137 replies to this topic

[tabc3dd]

FINAL CORE

 

 

 

THE GAME

Final Core is a real time strategy game set in virtual space, in which the player is given the opportunity to entirely build his ships from a choice of over 100 parts before sending them in battle.

 

 

Download Link : Final Core

 

 

Extremely Outdated gameplay video

 

 

CONTROLS

-All the controls can be accessed from the in-game help file ( The usual Gamemaker one (F1) ).

-Unit controls behave like in most RTS, left click to select, right click to move, numbers for command groups ...
 

 

FEATURES

- Build your ships from a selection of over 100 parts.
 - Innovative base building system with upgradeable buildings.
- A story line with 16 missions, bosses and bonuses.

- Absolutely lagless gameplay as armies engage.
- High replay value : No two games will ever be the same.

- 100 Achievements to obtain, at least 5 hours of gameplay.

- Important strategic depth, part placement and choice is crucial .

- A smooth difficulty curve with no real cap.

- A complete help menu, tips and infos . If ever you get lost or do not know what to do, post here, I'll fix it. This game is supposed to be comprehensive.

- An editor mode where you can export your creations to other players as small text files and pit them against each other. Can you create the ultimate ship ?

- In-depth gameplay featuring multiple ressources, stats, upgrades and strategies.

-Multiple options to adapt the game to your liking.

- Multiple modes, including missions, arena, skirmish, free play and more !

- An intelligent AI for both allies and opponents.

 

 

 

Comments and suggestions are gladly appreciated, thank you very much and I hope you enjoy the game.

Edited by tabc3dd, 24 March 2013 - 04:08 PM.

[CaptainLepidus]

Awesome game, I love the whole thing. Uber ships own

I usually just played free play and then let my allies do the real fighting while I owned all the enemy buildings with my missile launcher dudes

One thing I noticed- in the beginning cut scene, you used GM's built in explosion. Sorry to nitpick, but it will look more professional if you use a custom particle effect.

[tabc3dd]

Awesome game, I love the whole thing. Uber ships own

I usually just played free play and then let my allies do the real fighting while I owned all the enemy buildings with my missile launcher dudes

One thing I noticed- in the beginning cut scene, you used GM's built in explosion. Sorry to nitpick, but it will look more professional if you use a custom particle effect.

Thanks for the reply ^^.

Well, i'm trying to make sure my game doesnt lag, and i thought using particle systems might cause lag, with creating the system, creating the particles, then deleting the system.

I know that the built in explosions also use particles, but these are probably optimised by professional.

Anyhow, i'll take your reply in consideration, i'll see what i can do .

Replaced the gray explosion by a much more subtle smoke of the color of the part when a part is destroyed. The effect it gives is quite good, and it doesn't lag. Didn't go with a particle system, as parts are destroyed very often, and it could cause lag. Anyhow, you'll see when i post a next version, it renders quite nicely.

Btw, what uber ship are you refering to ?


Edit :
Uploaded a new version with minor fixes.

Only real change is that i obfuscated the game. Makes it slightly larger, maybe slightly slower, but now you can't decompile it correctly ! This GM8 decompiler is scaring me XD.

Edited by tabc3dd, 26 September 2010 - 03:52 PM.

[CaptainLepidus]

<snip>

1.Good. The game will look much more professional.
2. By uber ship I mean putting all your parts onto ship #1. It rocks
3. What GM8 Decompiler?

[tabc3dd]

1.Good. The game will look much more professional.
2. By uber ship I mean putting all your parts onto ship #1. It rocks
3. What GM8 Decompiler?

1) Thanks ^^.

2) Yep, it's quite nice. But it only works well in missions. In skirmishes : Imagine half your parts are defensive, and half are offensive. If you want to attack something and theres no one to retaliate, your defensive parts are useless. So if you put all your offensive parts on one ship and all the defensive parts on the other, you can have twice the firepower for the same cost as if you had put all your parts on the same ship. Same if you want to defend a place from long range attack, your offensive parts are useless. When i try to play well, i usually use 3 ships. One to lure and take shots, one to deal damage, and one to sneak around and hit sensitive spots ^^.
If you want to see a real uber ship, try the arena XD, they will tear you apart !

3) There is apparently a GM8 decompiler, but it's not open, only a few people have access to it. Better safe then sorry ^^.

New version is out, the main link has been updated.

Changes include (But not limited to):
-Part destruction looks more professional, with a more subtle graphical effect instead of the gray explosion.
-Huge optimization on part creation and shots hitting parts (Took off 2 calculations for both).
-Fixed some bugs and small problems.
-Changed the info message of parts to something more simple, with the possibility of getting detailed stats.
-Damage dealt to the core is increased by 30%. Before, you could hide your parts behind your indestructible core. Now, it's not a viable strategy.
-Gave the player a "class" choice on starting a new game, which affects the parts you start with. RPGs have them, so why not RTS .
-Changed the editor to improve some stuff (Like not having to remember the file's name to be able to load it.)
-Changed most enemy ships so they don't have overlapping parts.(All enemy ships were made with the editor ^^.)
-Performance updates.

