RockmanPM Forums
Rockman & Community => Rockman Series => Original => Topic started by: BaconMan on January 23, 2009, 01:02:54 AM
-
Hello, fellow RockFans. I'm TonyTheTGR, and I've began a GameMaker MegaMan project that I would really like some feedback/discussion about. Ideally, once completed, it will allow you to custom-configure (to a point) any Master Weapon setup to date, and include portions of every stage, as well. There are a few debatable differences throughout the series, though; which is where I could use the most feedback.
Also, programming genuinely kicks my butt; so getting a hand there would be nifty, too.
This YouTube begins the discussion... (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UXoMldxt5U) and forgive the annotation screwups; particularly at the end of "Part 2." I tried correcting them, only for YouTube to lock up and crash my computer... multiple times...
If you don't have an account, or feel like commenting, discuss it here instead. :D
-
So basically, you want the player to be able to use every single weapon from every Classic series game, on any stage, against any boss?
An "Endless Attack" type game that has all these features in it?
It does feel like the "Wily Tower" mode in "Rockman Megaworld" / "The Wily Wars". I like this idea. ^^
-
So basically, you want the player to be able to use every single weapon from every Classic series game, on any stage, against any boss?
An "Endless Attack" type game that has all these features in it?
It does feel like the "Wily Tower" mode in "Rockman Megaworld" / "The Wily Wars". I like this idea. ^^
At the start of the game, you can set up a selection of different weapons... I suppose a total freeplay "for fun" mode that allows total access to all weapons could be a fun feature, too... but the result is that yes, any weapon can be accessed and used, in any stage. :)
More details available here, (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnM3wKw69RE) on my latest and greatest Rock3 Endless video (3-parter). And yes, part 2's annotations screw up on me, again... :|
-
So this rival you speak of, is it an online opponent? Or even a real person? Or is it a Ghost like in racing games?
-
I've actually had a similar idea to this. except the levels would not be so random. It would be like one huge endless castle maze. And the bosses you face would either be completely random, or only random from the game series.
My other idea was just a robot master marathon. You would run into a room with 8 or 9 or so teleporters, each teleporter took you to an area to fight against a series of robot masters based on a particular game series.
And why Game Maker? The reason I never liked that is it doesn't give you an internal key config menu for games. So are you building this game from scratch, or do you have some sort of Mega Man source code for Game Maker?
-
Turian: More like a Ghost in racing games; but I'm thinking of setting it up later to "swap data" with other players online - so then, you'll be using Ghosts of other players, which is pretty close to online vs. play. Or about as close as a game in this format could get, and still be fair.
The sublevels are simply put in a random order, and on harder levels, given a couple of random elements (like spawning interference enemies) on higher difficulties. And the Robot Master marathon, that's exactly what "Power Mode" is. ;) (EDIT: Minus the teleporters.)
GameMaker (so far) is because I suck at real programming, and it seems like the best alternative so far. Other things I've been considering include map-editing/hacking Rock7FC, and ROM-hacking Rockman 2/3/5 endless to change terrain, and maybe a few weapons/graphics. But I wanted this to be configurable/expandable, so those didn't seem like good choices to go with.
The graphics so far, are from a combination of Rock7FC and NGPC's Battle & Fighters; but the programming/coding so far is totally from scratch. I would like to make a key config for it, as well... but that's a little less important than, you know, having a program that actually launches and runs. ^.^'
I'm also trying to set up starting points so that it creates an instance of "your character," and not "just" one of MegaMan. And at the moment, finding a way to set up the different weapons without having to copy and recolor every character ~80-100 times. ~.~ But so far, that sounds like the *right* way to do this.
On the bright side, I think I've narrowed down the soundtrack to just over 40 tunes, so far! XD
Not really a spoiler, I'm just saving you some screen space:
[spoiler]
Opening Movie (?): Title Mix Medley (RockCD)
Title Screen: TPB Ending - RockMan part 2 (TPB)
Config Screen: Rockman 3 Stage Select (TPB) or Rockman 8 Stage Select (Rock8)
Stage Start: Stage Start (TPB) -- That's a tough one!
Custom Levels/Fallback BGM: Maze of Death (Rock9 Arr)
General MM1 Level: GutsMan (TPF)
General MM2 Level: Skull Castle #1 (TPF)
General MM3 Level: Get a Weapon remix (RockCD)
General MM4 Level: Cossack Lab #2 (RockCD)
General MM5 Level: NapalmMan (TPF; the one used for Crash/Dust Man)
General MM6 Level: Stage Select (MM6 Arr/TPF)
General MM7 Level: Rock7 Intro Level (OG)
General MM8 Level: Rock8 Intro Level (OG)
General MM9 Level: We're The Robots (Rock9 Arr)
General MMV Level: Mercury Rising (MMV cover)
General MM&B Level: Robot Museum (MM&B cover)
General Wily Levels: Yellow Devil Showdown (TPB)
City/Urbal Levels: CutMan (TPF)
Water Levels: Splash Blue (Rock9 Arr) or BubbleMan (TPF)
Ice/Crystal Levels: GeminiMan (MM3 cover) or Frost Man (MM8 OG)
Space Levels: StarMan (TechnoCD)
Sewer Levels: MetalMan or ShadowMan (RockCD)
Temple Stages: GroundMan (MM&B cover)
Wilderness Levels: TomahawkMan (RockCD)
Aerial/Gyro Levels: CloudMan (TPB) or AirMan (TPF)
Electro/Magnetic Levels: GravityMan (MM5 Cover) and/or Plug Electric (MM9 Arr)**
Circus Levels: Concrete Jungle (Rock9 Arr)
Lab Levels: Galaxy Fantasy (Rock9 Arr)
Fire Levels: Blaze Heatnix (MMX6 cover)
"Cylinder" Levels: SnakeMan (TechnoCD) or FlameStag (MMX2 cover)***
"QuickLaser" Levels: TopMan (MM3 cover)
Wily Levels: Wily #1s (MM7 and MM8)
Game Over: Game Over (TPB)
Results/Continue Screen: Cutie Roll (MM9 Arr)
**=I'm not sure, this may be two entirely different stage types; like SparkMan vs. MagnetMan in MM3, or BrightMan vs. DustMan in MM4... CrashMan/QuickMan in MM2 face the same argument.
***=A subtle, but recurring theme. Look at SnakeMan, DiveMan, and TurboMan; you'll see what I'm getting at.
[/spoiler]
...and there you have it. Twice as big as it still needs to be, but anything less would barely be half as cool, right?
Finally, I think I'm going to go with *not* crossing 4-block pits/walls with jumps by default for now. After all, between Rush, Beat, Mega Ball, Ice Wall, Concrete Shot, Tornado Hold, etc.; there's tons of ways to work around that. You might as well have an excuse to use them, right? HOWEVER, there is a module to "fast walk," and one to "high jump," so equipping one of those might change your circumstances! ;) (And equipping both? Well, you'd be pretty freakin' incredible then, wouldn't you?)
-
Well to me eh, i don't know. I'm really not a fan of any sort of program that's outside of NES/SNES/etc emulators in comparison to flash, gamemaker, or whatever types of programs because they usually are never that good in my opinion in terms of the feel of gameplay, the controls, and especially how some people don't ever let the user customize the keys setup cause your forced to use whatever the author made only.
I recently tried out some "megaman return of wily" thing done with a game maker program, i know the graphics were great, lots of good stuff and level design, but i did not ever bother playing it because it felt very sluggish, and the jump/shoot buttons were reversed like the gamecube mm anniversary, and NOT customizable which really irritated me. :( I seriously can't play a megaman game at all with reversed controls. I'm not used to it at all.
I would not suggest taking the japanese hacks rock2, 3, and 5 endless by MISTY, and Rock5easily, hacking them, and re-releasing their patches as your own. I just wanted to say this because very recently alot of japanese people on the rockman 2ch forum i hang out at alot, were very upset and went berzerk over a youtube video posted by insedectuel where he accidently took some music from rockman DEM without the author's permission or something like that, which caused a bunch of japanese 2ch'ers to go real crazy. (this was only about 1 week ago)
Anyway, i'm not saying i hate your idea, don't mean that at all, i like it very much and look forward to see how ya do :) I'm just saying my honest thoughts. I've had thoughts about wanting to make an endless myself as well. for megaman 6 or 4. But I really do not have time to.
-
The endless mode is for sure interresting for any game, but without extras like the enhanced Yellow Devil of the Rockman 3 Endless hack, it becomes boring since you walk already through known places with some minimal differences. More changes would have been better to make the hack appear more advanced.
As for the Showdown hack of Insect Duel. Walking directly to bosses is boring, I want to surpass a [tornado fang]ing hard stage which kills me numerous times.
-
Well, if you want input, here's my take (though some of it assumes this project becomes more than vaporware):
1. If you're gonna create really difficult crap like in the Endless hacks, separate them via a difficulty option. I prefer the way MM9 did things, though I guess the hacks appeal to someone out there. Heck, the way I'd do it is more like how 6 had optional paths for four of the bosses to get Beat; with this method, the player could dictate the difficulty at pretty much any time provided they had what it took to reach the optional teleporter, which would be awesome. To this end, I would *NOT* require special weapons as much as possible on the easier levels for Mega Buster-only junkies. I prefer to use the Buster as much as I possibly can in Endless, which is why my EA compilation only uses Laser Trident and Concrete Shot when required for no damage purposes except in two instances (one where the Trident is required just to proceed and the other for an easier path that isn't possible to avoid taking damage on without using a special weapon). For harder levels? Sure, why not, I'm not playing those. Whatever you do, DEFINITELY make boss damage invulnerability time setting an option. 2 and 9 did it right, but I hate the other games in this regard, especially MM&B.
2. Along with a fully customizable button config, include individual sound volume (people do want to hear something different from time to time yet want to keep the sound effects, despite what Japanese game companies like to believe). A game that does not give you these simple choices can easily be considered garbage faster than a game that has them. In fact, forget music for now. Players can supply their own. You can add a soundtrack later.
3. Timer/energy loss option. Should a timer make things harder, or should the energy loss be increased? Why not both, or perhaps neither (sometimes I just want to play, challenge be damned)? Again, this should be an option. A timer by itself should not be considered "hard mode."
4. Physics choices! Separate by Mega Man and Rush. Some people might like MM2's crappy slide to a halt, while I really like 9's stop-on-a-dime method and horizontally faster jumps. I'm all for freedom of choice in my gaming, if you haven't noticed. Sure, it'll be harder to make, but to me, it wouldn't be worth it otherwise.
5. Bonuses would be nice, but I hardly think they're necessary. If you do include them, I'd rather you did something unique instead of *just* harder bosses and such, like maybe take a reference from Kirby Super Star and have an MMBN-like level for instance. You could even do a level where weaker RM's make up the regular enemies.
I can think of more, but that's enough for the moment.
-
Really, I'd love just a RM fighter with every single RM made. Like the Power Fighters, but broader.
Anyway, though, this seems like a fun idea. I agree with the difficulty setting needing to be in place.
The Gameboy games might be a real challenge, when you think about it. The screen was very small on those games and, consequentially, the worlds are made for a smaller screen in mind. You might want to remake a battle just to show how it'd be done (might I suggest Quint? A favorite of mine, even if his attack pattern is lame).
I imagine this'll include the ability to expand the game as well ... which seems a great way to do add-on levels.
As for the minor phisics details ... I'd probably max them out, so that jumps from all games are possible. I dunno how many people would notice, though.
-
I knew this was gonna happen eventually. It's just too good of an idea to not do. I'll give you my suggestions in a PM, 'cause I don't want to clutter this topic with any more huge posts.
