Across The Lake, CANCELED . See last post . Options

[Alexitrón]

Across the Lake will be the story of a young woman trying to prove her woman's worth in a man dominated world . It will be a semi-straight forward platforming adventure game , that means no backtracking . The game will feature action stages which are just regular straight forward stages with a boss at the end and dungeon stages that require some figuring out , solving puzzles , getting new items and such , very Zelda like .I plan to have at least 4 action stages and 4 dungeon stages . Right now I have 2 action stages and a dungeon and I am currently working on the second dungeon so once you hit this dungeon just quit because there is nothing to do here except maybe fall of the screen or some other weird event . This project is getting kinda big and is going to take a wile until I finish it in between other projects so I decided to show it around and see what people think .So I leave you with some screenshots a YouTube video and a playable version of what is there so far .

OH! You are going to need this in order to play :

Arrows left and right = move
Up = interact ( when you see like a bubble with 3 dots on top of something )
down = duck
A = attack
S = jump
SHIFT = select weapon ( I know I shouldn't have used shift , sorry , will change it )
ESC = exit the game
ENTER = I think this loads the game for testing purposes , try not to press it accidentally , but maybe you will need it if you die or something .

If you find any bugs please report them pronto . You will be credited .

The To Do list :

-The game tears an awful lot , turn the synchronization on please . ( Overman ) I noticed this myself but turning the synchronization on makes the game run at a very low fps rate . What can I do ? I am using screen scaling scripts that draw the game on a surface and double the view scale , does that have anything to do with it ?
- The room transitioning is hard coded and stiff , it will be nicer to have smooth room transitions . ( Amidos ) I really don't know how to go about this , what is there is as far as I can go with what I know now . Any suggestions?
- The horizontal movement just cuts when you let go the key , maybe with a bit of speed and friction ... ( Sparky )
- Things should move smoothly, the character jumps to quickly . ( Lucaz )
- Lots of health showed up when I had full health. It would be better if health only showed up when you were injured. ( QOG)
- The way the camera works when you get to the vertical area of the cave level is a bit disorienting. ( tesko )
- When I tried playing it there were black blocks surrounding all the sprites. They weren't going transparent properly .I'm on Vista 64-bit if that helps . ( eepman )
- It's easy to bump into the boss accidentaly, especially if the distances between "reach the boss with your sword" and "touch the boss and get hurt" are so close. ( Cesque )

The suggestions list :

- I would like to hear some ambient noises . ( Overman )
- Add a few more background details in the dungeon areas... torches, vines, broken walls, etc. ( Farik )

The music list : ( Feel free to collaborate , I love midis but anything is welcome . )

Our first two sample songs brought to you by Overman .
http://willhostforfood.com/?Action=download&fileid=72236

Screenshots:

All stages most end with a boss

Puzzling puzzles

There is no proper adventure without a cave


YouTube video brought to you by AuthenticKaizen ( http://www.youtube.com/user/AuthenticKaizen ) :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ol19e9UsuPA

And the game :
http://willhostforfood.com/access.php?fileid=72130

I hope you enjoy what is there of this project .Leave your thoughts and suggestions , all feedback is welcome . Enjoy !

This post has been edited by Alexitrón: Jul 13 2009, 05:02 AM

[Pro Pro.]

Its actually a pretty nice game, im not sure why it doesnt have commetns yet. The only thing i dont like is that after you die you must start the enite game over (as in pressing escape and clicking the exe agian). Add some type of feature that resets the stage and keep up the good work.

P.S. Oh, and music, please add music.

[AuthenticKaizen]

very promising game!
i really like the graphical style and the overall gameplay.

[farik]

this is great! plays very smoothly. simple, clever puzzles, nice style. good work.

[Alexitrón]

If you press ENTER you can load your last saved spot . Also , thanks everyone for playing , I am so happy that you people are liking this one . Keep the feedback coming , OH , and I added a a little something to the description that says that once you hit the second dungeon you should quit because there is nothing to do there except for maybe falling off the screen and other silly happenings .

[Overman]

I love the graphics in all of your games, and these look very well-done. The little graphics effects are what I like the most. I definitely recommend you switch on "synchronization" in the game settings - I don't know about your computer, but on mine the game tears a lot and synchronizing the graphics would fix this.

The character movement is another strong point of the game. I also liked the swimming part!

