Author: Brad

Update: another handful of fixes

– Rolling through tunnel problems. Hopefully this addresses previous issues with the tunnels also.
– Hanging: Whoops! Updated hanging to work with the new collision, and tweaked it a big. Finally, you can backflip from ropes!
– Little bug fixes to ground collision while near walls
– Updated the charge in air animation.

Well here we are, the last stretch of development. Finally feels like things are really starting to come together for World 3. I’ve been working on this game forever now, but here’s the push to get the game out of the door!

Got a lot of changes in this update to the Sneak Peek, remember to empty your cache if it’s not updating for you.

– The biggest actual addition is the new air jab. Jabbing felt sort of useless before, it bugged me that there really wasn’t a time to use it over the air spin attack. Now, tapping attack while in the air will perform a powerful jab, a one hit kill against spiders, and a great way to take Ninjas head on! (not to mention jabbing frogs mid jump!)

– I’ve been going over the combat in general, also, trying to make things a bit more fair. It should be harder to get hurt while performing combos on the ground, but the best way to stay alive is still to move around! There’s even a protected time after stomping, so you won’t, say, launch off of a baddie straight into another baddie. Super useful against a swarm of Ninjas.

– 3D camera is finally working properly! Check out the pinball test level, looks awesome 🙂 Spent some time on the tracking for FPM and the shell, should be much better now. Which reminds me, Bats are updated, bob in the air a bit and respawn. Though they probably shouldn’t in the pinball level, oops…

– Tweaked the seesaw platforms in the super hard room, should make them much easier to run up and jump off of.

– Here’s probably the most requested feature: Try hitting the mouse’s bullet now 😀 There’s not really a great place to do it in the Sneak Peek, but it’s great fun in Outer Squiggleville.

– I finally gave up and completely changed how I’m handling rotation and collision. Over the Top did it a much easier way for the console, I’m now doing something similar. So if you see any weird teleportation bugs, please send a replay, they should be much easier to fix now.

A few smaller things:

– I revisited the combo system for smacking baddies around. You’ll get a combo going for jumping on multiple baddies (I think I broke that after World 2), or bouncing around them with the air attack, or sliding into one and bouncing on another, or pretty much anything that you can do without touching the ground, wall jumping is fair game! Hmm, makes me want to make a level with a ton of baddies and walls, floor is lava! or something like that… Still need to add a few things, like a combo for the shell hitting things… Show off by hitting a baddie into a wall, headbutting it, then jabbing it into oblivion!

– Dead baddies now can hit other baddies. Not sure if I’ll leave this one in, but it’s pretty hilarious. I hope it doesn’t eat anyone’s computer alive when there’s a ton of baddies. Let me know if performance drops too much for anyone in the combat arena.

– The uh, shell wobbles a bit when bouncing. Yeah…

– And the pencil’s slightly larger… Totally the most important item on this list! Yep…

Stage 2 of the Misplaced Cave golf, er, stage: Outline!

Jumping on a shell into the ground should be fixed. Added another jumppad to get back up. Few other fixes…

And, a little something extra for completing the hole 🙂

Sneak Peek

Can’t believe that it was back in ’08 that I first uploaded the Christmas version of World 2, sheesh.

Got a little something different for this Christmas: a new challenge level for the Misplaced Caves in the Sneak Peek, but with a small Christmas twist (and of course, fixed a bunch of bugs).

You’ll have to find the room inside the Caves, it’s pretty close to the beginning, same as the console version.

There won’t be a Snailshell Golf course in every single level like in World 2, but as challenge levels, I have a lot more freedom making a smaller level specifically for a round of golf. I like how this level turned out, and I’ve tuned the shell physics a tad bit more, so hopefully the shell is a little easier to control, too.

And of course, Merry Christmas! Watch many good Christmas movies!

[Edit: Looks like some things in the first upload was a bad export, and with a few other problems. Should be fixed now!]

All those bug fixes, Time Trial’s been in there, but I figured I’d mention it in a post.

And, that door should be working now. Added some doodles to show kinda where you need to go, but the level’s supposed to be very very difficult to complete, let me know if it’s clear enough, or if you think it’s unbeatable, heh.

Also, been doing some more work on the combat, lots of tweaking to little things like how baddies act when they’re flying in the air, how far you hit them, all that, so have a few rounds in the Baddie Arena if you want to give some feedback on how that all feels.

