Here's an animated gif of the sprite layers system in action:
Would you prefer an animated gif, or a linked avi?
The legs, torso with head, and arms are rendered separately into the sprite sheet, and exist as individual sprite sequences. The torso sequence's frame is controlled directly controlled by the angle of the cursor in relation to the player. I've only set up an animation for the top 180 degrees, so if the cursor falls below the player either the first or last frame of the sequence is used. If the cursor hovers directly below the player, the torso frame snaps between the beginning and end of the sequence. The only way I know to solve this is to animate the torso sequence in a full circle so there are no snaps, which I will do soon.
Almost all of the time I've spent on this project has been on the engine and tools. I've finally decided to stop this for a while and start working on the game content. I've decided that making exclusively 3d-rendered backgrounds will be too time-consuming. I have a wacom (digital drawing) tablet that I only used for making textures for 3d models, but I recently discovered how fun digital painting is, so in the name of fun I'm using both 3d renders and painted backgrounds. Organic environments are well-suited for painting, and mechanical structures are easy to build in 3d. Any artwork I do is guaranteed to take a long time, so I'm asking former classmates for help with this.
The game needs a story, and here's what I have so far:
Its the future, and autonomous machines are common. You are a revolutionary new kind of robot, created by an eccentric robotics genius. Your creator has kept your existence a secret because of the experimental nature of your design. One day, many of the city's machines start "malfunctioning" and causing mayhem, with rumors of a computer virus as the cause. When he sees that the police are failing to control the situation your master fears for his life, both from the chaos outside and from the possibility of you "going maverick". In an effort to protect himself and test your vulnerability, he locks you out and tasks you with destroying any malfunctioning machines in the building. After learning of your potential he sends you into the city to help others. Your accomplishments do not go unnoticed though, because soon the military takes interest in you... What do you think? This project may not make it past a demo, so the story could expand if that happens.
