Kajika

Today I had the latest build of DMO hosted. Which is essentially an unstable work-in-progress version. Although a decent amount of information was provided upon login(taking up 1/4 of the screen) it seemed to go completely unnoticed.

However, getting past the complaints and many rude and offensive 'reports' players left me; the test was rather successful. I gathered a decent amount of feedback about some changes and new features.

Most of the game appears to be stable, there is some work needed in various areas and definite lack of polish in others. I'll continue to chip away at these and host occasionally so we can get closer to the finished version.

I'll be approaching it in pieces, getting one piece complete at a time then moving on to the next section. Things like rankings and scores/medals are a little down the list but they'll be viewed eventually.

I have decided how I would like new graphics and map layouts to be, it's nothing amazing but it's another step towards completion. I'll seek out some graphic artists in the near future or just try to get it complete myself.

Thanks to all those who helped test and left bug reports.

Thanks to the efforts of the server guys it looks like our lufika.com server is working again. This means validation will work properly, allowing public servers to run without problems.

Current update is still progressing. I've recently made some new decisions regarding the interface; so expect some minor changes there.

I'm considering delegating some work out to others, perhaps hiring a graphic artist to rebuild the graphic style of the game but haven't had much luck with others in the past.
I feel DMO reflects on BYOND somewhat, which has inspired most of the changes to the game to bring it up to a higher standard.

So a few questions:
Do you feel redoing the games graphics is worthwhile?
(The game has been limited to the maps which are only made up of my poorly made icons, a good artist could help expand the game in this respect)

Are there any major interface features that you'd like to see?
(I don't play any BYOND games so I don't know what cool things are becoming a standard)

Are there any good chat/text/communication libraries floating around? I have made my own but I don't know how great the security is and all.

Any other new innovations/features that I haven't noticed?

Things are still progressing at a slow pace, I've mentioned many times that it's difficult to work on the project.
I have completed one of the major updates to the game just recently, I won't reveal it just yet but it gives the game a more intuitive and polished feeling.

The major hold up with testing and progress is unfortunately our lufika.com server. Sadly the kind folks who run the server take weeks to respond to our requests. We need to update BYOND on the server and we're just getting blown off.

This is also the reason why there are no servers being hosted today it seems, the server is spitting out errors; I have no idea when they'll even acknowledge or fix the problem.

I still can't give an ETA on the updates, I still have a few changes and updates to make before testing will begin.

Control Problems
I received quite a few reports of characters over-moving and controls becoming "sticky" or "locking". In short, this is due to the game running behind; I hadn't tested on a slower computer so I never encountered the problem myself.

I am genuinely embarrassed such a serious issue made it into the release, even more so by the comments I've being pointed to on the BYOND forums.
I apologize for misleading users on the actual game, BYOND's controls aren't the problem.

I hope those users that experienced problems try the game one more time and disregard the problems of the earlier version.

What's different?
Not too much was added to this version. The major change was a complete rebuild of the collision system, which was the culprit in the past version for the slow-down.

I was in the process of separating the Mega Man parts from the engine when I read the comments of laggy controls so I had to shift gears to get a working demo out again.

A stage select screen has been added but only two of the stages are accessible now(Guts Man and Zero).

Mega Man can now slide. Charging animations and charge blasts are different.
Platforms have been improved.

Only two characters are available now, Mega Man and Proto Man. You can switch between these on the stage select screen.

Future updates?
My next goal is to separate Mega Man code from the engine so I can reuse the base for another platformer at some point.
I would like to add at least 4-8 stages and some boss powers and items.

Any multi-player yet?
Before I started working on getting this release together I had done a lot of work on getting two players moving around. Since it can't use BYONDs default network model, I had to set up a client/server model. Someone was nice enough to post a link to a demo but I was unable to learn or take anything from it so I had to create my own library.
Basically it sent "messages" back and forth between the server and multiple clients. If you've ever looked into dealing with networking in C++ games you'll have a good idea how this works.

I tested a very crude version(which just sent positions and control information many times per second) with Lufia.
The results were expected with the method used(characters were jumpy because of the time between updates) but short of that it was a successful test, we were able to run and jump around in the same area with around about 1/4 to 1/2 a second delay between us.
Obviously this is only a proof of concept as far as multi-player goes. A real game would apply smarter networking and estimate player movement to allow for a smooth experience.

I'm not promising anything as far as a multi-player platformer right now. Some people are interested in the possibility and I wanted to share my experiences thus far.

As the game only has three levels I am reluctant to call it a full game, although it does have all the necessary mechanics completed. Adding a few more levels, projectiles and bosses wouldn't take too long but I didn't want to turn this project into a full game, I have already achieved my goal.

Originally the game used more realistic jumping and movement velocities, when I decided to turn it into a Mega Man game I had to adjust it to accurately mirror the Mega Man controls and physics. A lot of study and testing went into this, including getting the collision box around Mega Man just right.

This game only contains three levels, which are unlocked one after the other. The final level was an added bonus, it was only added on a whim which gave me a chance to add a more advanced and difficult boss.

Several playable characters are available, they are unlocked as you complete the levels and find items. You're able to switch between them during a level except during the last boss fight.

Why a platformer?
This is a project I've been wanting to do for a long time. Since my time with BYOND I've created several small pixel movement demos in an attempt to create a simple side scrolling platformer, unfortunately BYOND lacked some features which made it possible.
With BYOND 4.0 came some necessary features, key up/down detection, interface customization and client screen offsets. I decided to start from scratch and make a simple platformer game from the ground up.

Is it Multi-Player?
Unfortunately the engine could only be used as a single player game. I tested the possibility of a multiplayer option multiple times but it just wasn't reasonable, the data transfer is just too slow; the game appears very jumpy to clients. It's not unexpected, the networking in BYOND is obviously not designed for that sort of game. Perhaps if the network export features were more reliable, it may have been possible.
I also toyed with the ideas of 2-player gameplay using the same keyboard. It worked fine but didn't seem as useful as network play, and the game wasn't meant to grow too big.

Will the game be updated?
Unlikely. BYOND isn't the best platform for a project like this, especially lacking multi-player support. There is an unknown problem where the game appears to slow-down and become less responsive; I spent a lot of time trying to track down any leaks but found nothing significant; everything the game creates is cleaned up correctly. Sadly BYOND lacks some more in-depth debugging features at this time.
This makes me reluctant to add any more to the game because features may have to be disabled.

Was it difficult?
Yes and no. The challenge was that the game required many unique systems, I had to create my own libraries and management systems. Game states were used to separate areas of the game. Sprites represent all game objects, which only use objects to display themselves. Sprites also had to be bigger than 32x32, up to 256x256. A custom icon management method was required as the sprites were bigger than 32x32, I couldn't decipher how the large icons worked in 4.0 so I had to create my own method using the 32x32 limitation.
The hardest part was dealing with the icons, something I don't like doing. This is the major reason more wasn't added.
Enemy AI was especially difficult, having never worked with AI in a platformer before I had to be creative.

Any plans to release the source
Not at this time. Due to my lack of experience with this kind of game some parts of the code doesn't look too pretty. I don't believe it would be beneficial to release it in the current state.
As for the libraries and such at the base of the game, possibly. I made them first and well enough but I'm no expert and the BYOND community is unforgiving if a library has a flaw or uses something that has a better alternative. The safest option is to not release anything.

What has BYOND 4.0 allowed?
The best feature is the interface and the ability to customize macros, allowing you to detect key up/down events. The other major feature was allowing the client screen to be moved in pixels.
Both of these features were essential.