I’ve done a bit of polishing on the swimming, too, so if you want to have a go at breaking that also, be my guest 🙂

Next up: Challenge level! I thought it would be a good time to make a super awesome Snailshell Golf dedicated level for World 3. Whatcha think?

Bunch of things should be fixed. There’s one more thing, but I don’t want to point it out. Let me know what you think. It’s something that I’ve been going back and forth on for awhile now, but I figured see how you guys feel about it.

If you’re having some trouble figuring out what I did, go fight something with the pencil, should be most obvious there.

Sneak Peek. Might want to just go ahead and clear your cache first.

[Unrelated Thought: So how many of you would like to see a really difficult bonus level, something that would separate the men from the boys, as they say? Or would that just be too frustrating?]

Play the latest Sneak Peek online now!

Report 33!

I actually didn’t notice that I was playing with the very latest build, with most of the squiggles finished already. Oh well, guess I’ll upload that, too.

Backgrounds done! Bugs fixed! Thanks to everyone would sent in replays, and your welcome for fixing them 😉

Can’t remember all the things I did, at the moment, I’m going to get some sleep then make a real post about it later…

Actually, better idea, here’s a few more bug fixes for now, and I’ll make another video tomorrow.

Got a nice bundle of tweaks here, let’s see what you guys think:

– Mouse health lowered, from 120 to 80. For reference, Spiders are at 40.
– Animated the Spider’s head to be a bit bouncier during the walk cycle. I don’t know, seems to fit better with all the new bounciness.
– Speaking of which, mouse bounciness tightened up some.
– FPM ‘stall’ jump clip finished, though it should appear less now, anyway. Hopefully now no one thinks it’s the game bugging out anymore, heh.
– Fixes to the player’s sliding clip, should be impossible to get hurt while slide tackling spiders, even when they’re protected.
– Jump rolling attacks properly.
– Plenty of little fixes to interaction with stunned, stun jumping, and protected baddies.

Check out the new changes for yourself here!

Alright, back to work!

Play the Sneak Peek now to check out all the updates!

Update 2 – 1:

Lots of little bug fixes, mostly. More background work done, should be finished with the frontmost background soon.

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First up we have the Caverns background. At least, the beginning of it. Like I said before, I tend to concentrate the most effort into the beginning as I try out new things, but here, you can take a look at my scribbly rough outlines in the rest of the level. That’s just to make sure that everything lines up properly before spending the time drawing decent lines. I also plastered a the color around the temporary background throughout most of the level, just to make sure it looks good everywhere. I keep everything on separate layers, since I tend to make up my mind a few times on the colors as I progress.

For the background, I’m trying out the three tone shading that Over the Top introduced to FPA while working on the console game, to keep the closer backgrounds simple enough to not obscure the player, but not too simple to look flat. I’m actually not sure if I want to make the closest layer less detailed, then move the stalactites back one layer, so the camera doesn’t look so cramped. Whatchy’all think?

I almost hate Googling for real life caves for inspiration, they just look so much better than any level I could ever draw. Real life in is, like, SUPER HD or something 🙁

Lots of bugs with the baddies should be fixed, I went back through all the code handling player interaction and fixed a bunch of it (some of this code is over 5 years old :O).

I really liked how springy the spiders with hats felt, so I extended that bit of code to work with regular spiders to. They’ll react properly while being slide into and headbutted and kicked and all that now, looks much more dynamic, I think.

Also, gave the Spiders some non-festive headwear, but they’ll need a few more hats to keep things fresh. I’m kinda looking forward to making some level specific hats for them (and no, sorry, W3 Flash won’t have hats for FPM like the console game does 🙁 )

So there it is, keep those bug reports coming, and remember to clear your cache before playing to get the latest version!

Update:

Foreground finished! Next update should be a new post, and a start to the backgrounds.

I messed with a bunch of code this time, so feel free to let me know how badly I broke everything. Remember to clear your browser cache to be sure you have the latest update!

It’s always a balancing act with World 3, my drawing has been getting better, but I still want FPA to have that scribbly look about it. You might be able to see some of that internal struggle here with this level. I’ve added some more scribbly texture since last update, but it’s still a pretty clean looking level.

