Alchemist Classic

by Oasiscircle
Alchemist Classic
Combine elements and create chain reactions to thwart your foes!

Alchemist 2.0

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Nov 30 2013, 5:09 pm
Sounds fantastic to me. I'll definitely be giving the new version of the game a try when everything is finished. You should make sure to get this on to some indie game sites and such when everything is all set. It's also one of my top picks for Flash when that comes out.
Nov 30 2013, 7:22 pm
In response to Oasiscircle
Dangit, Flame Sage! Transform() isn't a thing.

What you're thinking of is modifying the atom.transform variable using the animate() proc.

To rotate an atom, you set its transform to a rotated matrix:
//  There are a number of ways to make a rotated matrix
var matrix/T

//  The undocumented (and thus most straightforward...)
T = matrix(angle, MATRIX_ROTATE)

//  The boring (make a new matrix and turn it)
T = turn(matrix(), angle)

T = new
T.Turn(angle)

//  The math
T = matrix(cos(angle), -sin(angle), 0, sin(angle), cos(angle), 0)


atom.transform = T


To fade, you would modify the atom.alpha variable.
atom.alpha = 0


You can perform these modifications within an animate() to cause a smooth interpolation from one starting state to another.
//  Take 1 second to fade out and apply the transformation
animate(atom, alpha = 0, transform = T, time = 10)
Nov 30 2013, 7:24 pm
In response to Kaiochao
Kaiochao wrote:
Dangit, Flame Sage! Transform() isn't a thing.

I have shamed my clan.
*commits Seppuku*
Dec 1 2013, 4:49 am
Oasiscircle wrote:

Maybe I'll even throw in a contest, just for the sake of things once the Ranks get reset! ;)

Fancy, now I can pussy-win again.
Dec 1 2013, 4:57 am
In response to Alitron123
Except I don't plan on having a Grandmaster/Open split.
I'll probably have everyone in the same tier but you can only use the special abilities, no Expert Mode allowed. ;)
Dec 1 2013, 5:38 am


The tiles now shrink spin and fade when they disappear! The effect looks amazing, I'm really happy with how it looks!
Thanks Kaiochao for showing me how to use matrices. :)
Dec 1 2013, 6:11 am
So elaborate. :D
Dec 2 2013, 3:37 pm
I'm going to make a new hub for Alchemist now that's it's going to be going back online in a month or so.
Basically the only reason I'm doing it is to easily reset the rankings and to reset the counter for it's popularity. Because the top games list is determined by how many fans per month a game gets, we'd be at the bottom of the barrel even if we suddenly become increasingly popular. I'm also really interested in doing the outer-distribution so that'll be a nice drop of money if the current model remains at $100 but I think it'd be worth it. I could send a few emails and I'm sure indie game-reviewing companies would find Alchemist interesting if I hold myself to a high quality of games. (As you know I do.)

I'm pretty excited! Subscriptions will actually DO SOMETHING now! ;)
Dec 2 2013, 3:48 pm


Possible that a new way that refugees spawn will be added.
Perhaps if you get large numbers of refugees, special types of blocks will drop. These blocks will change into a similar amount of refugees to fill up their amount of space when they are broken, and perhaps will even have numbers on them to denote their durability! :) This will make matches longer and will also reduce strain on the user's computers from having to display large amounts of small objects interacting all at once! :)

What are your thoughts? :D
Dec 2 2013, 7:15 pm
I just got asked an excellent question:
Your subscriptions will roll over to the other hub, no worries! :)
Dec 3 2013, 1:11 pm
Cool, love what I'm seeing.
Dec 3 2013, 2:48 pm
I'm excited.
Dec 3 2013, 3:46 pm
I'm glad everyone's getting excited! I'm getting excited too, I can't wait to see what people think of the new updates! :)
Dec 4 2013, 7:44 pm
This game is so much fun! I'm glad you decided to work on it again.

