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Main => The Gallery => Topic started by: Coolboyman on July 9, 2012 06:09 AM

Title: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 9, 2012 06:09 AM
I worked on this for a couple of days six or so months ago.  It's glitchy and stuff so all the glitches you see I'm well aware of.  Should I keep working on it and turn it into something cool?

http://www.swfcabin.com/open/1341793132 (http://www.swfcabin.com/open/1341793132)

Enter: Start
Z: A
X: B
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: rtil on July 9, 2012 06:51 AM
what were you planning for it to be? all you can do is move around really (afaik)
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 9, 2012 06:53 AM
Quote from: rtil on July  9, 2012 06:51 AM
what were you planning for it to be? all you can do is move around really (afaik)

You can press enter to bring up the main menu and choose options with Z. 

I was planning on remaking the Pokemon Gameboy engine where it would execute the data in the same way the official game does (for example the map is stored as a binary array in the exact same way as Pokemon Red) because, I don't know I felt like it.  I'm thinking of taking it even further by embedding the ROM into the flash file and having the flash file read the data directly from the ROM.

Edit: Now with the ROM embedded in the SWF like I said I would do.  Took me about an hour and half and reads maps straight from the ROM: http://www.swfcabin.com/open/1341818739 (http://www.swfcabin.com/open/1341818739)
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: rtil on July 9, 2012 10:07 AM
swfcabin is not loading for me
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 9, 2012 03:45 PM
Quote from: rtil on July  9, 2012 10:07 AM
swfcabin is not loading for me

Why didn't I just upload it here.  Still needs a lot of work.

[swf]http://www.thebackalleys.com/dump/files/2563/848mK4_pokemon.swf[/swf]
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: SHADOWFOX2 on July 9, 2012 04:01 PM
I see I've chosen the fire type....excellent.
Of course you should finish whatever you start
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Kooh on July 9, 2012 11:23 PM
Woah nelly, after messing around in the pokedex the game suddenly just started lagging a lot.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 9, 2012 11:41 PM
Quote from: Mexican on July  9, 2012 11:23 PM
Woah nelly, after messing around in the pokedex the game suddenly just started lagging a lot.

Quote from: Coolboyman on July  9, 2012 06:09 AM
It's glitchy and stuff so all the glitches you see I'm well aware of.

lol.  I'm just asking if I should continue programming and finish this. 

A couple of people elsewhere were telling me that it's a good idea but "Flash is dying" and I should do it in html5 or something.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: rtil on July 10, 2012 12:52 AM
until youtube fully transitions to its html5 player and 99% of IE users are using IE9, flash isn't dead
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 10, 2012 01:43 AM
Quote from: rtil on July 10, 2012 12:52 AM
until youtube fully transitions to its html5 player and 99% of IE users are using IE9, flash isn't dead

Yeah I think so too... even though he thinks flash is on the way out extremely soon. 

I might as well make flash and html5 versions if I decide to go with this.  I'm interested in html5 anyway... also Javascript and Actionscript 3 are similar.

Think of this at the moment, as a Pokemon Red and Blue emulator.  I embedded my hack's ROM (Pokemon Brown) into the swf but if you embed Red or Blue instead it'll display Red/Blue maps instead.  It'd be the same... just with Actionscript 3 controlling the engine instead of Zilog Z80.  Programming for the game would be a lot easier. 

But of course, a LOT of work needs to be done before it gets to that point.  I might just do it for fun on my free time. 
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: dilly on July 10, 2012 06:44 PM
it'd be nice to know what all you are creating this for. is it just r/b/y in flash or an entirely new game?

as far as continuing it, i would at least change the fonts in the menus to a font similar to the game (which i'm sure you would do anyway)
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Blordow on July 11, 2012 05:42 AM
hintz and tipz: charizard evolves into squirtle using a moon stone
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 18, 2012 07:51 PM
Quote from: dilly on July 10, 2012 06:44 PM
it'd be nice to know what all you are creating this for. is it just r/b/y in flash or an entirely new game?

as far as continuing it, i would at least change the fonts in the menus to a font similar to the game (which i'm sure you would do anyway)

It's still up in the air.  I was just doing this for fun really, and was considering taking this engine and changing it into either an original game, or a Pokemon game with the look and feel of the first Generation for flash.  If I were to do the latter, it wouldn't just be a remake, it would be a new Pokemon game running off of this engine. 

This weekend I was able to emulate the 8-bit sound engine that Red uses.  It's not a wav or an mp3 file, it reads the bytes from a song in the Pokemon ROM uses that information to produce a song generated by a square wave.  I still need to implement the triangle and sawtooth wave support. 

