Topic: A Mega Man NES style Fan Game

[fifthindependent]

Mega Man's shots are appearing above his head because of some stupid animation error I thought I'd weeded out but apparently it's still there, I just programmed Mega Man to fire as soon as his begin walking animation plays where he moves he front leg a little before walking and it always does this.  This bug pisses me off most of all because it is so stubborn with being removed.  I put a band aid on it anyway and forced the animation to change when Mega Man or Bass fires while beginning to walk.

I guess I was wrong with the Mega Fist hurting enemies when it returns, I guess I'll have to change that.  Thanks for clearing that up.

Anyway, here's a new version again with those issues seemingly fixed.

http://www.fifthindependent.com/SECRETOMGLOL/MMR.zip

[N-Mario]

wait.... you have megaman and his mega buster out frames as one object? What I always did was have MegaMan as one object, and then his mega buster arm out frames as another object. Turn this invisible, and when player presses button to change variable, make the buster arm out frames visible, & shoot the object. This would have corrected any animation error displays, and sync animations with MegaMan's normal animations. just saying.

[fifthindependent]

Yeah I have them as one object.  I think the easiest thing to do would've been to set the bullets to the sprite's hotspot instead of an action point since Mega Man always fires his bullets at the same position from his sprite in the original Mega Man games I think.  I know when he's walking the bullets' created position is always the same relative to Mega Man, his buster bobs up and down when he walks, but the bullets remain steady if you know what I mean.   

[N-Mario]

Yea, though I make the bullets appear at megaman shooting's action point, and still made the bullets at a steady position. Just have to work with it.

[OBJECTION MAN]

wait.... you have megaman and his mega buster out frames as one object? What I always did was have MegaMan as one object, and then his mega buster arm out frames as another object. Turn this invisible, and when player presses button to change variable, make the buster arm out frames visible, & shoot the object. This would have corrected any animation error displays, and sync animations with MegaMan's normal animations. just saying.

I did the same thing back in the day. Just keep Megs' two animation objects synced and you're good to go.

Even in C++, when I did a Megaman themed experiment, I have two animation instances in his object, doing the same basic concept.

I was however using SNES and PS1 sprites for these, so I had to bind the buster nozzle to the 'action point' for firing, since bullets weren't fired the same height with those sprites of course. The difference here though was I also made the buster it's own segmented part, removable to compensate for the Mega-Arm alternate weapon I coded in. Same for using the hand instead of the buster, like some NES games did. I did the copout and just had him in his firing stance for the Mega-Arm being shot out, but, realistically in MMV he changes back to a normal stance waiting for it to return, just without an arm. What I would have done is make ANOTHER instance of animations just for the MegaArm variations, but I didn't bother to for the scope of the experiment, but did at least prove the point to myself that it was a viable method to do so.

I believe 5th is right though, in that the NES bullet paths don't bob, just Megaman's buster that seems to. Either way though, the double object visibility method is still a very viable way to go about it, and perhaps the easiest in some cases.

[fifthindependent]

I think I got it fixed this time.  I just told it to set his animation to the shooting + walking animation if the flag is on where he fired when his begin walk animation is playing.  After I did that it didn't do that bug anymore.  For some reason the code to make his shooting + walking animation play normally is getting interrupted by his begin walk animation even though I told it not to.

I want to try to avoid using two different objects for the same sprite anyway because of how easily they could fall out of sync.

Posted on: March 29, 2012, 06:14:48 AMOK I finished and made Pyre Man's stage available.  You won't be able to get the MEGAMANR letter or do the boss order, but play his stage if you want to.

http://www.fifthindependent.com/SECRETOMGLOL/MMR.zip

[OBJECTION MAN]

Just keep them in sync. Have the main object, without buster, be the primary object. The secondary, with buster, is always set to the animation and frame values of the primary, non buster, version. This will ensure they're always in sync. Remember to keep the animations from playing on the buster one.

This way the secondary, and any other object beyond that, will remain in sync at all times from the original source. You have to make sure all the animations are in the same order though. The idea is, whatever animation and frame the normal version is on, the buster version will also be on. They must be structured the same exact way; same order of animations, same frame count, etc. Only the non-buster version needs to have frame timings and such though, since all other versions look to the primary non buster version for all the animation and frame info it needs.

Posted on: March 29, 2012, 06:50:51 AMJust played the new version. I have to ask, who designs the stage elements?

Also, for Pyre Man; his shots seems hard for me to see. I think because they don't have much contrast with the background color, sharing the same red apparently. Perhaps making them brighter will help that. I like his pattern though. It's a pretty good and classic feeling boss. Fast paced too.