I think I’m going to focus more on the background for this level, since it’s very open in spots, so the foreground will only have a few different designs on it (plus, I need to hurry up and finish this game!).

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For Halloween!

Here’s an idea that I’ve been playing around with for awhile, and I think this is a fun way to debut it.

Check out the Spiders in the Caves. They’re… armored! Basically, this would introduce tougher baddies in the late game, to be fought specifically with the pencil.

Gonna make a post about it soon, but I figured anyone checking the site often should get the first view.

Sneak Peek Halloween Test

And remember, if you’ve found a bug and it’s at all a possibility, please email me the replay string. That way I can be sure that I’ve fixed your bug!

This is probably cheating, but I needed a thorough bug fix update. Not that I don’t expect y’all to promptly break it or anything, but that poor mouse, all his code was broken 🙁

Oh, and poke at the scratch he fires.

And a huge thank you to everyone’s who’s sent in replays, you really are speeding up World 3’s development significantly. I can’t thank you guys enough!

Quick update: Cave’s up in the Sneak Peek. Check it out at FancyPantsAdventures.com! I messed up the mayor’s dialog, so if he’s saying the same old thing, it’s not updating. You might need to clear your browser cache. I’ll update the preloader and make a real post about it soon, but until then, Misplaced Cave is one of my favorite levels, so have fun!

Hi ho, everybody! Looks like the natives are restless, so let me show you what I’ve been working on, and what the plans are for the near future.

First up is the Beach. Finished the background, touched up the sand a little, and animated the sand castles falling over. At the end of the day, isn’t getting kicked what sand castles are really for?

In World 3 in Flash, I’m handling the Beach challenge a little differently. Instead of having it’s own level, the challenge takes place all over the main level. Hunt down the castles! Those castley jerks…

Just for reference, here’s the first time I showed off the Beach level and sand effects:

So, what’s next? For awhile, I was planning on putting a poll on Facebook, to see if everyone wanted me to add the Forest level to the Sneak Peek (World 2 demo had 2 main levels, so why not), or add the Misplaced Caverns. Thing is, Forest is finished, Caverns isn’t. I can upload Caverns as it is, then while I work on it, I can upload new versions, and everyone can basically watch how I build a level. Basically, adding the Forest would be boring, so I’m going to overrule everyone here anyway.

And building levels is pretty much all I’ve been doing lately, and that’s what’s been holding World 3 up. I figure everyone will get a brand new level to play with while they wait, get to see it be built piece by piece, and even give some feedback as I create the MiniTrial and extra levels that go with ever main level. Everyone up for that?

So then, I’m going to go through all my files and give the Sneak Peek a good updating. I’ve actually updated a lot of the collision since then, also, so hopefully nothing goes wrong in the transfer. Let’s see if I can get the Caverns in there tonight…

And here’s exactly what it looks light right now. Beautiful, isn’t it?

Sadly, I don’t have enough content for a full update, but I should be finished with the Forest soon. I’m liking this style of grass better, and I’ve been doing some coding work to get every level set up for mini trials, challenge levels, and all that (before that was just sort of hacked together for the Sneak Peek).

Any questions in particular? I might do another video soon going through a few of the other things in the Sneak Peek. Need to get consistent with those again…

Mostly just going over everything that I’ve been posting, just to get the videos up to speed. Hopefully these will become a regular occurrence again, but you know me 😛

And apparently there’s some storms headed my way :/

[Update: Fixed head bumping and slash sounds. You guys need to have my back, I usually upload builds when I’m quite sleep deprived 😛 ]

Work on World 3 continues! Besides what I’ve been uploading to the Sneak Peek, I’ve been able to finish a lot of animations that were planned but not completed in time for FPA on consoles.

For the console, we had a very specific goal: to make a unique FPA game for home consoles that couldn’t have been done in Flash. Multiplayer was the biggest focus, along with a few new levels and game modes crated with 4 players in mind. Because of this focus, along with the fact that it’s far more difficult to get animations into the console engine than it is in Flash, there are going to be a few differences between the Flash World 3 and FPA for consoles. I can focus a lot more on animation and little details this time around, and even more importantly, I can do a lot more cheating since there will only be one player on the screen at at a time.

Can you tell?

(Sneak Peek updated again, can y’all check it out on fancypantsadventures.com to make sure it’s actually working right? I need some sleep…)