-
I knew this was gonna happen eventually. It's just too good of an idea to not do. I'll give you my suggestions in a PM, 'cause I don't want to clutter this topic with any more huge posts.
Huge posts are half the point of the topic! :D
So, let's see here...
DIFFICULTIES BREAKDOWN
-FAIR-
Areas are untimed.
Features regular power-up support (like "?" cans). The extra support module adds extras.
Most areas are straight-forward, and usually do not feature constant-spawning enemies (like floating head-things, for example).
You're allowed 7 modules to use. (See next section on those.)
-HARD-
You get 2 minutes per area.
Features fewer power-up supports, the extra support module makes it equal to "FAIR" mode.
Areas that were originally made with constant-spawning enemies will feature them.
You're allowed 6 modules to use.
-MEGA-
You get 1 minute per area. (Each area is 5-10 screens, meaning you'll need to keep an average pace of about 8 seconds per screen to not fail!)
Features *no* powerup supports by default, extra support makes it equal to normal "HARD" mode.
Any area at random can feature constant-spawning enemies.
You're only allowed 5 modules to use. And if that's not hard enough, you can *choose* to use fewer modules, too!
-POWER-
Untimed areas.
No powerup supports by default, extra support will place one in each "exit chamber."
You fight a boss every 3 screens, instead of every 30 or so. So basically, you're *constantly* fighting bosses. ;)
You're allowed 5 modules to use... but let's face it, there's no tricky platforming here. Gun up!
MODULES SUMMARY
Each module will allow you to equip yourself with a choice of:
-4 Robot Master Weapons (per set, including a "random selecton" of any 4)
-1 Primary Weapon (Mega Buster, Proto Shield, Piercing Laser, Mega Fist, etc.; if disregarded, = P.Shooter)
-1 Secondary Weapon (Balloon Lift, Hook Shot, Super Arrow, Mega Ball, etc.)
-1 Pet (Rush, Beat, Treble, or Tango; 3 functions apiece)
-1 E-Tank (to begin with)
-Super Jumping
-Fast Running
-Sliding or Dashing
-Extra Support
-Energy Balancer
-Energy Amplifier (+1 to life/weapon powerups)
-Energy Converter (surplus of one energy type charges the other)
-Maybe Spike Insurance (spikes = 50% damage, not "instant death") and/or Double Jumping, but maybe that's being too nice...
...also consider that this can lead to a large variety of strategies. Take for example:
-Super Jump
-Fast Walk
-Extra Support
-Energy Amplifier
-Energy Converter
-Mega Ball
You see, having no Master Weapons, as long as MegaBall is full, every powerup will yield you health because of the Energy Converter. The Amplifier will then increase each power-up's value by one, giving you quite an edge healthwise. Super Jumping and Mega Ball together would make it very hard to get stuck, anywhere. The Fast Walk will help you score good time, without sliding around, out of control; and the Extra Support would see to it that you're never hurting either way for too long... after all, weapon or life power can be converted either way!
And this is a strategy you could still use on HARD, even! With Easy, you can add any Buster, Master Weapon subset, or a starting E-Tank on top of that!
RANDOMIZABLE VARIABLES!
On top of shuffling the rooms' orders; I figured the usual runthrough could use some mixing up. So one thing I'm looking to do, as illustrated in one of the MM2 videos; is to map key points, and generate randomized, yet appropriate enemies (IE: aerial ones in the air; stationary ones in stationary positions, etc.). This also includes the different varieties of spawning enemies.
Random Robot Master weaknesses and immunities! They may not even make sense anymore. This may be in place of, or in addition to classic ones.
MORE REPLY!
Rest assured, custom controls and gamepad support are very much a must! ~w~ And likely, with an option to not only adjust SFX/BGM seperately, but a simple switch to toggle them on and off as well.
Charting the Gameboy titles' maps is indeed something different; those games also have vastly different physics to them as well; heck it takes pro-timing just to make a 3-block wide jump in them! They will probably be stretched/scaled to work within conventional MM physics. MM7 is ironically the closest non-NES title to the OG format, the only real difference in it, is that they put the ladder-side graphics (and NOT the actual "ladder itself!") in the neighboring tiles. MM8's is fairly similar, but the graphics are really stretched out horizontally, and the horizontal motion physics are way slower - that's why a 2-tile gap is actually hard to cross sometimes in that game, and why the levels feel SOOO freaking LOOONG. (They aren't *that* big. You're just slow.)
And even though MM9 is quite similar, the NES rooms are 16 x 15 tiles; where the Legacy ones are only 16 x 14. It sort of evens out, because the NES-standard "sea level" was on the third tile up, where Legacy's is on the second one, instead. I just hope it doesn't throw off the horizontal screen-scoring!
Room difficulty, for the most part, will probably max out at your standard "Dr. Wily Levels;" or about as hard as that. I do like being able to choose a psychotically difficult path, or a more standard one; but I'll probably balance that out by making the super-difficult path more short, and the managable ones more of a detour. Some level layouts have already required that I make detours in the game, particularly where sliding is concerned. Since sliding is an optional module, it's not too uncommon for a level like say, NeedleMan's, to become impossible to do without it - so a way around that has to be made.
There probably will be a *couple* of unavoidable, near-certain-death rooms; as pro players (which this isn't particularly aimed -in favor- of, but would certainly include them and their needs as well) also need a point in which they would get canned, eventually. There will probably be less than 5 of those, though; which would give any of them about a 1% (or less!) chance of occuring.
Custom maps/a map editor is something I would like to do; though it would probably be more of an update, once the engine/application is established.
Making a map the old fashioned-way is far more work than you might expect! First the "objects" define the boundaries and ground from open air, others define what blocks have water, or wind... then you have your "foreground," which is just graphics that cover all of that up; like a stage set - and that usually has to be added seperately... then you place the widgets (you know, the things that make the levels act different? Like the disappearing blocks, falling platforms, those "warp thingys" in GalaxyMan's stage, the springs and "ClownMan blocks..." all kinds of things like that!).
Then after all of that, you have to set starting points, ending points, enemy locations; if they spawn, then under what conditions and where from... it's not like putting together LEGOs, you know! (Like MMPU makes it look.) Then coming up with a way to auto-tile all of that stuff will take a long time!
I did think of one other weird kind of thing, once; but it would have to be "Flash"ed to work... An end-user MegaMan game, where you design up to 10 sublevels, which using a buddy system, are then linked to one another's. IE, someone beats one of your levels, they can then play another one of yours, or one of your friends'. But that would have to be a totally-online/web-based kind of game. That can be somebody else's pet project! I'm already in over my head with this! :|
Posted on: January 26, 2009, 04:48:42 PM
So, with all of that aside; what do you think the Robot Master encounters should be?
Old-fashioned, one-to-two screen brawls? Maybe in pairs?
Still a battle, but in an active scene (imagine fighting CrashMan in a stage that looped vertically, with differing pits/platforms, with or without enemy-spawning).
Goal-oriented? Pattern-oriented? New patterns/moves added?
That's one part that I'm still really undecided on; and I really don't want to make 3-4 of every boss, to correspond by doing different things with different difficulties... (though I suppose that's possible, too... then again, so's having 100 copies of MM, to handle each weapon seperately - could be done, but I'd rather find a smarter/simpler way to do that!).
And you thought MM GB's were gonna be bad! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtQH3E8thiQ) Downside: more weird physics/inconsistencies, and is that a SMB springblock? :| Upside: More GravityMan fun! 8)
-
Don't forget about the sideways level!
-
If you include those you should definately include the PC games. Just imagine how hard it would be to try and find your way through a par tof PC3 with a timer! ACK!
I dunno, I think some of these small things don't matter so much. I brought up the gamebloy games, but the walls could just be .... really, really thick, you know? Resizing them might ruin the effect of including them. Well ... I think testing is the key more than speculating. And, really, including wierd stuff like R&FWS (and even the PC games) would involve a lot more work than just physics .... you'd probably have to redraw a lot of things yourself.
I don't think you'd nessesarily need some "super tough" levels that have a 1% chance of surival just for the hard players. Just the gradual grinding-down of the player ought to be enough, IMHO.
I don't think some of the consistancy issues will be too noticable in your remake. But I guess we'll wait and see. Where are you starting with this? MM1? MM2?
-
Platforming-wise, I'm aiming at MM3; in a weird kind of way that lets you set up any other feel to go along with it (hence, the optional sliding/busters). MM1-2 were total bitches! :W There's a fair number of widgets that I'm just not gonna bother remaking (yet), and a couple of things will be ditched entirely (like MM5's "Retard Coil")... and some are easily substituted (like the "RingMan roads," why not just use drop-blocks?)
And actually, given presence of the E-Tank, and the normal frequency of power-ups; the certain-doom chambers are necessary, indeed. In fact, go to YouTube, watch *any* 3 Endless Attack videos, of any version (MM2, MM3, MM5, or MM9), and see when these players die. It's almost ALWAYS some kind of instant-kill trap, like a missed/mistimed jump. Very rarely are they worn down. Besides, there's a good chance of one *not* being featured for quite awhile... and I may make it possible to avoid them entirely. But you'll have to be smart - and correctly equipped - to pull something like that off!
This one actually IS a spoiler, btw.
[spoiler]I thought of doing one or two sections as a sort of tribute to IWBTG! ;)
How could I -not- make that a deathtrap?[/spoiler]
Not only that, there's *nothing* like the sensation you get, when you FINALLY beat that crap. You feel proud, like you've accomplished something special; and providing that kind of sensation - based on skill and practice, not dumb luck - is a vital ingredient to the MegaMan experience! (And the gaming experience as a whole!) In fact, that factor alone is usually what makes a great MegaMan game stand above the average ones (IE: why many people still to this day, favor MM's 2 & 3).
Rush Jet and Beat Plane are there for whoring.
And the GB levels? 10 x 8 tiles, and you don't think that takes some resizing? o.O Only problem with leaving them in their OG format, is that they rely on a 3-block high barrier (IE: you can only jump 2 1/2 tiles high), which would be easily penetrated with normal physics. I've seen ONE 4-block wide jump EVER, and that was on the Saturn level, with modified gravity to boot.
Now, that online level-editor project I mentioned above? That would probably be *best* to do in GB size/physics, which would make level creation and loading times minimal! Plus, they didn't focus a whole lot on widgets... they were much more like MM&B, as the whole power-up risk/reward thing was present in practically every level, ever. Smart item use, or just dumb luck would often get you something good. They were pretty basic layouts, too.
I did stumble upon plays of the PC titles... and you know, that *might* sorta work, if they were sectioned off. I don't think they're map-charted, though... (am I the only person who thinks it's funny just how worthless the P-Shooter is in those games? Oh no! Knee-high enemies, everywhere!) I'm not totally sure I'm going to do that, or "Rockman +42" yet. (At least in the latter's case, I wouldn't have to track any new music. But the way the BGM restarts after every pause/weapon switch would drive me NUTS.)
-
* resizing GB games
I suppose I never really looked at it, but the graphics all are NES-sized ... at least vaguely (the early games shrunk their RMs int he wash). I'm not really looking at this from the tiles perspectibve ... aren't you totally remaking that anyway? And, if so, does it really matter how the origional games stores anything? You can just rip the existing graphics from level maps and compile them how you see fit. That's my view.
* PC games
The PC games are sort of my "adopted" game. Even made / edited a bunch of NES-ized Robot Masters if you're interested. An NES/PC project was gonna use them, but I dunno how that turned out.