Edited by tabc3dd, 29 September 2010 - 08:59 AM.

[tabc3dd]

New version is out, alot more polished along with many small improvements.

[batoonike]

Looks extremely confusing, doesnt make me want to download this. Im sure it might be good but can you make screens of something more understandable? Excuse me for deciding based on surface of stuffs.

[tabc3dd]

Looks extremely confusing, doesnt make me want to download this. Im sure it might be good but can you make screens of something more understandable? Excuse me for deciding based on surface of stuffs.

Bah, people should really download before judging ^^. And the screenshots are slightly outdated.

Screen 1 : The white things connected by lines are enemy buildings. The ones where all the lines go to are relays, the others are money generators, energy generators, ship builders and building repairers.

Screen 2 : The blue things connected by lines are the player's buildings. The star-like buildings are turrets, and the lines going to a purple ship are damage lasers.

Screen 3 : The intro screen, which is admittedly slightly chaotic. This has been solved in the new version. Plus, when you see the parts move as a whole, everything gets clearer.

Screen 4 : Three player's ships on the left (you can see they look the same) against a huge enemy ship on the right.

Screen 5 : A rather none-confusing base i made. Blue things connected by lines are my buildings.

Screen 6 : This one can be confusing. The green things are, as you guessed, buildings ! The small white things flying around are assault drones. The blue curves at the bottom are the effects of a projectile.

Screen 7 : My three ship against an enemy which has just fired all his shots in a single salvo. Central shots deal high damage, upper blue shots slow and lower purple shots reduce repair-regen-restore rates.



You should really give it a try ^^.

[batoonike]

Yeah I propably will but you cant change the nature of man Wich is to judge things at first sight and if doesnt appeal, move on. I know its unfair and stupid etc etc.

EDIT:

K, now that Ive started it, it already looks cool in main menu. The font is kinda impossible to read at first. Should prolly make it a bit clearer.

I achieved something by staying in main menu, heh. First achievement before even starting to pla.

Anyways It looks like awsome game. Try to figure out a way how to let a player play around a bit in the middle of the whole learning proccess. At the moment it seems like I have to obtain a masters degree in it before any actual gameplay. Wich is going to drive away like every other player.

For instance the basic build-up goes something like this (I think): energy, storage, energy.. etc. This means that you could make a technology tree. So player can only build like 2-3 buildings at start and once he has at least 1 energy and 1 storage he can get to other stuff. This way you wouldnt have to read so much cause you cant mess up anyway by building 25 Relays and nothing else.

+Consider changing the background square-network ###### a lot darker. Theres already a lot of lines on the map.

+ Consider removing some of the AI lines. Currently there's so many that I cant really SEE any of them. They just make noise.

Overall it looks like a very deep game and Im probably going to nolife it If you want to work on it please release the less-background-squares, less-lines version first.

Edited by batoonike, 07 October 2010 - 09:14 AM.

[tabc3dd]

@Battonlike : Thanks for the reply. All issues have been addressed in the current version.

Edited by tabc3dd, 19 October 2010 - 06:27 PM.

[tabc3dd]

New version with many, many improvements.

[Excaligo]

A really great game. I rated it 5/5 on Yoyogames. ^^

Just 2 things:
-I don't know how to save and load. When I started it the second time and wanted to continue it said I should load a savegame. I had assumed it would save and load automatically, but oh well.
-Also when I started it the second time, the music was bugged. It was playing during the intro-video but after that I could only hear it in the optionscreen. Unchecking and checking the music option again didn't change anything. (Btw I really like the music =D)

Furthermore, could you increase the rate of gaining credits, please? XD
After a bit more than one hour (with learning how it works etc.) I had only gained around 1600 credits and around three parts. This is insufficient, considering that we have to upgrade each part individually. I don't want to farm the first mission.

Btw, am I supposed to defend the HQ in mission 2? Because when I defeated all enemies on my second try, I was suddenly back in the Hangar with the message "You were forced to retreat and regroup".

As soon as I know how to save, I'll play it again...

