Just Death coming to Steam!

Published November 28, 2015
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Just Death is an "Open-World Sandbox Crime Game" set in procedurally generated cities. At its core gameplay mode - Just Death is my take on the Vigilante genre. You must rid the streets of "thugs and scum" using your antihero, playing in the first or third person. Due to the procedural nature of the environments, I can provide ample replayability with ease. All gameplay modes have been designed to be played both offline and online. The game is being offered on the Steam platform, as an Early Access product. I want to take into account the player's feedback while I finish development of the game.

Below is a piece of concept art, for each of the 3 gameplay modes. The first is Vigilante mode, where you clean up the streets from scum and bad guys. The second gameplay mode is Bank Heist mode, which you can rob the bank with friends, and escape the procedural cities. The third gameplay mode is called Gang War, you fight for control against other gangs for control of the city.

Concept Art
Just_Death_Vigilante_Promo1_Final.jpg
JustDeath_BankHeist_Promo2_Final.jpgJustDeath_GangShootout_Promo3_Final.jpg



The core feature of Just Death is the Procedurally Generated Cities. With a feature like this, I can provide the players with almost unlimited gameplay environments, by simply changing the "seed number" used to randomly generate the world, or by changing the simplistic input splines which form the "backbone" or basis for the city generation. See the images above for a visualization of the input and output my technology can produce. One issue that has plagued procedurally generated environments for the longest time is that they always look "boring". My solution was to simulate every layer of a city individually with as much detail as possible, to hopefully alleviate the repetition.

Procedural City Screenshots
p_JustDeath_Procedural_City.jpg
p_smallJustDeath_Procedural_City.jpg



If you want to read more about the project, or purchase the game please visit www.JustDeath.com and check it out! Here are some screenshots of the game, these are Pre-Alpha screenshots and will increase in quality as the game nears completion.

In-game Screenshots
JustDeath_Screenshot1.jpgJustDeath_Screenshot2.jpg
JustDeath_Screenshot3.jpgJustDeath_Screenshot4.jpg



Stay tuned to www.JustDeath.com for more updates!

- Dan
13 likes 13 comments

Comments

Aardvajk
Good to see you back, man smile.png
November 29, 2015 09:27 AM
poss74

Like Aardvajk says, good to see you back here :-)

Is there anyway you could randomise the splines, rather than having to manually generate them?

November 29, 2015 08:24 PM
dgreen02

Like Aardvajk says, good to see you back here :-)

Is there anyway you could randomise the splines, rather than having to manually generate them?

Thanks guys! I'll be posting a lot more now that I can talk about the project ( was being funded by a publisher for the last year ), now I'm 100% back on my own and can do whatever I want.

Great question about the randomization/generation of the "backbone splines", currently I'm using a static input set of splines to test a few different scenarios, and to obviously make it easier to debug the algorithms that flesh out the city. I've thought many times about randomly generating these splines, and will integrate that once I've refined the rest of the code. A simple square grid has been done in my testing, but maybe pulling in real-world city road lines would be another option ?

I use .svg as the input file format for the roads, so maybe there is a system to import real world road data in that format :-o

Thanks for the comments guys!

- Dan

November 29, 2015 09:00 PM
Eck

It'd be neat if you could plug in your zip code and get the splines from google maps and maybe even the street names. :)

December 01, 2015 03:20 AM
dgreen02

It'd be neat if you could plug in your zip code and get the splines from google maps and maybe even the street names. smile.png

Yea if anyone has experience w google maps API and can say, if it's that easy I think it's a great idea :-D

- Dan

December 01, 2015 02:23 PM
poss74

It'd be neat if you could plug in your zip code and get the splines from google maps and maybe even the street names. smile.png

Yea if anyone has experience w google maps API and can say, if it's that easy I think it's a great idea :-D

- Dan

Unfortunately, I think Google's got some language in the API against commercial use :-(

December 03, 2015 10:05 AM
cozzie
Great respect for what you've achieved. Are you working on it alone or with a team? I might give it a go from steam
December 03, 2015 07:06 PM
dgreen02

Great respect for what you've achieved. Are you working on it alone or with a team? I might give it a go from steam

Thanks man! It's just me, but I had funding from a publisher for the last year. I also work with a team of great artists from around the world on a contract basis. E-mail me dgreen@radioactive-software.com and I'll give you a Steam Key to check out the WIP builds.

I have a much better build coming soon, and once that's LIVE I'll make a call to anyone who wants to check it out & give feedback, before the Early Access launch. Building a game of this scale and not having anything but my ~20 test computers, and no publisher makes QA kinda difficult lol.

It'd be neat if you could plug in your zip code and get the splines from google maps and maybe even the street names. smile.png

Yea if anyone has experience w google maps API and can say, if it's that easy I think it's a great idea :-D

- Dan

Unfortunately, I think Google's got some language in the API against commercial use :-(

Ah... I figured... well, one could just trace the outline of a googlemaps screengrab, or a regular map/image of a city.

December 03, 2015 07:22 PM
cozzie

I'd be happy to assist you on QA.

Mail sent on the alpha version

December 03, 2015 09:32 PM
Yudovskiy Sergey

Looks great! I`m seriosly )

December 06, 2015 02:44 PM
Servant of the Lord

Welcome back! Your work is always inspiring and interesting to read about.

Is the game name 'Just Death' as in "It's only death", or 'Just Death' as in "It's a justified death"?

December 07, 2015 03:46 AM
dgreen02

Looks great! I`m seriosly )

I'd be happy to assist you on QA.

Mail sent on the alpha version

Thanks a lot guys!

December 07, 2015 07:55 PM
dgreen02

Welcome back! Your work is always inspiring and interesting to read about.

Is the game name 'Just Death' as in "It's only death", or 'Just Death' as in "It's a justified death"?


Thanks buddy! It started out as the 2nd one, since the primary gameplay mode in the game is a "Vigilante" mode where you need to cleanup the streets from "thugs and bad guys", but in the last year I added bank heists, and gang warfare modes...so now it's more of the 1st I suppose :-)

- Dan
December 07, 2015 07:56 PM
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