Trigger Man: a retro fps

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10 comments, last by MarcPilkington 12 years, 1 month ago

[color=#000080][font=tahoma,geneva,sans-serif][font=verdana,geneva,sans-serif]Trigger Man[/font][/font]



[color=#000000]It's been a busy weekend and I thought I'd finish it with a post here.

[color=#000000]Currently in development is a fast paced, action fps very much in the style of Wolfenstein 3D and the classic Doom. We've been developing a whole new engine from scratch and the tools to go with constructing levels and setting up weapons and enemies. The game's target platforms are XBOX indie and the many PC online distribution networks (which still need investigating) and it's been in development for about 7 months and we're on target for a good prototype by May. It's all sprite based as you can imagine, so it's time for screenshots!

[color=#000000]Work complete to date:
[color=#000000]6 enemies (42 sprites per character)
[color=#000000]4 weapons



[color=#000000]new_hud.jpg


(New HUD graphic)



walls.jpg


(1-bit alpha walls allow for a lot of extra detail in the levels)



trigger4.jpg


[size=2](Every retro fps needs an elevator room)




[size=2]trigger2.jpg


(Cargo room)




[size=2]map.jpg


[size=2](Editor tool - screenshot of the tool here is abit out of date and has changed abit)



[size=2]scuttler.gif


(Sample enemy)



It's hard work but we're slowely getting there, and it's only getting better. Well thanks for looking at this post, everyone's time is important and it means alot.

Mark.
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The project has been going pretty well, really getting the most out of the 1-bit alpha textures which really allows me to add layers of detail and even rooms with windows! It just means levels will really be alot more interesting than your basic Wolfenstein maze affair.

I hope you enjoy the screenshots below I hope to make a small video soon so stay tuned for that.



level_details.jpg

(Layers of detail using alpha images)



level2.jpg


(Simple corridor from level 2)



windows.jpg


(Using alpha images to create windowed rooms)

Looks great. For me, a major part of DOOM was the level design - hopefully your editor and engine will allow you to create some interesting levels.
Yeah, our tools are getting better all the time, there wont be varied floor and ceiling heights sadly so levels are flat like Wolfenstein (the varied ceiling and floor heights is something we plan to add in for a later project) but theres still lots of scope to build nice looking environments and desgin some devious levels smile.png We're making the game outside of work hours so its always tough to squeeze in the dev time but we've done pretty well I think in regards to the style of gameplay we're trying to achieve.
A great start so far. I'm looking forward to it's release. :)
Looking good. Is your engine a real ray-caster, or is it a simplified polygon engine of sorts?

throw table_exception("(? ???)? ? ???");

It's all polygon based which is enough for what we're trying to do, I'm only the artistic brains behind the project though so I only have a rudimentary view of the engine stuff haha, but thanks for the question smile.png

---edit!
Oh! you mean the old school way they did it I'm guessing? No haha I had spoke with Ken Silverman when the game was in a very early stage of development but decided to go down the normal poly route and that gives us some advantages with the current graphic devices. We just thought it would be better to fake the effect with modern technology (i.e programmable shaders iun the graphic pipeline for post processing effects - one of these will be depth relative lighting which should be good).
Yep, I thought that was the case by looking at the screenshots (they're too crisp to be ray-casting), and it would almost certainly be the way to go on more modern hardware, especially if you want to get into shader effects and the like -- and it also greatly simplifies transparency, doors, etc.

Has your programmer tried nearest-neighbor sampling on the textures? You wouldn't normally want to use it, but in a retro game like this it might take enough of the crispness out to make it feel even more retro (you'd probably also have to render to a smaller render-target, and then scale that up to full-screen using a box filter or maybe nearest-neighbor again). It might be interesting as an optional effect (effectively making the current mode the "HD" mode).

throw table_exception("(? ???)? ? ???");

Well definatly look at that, I'm pretty sure we're doing that but I'll mention it to him and see what he says.

Cheers Ravyne.
No problem, hope to see that it looks like I think it will. The art looks great by the way. Appropriately retro, with a sort of sci-fi cartoon aesthetic.

throw table_exception("(? ???)? ? ???");

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