[tabc3dd]

A really great game. I rated it 5/5 on Yoyogames. ^^

Just 2 things:
-I don't know how to save and load. When I started it the second time and wanted to continue it said I should load a savegame. I had assumed it would save and load automatically, but oh well.
-Also when I started it the second time, the music was bugged. It was playing during the intro-video but after that I could only hear it in the optionscreen. Unchecking and checking the music option again didn't change anything. (Btw I really like the music =D)

Furthermore, could you increase the rate of gaining credits, please? XD
After a bit more than one hour (with learning how it works etc.) I had only gained around 1600 credits and around three parts. This is insufficient, considering that we have to upgrade each part individually. I don't want to farm the first mission.

Btw, am I supposed to defend the HQ in mission 2? Because when I defeated all enemies on my second try, I was suddenly back in the Hangar with the message "You were forced to retreat and regroup".

As soon as I know how to save, I'll play it again...

Thanks for the reply Excaligo!

- P to open the pause menu. From there, you can save and load your games.

- Will solve the music bug, i think i know where it is.

- I believe credit gain is okay as of now. After the first mission, you have enough cash to buy 5 out-of-playstyle parts or 6 playstyle parts. In addition, you can play skirmishes which each give enough money for the same amount of parts. That means, after doing for example 2 skirmishes and one mission, you should have an additional 15-20 parts. I think the main problem is that you spend alot of money on upgrading. However, if after playing a bit more you still think it is a problem, i will increase the income.

- Wait, you defeated all the enemies in mission 2 ? When ? Before the HQ is built, on the first wave, on the second wave or after getting the ubership ? If you kill them before getting the ubership, it might bug, mainly because i didn't code that possibility XD. Over-upgrading FTW !
.
Thanks again for the positive feedback, i'm glad you liked it. I will try to bring out and updated version ASAP.

Edit : New version :
- Music bug solved.
- How to pause, save and load in the F1 help file.
- Clicking the exit button gives you a tip that you can save with P.
- Thats all.

I tried to recreate your bug in mission 2, using a code to kill all enemies. No matter when i killed them all, there was no bug. I looked at my code, and there can't be a bug either. Can you be more precise when it happened ? Maybe it was just your escorted ship that was destroyed ?

2 Questions :
- Did you ever have any lag ? Like when you are facing 80 enemies in mission 1 ?
- Do you find the music starting at every room annoying ? Before fixing the bug, i never noticed. Now, if i decide to go from "Main menu" to "Hangar" to "Achievements" and back to "Hangar", i hear the first 5 seconds of the background music 4 times in a row !

Edited by tabc3dd, 20 October 2010 - 11:22 AM.

[Excaligo]

Thanks for the answers. Now I'll start constructing my ubership.
(I thought the save at the pause menu would just save this very skirmish/mission. So I never used it. ^^)

Does the amount of credits for winning a skirmish increase with the difficulty? If so, the amount of credit should be okay, you can leave it as it is. ^^

I defeated the enemies in mission 2 after I got the ubership as reinforcement. But I had lost everything else.
But everything happened a bit too fast, maybe the very last ship sniped my ubership through its armour, who knows... XD (Don't remember it clearly, but I'll report if it happens again.)

I didn't notice any serious lag. But when I had 70 ships in a skirmish the sound got a bit annoying (even the music faded out, because there were too many gunshots). Though it would be strange if they didn't make any sound.

And for the music I think it would be better if it doesn't start again. Just check if it is already playing or make a global & persistent music controller. ^^

Thanks again for the explaining.

[tabc3dd]

Thanks for the answers. Now I'll start constructing my ubership.
(I thought the save at the pause menu would just save this very skirmish/mission. So I never used it. ^^)
Should i make it more precise that it saves the whole game ? Btw, when you build your ship, try to make it as compact as possible. The smaller a ship, the less easier it is to hit, plus it looks better imo.

Does the amount of credits for winning a skirmish increase with the difficulty? If so, the amount of credit should be okay, you can leave it as it is. ^^
Yep. Credits for winning a skirmish are, i think, 600+50*Level.

I defeated the enemies in mission 2 after I got the ubership as reinforcement. But I had lost everything else.
But everything happened a bit too fast, maybe the very last ship sniped my ubership through its armour, who knows... XD (Don't remember it clearly, but I'll report if it happens again.)
Tbh, i don't know what the bug can be. The message only pops if you have 0 HQ and 0 Ships. Maybe your HQ was destroyed ?

I didn't notice any serious lag. But when I had 70 ships in a skirmish the sound got a bit annoying (even the music faded out, because there were too many gunshots). Though it would be strange if they didn't make any sound.
What should i do ? I tried reducing the volume, but then you barely hear it when a single shot is fired. And i can't have each shot adapt it's volume, as that would cause lag. Any idea ?

And for the music I think it would be better if it doesn't start again. Just check if it is already playing or make a global & persistent music controller. ^^
Yep, i know, the music is played by my global and persistent Controller object. However, the room start code is "If !sound_is_playing(BGM) sound_play(BGM)", and it thinks its not playing since theres a second of silence when a room starts. I will find a way to solve it though !

