Topic: Any Interest in assisting with an open-world Metroidvania (Megaman-esque) Game?

[Terin]

Hello all,

Fairly new here (but a very, very, very long time lurker, prior to registering).

I've been working on a game engine for quite some time now -- it should port to Android, iOS, PSM (Playstation Mobile), Windows, Linux, OS X, and eventually the Wii U (and if you were trying to figure out what I was using, the answer would be MonoGame.net; I've recompiled and tested on Linux/OS X with little effort, successfully; iOS and Android will require a minor scaffolding to support, but shouldn't be too much effort).  Custom-written, and I have a few "demos" written, which show off the technology.  I'm also utilizing Spriter (I wrote/ported the native C# library for it) to handle "animated" sprites (which are essentially 2D images with bones, somewhat similar to what you'd see in a 3D game).

At the moment, I have a full-fledged side-scrolling engine that contains collisions and multiple layers.  I still need to add in climbing and a few other cool platforming tricks (would like to get the wall-repel abilities that the newer Mario games, as well as Megaman X had) and combat.  Most of the groundwork for the engine itself is complete.  The game dynamically loads maps, such that there is NEVER any load times, except for initially.  There's a lot of cool asynchronous cycling to manage resources, and my benchmarks seem to do well (running at 720p at 60FPS with 100 Spriter objects [each having about 15-20 different "pieces" on them] on the screen).  Haven't tried 1080p yet, though, that is just a setting, and I just want to be able to run in Windowed mode while I debug.  Keep in mind, these benchmarks are all in windowed and debug mode, so they're a lot slower than the end result, which is a positive thing.  The maps are each (when uncompressed) around 4MB -- but with compression and other dynamic loading, they're about 70KB.

I'm looking for folks who might be interested in working on the actual resources -- the art/graphics (concept art, tiles, icons, characters, enemies, etc), music (music, sound effects), etc.  Mapping would be nice as well, since I'm not sure HOW many maps I'll be able to build on my own -- most of what I'm trying to do is stabilize/enhance the technology to include more features.  Right now, everything is placeholder.

The general concept of the game is to create a Vampire Hunter D-esque world -- a blend of high fantasy with a bit of science-fiction elements (but mostly high fantasy) similar to the original Final Fantasy (mostly fantasy, but they had robots in different places).  The game is aimed at being rewarding to those who are skilled at gameplay in general (if you've played Megaman X2 and beyond, you know that you get essentially everything you need to beat the game from the get-go -- no special items required -- I love to play that game without any of the power-ups, just to test/hone my skill).  The game will have a main questline and several optional side quests/missions that can change the outcome of the ending and other events.  The heroes (I would ideally like to have a female and a male character with minorly tweaked stats) start off "ordinary" but inherit runes in the initial tutorial/quest (which you'll be forced to complete).  When I mean ordinary -- they jump, run, and walk like a normal Human.  The tutorial guides them through and they get a few power-ups that enable more modern platforming skills (increased jump height, ability to change velocity in air, and probably running).  You will be able to turn runes on and off -- so if you want a Classicvania-esque feel, disable the rune that allows mid-air velocity adjustments, and you'll be pretty darn close to Castlevania 1-3 (a setting I've been playing with).  Items can also affect these abilities, so you may find that equipping "Pegasus Shoes" or something like that later on might increase your speed or grant you an additional jump.  The heroes are essentially in a long line of supernatural hunters (how does that sound familiar?) and the initial tutorial is the rite of passage.  The end boss of the game will be a demon -- but that doesn't mean there won't be familiar foes -- and it leaves room open for other things in between and outside.

At first, I could really use some assistance with concept art, and potentially graphics, once characters have been decided.  I have one license for Spriter right now, but if someone works with me and has been helping for a while, I would be more than happy to purchase a license for them as well.  Spriter has a good free trial as well, so if anyone is interested (even for your own projects), I highly recommend it.  It's pretty complete for what/where it is in development.

If you're interested, please let me know.  I'll maybe post a small demonstration in a few days.

One note, though -- my dog was diagnosed with cancer about two months ago, and is currently getting radiation treatment (so I'm running back/forth every week about 500 miles to an animal hospital that can handle his problem), so my development has slowed a little bit.  I have been trying to pummel in new features (added new collision detection last weekend) when I can -- but the radiation treatment should be over before the end of July.  So, right now, I'd ask that you be a little patient with me -- and if you're interested, but waiting to see where things go, feel free to reply/message me your interest and let me show you some of the new things.

