[GAME][IN DEVELOPMENT] Fl1p

[puggsoy]

Yeah, I know I already have a thread about that other app of mine (Puzzel), but I've been working on this more so I thought to make this thread.

Fl1p is a Flash game that I'm making, and my first one, at that. Basically, the mechanics are that you can flip the entire level horizontally. If you're touching any of the level (on any side of you) you flip along with it, but if you're in midair, only the level flips. Obviously, you can run left, right, jump, and you finish the level by reaching the exit (which is just somewhere in the level).
The theme is, as the name suggests, kind of digital, and a few things in the game will reflect that. I'm not sure exactly if I will have a storyline, but if I don't then I'll try and show the digital-ness as much as possible, so that the name actually makes sense. To be honest, I initially used a 1 instead of an I just because it looks cool

I'm developing it using the Flixel library for collisions, animations, game states, and so forth. So far, I've got the level mechanics sorted and am currently working on switching between levels, and level selection. Once I've got that done I'll focus on graphics and music.

If anybody is willing to help with graphics, that'd be great. Pixel art is preferred, since I'm using Flixel. I'll be able to find music from something like Newgrounds, but if anyone feels like making it then that's cool too. There's no money in it, although I will certainly give proper credit.

[Sengir]

Sounds cool, I know it won't be a fl0p!

But uh, I've never used Flixel. Is it as good as Flashpunk?

[puggsoy]

Dunno, never used Flashpunk

But from what I've seen, they're often compared and the Flixel site occasionally refers/recommends Flashpunk, so I'd say they're pretty similar. "Good" is probably a case of opinion/requirements, though.

I decided to use Flixel because it looked simple enough, all I really wanted was an engine that handled collisions (and maybe animations). Flashpunk looked like it was a bit more advanced, although I haven't tried it yet. I might give it a go for future games.

[SimplyMatt]

Reminds me like this, which is actually made in FlashPunk.

[puggsoy]

See, I knew it wouldn't be as original as I thought it was. Still, the theme will be more like Shift, and the mechanics aren't exactly the same, so I don't think too many people will say "hey, you copied Horizon!"

Thanks for showing me that though. Maybe I'll use Flashpunk for a possible sequel?

[SimplyMatt]

Never tried either Flixel or FlashPunk, but as you've said, Flixel seems easier, but lacks more advanced pre-built mechanics. Ever thought of using the Ogmo Editor? A friend suggested me using it if I ever make a flash game, saying that if you know how to use the easy Game Maker room editor, you know how to use this. It can be exported to any platform which has similiar syntax, you just have to mess around with the xml file it produces. Flixel and FlashPunk alike have been examples of it's uses (actually, Matt Thorson, it's creator, used it for his Give Up, Robot duo). Chevy Ray, the guy who develops FlashPunk and made Horizon, used it in his Ludum Dare entry, another example for you and has what seems to me a good tutorial on it.

Another game (or series) you want to try out is Innoquos, which has 4-way gravity 'shifting'. Going to try Shift now...

[puggsoy]

Right, so I've been working on this fairly rigorously recently. I've got a level editor, it's very rough and just about everything's handled by shortcuts that only I know, but it's usable and allows me to make levels much quicker than writing an array myself. It generates code that I can plug into my Levels class, which contains all levels in the game as static variables.

I've also been working on text. Due to the nature of this game, it's more complicated than just smacking on a TextField (or FlxText, in my case), and I've actually had to do some work with Bitmaps and pixel editing. It's almost perfected, there's a tiny graphical inconvenience but I should be able to get that fixed soon enough.

Once that's done I can start focusing on stuff like switching between levels. Then I'll do graphics and music, after which I can start making levels. I'd like to know how the game will "feel" before I start designing the actual puzzles and level shape.

[Shade]

Glad you're still working on this, sounds interesting.
I was working on a game similar to this at one point called "Shift", wasn't exactly the same, but you did change the enviroment.

Anyway, good luck with this!

[Skorpion]

The description in your first post reminded me of Shift and VVVVVV. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vvvvvv
VVVVVV gameplay video.

Spoiler

In VVVVVV you can't jump though, you just switch the gravity between up and down. It's been well received, so you might be onto a winner.

I look forward to hearing more.

EDIT: Thinking about it, it sounds like your game could be fun to speedrun. Have you thought of adding a timer to each level that saves a high score of quickest times?