And yeah the flash should use PC Senior fonts, I just forgot to embed it for certain parts because I forgot not everyone has that font. 


Quote from: Blordow on July 11, 2012 05:42 AM
hintz and tipz: charizard evolves into squirtle using a moon stone

Yep, testing evolutions with items at the time.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Philip K Dick on July 21, 2012 02:46 PM
so wait is this you http://www.rijon.com/ (http://www.rijon.com/)
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 23, 2012 04:02 AM
Quote from: Hey guys, look! I'm finally a parkour master! on July 21, 2012 02:46 PM
so wait is this you http://www.rijon.com/ (http://www.rijon.com/)

yep.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Philip K Dick on July 24, 2012 08:27 AM
i knew it!!
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Kooh on July 24, 2012 08:11 PM
I say yes continue this fine game.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on July 27, 2012 01:43 AM
Then I shall work on it from time to time and decide what to do with it later if I want to make a finalized game. 

I made some progress since last time resulting in an almost empty library.  I'll upload it when it's playable.

Flash is leaking memory on map reloads for some reason.  "Automatic garbage collection" my ass.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on August 18, 2012 07:01 AM
An update! I've made A LOT of progress with this engine.  Check it out.  Also read below before playing.

Make sure your mouse isn't over the flash.  It lags it for some reason.

The NPCs are missing and you can't leave the city.  It has a lot of stuff built in though.  This reads from binary files in order to draw the maps and absolutely everything, even the new dynamic music engine which I also wrote myself (It produces sound without library sound files). 

If it lags for you then I'm sorry I'm still trying to optimize the memory because flash refuses to do it automatically like it claims it does. 

DO NOT access the menus at the moment.  I haven't fixed them since last time and they might fuck up again.

So I'm thinking of getting the overworld engine completed then move onto the rest of the menus then battles.  After that I'll have a kick ass RPG engine with an 8-bit feel I can use to transform into other games.

Please let me know what you think!

[swf]http://www.thebackalleys.com/dump/files/2563/452c2B_pokemon.swf[/swf]

Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Crabarms on August 18, 2012 08:32 AM
I think not having an npc block the stairs in the poke center is an improvement over the original.


Still lags a bit unfortunately sometimes exiting/entering will screw the sound over for a few seconds.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: rtil on August 18, 2012 11:11 AM
that music engine is pretty damn cool. but i imagine you are still working on it, because it seems to have trouble keeping a constant beat haha. but seriously that's really cool that you coded that. do you feed it some data and it plays the music?
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on August 19, 2012 03:16 AM
Quote from: rtil on August 18, 2012 11:11 AM
that music engine is pretty damn cool. but i imagine you are still working on it, because it seems to have trouble keeping a constant beat haha. but seriously that's really cool that you coded that. do you feed it some data and it plays the music?

The reason why it's having trouble keeping a beat sometimes is Flash's memory problem which I'm still trying to resolve.  Sometimes it struggles when you go into a different map.  It's hard for me to test where it really lags because my computer is so great.

It retrieves a hexadecimal song file embedded in the flash (usually only around 200 bytes) and executes sound based on the bytes in the file.  The song only needs one byte to play a note (Each section is divided up into four bits, one is the note and the other is the length).  There's also other commands that control the pitch, tempo, changing octaves, and more. 

Not only does my sound engine allow for the songs to be EXTREMELY small compared to mp3's and wavs, but as far as I know it's also the closest you'll get to producing sound that sounds exactly like an 8-bit game.  Gameboy has four channels: two square wave, one triangle wave and a white noise (which I haven't implemented yet).

I need to look up more commands that can be used with square waves/triangle waves.  There's also a few problems with the code (not all songs play properly and channels dis-align with each other), but I'm workin' on it.

I'll probably get NPCs and signposts (along with a text box) working in a week or two, or less!

I'm wondering what kind of game I can make out of this.  Even though it's going to be 8-bit oriented, I can still "Subtly cheat" for things here and there.  Of course, I'd need a dedicated artist (I've had bad experiences with online artists in the past.  They say they'll do something, two months later nothing gets done and they say "oh im too busy".  If they're too busy then they shouldn't have applied for the position in the first place.  )
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: rtil on August 19, 2012 03:46 AM
i noticed when i scrolled down and it was outside my screen it started lagging pretty bad. not sure if that means anything.
Title: Re: Should I continue working on this flash game?
Post by: Coolboyman on August 19, 2012 08:58 AM
Quote from: rtil on August 19, 2012 03:46 AM
i noticed when i scrolled down and it was outside my screen it started lagging pretty bad. not sure if that means anything.

Not really. If any flash is off screen it's gonna slow down.