In the very least, I hope the topic is interesting to anyone who read, and thanks for your reading/input!

I've attached an animated GIF of Spriter in work (it's a little off, because I clipped it at the wrong part of the animation), but it should give you an idea of what I have in terms of that.  The demos are more obvious in terms of gameplay.

EDIT: Apparently having issues posting an animated GIF as an attachment -- let me try linking in a public URL:

[Claimh Solais]

Heya, there, gave your thread a read-through. Do you got any videos that'd show us a W.I.P. of your engine so far? It'd encourage more people to hop onto your project if you've got a vid showing off what you've got so far.

In any case, though, I'd be willing to help out. Though... I'm not entirely sure what I could do. Two of the things you asked for were graphics and music, which are two things I used to be big into, but I've since kinda dropped out of both. I wasn't really good at graphics anyway (I was only able to modify existing graphics, and couldn't create any from scratch), and my music was pretty okay at best.

Though a couple things I'm good at are story/dialogue writing and character designing. The former is something I do on a regular basis (but unfortunately, they never get used as I can't find any takers) and the latter is something I used to do but really wanna get back into it. Note it means I can design concepts on characters but I can't actually create the art. I'd love to be able to help out in these two aspects (particularly the first, and I can provide a few examples of my work in the event you do need help with story), if possible.

EDIT: Also, I'm not quite sure what I'm looking at in the animated image. Did you create the character animation in Spriter? If so, that's pretty nice looking. Nooooot quite sure what all the blocks are though.

[Terin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyCYD1VeFnI

Here's a video.  You'll see physics (on the ramp) with collisions, and multiple jumps enabled (three jumps allowed total).  You'll see the bottom left area (clouds) have actual pushing force (so the character is being pushed by an external force, like as if water were pushing to the right).  There are three layers and you can see a little bit of the physics.  Hope that helps.

Per your comments -- I'm not at a point where I really need writing -- that's kind of what I'm trying to eventually get into myself.  At some point, it might be helpful to have a scenario writer for quests and maybe for inspiration as to what kinds of areas we should/can have.  If that sounds like something you want to do, that'd be swell.  Something like figuring out areas in the world (i.e. think like the different sections of Dracula's castle, i.e. Colliseum, Olrox's Quarters, the Clock Tower, etc) -- but at a much grander scale, that'd be cool.  The initial village should be in a forest, wherein the hunters are from.

The motif/feel for the game should be somewhat similar to Castlevania III -- the hero has to be sought out because some evil has been plaguing the land, and the hunters (known for their lineage) are the only ones left who can help.  There will be other characters along the way who were also sent (by who -- that's another question), but may not have succeeded or diverted from their quest.

I'd like to also try to keep the text to a minimum.  As much fun as it'd be to have a lot of text/storyline, I found something amazing in minimalism.  There was enough storyline in Symphony of the Night and even Dracula's Curse -- there wasn't a whole lot of dialogue.  One of my other favorite games, Breath of Fire III did amazing things with such little actual text.  Compare that dialogue to the prior incarnations, and you'll find the script was nearly half the length.  It should be fun and easy enough to just jump in, but dialogue optional for those who really seek it out.

Let me know, and hopefully the video helps others see where I'm at.

[darkmanx_429]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyCYD1VeFnI

Here's a video.  You'll see physics (on the ramp) with collisions, and multiple jumps enabled (three jumps allowed total).  You'll see the bottom left area (clouds) have actual pushing force (so the character is being pushed by an external force, like as if water were pushing to the right).  There are three layers and you can see a little bit of the physics.  Hope that helps.

Per your comments -- I'm not at a point where I really need writing -- that's kind of what I'm trying to eventually get into myself.  At some point, it might be helpful to have a scenario writer for quests and maybe for inspiration as to what kinds of areas we should/can have.  If that sounds like something you want to do, that'd be swell.  Something like figuring out areas in the world (i.e. think like the different sections of Dracula's castle, i.e. Colliseum, Olrox's Quarters, the Clock Tower, etc) -- but at a much grander scale, that'd be cool.  The initial village should be in a forest, wherein the hunters are from.