[fifthindependent]

I will look into this or an alternate method if the shot placement glitch is still present in this version.  I'm fairly certain it's gone though because I created a line of code to specifically initiate the glitch and it no longer happens in that code.

As for the stage elements, I'm designing them with some ideas tossed out here and there from the friends involved in it.  Why do you ask?

You're right, Pyre Man's shots don't contrast enough with the background, the red fiery part of the Fire Seeker isn't the exact shade of red, but it's awfully close.  I changed the palette of Pyre Man's stage quite a bit and put a black outline around the Fire Seeker itself.  Now the stage looks a bit more diverse and colorful instead of pure reddish tones.  I uploaded this change.

http://www.fifthindependent.com/SECRETOMGLOL/MMR.zip

I also noticed a bug with items that spawn from enemies that they sometimes hover instead of flying into the air and then bouncing off the ground, I'm trying to figure out why this is.   

[OBJECTION MAN]

I think you have a good basic working skill of how stage design should be handled. I was impressed by a lot of aspects of them. I do have some concerns though. Perhaps a more direct talk, say on MSN or something?

As for PyreMan's changes; Outlines don't fix the contrast issue here, as the outline is also dark. As a general rule of game design, selective contrast and lighting help the player to determine, and notice, what is and isn't an active object/tile/floor/whatever or something to look out for. Likewise, making an active object colored darker it blends enough into the background makes it less noticeable and harder to see. The outline helped minimally, but the true fix is to have the object colored brighter in some fashion.

[fifthindependent]

OK I sent you a PM regarding contact over MSN, I explained in there why I need to add you first for it to work.

I will try and brighten Pyre Man and the Fire Seeker at any rate.  I liked his palette so I was hoping those palette changes would help, and while I think they did improve the overall look of the stage, it's not helping the visibility of those two as you said.

[OBJECTION MAN]

Pyreman himself is fine. It's just his fire seeker.

[Zan]

Pyre Man's stage is definitely inspired, I give you that. It just want to note, though, that it somewhat suffers from lacking an overarching theme. The stage has about three gimmicks of which only one is linked to fire, and never are the gimmicks used together. If I were you, I'd take the targeting and catcher ideas, and apply these to other stages where they might be better served.

For example, it'd be neat if the targetting actually had an origin or source. If you had an actual boss that used this gimmick in battle, it'd have the players realize during the battle that the boss was trying to shoot them down earlier in the stage.

Another advantage of giving some of these gimmicks stages of their own is that you can introduce them more gradually, in a controlled environment. Let the player get to know what these gimmicks do before they result in deaths. While you're off to a good start with the catchers appearing early on, the saws could stand some introduction, as could Bass' double jump for those just coming off Mega Man 10.

For the saws, all you can really do is set up a scripted scenario where an enemy gets mauled by them, so that the player realizes they're not just part of the background. For Bass, a too high to jump wall or a non-lethal pit jump should do the trick.

[OBJECTION MAN]

That was pretty much what I wanted to talk about on MSN in greater detail. Bass I can take or leave, since the selection screen indicates double jump. The high amount of separate stage gimmicks in Pyre's stage is my main focus.

[Zan]

Yeah, I figured this is what you wanted to talk with him about on MSN. I'll let you handle the finer details, though, just wanted to give him a quick overview of the matter at hand.

About Bass; an introduction to his ability shouldn't have been needed if not for the guy changing mechanics in every game he's been in. I know, it's not an entirely realistic expectation to remind the player of Bass' double jump in a game like this, because then you'd have to do it in every stage. But that's nothing a good intro stage can't fix.

[fifthindependent]

You do have a good point, maybe Storm Man could use the crosshair in his stage instead and then later in the stage when you actually fight him he flies off screen momentarily and attempts to use it on you.  I was planning on having the catcher robots appear later in a fortress stage with something a lot trickier to get past with them.

[Splash]

Will you change used enemies (Changekey Maker, Skeleton Joe and etc) with your own original enemies?
EDIT.
Noticed two new bugs.
1. Shoot with the Mega Buster, then (while bullet is still on screen) change to special weapon, and then you will shoot this weapon! This bug works even if weapon energy is empty.
2. During the fight with Saw Man, I used E-Tank. Then I used M-Tank, and then I got hit while I was still in menu screen! Then I resumed the game and I became invulnerable! Then I paused and unpaused the game and only after that this I got rid of this invulnerability.
Suggestions:
Energy consumption for Fire Seeker is very high because it's Magnet Missile/Vertical Solar Blaze and weapon isn't too strong.
Also, GhostMan's diving and teleportation reminds me Astro Man. Maybe you should make him to appear on side of the room and fly to the another side (and Megaman should jump over him or slide under him, while Bass could just jump and double-jump over him)

[fifthindependent]

I was going to keep the enemies from previous games the same, unless someone was willing to come up with original enemies to replace them.  I can draw the sprites (although if someone would draw them for me that would be awesome), I just would need concept drawings of them that are decent enough I can tell what I'm looking at.  Some of the levels that are finished still needed a few original enemies and tiles as well.