The PC games, to me, seem ideal for an endless mode .... especially one that's timed. Just because of how annoying some of those maps from PC 3 are ... you can leave out the shoddy graphics, play control, and physics. lol. There's entire maps of them all at VGMaps. PC1 follows a more traditional MM game's style, but PC3 is total freeroaming ... hence the frustration. But I think you could section off portions and make it work. I think it'd be an interesting sort of challenge ... entirely your call. Although if you do use them ... Torch is my favorite of the bunch. The only level out of them all that might be impossible to section off would be Sharkman's level because of how free it is ... no point in remaking the entire thing. I mean, you wouldn't be remaking any levels in their entirety anyway, but Sharkie's has no "hard parts" to section off and the swimming is quite irksome. Although you could say it'd add one "instant death" room.
*Ringman's platforms
I dunno about sub stituting them for something else ... they were pretty neat little things in MM4. If you can do it with hardly anything different ...
- Good choice with MM3! lol. Naturally I am a huge MM3 fan. Really, I think there's just nothing but to do it and worry about adding more when the time calls for it.
Really, I think there's nothing to it but to do it as they say....
-
http://www.a3share.com/members/1119/megaman5GBtest-0.png
I once tried to create at least 1 screen from one of the levels on the gameboy megaman 5, on the NES. Those were all the exact tiles all copied using tile layer pro, and YY-CHR from megaman5.GB to megaman3.NES
And i did not stretch anything or touch any of it, but that's how it came out. It's sooo small for the NES screen :(
They would not be able to be stretched by double the size because the Gameboy's reolsution would have to end up matching the NES's precisly. And they do not equal each other. So it would not come out right any way whatsoever if it were done. I don't know how it would ever be possible to make gameboy graphics decent enough for a NES reoslution.
Edit: Oh yea, but check this out. Was looking through my screenshots from my fceuxd 1.0a folder, and this one time a really long time ago, i tested out more gameboy megaman 5 graphics, and you know the big wily ship right before going to the wily stages after fighting Terra ? ..well i did a test by seeing how the ship would look on the NES..and i stretched it out by double the size, and spent many hours adding color, and and so on.
http://www.a3share.com/members/1119/117.png
THIS turned out pretty good. It's not a copy-paste in paint. It really was an in-game screenshot i took for reals. Even coded it to slowly move up and down, giving it a boss lifebar, but that's it :P
-
* resizing GB games
I suppose I never really looked at it, but the graphics all are NES-sized ... at least vaguely (the early games shrunk their RMs int he wash).
Only the second game bothered to redraw every character slightly smaller. The rest of them only shrank the very largest enemies.
Have any of you seen Joseph Collins' attempt to hack the NES CutMan level to resemble the GB one? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU2elvmgRi0 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU2elvmgRi0) Now, it's not perfect, and obviously it doesn't include the conveyor belts and the sawblade enemies, but it gives you an idea.
-
Yes, in fact I have seen the CutMan remake, and something like that is what I had in mind - recreating the general layouts of the rooms, in ways that would work and make sense with classic physics. :) And maybe adding a couple more enemies here and there, to fill in the extra space created by doing that. (Gauntlet: I mean stretching the room layouts, not the tiles/characters.)
There's a swimming level that's not in MM8? Perhaps further justification for a "swimming module..." though that would also enable you to swim through StarMan's level, and parts of Saturn's, too... (since the low-grav areas are just "water areas, without graphical water.") I'll have to check out the maps, see if I can adapt them, since the idea of timed rooms isn't to get the player lost; it's to give them a start and a finish, clearly defined, and a challenge to get from one to the other. I'm sure there's *some* areas that would work with, and maybe a couple of "find the transporter" areas would just add some nice variety to the bunch.
Do you really think Robot Masters or weapons from them would make very much of a difference? The NES-ized masters would be interesting to look at, if nothing else - I wonder if there are SNES-ized ones, too... I know some of the MMV ones could be edited/adapted from other RM's (like NapalmMan = Mars, or ShadeMan = Jupiter).
Reason I'm going with Battle and Fighters first, is because they coincide with both potentials (NES + SNES). The game itself runs in double-resolution; which the SNES-ized graphics can be "layered over" the classic ones, if that option is enabled. Of course, I'm still looking for HeatMan, GeminiMan, StoneMan, and CentaurMan of NGPC-format; which Sprites, Inc. is still missing.
For the testing version, I'm using a very basic, ugly tileset that just establishes basics - here's the spikes, here's the ground, here's the ladders and the water... the "uglytiles" can be copied and adapted to different themes/looks, which again, will probably be a little more lazy than the actual NES ones (after all, CAPCOM has an entire art team!).
Those MMV adaptations are really nice-looking, btw! I always pictured "the Wily Star" ("the Meth Star?") as a wannabe Death Star, which is exactly what it reminds me of! If *any* of the GB games needs a proper adaptation, it's MMV. The purple skull is a very nice, Wily-esque touch, too.
-
http://gauntlet101010.deviantart.com/art/Megaman-PC-NES-sprites-94680018
There's my PC NES-ized Robot Masters. I didn't fully make them (long story), but they're mostly mine.I also made some symbols for their weapons, but they aren't in 8-bit.
The Weapons ... well, IMHO, you should handle the special weapons like the Wily Wars did. That said, no they aren't really worth anything. The PC1 guys all have far superior and similar types of weapons from canon MM games while the PC3 guys mostly have shot-type of weapons that aren't too unique. It'd just be nice for the PC guys to be included.
The water levels aren't like Bubbleman's water levels. They require swimming. That said .... you don't have to be totally true to them at all.
-
There's a swimming level that's not in MM8? Perhaps further justification for a "swimming module..." though that would also enable you to swim through StarMan's level, and parts of Saturn's, too... (since the low-grav areas are just "water areas, without graphical water.")
So you can't just add different kinds of water, maybe separate them into Jump Water, Float Water, and Swim Water?
-
It's definately possible to seperate different kinds of water. To a computor it's all just programming. That's why, in Mario 1, Mario can swim in some water and other times he dies!
-
Well, yeah. But does separating "swimable" water from "unswimable" water make sense to end-users? :| (Plus, in SMB1, water Mario dies in is just not identified as "water" at all. It's a pit, like any other, but with pretty water BG graphics.) So far, the water is just "0.5x gravity" areas, but if I make a swimming module, it will be to react to that. I suppose I could just copy/rename the space-jumping areas... or, maybe just allow swimming in space anyways. XD Again, that's if I -do- swimming...
Anybody have animations of Mega, Proto, Bass, Zero, S. Adapt Mega, T. Boost Bass swimming? In 8-bit, 16-bit, and/or 32-bit? ~.~' (Finding ladder-climbing one for Bass/Proto is a PitA, too! So far, I've only got 8-bit Proto [ProtoMan 9], and 32-bit Bass [RnF/MMnB]. Rock and Zero are both solid though, through and through. Except maybe Zero jump-shooting...)
Re: MMPC Bosses
Those are pretty good edits, btw! I'll have to look up a little more on them... but what kinds of battles do you think would be coolest? The conditional/situational battles, the classic patterns, new patterns/moves, or player reactions? I want to do something that will establish them some personality... give them some basic movements, and then 3 priorities to accomplish with them... which could make for both simplistic programming and yet, diverse gameplay.
I recognize a few (SharkMan being obvious, along with Dyna/Volt/... and uh, that other one, too... oh yeah! SonicMan. >w< ...and then Torch. I'm guessing Toxy is the ~= AirMan, right?
Perhaps a small touch-up of the OG boss sprites could double as the 16-bitters, too.
VGMaps has MM 1/3 for PC, but not 2. Was there a PC MM2? ???
Well, this certainly WILL add some unexpected variety to the mix, that's for sure! You think we should actually make those weapons interesting this time?
Also, it looks like there's only two parts to Sharky's level that would require swimming, one of them reaching his chamber (which in an Endless setting, would be worthless anyways), and the part just below it. The, uh, texturing of the levels may take some "blockifying" to work, but the general layouts are no less adaptable than the portable titles, I suppose. But they'll probably be an early update, as establishing a working engine, that does what we *know* it should do; is the obvious first step in all of this.
And yes! They have R&F2, as well! 8)
If somebody has the MMPC titles, especially 3; do you think I can get a weapons usage clip for it? If there's other items along those lines, that would kick as well.
-
I'd like to see an option to select a constant BGM. 'cuz an Endless Attack with MM3's Wily Stage 2 throughout its entirety would be epic beyond all sane reasoning.
Well, yeah. But does separating "swimable" water from "unswimable" water make sense to end-users?
'bout as much as separating current-water from death-water (Xtreme2).
Just have the death-water flash so that it looks all electrified and stuff.
-
VGMaps has MM 1/3 for PC, but not 2. Was there a PC MM2? ???
If there is one, I've never read anything about it on the Web. They may have skipped from 1 to 3 in order to profit off the popularity of the NES game, or so they could re-use the box art and pass off SparkMan as BitMan.
-
There's also the Tiger LCD games Mega Man 2 and Mega Man 3. ^^
-
@BaconMan
http://themechanicalmaniacs.com/articles/MMPC.php - Download MMPC and MM3PC right at my site. It was one of my first bits of content. And no ... there was never a MM2PC. WTF, right?
Torchman is the Magnetman edit. Waveman is the Airman edit.
On patterns - Well, IMHO, it's best to make everything as true as possible. I'd take the sound effects (lol) and just go with the existing patterns. For the hard mode though ... you can make them interesting there. I have much more than is needed in that sprite sheet, so you can put it together with some imagination. And there's playthroughs which show you what they're pattern's supposed to be.
Sharkman's level & Swimming - It ALL requires swimming. If you really go through it you'll see. Especially if you want to be true to the games, and I think it'll be a stronger project if you are. I think it'll make sence enough to the end users. Just insert a sign that shows MM swimming or something and they'll get the idea. Just use MM8's swimming ... the swimming in PC3 is [parasitic bomb]. It'd be fun to see these levels in the game, but there's no point is they are shitty and unplayable, you know?
Although you'll have to graphically remake the enemies. They don't have many frames and shouldn't present too much challenge, though. I mean ... if you're willing to tackly R&F WS and all. I think it'd be worth it though, if it meant the inclusion of these bizarre levels. They do have tile data, BTW. In the gallery at my site (follow the link in the article I posted). I could help sprite *some* enemies if the PC stages are a definate go.
Smart bet is to disable the helpers in the water; like Jet post 3 and in WW. Having them actually in the water would negate the challenge and is logistically questionable. Would gospel boost and Jet MM work in the water? Could MM swim as Power MM?
On Weapons - I'd include them as options, but no. No changes. That's like changing Shadow Blade around because the game has Metal Blade. If you have them, you have them as they are for better or worse.
To me, the strength of this kind of project is to make the emulation as true as possible. Like the fanmade MM7 NES remake ... it mimicked the origional levels as well as the NES series. After you do that, WELL ... then it's time for some fun, eh? Super hard Torchman on hard mode sounds like a great idea to me. And very ironic.
-
There's also the Tiger LCD games Mega Man 2 and Mega Man 3. ^^
See already: Power Mode. ;)
[spoiler]XD Are you serious?! *lol*[/spoiler]
And the swimming is one of the weapons? ^.^' Well that's not gonna translate too well, is it? Besides, the only frameset I have with swimming frames at all is MM8's Rock. Bass' dash or G. Boost (MM7) frames could sorta... do... something... but Proto's totally screwed, then! (And actually, that would break Zero, too.)
-
I think you're misunderstanding me based on the swimming comment ....
If you're swimming, I think Gospel Boost and the Rushes should be disabled. Just by default. It forces you to actually swim.
I think you should base Bass off his Power Battles and Fighters sprites. LOTS of options there. I don't think anybody ever made swimming sprites for him though.
Someone made a swimming 8-bit MM for the MM8 remake game ... I don't think he'd mind you using it if you asked and gave credit.
-
I think you're misunderstanding me based on the swimming comment ....
If you're swimming, I think Gospel Boost and the Rushes should be disabled. Just by default. It forces you to actually swim.
