entries in order, so I'll comment in the appropriate threads as I get through 'em

This comp was an inspired idea, I really enjoyed myself this whole time despite the tribulations, thanks DBS

ZX Spectrum 48k Issue 3, Radio shack Tape drive, Rank arena 12" T.V. set.
mamaji4
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Joined: 24th Nov 2002
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Posted: 24th Apr 2003 12:51 Edited at: 24th Apr 2003 13:37
Cool. No more complaints.

Incidentally, anyone who would like to try out my game Heartache would require 3D glasses. Here is a cool link that sends you a pair for FREE. Alternately, you could make your own as specified in the "Instructions" in my game. Also, please note that the <F1> key is for switching beween the "Normal" and "Pseudo Stereo" modes in the game (The pseudo stereo mode is when you see the objects in the game, with the additional blue colours added)

http://www.rainbowsymphony.com/freestuff.html

The red-blue variety is the one I have used, and is the one most commonly used for Stereo viewing. There are other interesting glasses for 3D TV viewing, etc. which are also for FREE.

To play my game in the 2-mouse mode you would require another PC/Laptop which has a Laplink cable or an NIC to able to pass the remote mouse parameters to the host PC. Needless to say, the two PCs should be in sufficiently close proximity that both players can use a mouse each to play the game on the host PC.

Plese note: The pseudo stereo mode is something I have attempted and is an offshoot of my attempt to get monocular stereo. Please don't view in pseudo stereo mode longer than necessary with the glasses on becuse you might experience optical discomfort caused by a lack of convergence of the red/blue images. i.e. You will be able to perceive the stereo effect but because it is not a true stereo representation of the left/right eye images the images do not converge and there will be visible ghosting.

Matto
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Posted: 25th Apr 2003 03:00
thats definately inovative coding withthe 3D effect and also very good of you to find a download for free glasses.. do you get cereal with those?

1ghz Cel,512 sdram 133,Gf2 MX 400 64,SBL 5.1,Win98
Best Upcoming MMOG - http://WWW.Atriarch.com
Project: Card Game with No Name
mamaji4
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Posted: 25th Apr 2003 13:24
LOL. Matto, I wish they would pack in cereal with the freebies. But you'd probably need a huge SASE for that.
And thanks for the compliment.
I'm just trying to figure out how to get you'll to try out the 2-mouse version of the game. I'd have to find a site that's giving away free PCs. If any of your friends has a laptop with any kind of network interface you can play the game with 2-mouses. Someone asked me how it was different from an ordinary networked game. The difference is that you are sitting on a single PC with 2-mouse and if you don't like the fact that the other chap is beating you, or just plain don't like his taste in clothes, or the smell of yesterdays dinner still on his breath, you have the choice of punching him. You'd be hard put to do that in a networked game with you sitting at home and the other chap in Alaska. I call it the "interactive,frustration venting" part of gameplay.


Van B
Moderator
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Location: Sunnyvale
Posted: 25th Apr 2003 14:29
Yep, it works too. 'Get that flag back or it's a Chinese burn for you boy!'


Van-B
Van B
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Location: Sunnyvale
Posted: 25th Apr 2003 14:36
Ahh!!!

They made a new version of pong, but they stole your idea!

They had a special cabinet, that was like the old defender tables - a controller at each end and a little thing you put your hand in.

Everytime you lose a point - you get slapped on the back of the hand by a little spinning strip (like a cheap plastic lawn mower blade). Not severely, just enough to make it unpleasant - it does leave red marks.

It was part of an experiment to see how men and women react differently to pain, women played the game in pretty much the same way despite the pain, men were sorta haphazard, some got better, some worse.


Van-B
mamaji4
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Posted: 25th Apr 2003 15:14
LOL. Van, if you would now just point me in the direction of all those women who liked to play Pong I would be much obliged.

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