The motif/feel for the game should be somewhat similar to Castlevania III -- the hero has to be sought out because some evil has been plaguing the land, and the hunters (known for their lineage) are the only ones left who can help.  There will be other characters along the way who were also sent (by who -- that's another question), but may not have succeeded or diverted from their quest.

I'd like to also try to keep the text to a minimum.  As much fun as it'd be to have a lot of text/storyline, I found something amazing in minimalism.  There was enough storyline in Symphony of the Night and even Dracula's Curse -- there wasn't a whole lot of dialogue.  One of my other favorite games, Breath of Fire III did amazing things with such little actual text.  Compare that dialogue to the prior incarnations, and you'll find the script was nearly half the length.  It should be fun and easy enough to just jump in, but dialogue optional for those who really seek it out.

Let me know, and hopefully the video helps others see where I'm at.

Take the "S" off http on your youtube link and the video will show up on the forum...

[Terin]

Thanks -- done!

[Claimh Solais]

Quite interesting. Was kinda weird seeing the big sprite on the small tiles, but it's easy to see the smaller "collisions box" to know how the character would fit in with everything.

As far as scenario writer, I wouldn't mind giving that a shot. I was a member of a (now-defunct) role-playing board several years back, where I wrote out all the quests for characters, providing quest details and dialog for the client (short one/two line dialog that adds some personality to the client). Is that the kinda thing you're looking for?

As for dialogue, whatever little of it you have, I wouldn't mind taking a crack at it. I have here a complete rewrite of Symphony of the Night's dialogue, where I attempted to make it... I'unno, more dramatic, I guess? I dunno, lol.

[Terin]

Still a bit over-the-top, but definitely less cheesy and an improvement over what we got.  I suppose the stakes are high, but the character's seem to be a bit full of themselves.  Good read, nonetheless.

I was a scenario writer for a few (defunct) games that were being developed...  Unfortunately, it's hard to balance programming and spriting and script-writing.  I'll send you a PM and let you know how to contact me -- maybe I can give you some broad ideas of what I'm trying to do on the quest, and you can maybe flesh it out?  Probably will do it all via email correspondence, if that's cool.

And yeah, the underlying sprite is actually Dracul from LOS2 (the previews we had that would eventually make it into the 2D tutorial images).  My hope was to be able to do something a little more high-res than that (which is actually around 40x120 pixels), but the Spriter sample/template (just in there to show the working technology) is definitely larger than it needs to be.  Everything is place-holder.  That's why you don't see any jump animations in there -- they're easy to start and actually render, but I didn't feel like placing it in there when I'd be moving to something new/different, anyway.

[Jorge D. Fuentes]

If you want a more Castlevania-based testing sprite, you're welcome to use my Simon Belmont.
I've shared it with people:


Edit:  Here is my archive of Castlevania music.  You may use it as well.  Just gotta make your own loop points for the MP3's or convert 'em to OGGs and do so.
**Clicky**

[Terin]

Thanks for the resources, Jorge.  Unfortunately, I cannot really use the sprites, since they'll be built using the Spriter engine (if you noticed, the weird big-headed guy had multiple points that rotated, etc).  Though, I may attempt to tear your Simon apart into components later on and throw him in with the engine, but not entirely sure yet.

I'll definitely have to borrow some of your music when I get to working with sound, etc.  That probably won't be for a while, but again, I will definitely come back to this, so I have something to test with!

As a minor update -- I just pushed out a new release on my internal site.  Still very, very alpha, but fixes some collision issues (as could be seen in the video) and adds in climbing.  Time to come up with a new feature set and work towards building that!

EDIT: Jorge, I couldn't get them -- do you need to have a Mediafire account just to download them? :-/

[Jorge D. Fuentes]

You should NOT need a mediafire account to download them.
However, you cannot do a 'bulk' download.  Mediafire won't let you do that unless you have a Pro Account, which wouldn't be free.
So basically you'd have to just pick one download at a time.
It's a pain in the butt, to be sure, but it's the only way I know of to have one large archive that's easily downloadable.  It's either that or zip up everything and upload it (but if I did that, then every time I'd update by adding a new tune, I'd have to update the zip, and then re-upload the huge zip).

Edit: You may attempt to break my sprite into marionette-style parts.  I'm interested in seeing what that would look like.