I bequeath a boot to the head.
*THWAKK!*
NEVER diss Rush.
There's also the Tiger LCD games Mega Man 2 and Mega Man 3. ^^
DEET. deet. dootDEETdeetdootDEETdeet.
Ah, the memories...
(I only had 3)
-
I wasn't talking about using the actual Gospel Boost - you know that "dive attack" Bass does in MM7 with it? I was talking about using that as a basis to edit a swim animation. And one problem with using the Battle/Fighters sprites (which I would otherwise do), and it's the same one as using Rock7FC's... he needs a ladder-climbing animation, still. (Plus, IIRC; Rock7FC's is based on NGPC Battle & Fighters, anyways!)
[objection!]
Pets are -not- getting disabled, though. It's MegaMan, since when does anything *need* to make sense? (Fire Man weak against Ice... whaaat?!) Besides, doing that as associating with "water" is a REALLY bad idea. Know why? Play GeminiMan's stage. THAT'S why. ;)
Gauntlet: Who and where? :D
-
Is Rush disabled in MM8's swimming levels?
Plus, Rush Jet IS disabled in the water post-MM3. Rush Marine is disabled outside of water post-MM3 too. So it's not like it's some sort of stretch to think the suits might not work in water. Swimmable water, anyway. YOU'RE the one who'se saying it's a problem to make swimming frames for these modes, though. I'm just offering you one solution. Obviously, you could just create swimming frames for these modes if you don't want to disable them.
Before the crash someone posted swimming sprites in the MM7FC thread for the guys making MM9FC to use. Don't know who though.
If you really wanted Bass in the game you could CREATE some ladder sprites. It's not like it's all that hard. There's even unused PB sprites of him climbing a ladder. You're thinking of remaking part of the WS game in 8-bit, so why the aversion to making some ladder and swimming sprites?
edit: You can't be afraid to create some custom sprites for things you want the characters to do. If you want Jet megaman to swim in your game then, obviously, you gotta make swimming sprites for Jet Megaman. If that's too much work then, maybe, Jet megaman doesn't need to swim in the game. But it's one or the other.
And the Sakugarne and Top Spin, and several other weapons ... they all require some customisation. The damage chart too ... the RM's damage data is well documented, but the damage to minor enemies is not. You see the challenge you have here, right?
If you want Bass in the game, obviously, he needs a few more sprites. But it's not like that's some insurmountable challenge. I mean ... why balk at ladder climbing sprites when programming a mixture of MM1-8 and the GB games and the PC games is a daunting challenge in and of itself? The game you want to make is a huge challenge to program ... making new ladder climbing sprites or Top Spin sprites is not.
-
Smart bet is to disable the helpers in the water; like Jet post 3 and in WW. Having them actually in the water would negate the challenge and is logistically questionable. Would gospel boost and Jet MM work in the water? Could MM swim as Power MM?
Well, Jet and Power MegaMan worked just fine in the regular water of Mega Man 6. And even with the Super Adaptor, you still float in the "float water" of BurstMan's stage. Now, with "swim water", I think it's okay to allow Rush Marine because it has limited energy anyway, but I see your point about the Rush suits. It's really up to the author here; if you think you should just swim in suit form, then do that. If you think there should be a change to the physics because the suits are considered "heavier" (the reasons for not allowing sliding and for Power RockMan's slower running animation, I believe), then change it until it feels right.
On Weapons - I'd include them as options, but no. No changes. That's like changing Shadow Blade around because the game has Metal Blade. If you have them, you have them as they are for better or worse.
That's true. But one consideration is that now we're adapting various different games from various different systems, and sometimes a game will re-use something from a previous game with a slight tweak to it. For example, there's this dome-headed shooting enemy that lifts a shield over its head to fire in Rockman 5, and in Rockman World 4, it's modified to allow standing on the shield. This would be funny to implement, but should it always be this way so the player knows what to expect, or should it only happen in Game Boy-styled levels so as not to take away the challenge from the NES levels with their higher ceilings? The weapons should probably stick to their original style for the most part, but I'd still look to the handheld and arcade games for ideas on how to spice them up a little.
And if you do put Beat in the game, which Beat is it? Even on the NES, there were two very different versions. 5's Beat only takes a little damage off each enemy it hits, while 6's Beat destroys an enemy in one hit, using up energy equivalent to the remaining energy of the enemy, but it doesn't attack bosses like 5's. I haven't tried the Game Boy one in a while, although I think it was more like NES 5's, except I remember there was a trick where Beat would still damage enemies without actually flying into them--just get the target over your shoulder and turn around.
Plus, Rush Jet IS disabled in the water post-MM3. Rush Marine is disabled outside of water post-MM3 too.
And that's a shame. I liked being able to hop on land before disembarking, although it shouldn't have wasted energy to sit around on land.
If you really wanted Bass in the game you could CREATE some ladder sprites.
Aren't there a few ROM hacks that feature Bass? Why not just imitate the climbing sprite from one of those? Seriously, you only need to draw ONE FRAME for this. The climbing animation in the old games is simply flipping it back and forth.
The damage chart too ... the RM's damage data is well documented, but the damage to minor enemies is not. You see the challenge you have here, right?
It's been my dream for a while to see a page with damage data for EVERY enemy in every game. I could probably help with this as long as I've got nothing better to do.
Now some of the inter-game damage data are covered by games like the Rockman World series and Rockman Megaworld, while the rest you can just make up based on how the weapons tend to work and what the characters tend to be damaged by. The only sticky part is when these games conflict with each other... Maybe use the conflicting damage values in different difficulties? (If you're not following me here... Think about what happens when you use the Mega Man 1 weapons on Changkey Maker in Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge as compared to doing so in Mega Man: The Wily Wars or Mega Man: Powered Up.)
-
Aren't there a few ROM hacks that feature Bass?
The Adventures of Bass II by Sivac Drac. ^^
-
Suits - Another problem with armors (at least jet ones) in swimming levels occurred to me. Namely that swimming involves mashing the jump butting. The same button used for flying. Logistically, it doesn't make sence. If you're swimming, how would the flying work ... I mean, you'd be wearing the suit, but every time you're in the air you're swimming. So you'd never actually be able to fly. Disabling the effected suits is the simplest solution rather than having them simply not work.
Bass' R&F Gospel Boost would probably work all right. His MM7 suit (a copy of MM's suit) suffers the same problem.
Keeping Rush Marine is fair. It's the suits that are a concern, not the standard stuff.
Bass ladder - I wouldn't use a rom hack to nab sprites from. At least, not without permission. Ladder sprites aren't hard to make yourself ... it's shameful to nab them from some hack just because you don't wanna take the time to do your own.
Beat - Gooooood question. I liked Beat in MM5 the best. But that's just because Beat didn't work on Wily in 6.
I suggested to do this WW style, so that'd mean a choice of three support units. So, a choice of any of the Beats (MM5-6, MM7, R&F) along with Tango, Rush, and Eddy too I guess.
-
Bass ladder - I wouldn't use a rom hack to nab sprites from. At least, not without permission.
Well sheesh, I didn't mean you had to steal anything if you didn't want to. You could at least study those sprites and try to improve them. And really, there are only so many ways to fill those small tiles, so I don't make a big deal out of stealing sprites anyway.
a choice of any of the Beats (MM5-6, MM7, R&F)
Sure, I would say combine the best aspects of the homing attack forms of Beat and call it Beat Attack, then have a Beat Rescue and a Beat Shield. Just as long as the player doesn't get them mixed up...
-
Well, obviously recreating every element of every game (including every minor enemy!) would not only be totally exhausting, but also would make the file size/loading time on this thing EEEEENORMOUS! >.< It is more of a "generalization" game; after all, given differences in MM physics, taking that approach would mean making 20 "Rockmans," one to recreate every detail of every title. Heck, if I were doing that, it might as well just be a patch for Perfect Collection, or something. >.< A total, perfect emulation project really IS above my head! (And I'm not too proud to admit that.)
Another part of an "exact recreation" that wouldn't make any sense, is the "double-damage deal." Zero takes double damage. Proto takes double damage. Bass takes double damage. I mean, WTF?! -u-' (Honestly, I just think "RockHead" is twice as oblivious to damage. XD )
Keeping a project like this simple, but still fun and worthwhile; that's what I'm really looking to achieve here.
Suits and Water:
Mmm... (looking at the "jump button" issue,) that IS a very valid point. I was going to go so far as to make Armored Megaman/Bass just seperate selectable characters from the originals... (much the way X5/X6 make the different armors available) but the swim module really -would- screw that up. (0.5x 'ing the gravity wouldn't change the flying dynamics enough either, would it? Just the falling ones...) In fact, the "double jump" module couldn't coincide with anything like that, either. >w< Oh, crap... something's got to give!
Rush Marine:
To be honest, I was just going to axe Rush Marine, in favor of Rush Drill, remember? Beat Plane (being wing-propelled, and not jet-propelled) will be usable under water, the same way MM3's Rush Jet was (since that's what it mostly mimics), and effectively double as Rush Marine as well, I suppose. Besides, wasn't MM3 and Wily Wars the only games that even featured it, to begin with? (Not counting the "Space Adapted" version in MMV.)
Homing Beat:
Well, I suppose I could integrate Reggae as a similar kind of character (assuming I can find frames for him, at all!); since Beat Attack ~= Ouroboros. Beat's other functions thus far are the Beat Rescue (ala MM8 Rush Aid, not pit-saving!), and the Beat Plane (rough equal of MM3's Rush Jet... even though it just looks like "a big Beat").
What other functions do you think Reggae should support? Some kind of vertical flying lift? That -could- save you from a pit, or take you up to higher places, but you'd have to equip and activate it pretty quickly! But then, that's exactly what the Hook Shot does, anyways; why make that worthless? Either way, he'd still need a third...
Weapon Edits:
I was going to keep these to a minimum, but at least give *some* value to each weapon - a perfect example of a weapon in NEED of revision is Burning Wheel. I really don't see how burning open one secret passage would make it worthwhile, especially when any fire weapon can/will do that. If the system really is weapon-for-weapon, then it would only make sense to create/include ones that people will (ab)use, religiously. Plus, there really are many copy-paste weapons out there.
Ladder Sprites:
This is actually kind of funny. I know how to draw, pretty well. I know how to use software, pretty well. But using drawing software, ironically; is something I completely suck at! :| I suppose I could do a simple edit of Rock's climbing sprites, but fair warning - if I do, it will probably be "obviously so!"
Treble function #3?:
Well, I was playing around in Rock5 Endless the other day. And I did say I was probably going to scrap it... but the "Retard Coil" in the game gave me a bit of an idea.
What if Treble did something similar, except instead of jumping straight up, he jumps -forwards- instead? This way, it can be used to jump wider pits, as well as taller areas (IE: Treble jumps to the right, then you jump to the left). Treble also inflicts damage to enemies he collides with, along the way, and is immune to spikes.
If you *remain* on Treble, he will take another jump, and repeat the energy cost. Thus, Treble can cross big chasms of spikes (similar to the Raptors in SlashMan's level - but more like the size of Wily's Lab part 1, MM1) this way, and carry you along as well; plus have enough offensive power to mow through crowds of minor enemies (but not major ones!).
Another thing I was considering, was having the direction you face determine the direction Treble moves in; much like Poochy from Yoshi's Island. So you could hop back and forth, rather than just one direction or the other.
Treble already has adequate animation to support such a function too. :) What do you think? It still needs a catchy name, btw.
-
Bass' double jump and the MM7 suit
- Easy solution. Instead of gliding on the second jump he glides on the third. Remember, his weapon would also have to change to a chargable buster.