Thanks again for the explaining.

Thanks again for replying ^^.

Answers are in bold.

[Excaligo]

With the notification when you press the exit button it should be clear enough now. ^^

Yeah, my HQ was destroyed. But I was confused that I didn't lose when it was destroyed but after that, when I had defeated all enemies (since the reinforcement warped away).

Hmm, I'm not quite sure about the sound. Maybe lowering the volume of the gunshot if there are more ships? Or only play those, who are on screen...

Btw I like the mirror option. ^^

[tabc3dd]

With the notification when you press the exit button it should be clear enough now. ^^

Yeah, my HQ was destroyed. But I was confused that I didn't lose when it was destroyed but after that, when I had defeated all enemies (since the reinforcement warped away).

Hmm, I'm not quite sure about the sound. Maybe lowering the volume of the gunshot if there are more ships? Or only play those, who are on screen...

Btw I like the mirror option. ^^

Ok thanks.

Yep, i see now where the bug is. Instead of checking if you have ships, HQ or escort, i should check only for HQ or escort.

I didn't find a way to lower the volume of the sound effectively. And only playing those on screen would cause lag as over 200 shots are usually shot at the same time. I really don't know what to do. I will try reducing the individual noise of each shot.

BTW, i still haven't managed to find why i can't have the same music continue from one room to another. I have something stopping the sound, but i can't find it ... The search goes on XD.

The mirror option is extremely new (latest version and maybe the one before), so some bugs might still be present. However, i believe i have ironed out the major problems.

Thanks for the reply ^^, how far are you in the game ? Btw, did you try the bonus mode button in the hangar ? Shooter is quite fun.

[Excaligo]

Yay, finally beat mission 2. XD
But now I get an instant defeat on mission 3? I start the mission, see my blue portals and then I'm back in the hangar. I don't get any message.

For the shooter:
It is indeed fun. Especially watching how my missiles hit the enemy. =P
Though I found some points:

• Since you control your ship with WASD you're in constant simulation mode.
• There isn't a defeat condition yet.

And something small:

• If you press for example forward and right at the same time you are actually double as fast as normally. (You get your speed for forward and for right) This is a common Game Maker bug. (That's why I've noticed it.)

Mirror option seems to work completely fine.

Edit:
Well, the mirror option is buggy after all. Only the piece at your mouse is checked. It doesn't matter if there is a part at the place of the mirrored part. Meaning I'm able to stack a second part on another.

Edited by Excaligo, 20 October 2010 - 07:58 PM.

[tabc3dd]

Yay, finally beat mission 2. XD
But now I get an instant defeat on mission 3? I start the mission, see my blue portals and then I'm back in the hangar. I don't get any message.

For the shooter:
It is indeed fun. Especially watching how my missiles hit the enemy. =P
Though I found some points:

• Since you control your ship with WASD you're in constant simulation mode.
• There isn't a defeat condition yet.

And something small:

• If you press for example forward and right at the same time you are actually double as fast as normally. (You get your speed for forward and for right) This is a common Game Maker bug. (That's why I've noticed it.)

Mirror option seems to work completely fine.

Edit:
Well, the mirror option is buggy after all. Only the piece at your mouse is checked. It doesn't matter if there is a part at the place of the mirrored part. Meaning I'm able to stack a second part on another.

Thanks again for the reply.

Mission 3 was a small stupid bug,a misplaced parenthesis .... I have played through mission 1-10 ( 16 in total, didn't have time to go farther) and they all work now ^^.


All problems concerning Shooter mode have been addressed, thanks .

Part stacking has been fixed. However, parts will sometime blink in and out. Thats because my sprites are in groups of 4, and the subimage cycles, so sometimes it thinks it is staking and sometimes it isn't. It's easy to fix, but that would imply modifying 250 objects and 125 sprites, so ill do it later. Anyways, it isn't a really problematic thing.

Sorry bout the problems. Did you try defeating some arena bosses XD ? Some are horribly hard to take down (Nether ).

Edited by tabc3dd, 21 October 2010 - 04:47 PM.

[Excaligo]

Thanks for the fast fix. ^^
I beat mission 3 on first try. Mission 4 is harder again, but I think if I arrange my ships better I'll be able to beat it.

The arena bosses. Hm, I can't even defeat the first one. His ravages (the upgraded ruins) are tearing my ships apart. XD I think I'll need a second intervention part and more energy regeneration.

Edit:
I finished mission 4.
But I think the timer for mission 5 is broken. Instead of counting down 1 second per second, it only counts down 0.03 seconds... That's around 3 hours of surving, instead of 5 minutes.

Edited by Excaligo, 22 October 2010 - 07:58 AM.