[puggsoy]

I did get the original idea after having played through all the Shift games (not including Freedom), so I'd expect people to relate it to that. The colours will also pretty similar, black and white, although there will be some gray. I'm not being too adventurous as it's my first game

And now that you mention it, it is fairly similar to VVVVVV's concept. I haven't played it, but I saw a bit of gameplay during a talk Jonathan Blow (creator of Braid) gave by some conference, so I know what you mean.

I have considered a time trial mode. Whether or not I'll include it depends on how I feel about implementing it at the time, and how much work it'll be. But as you say it would be fun, and it would add an extra level of difficulty to the game.
So yeah, if it's not too much work I'll add that. If I do that, do you think it would be cooler if the timer was shown while playing, or should it be hidden until you're done (at least the first time)?

[Butler]

Go onto Kongregate, and you can play a flash demo of VVVVVV produced by the developer.
While playing (timer)

[puggsoy]

After a bit of a break *cough*playinggames*cough* I've finally gotten some more progress done on this. The main mechanics are in place, I can switch between levels. I'm currently working on a good-looking and fully-functioning menu, most of the work now is pretty much cosmetic, stuff like level transitions and all that. I still need a character sprite sheet, and I'll probably make some custom tiles too (currently I'm using Flixel's default tileset).

What I'm a bit worried about is the story. There's no real story and I don't really want one, but I do need some way to kind of explain how to flip, and I think most people will want some sort of goal as well. I'll think something up once I start making the levels, but it'll probably be something like "main character knows nothing, undefined entity speaks to player (and explains how to flip), something mysterious happens to character on final level, to be continued". I am planning to make a second, after all, in which case I'll hopefully make a more concrete story.

[puggsoy]

Bet you thought I'd stopped working on this.

I finally made something playable, so hopefully I can get more feedback. It's just a little preview with 7 levels, the first 6 just kind of explain the game, and the last one's a proper puzzle. It might seem a bit uninteresting and the story might suck but keep in mind this is simply something I made to showcase the mechanics. The actual game will have a much better gameplay, explanations won't be as obvious, and there will be a few more features (autosaving, level select, and as Skorpion suggested, a speedrun/time trial mode). It'll also have music, a preloader (I'm working on one but it's being weird), and probably level transition animations too.
I did get a guy to help me with the character though. He's not really a professional spriter but I think it's a fairly good sprite, it's basically what I wanted so it'll do I think.

Anyway, you can play the preview here.

I'd appreciate any feedback at all, I really wanna know what you guys think.

[Previous]

I think he shouldn't jumpittyjump when you keep the button pushed.

The first room with white walls was a bit glitchy, I kept jumping against the black part but it would work randomly rather than as expected.

Inmidst room three or four, I was magically thrown back to an intro screen.

I'll just drop my usual preloader code here in case it could help you?

Code:

stop(); // important. Prevents the game from startinjg before loading.

addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, loading); // tell flash that we want to call that function every time

function loading(e:Event):void
{
    var total:Number = this.stage.loaderInfo.bytesTotal;        // total size of the flash
    var loaded:Number = this.stage.loaderInfo.bytesLoaded;    // loaded part
    
    if (total <= 0) {
        total = 1;    // prevents a divide-by-zero INFINITY error
    }
    
    // I have a loading bar movieclip that's basically a rectangle which I scale here.
    bar_mc.scaleX = loaded/total;
    // also some text thingies to display the loaded bytes and percentage
    txt_percent.text = Math.floor((loaded/total)*100)+ "%";
    txt_bytes.text = Math.floor(loaded / 1000) + "/" + Math.floor(total / 1000) + " KB";
    
    if (total <= loaded){
        gotoAndStop(2); // go to next frame (actual game)
        // you could also enable a "START" button here instead.
        removeEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, loading); // we don't need that any longer!
    }

}

[puggsoy]

I'll stop the jumpity-jump when holding down, I was wondering if I should keep it or not.

With the white wall room, just run up right up against the wall, then jump and flip when you're touching the black part. You need to be right next to the black part, like not even a pixel apart, otherwise it won't work. However that intro screen in room 3/4 is weird, did you do anything strange or were you just playing and it just went back out of nowhere?

By the way, thanks for the code but I won't need it. I'm using Flixel's built-in preloader, just making my own animation (which is supported). The problem is that it doesn't preload, it just loads the entire thing, then the preloader flashes by for a second, which effectively nullifies the preloaders function. I don't know why it's doing this, but even when I use Flixel's default preloader it doesn't work, so it's strange. It might have something to do with the fact that since I'm using FlashDevelop, I'm using Flex tags for frames, but as far as I know I've done everything right. I've asked for help on the Flixel forums though.