Hm ... actually, maybe this suit should be left out. It kind of makes him no different than MM ... so what would be the point between switching characters at all?
Does Bass really take double damage in R&F?? Are you sure about that? It isn't documented anywhere. Oroto's a harder nut though. Since MM can charge and slide, the advantage to using Proto that was present in MM9 is blunted. You might wanna go with PU's Proto with his double-damage, single hit shield, and single, super powered "break" shot.
Bass ladder
- Just shrink down the unused PB sprites in Adobe and trace away on the above layer. That's the best way to do it, IMHO.
Rush Marine
- No, I must have missed that part. Whichever, I guess. Marine was in WW, MM3, MM4, 2GB, and 3GB.
Reggae
- Geez, I dunno what he would do. In R&F WS he drops a random powerup. There's frames for him in Rockboard that should do anything you really want Reggae to do.
Not totally all-inclusive
Hm. Good point on the enemies and weapons. You know what? Maybe you should pick the "best" weapons from the series and just do those. Enough for a wide variety, but not every one of them. If you made this open source, and structured it the right way, though, ... it's possible that people could do hacks later on and include weapons you didn't at first. So you wouldn't have to do all the work.
Although, and I hate to say it, if this is the case then maybe Metal Blade is on the scrap heap. Because Forte has rapid fire and if you include Metal Blade then that's just one thing less different between playable characters.
Treble funtion #3
"Gospel Ride"? I dunno ... if you have something like that that's required to pass certian levels and people don't select it, then they're screwed. They're also screwed if they run out of energy before reaching that point. And what equivalant weapon would MM have? It seems like it should just be like in Brightman's level or in Slashman's level rather than a whole new adaptor.
-
Weapon Edits:
I was going to keep these to a minimum, but at least give *some* value to each weapon - a perfect example of a weapon in NEED of revision is Burning Wheel.
Even if you don't change what the weapons do, you can still affect the balance of the game by changing how much energy they use. For example, I just got done replaying Rockman 6, and I REALLY don't see why one use of Blizzard Attack is worth three notches. Hardly anything's weak to it, and it's not as if those small projectiles are guaranteed to hit anything, even if they do go in four directions. What it's really useful for is destroying those big Gabyoals from a distance, but... That's just one enemy! I'd like to use a weapon like that repeatedly for a while, and not have to conserve so much!
It's not as if there's no precedent for changes like this. 4GB let you have 19 uses of Rain Flush instead of the original 7, although it still only gave you 7 uses of Flash Stopper. And on the flip side, you could easily change Metal Blade to use up a whole unit of energy so it's less abusable.
I suppose I could do a simple edit of Rock's climbing sprites, but fair warning - if I do, it will probably be "obviously so!"
Hey, at least when you edit old sprites, the result tends to still match their art style pretty well.
but the "Retard Coil" in the game gave me a bit of an idea.
Is that what people are calling it now? My only two issues with that Rush Coil were that it was thinner than it looked, and if you were used to the Rush Coil in the other games, you would use 5's Coil incorrectly, and vice versa. Basically, it was fixing something that wasn't broken, but it still worked okay.
Marine was in WW, MM3, MM4, 2GB, and 3GB.
Nope, Marine wasn't in 3GB. That was also the game that turned Rush Jet into the slow version of Item-2.
-
You know what'd be cool to add? A "wild card" Metool. A Met that switches from one type to another randomly. From standing and spinning to walking towards you, to sprouting a copter and flying. That's be pretty tough because you'd never really know what to expect.
Anyhow, yeah, you can fudge the weapon nubers a bit. Although I still think it's best to keep them as true as possible. It's not my game, so .... there ya go.
You know, though ... even if the weapons are broken, it's an endless .... they'll wear down with time. So it's probably not a big deal. The Rush suits might be more so since they don't run out of power.
Were the playable characters that are hoped to be in the game listed yet? I've heard R&F Bass and MM9 Proto, and Zero, but that just m,ight be me guessing.
-
Playable characters, so far:
[spoiler]Rock/MegaMan
Blues/ProtoMan
Forte/Bass
Zero
Hyper Rock/MegaMan (IE: S. Adapt)
Super Forte/Bass (IE: G. Boost/T. Boost)
I was going to try and get Duo and Roll in here... Roll-chan may be possible, if the sprite for her in "Roll-Chan 5" is available, somewhere. And spying on another hack I ran across, there may be one more... but Duo is now boss-status, as there's little-to-no platforming structure to him! But so far, those above are the only ones I have sprited.
The very fact that the S.Adapter takes no power, plus that the Mega Fist is available seperately, is exactly -why- I'm making Hyper Rock/Mega a seperate entity. ;)
Different busters and ability modules mean that even though different chars are available, they are very similar in play, unless *made* to be different (IE: Hyper Rock/Super Forte).[/spoiler]
Weapons and Costs
Obviously, extensive testing will be done to "balance" the energy costs of the weapons. But a low-to-no cost weapon that's worthless isn't going to be of value to anybody! Metal Blade's cost will probably ~= Shadow Blade's, because the only real difference is that Shadow Blade's reverses direction after a second. But then, how many other weapons do the same thing? Ring Boomerang, Magic Card...
I'm basing the energy costs by comparing their usefulness to the weapons in MM3 and MM7. This, unfortunately; leaves "full-screen" effects like Time Stopper, Gravity Hold, and Lightning Storm kind of "up in the air." Time Stopper, at least; I'm planning on only making effective as you HOLD the shoot button, which will eat up the bar as you see fit (so rapid fire ~= slow motion; but then balancing -that- cost so it's not used up "faster").
Blizzard Attack's fix, btw: Shoots 2 "blue Leaf Shields" that spread out. *THAT* is going to hit something, and plus, more like a blizzard, it's not going to "vanish" upon hitting an enemy (unless it's totally withstood). I think I set it to 4-5 bars per use, 8 damage (= 4 P-Shooters) per hit... just less than a full-charge buster.
Also, just as a funny note/for kicks, I was considering making "Metal Blade" a secret PRIMARY weapon! >U< Don't know what else I'd put with the MM2 weapons, however.
Weapon Selection:
For the playtest/beta, I was going to put together 4 weapons from each game, rather than the entire 8... along with a few variety packs to fill in gaps for more weapons that have been prepared. I'm going to make a spoiler list of weapons that are -currently- ready (for testing, once I get the weapon select/firing script together in the "player" object):
[spoiler]MAIN WEAPONS:
P-Shooter
Mega Buster (WIP)
Proto Array (the "break shot" or spread shot)
Mega Saber
Mega Fist (WIP)
Mega Laser
Turbo Blaster (IE: Bass Buster from R&F, except it doesn't shoot -straight- up, and has a 5-shot max, and shoots P-Shooters for now)
SECONDARY WEAPONS:
Balloon Lift
Mega Ball
Proto Shield
PETS:
Rush
Beat
Tango
Treble (WIP)
MM1 WEAPONS:
Fire Storm
Ice Slasher
Rolling Cutter
Elec Beam
MM2 WEAPONS:
Quick Boomerang
Atomic Fire
Metal Blade (4-directional, working on diagonals still)
Leaf Shield
Air Shooter
Bubble Lead
Crash Bomb
MM3 WEAPONS:
Search Snake
Hard Knuckle
Needle Cannon
Shadow Blade
Gemini Laser
Magnet Missile
MM4 WEAPONS:
Ring Boomerang
Drill Bomb
Skull Barrier
Pharaoh Wave
Dive Missile (presently, rough equal of Hard Knuckle)
Dust Crusher
MM5 WEAPONS:
Power Stone
Gyro Attack
Charge Kick (WIP; also enables slide without having "sliding module")
Napalm Bomb
-(presently, rough equal of Wild Coil - when it hits the ground, it reverses vertical momentum, instead of "rolling on the floor")
Crystal Eye
Water Wave
Star Crash
MM6 WEAPONS:
Knight Crush
Wind Storm
Flame Shot
Blizzard Attack
Yamato Spear
Silver Tomahawk* (currently, it shoots "Air Shooter") XD
Plant Barrier
MM7 WEAPONS:
Freeze Cracker
Thunder Bolt
Slash Claw
Noise Crush (working on charged/absorbed version still)
Wild Coil
MM8 WEAPONS:
Tornado Hold
Flash Bomb
Ice Wave
Flame Sword (WIP)
Homing Sniper (WIP)
MM9 WEAPONS:
Concrete Shot
Jewel Satellite
Laser Trident
Hornet Chaser
Plug Ball
Magma Bazooka
[/spoiler]
Wild Card Metool:
That's -exactly- the kind of thing I'm talking about! With the randomizing enemies, and so forth... Metools would certainly be a group of their own (but the swimmers? Not sure how that would work, yet...), in this case. I doubt anyone would fall for a 1up Met either, but that doesn't mean it wouldn't be cool to see, right? But yes, this is definitely a good, fun approach!
-
Know what else would be cool?
if you could fight non-selected playable characters. You don't select them, so they will have to be fought eventually. Even MM has been fought before (in Powered Up), so they have patterns you could access.
I dunno if the suits should be seperate chatacters in and of themselves ... that really limits your level design since they don't dash or slide. They're very slow, so any "Quick Beam" levels will be pretty unplayable.
Plating as Roll Chan would be pretty fun. It's a pity that the new Rm1 Cell phone game isn't ripped. It has full sprites for her.
-
Hey, I've almost finished a spreadsheet with damage data for every enemy in RockMan 1. Will this be helpful? Should I keep going?
-
Hey, I've almost finished a spreadsheet with damage data for every enemy in RockMan 1. Will this be helpful? Should I keep going?
Even if it's not used in this game it's interesting! Keep going!
-
I found an Easter egg while working on it. When you fire Thunder Beam on those jumping Super Cutter enemies or on CutMan, the beam suddenly shatters into a whole bunch of pieces and scatters in many directions, although it still hurts CutMan. This also happens if ElecMan uses his beam while RockMan is equipped with Rolling Cutter--you still take the normal 10 damage, but you get the shredding effect. Furthermore, I peeked into the GameFAQs board for the game yesterday, where it turned out that somebody had already reported all this, as well as the fact that if you switch to Rolling Cutter after Copy RockMan fires a Thunder Beam, it will not only be shredded, but RockMan will suffer 10 units of damage, when normally all attacks the Copy Robot does only take 4. So that's a funny inconsistency, and it also makes me paranoid that I should have been switching to every weapon before logging the result of an enemy hit. I wonder why the developers were so keen on having a special effect for using a Beam on a Cutter-user when no other weapon in the game gets deflected by anything.
Now, there will be several blanks left empty unless I learn how to make a Game Genie code that allows you to grab blocks anywhere or make Hyper Bombs float.
-
I found an Easter egg while working on it. When you fire Thunder Beam on those jumping Super Cutter enemies or on CutMan, the beam suddenly shatters into a whole bunch of pieces and scatters in many directions, although it still hurts CutMan. This also happens if ElecMan uses his beam while RockMan is equipped with Rolling Cutter--you still take the normal 10 damage, but you get the shredding effect. Furthermore, I peeked into the GameFAQs board for the game yesterday, where it turned out that somebody had already reported all this, as well as the fact that if you switch to Rolling Cutter after Copy RockMan fires a Thunder Beam, it will not only be shredded, but RockMan will suffer 10 units of damage, when normally all attacks the Copy Robot does only take 4. So that's a funny inconsistency, and it also makes me paranoid that I should have been switching to every weapon before logging the result of an enemy hit. I wonder why the developers were so keen on having a special effect for using a Beam on a Cutter-user when no other weapon in the game gets deflected by anything.
Now, there will be several blanks left empty unless I learn how to make a Game Genie code that allows you to grab blocks anywhere or make Hyper Bombs float.