I do have a few suggestions on the design of the interface:

I think you should integrate the chat into that black area where the players are listed. Doing so would make it more streamlined and intuitive than having a separate window, and should also enable compatibility with the flash client in the future. It could be done by either dividing it to reserve a lower section for the chat, or there could be a button to toggle between the player list and the chat. Either way, it should still be possible to hide the chat so that it doesn't become a distraction for any of the players. In the case of the divided option, there could simply be a button to collapse and expand the chat area.

I just thought of a cool idea that might work as a really dramatic effect. Basically, you change the skin graphics of the entire HUD for each match based on the rank of the highest ranking player of a particular match! In a way it would be similar to the concept of "levels" in many single-player video games.

In this case, a level could be defined as a fixed percentage of the current highest rank in the game. As mentioned, the level of a match would be determined by the level of the highest ranking player in that match.

The idea is that as the match level increases, the whole playing area will look increasingly more grand. Everyone in the lobby would know right away how serious things are! The highest level would be a special one reserved only for matches against the current champion or master who holds the highest rank in the game. I'm not sure how many of these levels there should be, but I would say anywhere from 5 to 20. The only downside to this is making all of the required art assets. I just think it would be nice if the "scenery" changed every so often, to make things more competitive and interesting.

Also, I should mention that it would be nice if there was support for simultaneous matches, but that may be hard to program with BYOND's network model. I think one way to do it would be to make all of the servers automatically communicate with each other, to bring about a single, unified "virtual lobby". This hypothetical virtual lobby system would make it appear as though everyone was connected to the same server, when in reality that's not actually the case. All player information and chat messages would be exchanged and updated across all servers. The maximum number of simultaneous matches would simply be determined by the number of servers. When attempting to participate in or view a match being hosted on a different server, the player will disconnect from the current world and connect to that one instead, but everything else will stay the same!

Anyway, it seems like a lot of information to exchange, so I don't actually know how feasible something like this is, but I'm just putting the idea out there. There would actually be an exponential increase in communications with each server that goes live. That doesn't necessarily mean that the system would fail, but it would definitely have its limits, so regulations would need to be enforced somehow.

Well, I hope some of this was helpful. This game needs to be ready if it's going to face the world outside BYOND.
Dec 4 2013, 8:01 pm
In response to Multiverse7
I love your ideas! Does this look alright for the chat? :P
I think it might be a little wide, perhaps I could bring it closer together and add in some buttons on the sides for added chat options and whatnot.

Dec 4 2013, 8:21 pm
In response to Oasiscircle
Well, it's not bad, for people with very wide screens. Honestly though, I feel like it would fit in better in the bottom center. You could even delete that horizontal column segment there on the bottom, to make more room.

The thing is, when you have the chat off to the side like that, it forces the rest of the game into a smaller area of the screen.
Dec 4 2013, 8:23 pm
In response to Multiverse7
I'll try putting the chat on the bottom tomorrow and I'll post a screenshot! :)
Dec 4 2013, 8:36 pm
In response to Oasiscircle
That's great!

I find symmetry to be a very nice aspect of your game.

To reduce dependence on the player list, you could also try placing the names of the current match players above or below their corresponding boxes.
Dec 5 2013, 4:33 am
In response to Multiverse7
Theoretically the names could be put over the column along the bottom below each players respective playing area. I'm pretty sure it's large enough for a name to be placed over it, providing the name doesn't get too lengthy.

I really like the chat box idea, but there is more room to explore on that. For example, the box could only appear when you press a button to type and chat, or maybe that's the only way the 'input' appears is if you do that. Hard to comment without seeing it first, but just wanted to put that out there.

I absolutely love the multiple matches idea, too. LRS desperately needed that years ago, so I can certainly see why Alchemist would need it now.
Dec 5 2013, 4:49 am
In response to Toddab503
I really like the name-placement idea, I'll definitely do that! :)
I've been unsure about the chat box placement ever since the beginning of Alchemist, because the game looks so perfect without that huge chat box strapped on and I'd hate to mess with it because it just looks so elegant without it.
This is why I added in the unattached chat box in the original version. Perhaps I could mess around with a collapsing chat box or something...
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