Does the health fill up when you stand still? Because I just left the game running to write this, and I had full health when I went back. Well I've only completed the first stage so far, I'm going to finish the rest now. Definitely a promising game so far.

Agh, that flower boss was hard! Until I figured out the pattern, then it wasn't too bad.

One comment I have is that there's no incentive to kill the enemies. Unless you already lost health, it's better to leave them alone, as they tend to hurt me before I hurt them Oh and the hammer boss is awesome!

The puzzles are really clever in this, smarter than in Lab 14 or Karoshi etc. Oh I just realized, the atmosphere is good in this game but there should be more ambient noises. Wind whistling, owls hooting, chandeliers swinging and creaking would be excellent additions IMO. I'm enjoying this game a lot!

The boss fights are great! The golem fight is hilarious

This post has been edited by Overman: Jun 27 2009, 10:20 PM

[Alexitrón]

Such an in depth comment I just love them . I really don't not what to do about the tearing problem , synchronization makes the game real slow . I added it to the TO DO list in case anyone knows a way around this .
The health doesn't ( or shouldn't ) fill up if you stand still , maybe you saved your game ? that does fill it up .
Yes , the enemies only provide annoyance and resistance , later they will also drop air fills and some other stuff that you need to fill up .
I'm happy to hear that you are enjoying the graphics , engine and overall experience so far . Thanks for your feedback and your collaboration .

Also , I added a To Do list , a suggestions list and a Music list ! because we got some music already , check it out ! . Thanks Overman .

[Overman]

I really don't not what to do about the tearing problem , synchronization makes the game real slow.

What is the room speed? I think unless it is 30 or 60, synchronization does slow it down a lot. You can ask in the help boards, perhaps.

And yeah, I figured that out later about the health refilling. I just saved the game, heh.

[farik]

well, i just got to the end and i have to say i really enjoyed it. the last boss was great! my only suggestion would be to add a few more background details in the dungeon areas... torches, vines, broken walls, etc.

This post has been edited by farik: Jun 28 2009, 08:05 PM

[Alexitrón]

@ Overman : The room speed is awesome 60 .

@ Farik : thanks for playing and for your suggestion . I will see if I can come up with something .

To Do and suggestions list updated .

Also , IndieGames . com ( http://www.indiegames.com/blog/2009/06/pre...t.html#comments )

Lastly , I now have my own spot on the net ( http://alexitron.weebly.com/index.html )

Well , back to work I go .

[Captain Ricco]

This ngame was truly great, really nice anim, simple but nice looking sprites. The bosses were awesome, very creative, i specially liked them rock golems, they were funny, not hard at all, but funny


I think maybe you should expand the areas a little, cause i played the game for like 15 minutes and had killed 6 bosses, i mean, how many cool boss battles you have in mind???

[Alexitrón]

I decided to stop reworking The Power and cancel the Across the Lake project in favor of better learning Game Maker now that I'm using GML . I did updated The Power but didn't deliver on new additions like music and a last boss . The new version is up for download . As for the Across the Lake project I will not work on it anymore but I will make the source available for download from my site in the coming days .
I will now focus on re-learning GM with a GML focus so expect to see smaller and more experiment like games from me for a while .
I apologies for any disappointments .


- Alexitrón -

[dadio]

I think it was a good idea to not continue with this one.

I'm sorry but I think this is one of your weakest games.

The level design is very "empty" & "spread thinly" - very different from "The Power".
I think maybe that having a "free scrolling level" game you too much freedom in the level design...
& diluted this game.

Often, tight restrictions (like a single screen) result in the best design, I think.
"The Power" demonstrates this very well, as do many of your games

PS: I am almost ready to release the playable demo for my own game that is similar in some ways to "The Power"...
I am very curious to hear your opinion of it & I think it is a good example of just how "tight restrictions" can be turned into great games. I'll PM you when I release in a few days.

Best of luck with your GML learning! I expect great things!

-----

EDIT: Wow, just re-read my comments, sounded very negative! Just to be clear... this game is a good game & compares well to most GM games - just that personally I feel *for you* it is not as strong as your other games, because you make such good games!

This post has been edited by dadio: Jul 17 2009, 10:49 PM

[Alexitrón]

Looking forward to your game dadio . Let me know as pronto as you release it .

[farik]

hows this coming along?

ps - the download link is down.

... oh. it's canceled. crap!

This post has been edited by farik: Jan 30 2010, 07:59 PM