Stuff like this! It's very... WOW. >w< Is this MM1, MM1 for Cell, MMPU; any/all thereof? It's amazing how many tweaks like this appear!
bag: Damage sheets are priceless in an age of homebrew gaming! Keep up the good work!
-
I just finished the damage chart for Rockman 2 as well, but I'm tired now, so I'll figure out how to upload it in the evening. One of the weird things I found was that standing on Item-3 makes AirMan's tornadoes slow way down, to like a pixel a second or so. Why would that be?
Posted on: February 06, 2009, 04:49:22 AM
Here, if you have Microsoft Excel, please check this out and give me advice. http://www.box.net/shared/5xg58xncfa (http://www.box.net/shared/5xg58xncfa) It now covers the first two Famicom games on separate sheets. I'd like to hear ideas on how to format it better so it's easier to read and share. Also feel free to look for any errors in the tables. (I almost logged an 8 as a 6 once, because I was only paying attention to the fact that there was 4 left over after a few hits.) Right now I'll give some explanations on how I set up the numbers.
All throughout, I was logging the amounts of damage that Fire Storm and Crash Bomb did with a single hit as well as what sort of multi-hit combo I could achieve by standing next to an enemy with Fire Storm's shield and detonating a bomb right next to an enemy. Crash Bomber is particularly erratic with its chain-hits, so don't expect the maximum every time. Similarly, I logged the amount of damage from just one of Air Shooter's tornadoes and typed "per tornado" beside it so you would know you could get 2 or 3 times that number depending on whether the enemy can absorb all the tornadoes fast enough. On the last couple bosses of RockMan 1, I even logged multi-hit damages for all the weapons, although I tried never to count when Rolling Cutter returns to you for another strike, because it's pretty obvious when you get a second hit that way and it doesn't always happen.
One thing that's interesting about RockMan 2 is that there are some enemies that actually take less damage from a Master Weapon than from your regular buster. So instead of putting in lots of tiny fractions for those, I claimed whatever the weakest weapon was did 1 point, and the total hit points were based on that. I still ended up with some values with fractional parts, though. There were times when Weapon A would beat the enemy in 5 hits, while Weapon B would beat it in 3. Or you could beat it with 2 shots of Weapon B and 2 shots of Weapon A, or you could beat it with 1 shot of Weapon B and 4 shots of Weapon A. So I figured Weapon B was doing about 1.7 units, because:
1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 5
1.7 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 5.7
1.7 + 1.7 + 1 + 1 = 5.4
1.7 + 1.7 + 1.7 = 5.1
Now that's probably not exactly what it is, but I don't feel like learning how to hack the memory right now, so at least it's good enough to make predictions. And of course I always said that bosses had 28 HP, even if all the weapons did 2 points at the least, just because it would be strange to say that AirMan really had 14 and every 2 notches represented 1 HP.
For some reason, I felt like listing CWU-01P and PicoPico as one of their components with just a note about how many there were, while I listed BueBeam as the full 28, if only so I wouldn't have another dumb "1 HP" enemy as a boss. So you can figure out that there are 5 of them by taking 6 into 28.
I put in a few enemies that aren't really live enemies, just stage hazards, because I figured it would be important to know how much damage they did or if you could freeze them. So that's what "fire wave", "electric beam", and "lasers" are all about. I think "fireballs" was what the freezable fire pillars were called in Navi Mode, so that's where that came from, but I'm probably wrong and I'm terrible at finding correct names. There were even a couple of cases where two enemies might be considered the same thing, but I separated them anyway. Like, the Scworms and the bendy things they produce have the exact same damage table, but since they look and behave differently, I listed both to avoid confusion. The Metalls that Guts-Dozer produces also have the same weaknesses as the regular kind, but they act a little different, so, new line. Pipi's egg was interesting: Destroying Pipi destroys Pipi's egg, even if it's already falling! When the egg's falling, Quick Boomerang doesn't work on it, but it does work on both Pipi and Pipi's children. Anything an enemy produces that can't be destroyed I consider a "shot". (Should Needle Harry's shots be considered enemies then? Hmm...)
I left blanks wherever it wasn't possible to use a particular weapon against a particular enemy. With a cheat code they might be possible, but I don't know where to get good cheats like that, and I wouldn't fully trust the results of something you're not supposed to be able to do. So there's no Super Arm data for things that aren't near blocks, no Hyper Bomb data when targets are too high, and no RockMan 2 weapon data when an enemy is only found in the stage where you obtain that weapon. I also couldn't get Atomic Fire charged up in time to fire against Crabbot's empty shell; I already had to pull off a crazy stunt to hit it with the semi-charged shot. By the way, I made an educated guess that Crabbot's shellless body retains its HP from when its shell was still attached, while the shell is a newly generated object. This was because hitting it first with a stronger weapon made it require fewer hits with a weak weapon afterward, while the shell always took the same numbers of hits.
One last observation: Uncharged Atomic Fire's damage table is almost identical to Rock Buster's. The only differences are that it doesn't work against BubbleMan and it restores HeatMan. The medium level shot is always 3 times as powerful as the uncharged. And the fully charged shot has a completely different table, sometimes finishing off high-HP enemies in one shot, and sometimes not even affecting things that the smaller Atomic Fire shots would.
Oh yeah, and that "average" thing was just some weird experiment I wanted to try. I probably won't be doing it again.
EDIT: I just added the database for Rockman World into the same file. This time, I logged all the multi-hit combos I could get, because that's how most of the weapons do their extra damage in this game. It's disappointing that it turned out each weapon uses only one multiplier for every stage enemy, hence only bosses have customized damage multipliers. Of course I found a few oddities while making the list, but the weirdest thing was that the damage from BubbleMan's bubbles varied. Sometimes they did 4 points all throughout a battle, sometimes they did 2 points all throughout, and often the first bubble would do 4, but the rest would do 2. I still haven't figured it out.
And to be thorough, I listed 5 different versions of Cutting Wheel, although I think only the last one is really different in how it reacts to weapons and the damage it inflicts.
-
DESIGN YOUR OWN VARIETY PACK!
Assume Super Arm/Deep Digger rocks, the ice blocks (MM6/MM8/MM&B) and explosive-triggered barriers are one and the same (because in this case, they are), except fire weapons can take out the ice blocks, too. Concrete Shot and Ice Wall also *make* those, btw. ;) Which one custom 4-weapon set from any combo of games (Robot Master selections only!) would you arrange, and optionally, what strategy/reasoning would you have for choosing the set?
Also, keep in mind, that weapons from a common game are already likely to be together, by default. ;)
(Open for next 48 hours.)
RE: Damage Chart
I suppose it's possible that each weapon was assigned a default value, such as P-Shooter = 10, and then weapons are based around it's relative value. That would explain the 1.7's, even though you could also hit with a remainder, which would also be dropped...
(IE: "2 + 2 + 2 > 5")
Assuming W1 = 2,
[2*5] = 10
3 + [2*4] = 11
[3*2] + [2*2] = 10
[3*3] = 9
Only the second line is logically inconsistent (3 + [2*3] = 9, if -that's- the target HP).
The defaults I'm using with the M.Buster levels = 2, 3, and 10. Anything that does a full buster of damage = 10, and rounded out from there. "Minor" enemies are anything that's a one-hit kill, though for some 2-hitters (like Batontons), I've set their life to 3, so a L2 shot will take them out as well.
I understand about the super bomb/power arm thing... there's really no way to check for that kind of thing (like SuperArm damage for enemies in FireMan's level). All we can do is give a general, estimated value of that kind of attack (I'm thinking ~15, actually, since many levels don't feature the blocks).
Also, Leaf Shield = 1 hit kill against the fire dogs in WoodMan's level! But not even *that* damages those ostrich-things. (Discovered via Endless) Those rolling shell/crab things are immune to Bubble Lead entirely, as well.
Good work so far, bag! MM3 and MM7 will probably be of great value, as well; as that's much of the basis of this project, too. MM8/MM&B would be next most useful after that, as that's likely to be of influence soon, too (in their own family of stages).
Robot Master Selection/AI:
Bosses planned on available sprites so far:
[spoiler]
MegaMan 1-2:
-CutMan %
-GutsMan
-ElecMan %
-AirMan
-BubbleMan
-QuickMan %
-CrashMan
MegaMan 3-6:
-ShadowMan
-MagnetMan
-DiveMan %
-DustMan
-GyroMan %
-NapalmMan %
-PlantMan %
~maybe KnightMan
MegaMan 7:
-FreezeMan
-JunkMan
-CloudMan
-BurstMan
-ShadeMan
-SlashMan
-TurboMan
MegaMan 8/Bass: *once the FC's are released, maybe!?
-FrostMan
-GrenadeMan
-SearchMan
-TenguMan
-AstroMan
-GroundMan
-MagicMan
-BurnerMan
MegaMan 9:
-ConcreteMan
-MagmaMan
-JewelMan
-SplashWoman
-TornadoMan
-GalaxyMan
-PlugMan
MegaMan PC:
-SonicMan
-VoltMan
-DynaMan
-TorchMan
-SharkMan
-BladeMan
-BitMan
Fort Bosses:
-Yellow Devil %
-Mecha Dragon %
-GutsMan 2.0
-Jack O' Lantern
-Rex %
-Bully Dozer %
-Crabby Cakes
[/spoiler]
9.9 -Wow. That's almost FIFTY of them already! And that's -without- Wily, yet! :O
There's actually a few more bosses I'd like to do, particularly in the 1-6 range; and a number of them I've already got battle priorities/plans (%) for, but some AI/personality quirks could still be useful to brainstorm about.
Getting Stuck?:
There's never just one way around a situation, you know? You can bridge spike chasms with MegaBall, Rush Jet, Concrete Shot, Beat Plane... and yes, if you do mismanage your weapon energy (or just hit dumb luck consistently), it is possible to paint yourself into a corner. You can't always last forever, you know - and with a game that has no objectionable end to it, that's eventually the fate you'll always have to accept.
You can, however, anticipate and prepare for such situations! And this is the entire strategic point to the game's setup phase. What is it that you want help with? Fighting? Trick platforming? QuickLaser runs? Robot Master duels? Moving fast? Conserving life? Accessing shortcuts/fast tracks? There really is a lot to consider! (FYI, I intend to make just about every QuickLaser route possible without sliding... though it may be difficult, or require you to be smart about your terrain. And remember, there are weapons/items that can affect those things, too!)
But yeah, running in, Buster-Only is not a good idea! You can minimize special weapon use, but let's face it - acquiring and using the other Master Weapons is the very core of MegaMan gameplay! It's really what makes the game what it is!
I'm sure playing with this italic thing a lot, huh?
-
Assume Super Arm/Deep Digger rocks, the ice blocks (MM6/MM8/MM&B) and explosive-triggered barriers are one and the same (because in this case, they are), except fire weapons can take out the ice blocks, too.
Wait, now, when you mention the "ice blocks" from MM6, are you talking about the the actual icy pillars that you need Flame Blast to break, or those cracked blocks you break with Rush Power that happen to be white in BlizzardMan's stage, or both? And what about those blocks that you can push to plug up the Beat Impostor pits? It would be funny if you could lift one of those and just set it on top of the pit yourself.
The defaults I'm using with the M.Buster levels = 2, 3, and 10.
But isn't the big shot traditionally only three times as powerful as the small shot? Five times sounds a little extreme.
I suppose it's possible that each weapon was assigned a default value, such as P-Shooter = 10, and then weapons are based around it's relative value.
Yeah, that's what I was thinking, that all the values in memory are multiplied by some constant like 4 or 6 or 10 or something. Really, you might be able to rip them from the ROM somehow, but I don't feel like learning how to do that right now. I'll just keep going with my procedure of trying everything in gameplay.