I fixed the two bugs you mentioned, the first one was because I didn't turn off the flags related to shooting when the menu pops up and the second was because I had an event that tested for whether or not the player's energy was higher than 28, which if it was to set it back to 28 and turn off global pausing, regardless of whether the pause menu was open or not.  I fixed both of those however.

I also worked on the fire seeker, I doubled its damage output and I just remembered to have the items go invisible when the screen scrolls by itself until it stops scrolling.    

[Zan]

In regards to bugs, the only two I've noticed thusfar are:

1. After some strange combo of holding down the movement keys, dashing and getting hit, Bass will start moonwalking across the stage; his back is turned to the direction he's moving, and all shots fired go in the opposite direction.

2. When boldly jumping into the last set of catchers, it's possible for the second one not to spawn at all, leaving sudden death as your only way forward. Related to this is the second to last catcher always despawning immediately after it appears and moves back off-screen. For experienced players this is a minor nuisance, but for those entering the stage for the first time it severely impacts one's understanding of how to cross the gap. It would be best if both were less sensitive to despawning algorithms.

[fifthindependent]

1. I will try to figure out why this is happening.  I have a feeling it has to do with the fact that Mega Man and Bass' directions are falling out of sync because I have the other character invisible but still present when you play as one of them, but it only tests for Mega Man's directions due to the fact that it'll save on the sheer amount of code I have to make.  I'm just trying to keep it as simple as possible.

2. I guess this happened for me as well one time when I was playing as Mega Man, but I thought it was just because I accidentally scrolled the catcher off the screen due to a nervous button press or something.  I'll look into it more and try to make them attempt to avoid flying off screen.

EDIT:
1. I found there's a bunch of events where Bass' direction is set while Mega Man's is not.  I synced them all up so maybe, just maybe this moonwalking issue is no longer present.

2. I made the catchers try to stay on screen while they can still be scrolled off but I still had that bug occur where the last one doesn't spawn at all.  I tried increasing the range from the screen that spawn points become active because it was only 16 pixels from the screen but the spawn points for catchers are 32x16 pixels big.  So I tried setting 16 to 64 and the bug didn't happen anymore, but it seems to be a random hit and miss situation so I don't know if this fixed it or not.

[Splash]

Bought an upgrade for Bass Buster.
He can move while shooting only straight, or in other direction too?
Also, IMO, it's really overpowered  Maybe it could cost more?
P.S. Explosive Tellies - best place for farming, but they appear immediately and they can cause crossing fire pits to be very difficult.

[fifthindependent]

Yeah he can't move while aiming diagonally so aiming is easier.  I COULD edit his sprites and make him walk while aiming diagonally if you all think that would be better.

I could perhaps make the buster boost cost more, get rid of the double damage OR make his shots fire less rapidly with the buster boost.  Which do you think would be coolest to do?  I'm leaning towards making his shots fire less rapidly.

The explosive Tellies I named Mobinades (a combination of mobile and grenade) and I can get through without getting hit by them, but to players who are just coming in to this stage, this part could prove to be frustratingly difficult.  I will increase the delay where they appear.

[Splash]

I could perhaps make the buster boost cost more, get rid of the double damage OR make his shots fire less rapidly with the buster boost.  Which do you think would be coolest to do?  I'm leaning towards making his shots fire less rapidly.

Maybe just make it available only after beating first 8 stages?

[fifthindependent]

I made Bass' buster with the Buster Boost fire slightly faster than half the speed it fires without it.  It would still be extremely overpowered in the fortress stages so I guess this counteracts that.  I also reprogrammed the Bass Buster as it totally bypassed the code that prevents that bullet placement glitch and now it appears Bass doesn't do it either.

Also I took out the crosshair in Pyre Man's stage as suggested but moved it to an unavailable place in the game so it can be used when another stage is made.  Next I'll be focusing on making Sand Man's stage finished and available.

[IQ-0]

A good suggestion for Sandman's stage is to add enemies that shoot sleep powder to make you sleep standing up, unable to move, and potentially vulnerable to other enemies.

[fifthindependent]

That could be easily done by just turning on the flag that disables the controls and setting Mega Man's animation to the blinking sprite while he's out.  I like the pun it creates for the name Sand Man.    It could even be that you need to press buttons rapidly to wake up.