I'm halfway into Rockman 3, and so far there haven't been any of those weird fractional values like the first two games. I'm even testing the strength of the Rush adaptors, just to make sure their shots are identical to the regular ones! Then I think I'll do Rockman World 2 and Rockman Megaworld, so you'll get the whole three-game mash-up. Maybe then I'll try to put the tables into a web-friendly format.
-
Actually, IIRC; Mega Buster = P-Shooter x5, consistently. I mean, let's face it... why charge a shot for much longer than it takes to just fire 3 P-Shooters? You can do that with autofire, anyways. Compare a shot's worth of damage on a Robot Master, to that of a full-charge one. I'm pretty sure it's about 5x as strong. Well, assuming it's not blocked, anyways.
The other difference is that it doesn't disappear upon collision, it continues plowing through enemies, full force, until it *IS* blocked.
Wait, now, when you mention the "ice blocks" from MM6, are you talking about the the actual icy pillars that you need Flame Blast to break, or those cracked blocks you break with Rush Power that happen to be white in BlizzardMan's stage, or both?
Both. Hadn't thought about that third one, though... (isn't that on the WindMan stage?) :|
-
Okay, I don't think I've played any game where it did x5 damage. I remember it was x2 in Mega Man 7, and I think it was x4 in the Game Gear one, and the Game Boy Mega Man 5 even made the medium charge level do x2 instead of x1, but I haven't seen a x5 yet. Which game were you checking last?
And hey, x3 is still not that bad. It helps when bosses have long invincibility times after they get hit, or when you just have some free seconds before the next enemies show up.
-
Yes, a Mega Buster that's 5x the power of a regular shot is a little overpowered. With that much power, the average Robot Master would go down in five hits! X(
-
Both. Hadn't thought about that third one, though... (isn't that on the WindMan stage?) :|
The birdie blockers? Those are on the fourth Mr. X stage. I don't think I even knew you could move them until Navi Mode.
I have now added Rockman 3 data to the file (http://www.box.net/shared/5xg58xncfa). People who are very bored should either check my work for mistakes, or make a table for one of the very newest games because I probably won't get to it for a long time. Here are some notes:
I decided to put all destructible projectiles on their own lines, so you would know what would destroy them, but I also put their "body damage" value in as the "shot damage" for the character that produced it. So those values are duplicated.
There were a few bosses that could do more than one amount of damage through bodily contact, so I finally split the "body damage" column too. This includes NeedleMan's and ShadowMan's special moves as well as the different parts of Wily's machine. Now that 6-or-12 business with HardMan is that he seems to be able to cut your invulnerability time short sometimes, like when you get stuck inside him, so I thought I would note he got a double hit. The same thing happened with the Flash Man clone just as he was doing the flash, although I had to pull a weird move to get that to happen so it might not be all that common.
I regret that I didn't note which enemies don't attract the Magnet Missile, but then I figured this wasn't so much about how things move as about what happens when something actually gets hit. Still, I did mention that if you fire Hard Knuckle while Nut & Bolt are in the process of joining, the fist flies upward as if you were holding Up, even if you aren't. What's the deal with that?
I did try to note when Top Spin used 0 or 2 units of energy per hit rather than the usual 1, but I may have missed a few because I wasn't thinking about it the whole time. Of course there is that trick where you spin into an enemy right after taking a hit, giving you a hit on the enemy every frame and draining your energy very fast, but this only really matters on fortress bosses that take damage from Top Spin. I noticed that whether the Top Spin uses 0, 1, or 2 units does matter during that trick, as if you watch frame by frame, a character that makes you use 2 units during a regular hit will make your meter count down by 2 each frame when you do the invincibility spin.
It turns out the Junk Blocks the Junk Golem throws are definitely NOT the same as the Junk Blocks that fall out of the chutes. In fact, although it has 8 HP, the block seems to have the exact same weaknesses as the Golem; it does appear to be the only stage enemy that takes damage from Top Spin but isn't a one-hit kill from it. It was very difficult to figure out the block's weaknesses, though, because of how fast it moves. I had to use frame advance on an emulated copy to be able to finish it off in time. One funny thing I discovered by doing this was that if you use Rush Jet to destroy the block before it reaches the Junk Golem, the blocks stop coming, and Junk Golem can do nothing but stand there looking at you and hoping you bump into him.
There is a strange inconsistency with SnakeMan's snakes, and I don't think I've got it completely figured out yet. Usually those snakes only take one hit to defeat and can be hit by the Rock Buster, Needle Cannon, or Top Spin. But in some battles, the first snake takes 3 shots to defeat, and Top Spin doesn't work on it even if I already shot it twice. On the savestate I was testing the most, I believe the first snake of two was the 3-shot snake, and the one just behind it was the 1-shot snake. Furthermore, until I destroyed that 3-shot snake, SnakeMan would keep making 3-shot snakes, at least for the snake in the lead. I think there was a time when I started the battle and both snakes were 3-shot snakes, and there might have even been a 2-shot snake in there somewhere, but it's hard to keep track of because those things are really hard to hit. I guess it's not a big deal, but some hacker might be interested in finding out where the difference in the snakes' power comes from. (Come to think of it, how rare is it for a Robot Master to make things you can destroy?)
So, it did turn out that the shots you fire while using Rush are exactly the same as the regular ones; you just can't have as many shots on screen is all. Needle Cannon is also exactly the same except on bosses, just like uncharged Atomic Fire and some of the Dr. Wily's Revenge weapons.
-
Hmm... it appears there may be yet another programming option. (http://www.youtube.com/user/N64Mario) Or at least, a good fallback for the project, assuming my GM engine doesn't do the trick. Not sure how I'd do with MMF2, however.
Posted on: February 18, 2009, 07:14:11 AM
As far as variable difficulty goes, consider that players like THIS (http://www.youtube.com/user/MasterZED) will also be playing. A player of this caliber is exactly what "Mega Mode" is being designed for. (Hence, the 1:00-per-segment timer.) Check the related videos too, this guy is INSANE!
:O
-
why charge a shot for much longer than it takes to just fire 3 P-Shooters?
If only Inticreates had asked themselves that when making MM9... *sighs*
Yes, a Mega Buster that's 5x the power of a regular shot is a little overpowered. With that much power, the average Robot Master would go down in five hits! X(
Try 7.
I've not checked Classic-series charged shot damage. But in the X-series a charged shot is 4x normal on stage enemies, with a different formula applying to their effects on bosses. (2hp off a boss; X2's double-charge breaks the damage barrier for an extra 1hp per spiral shot segment).
Zero/ZX typically do 6x, Grey does 5x and Ashe does 4x.
-
Ah, I must not have played enough Zero or ZX then. And of course it started getting complicated with X.
Yes, a Mega Buster that's 5x the power of a regular shot is a little overpowered. With that much power, the average Robot Master would go down in five hits! X(
Try 7.
Wait. Let's do the math. Classic energy bars are 28 notches, right?
28 -> 23 -> 18 -> 13 -> 8 -> 3 -> 0 (Or, 5 * 5 = 25 < 28, 6 * 5 = 30 > 28)
So, six hits. Consider that Mega Man 4 through 6 always made the weakness weapons take away 4 notches, finishing in 7 hits. Your starting weapon shouldn't be better than the weakness.
-
Feel compelled to point out that RM7FC .... and, quite likely, every single other NES game's energy is actually 280 pts, with one point being worth 10. I remember hearing that it's 280 and not simply 28.
I could be wrong. Not about 7FC, though (had to figure this out to cheat). I'm not a big tech-head for this sort of thing.
-
Oh, that reminds me, I haven't written anything about the Rockman World 2 data I uploaded. Well, the main thing there was, the enemies kept doing different amounts of damage, like they'd alternate between doing 2 and 3 units. It was pretty obvious that they were doing fractional damage, but I couldn't figure out the exact values the normal way, so I used VisualBoyAdvance's RAM watch to find all the HP values. It turns out that RockMan and all the Robot Masters have their energy units multiplied by 8 in that game, not 10. So the total energy is 19 * 8 = 152, or 98 in hex view. Most enemies were doing damage in multiples of 10 (hex A) though; this meant that they were taking off 1.25, 2.5, 3.75, or 5 for the most part. Some of the enemies in the second half of the game did 1.875 (15 in memory or hex F), however. The bosses were simpler: They all do 4 units by contact, and 1 or 2 units from projectiles, except for one attack of Wily's that did 3.
So all the stage bosses and weapons amounts were multiplied by 8 like that, but Quint and the minor enemies only counted 1 per HP in the memory area I looked at. This made it simpler to discover how much damage the Master Weapons did, although RockMan's and the stage enemies' values only appeared after they had been depleted once, so the only way you'd see 98 for his HP was to get a refill. And it turned out the refills were inconsistent. They round off to the next whole unit (of 8), it seems, so a small capsule might refill 2 1/2 or 3, and a large capsule might refill 8 1/2 or 9.
So, yeah, that's why I agreed that the NES games probably multiply their energy values too, but there haven't been enough strange fractions to matter to me yet. (I'm betting those 1.7s I logged were really 1.75s.) Maybe I'll do another pass over the games to check their memory too, where I might also check the Normal mode damages in MegaMan 2.
-
Classic energy bars are 28 notches, right?
Threw me off. I thought it was 32 (the notches on Zero, ZX, and SNES X boss bars).
I guess that's the reason SNES X weapon bars are two heart tanks lower than the life bars.
Full life minus 4 notches = 28.
-
Ah, I must not have played enough Zero or ZX then. And of course it started getting complicated with X.
Try 7.
Wait. Let's do the math. Classic energy bars are 28 notches, right?
28 -> 23 -> 18 -> 13 -> 8 -> 3 -> 0 (Or, 5 * 5 = 25 < 28, 6 * 5 = 30 > 28)
So, six hits. Consider that Mega Man 4 through 6 always made the weakness weapons take away 4 notches, finishing in 7 hits. Your starting weapon shouldn't be better than the weakness.
On the contrary... Mega Buster has 3 sec. of windup, whereas (most) master weapons don't. (That's also another instance of how 4-6 "broke" the MegaMans, btw.) I can see 4x being fair, maybe more practical than 5x. But I suppose the defining point is: How many charge shots do you think is fair to wipe out a Robot Master? It's debatable between 6 and 7 shots, they both sound/feel about right, and this can always vary a bit, upon how vulnerable a RM is (IE: an "extra" 1 damage for those with high invincible times, or hard-to-hit manuevers).
I could see 5-6 for using a weakness being fair, too. Though MM1-3 had it do something like 8 bars of damage apiece (perfect examples, Needle and Magnet Man going down in 4 hits). And it seems like 7/8/Bass made it do closer to 3-4. Those took FOREVER (see, if you were to nail one of THOSE 4 times, reactions and all, THAT would be a considerably less "boring" fight). Even 5 hits would still be fair.
So far, I've only used a 2x multiplier, mostly for sake of inconsistent damage rates to different enemies; and then to MM & Co. to keep their life/damage rate consistent with other RM's.
Estimated damage summary (for general gameplay):
2 = pts. per shot, or per turbo-shot
3 = pts. per mid-charge shot, spread shot
4 = pts. per (quick/rapid master weapons); ones that kill 2-shot enemies, where mid-charge shots don't
6 = pts. per (most other master weapons) and piercing laser shot; 10 = win vs. RM
8 = pts. per full-charge shot, Mega Fist, or (heavy-damage master weapons); 7 = win vs. RM
10 = pts. if master weapon is a weakness, and NOT in the 15 pts. category; 6 = win vs. RM
(or 12; 5 = win instead)?
15 = pts. per explosion, Super Arm/Deep Digger attack, or collision attack (Break Dash, Charge Kick, etc.); 4 = win vs. RM
56 = total health (28 x 2)
2 = pts. damage for basic shots
4 = pts. damage for most direct enemy collisions
7 = pts. damage for master weapon hits against you or trap collisions; @ full healty, 8 will finish you
8 = pts. damage for collision with highly-mobile RM or major enemy (QuickMan, for instance); @ full health, 7 will finish you.
10 = pts. damage for collision with basic RM or major enemy; @ full health, 6 will finish you
15 = pts. damage for explosions, major attacks (like colliding with Wily?); @ full health, 4 will finish you
28 = pts. damage for spikes, when "spike insurance" is enabled. It doubles if "false."
How does that sound? Fair and simple enough?
-
How many charge shots do you think is fair to wipe out a Robot Master? It's debatable between 6 and 7 shots, they both sound/feel about right
Well, 6 charge shots and 1 little shot are enough to finish a Robot Master in the Game Boy series with its 19-unit bars, so you could say there's precedent there, too. (And the charge shot was introduced two games after the 19-unit bar, even!) I guess it was annoying having to shoot a boss with the charged shot successfully 9 or 10 times on console games...
But maybe that's what makes it challenging, and therefore fun! I mean, it still beats trying to shoot IceMan or ElecMan 28 times.
-
How Random is Too Random?
I'm actually thinking of starting the project from scratch again - at least the room layouts; though I will keep a backup of where things are now. But after a few days of playing Spelunky, it got me to wondering... what if each level segment was constructed by randomly arranging a stage's elements? Granted, some are very vertical-oriented (ElecMan, CrashMan, and QuickMan come to mind) and many of the aerial ones, in irony, are very horizontal. But maybe doing such a thing is being too random.
I mean, Spelunky makes it work by giving you the ability to destroy the terrain, a liberty that's not very RockMan-like. And while adjusting to differing heights is addressed in many ways... I'm still not totally sure how to make such a thing work - for example, the vanishing-block rooms would have to be arranged so that travel in BOTH directions would be possible, and not by predictably going around in a circle, right?
The other reasoning/excuse behind considering a redo, besides testing this new concept approach, is making sure the graphical adjustments involved would actually work. Since the soundtrack isn't strictly 8-bit, then would using comparable graphics be so bad? (Besides that, there's no sign of NGPC-style HeatMan, GeminiMan, StoneMan, or CentaurMan, anywhere).
Finally, I think I'm kind of up against a wall, here. XD I guess one thing irking my program is the menu/configuration screens. I began charting gameplay rooms first, then came BACK and filled in that need later - but when I did that, the game configured itself to do the gameplay first, and the configuration later. And for some reason, that doesn't work too well! :|
Either way, it's just redoing the room structure that needs done so far - and I may need to make a MMAC-style character-based interface, instead of menus.
But how do you feel about "LEGO" terrain? By that, I mean a series of individually navigable screens, but arranged in a random order, sometimes mirrored around and such? Do you think that's a better approach than totally prearranged scenes? Or maybe use prearranged scenes, but then simply randomize the elements within them...
( :O *sigh* Why can't I just stick teleporters in WilyWars, and call it even? Oh yeah, Magnet Missiles. -u-' )
-
So you can't hack the Magnet Missiles to be faster and not seek the wrong things?
-
Only if I could copy/paste the NES code for them, which I doubt would work; being re-engined and all. Physics speed reflects that, too. And IIRC, the whole reason why they track enemy shots in WW is because the shots are no longer differenciated from being "enemies," themselves. (IE: "Shots = Enemies")
No, I'm just saying "I wish this were easier than it actually is." ;) And in retrospect, randomizing elements probably IS a bad idea, especially if ghost-racing elements are in play, too.
>_< Oh, [parasitic bomb]. That's right, "stalling" a rival, even minorly, would mistime the widget elements that are timing-specific like vanish-blocks or cloud-lifts. And scrolling them on-screen differently would, as well. That might not work either, after all...
-
Well now that I've started noting it, there ARE some things that Magnet Missile fails to seek in this game, but I don't know how you would go about changing the list of them.
Posted on: March 11, 2009, 19:13:28
Hey, so, I'm getting close to finishing my Wily Tower damage table. Is the big game project still in need of updates about this, or should I post in a separate topic about damage tables?
Anyway, I did some RAM searching recently to check out a few things that were bugging me. It turns out that the HP values are not multiplied by any particular factor, unless some of the weapons on my chart are listed as doing fractional damage, in which case the hit points and damages will be 2 or 4 times what I typed so that all the values are whole numbers. So yeah, those 1.7s were really 1.75s, but eh.
One mystery I think I've mostly solved is about the few objects that seem to take hits from any weapon infinitely. These include the Thunder Chariots that the Lightning Lords ride, the cannonballs fired by the Giant Metool, the blocks thrown by the Junk Golem, and the righthand wall of Hyper Storm H's room. I discovered that these things all have HP and take damage normally, but when they reach 0, they don't disappear, so weapons that don't disappear when they finish off an enemy will make a grinding noise of hitting an enemy over and over as they pass through one of these objects. I don't know if this has anything to do with how special weapons do the same thing to Fan Fiends until they finish passing through on the final hit, though.
Part of the reason you can't really rapid-fire the Bomb Fliers from SnakeMan's stage is that they don't have their 3 hit points until they finish their "puff away" animation and start moving again. I found out that they actually start out with 23 points! You can hack off a few more of these points while they're "puffing", but then they suddenly jump down to 3. I labeled them as simply having 4 points in my chart, as for some reason every weapon in the game does exactly 1 point to them, but maybe I should separate bomb from cloud as I did in the NES version.
RAM watching didn't solve the mystery of why Buster Rod G sometimes takes 2 points from a Crash Bomb instead of the usual 1, although it generally happens on the second hit from an explosion when he's been using his spinning shield technique. Possibly related to this is a situation where an explosion did 4 points to WoodMan after the usual 2 when I detonated it on his shield. If anyone wants to experiment with this, I could send you a savestate from just before that happened!
When I finish the chart, I might go into more detail about the differences between original and remake.
-
My guess, on both occasions, is that they're seperate sprites (the "Crash Bomb" and the "Explosion," for instance). Seems like you're already through the first chapter of the bunch (IE: MM1-3/WW); and 4-6 seem pretty systematic... about all I think will change there would be the weapons and their corresponding values. And it's also possible that your final hit -exceeded- the amounts needed to finish a baddie, rather than the exact total thereof. I'm pretty sure that a program as basic as NES-standard games is nearly all solid numbers.
I'm still tinkering. It's just taking time to get things coded correctly. I'm having to recode, making the mistake of hyphenating objects (which for some reason in GM, *always* implies a subtractive calculation, regardless of it's spacing), adjusting the coding to match... and there's not a lot of definitive stuff to talk about, really. ^.^'
I am trying to keep the baddie selection to a minimum of standard grunts (for example, to make everything similar to "Big Eye" or "Sniper Joe" consistent), for both sakes of simplicity and quicker loading; but it's still important to know where different weapons from different titles stand in regards to damaging such enemies. Comparing a Shadow Blade to a Magnet Missile is simple enough, they're in the same game. But comparing either one to say, a Gyro Attack or Silver Tomahawk, might not necessarily be so smooth, you know?
Also, debating on the quantity of screen-dedicated minibosses to feature... and preferably the funnest ones (like the Sphinx-thing in the Uranus stage of MMV (GB), the waterfall squid from AquaMan's stage (MM8), or the elephants in ConcreteMan's stage (MM9)). A lot of them are simply tedious, but some are really fun to fight... and I really just want to plug in the fun ones.
-
My guess, on both occasions, is that they're seperate sprites (the "Crash Bomb" and the "Explosion," for instance).
No, it's not like that. I mean it's long into the explosion, on the second hit long after the first hit, and that's the hit from the explosion that does double.
I did find a way to hit regular enemies double with the Fire Storm, because the shot and the shield can be used one right after the other. But you can't get the extreme combos from it like the other games, because both shot and shield are absorbed when they hit. That's one of the weapon changes I'll get into more later...
And it's also possible that your final hit -exceeded- the amounts needed to finish a baddie, rather than the exact total thereof.
No, otherwise that phenomenon would be happening a lot more. It's always just those few things that take infinite hits, and their numbers don't go negative. I guess the real reason I brought it up was that I meant to ask whether I should include their HP values and damages, with the caveat that they don't actually die from hitting 0 HP. I might as well, since I already stuffed the chart with rows of projectiles, just because the Magnet Missile seeks them. So everything else is "0, passes through," or for Top Spin, "0, uses no energy."
-
I mean that about other baddies, not just undamagable ones. Baddies themselves can be sub-coded to take "0 damage" from a weapon, rather than -just- deflecting the shots (Mizziles in MM5 come to mind). But exceeding the total damage for enemies theory pertains mostly to other enemies, not just the infinitely-damagable kind.
Proof of concept: I suppose charged Buster ~= 4 shots. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azB9LN4sjGk) Or at least, it's supposed to.
-
How does that video support your belief? He hardly charged up at all. I tried playing that part of the game just now, and a single fully-charged shot was NOT enough to beat the Malmets which normally take 4 shots, and it only took 3 notches off the Skull Blazer meter.
-
This looks like a cool idea, if i can make one recommendation..
Use the items from mega man 2, at least Item-1 and Item-2.
Rush coil/jet are trash, sub in anything you want for Item 3 and this hack will be really awesome.
-
How does that video support your belief? He hardly charged up at all. I tried playing that part of the game just now, and a single fully-charged shot was NOT enough to beat the Malmets which normally take 4 shots, and it only took 3 notches off the Skull Blazer meter.
So you all think = 3 shots should still be the standard, then?
The other comparison I was making before was that of Shadow Blades, Magnet Missiles, and Gyro Attacks to enemies, in comparison. Should each of those only = ~3 shots too?
Practice: I am using the MM4-style Balloon lifts, a practical equal of Item-1, and Item-2 is roughly equal to the Super Arrow from MM5, which is also featured; only main difference being that it doubles as a weapon and you can have more than one on the screen at a time. (I'm making that a set amount of energy though, not the continious/nearly-instant drainage that MM5 does with it.)
I suppose I could duplicate them with their MM2 sprites, for what that would matter. But roof-squishing = death, not glitching. Fair warning!
-
Crush kills aren't cool. Just make the items vanish if they get too close to a wall.
-
It'd make more sence if you fell off the item / balloon than being crushed to death.
-
So you all think = 3 shots should still be the standard, then?
The other comparison I was making before was that of Shadow Blades, Magnet Missiles, and Gyro Attacks to enemies, in comparison. Should each of those only = ~3 shots too?
Practice: I am using the MM4-style Balloon lifts, a practical equal of Item-1, and Item-2 is roughly equal to the Super Arrow from MM5, which is also featured; only main difference being that it doubles as a weapon and you can have more than one on the screen at a time. (I'm making that a set amount of energy though, not the continious/nearly-instant drainage that MM5 does with it.)
I suppose I could duplicate them with their MM2 sprites, for what that would matter. But roof-squishing = death, not glitching. Fair warning!
You may consider letting people zip?
In my opinion - I mean, honestly, it's pretty hard to get into a wall by accident, sure it can happen I guess... But some people do it for fun. Wall = death is one of the worst ideas by capcom, ever. All it does is limits players who want to do it, and it can be very hard mind you in some situations to even get it to work.
It's not like your going to have everybody zipping through the walls and nobody playing the game. Alot of people don't know how zipping even works, and some people who do - don't like it so choose not to.
-
I dunno.
Progress: Working lots of bugs/inconsistencies out now, getting minor baddies to act right, and procrastinating a bit too.
8) '
Also, anybody know if the Robot Master sprites for Rock8/Rock & Forte FC are done yet?