Game Development

7:29 AM

Quickly free points gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/126274/…

8:29 AM

\o

Ahoy

10:14 AM

@Tyyppi_77 84th? doesn't that mean that you should have passed gl? were not the goal to reach top 100?

user92578

@Leggy7 Well no, the goal is to be somewhere in the top when a community manager decides to light some games

user92578

I rose to the top because the games above me were lit

:D

han, I understand

so, everyday is the day from now on

user92578

So I guess my tactic is to hope that one time I won't drop too far when after games above me are lit

user92578

10:17 AM

After the previous batch was lit, I moved to 88th

user92578

Oh, now #81

user92578

With 3 new votes

user92578

Greenlight is weird

lol

one of the Steam Dev talks from 2 years ago
Newell said they were hoping to evolve greenlight somehow
but I guess they haven't thought of anything better yet

user92578

yeah, and TBH I can't think of really any improvements

10:22 AM

its valve things just happen really slowly. Unless its a new hats for dota or skins for CS

even then, they don't accept all submissions

you could dream of making a hat or skin and then never get approved :/

user92578

it's really funny, lately I've been dreaming about getting to maintain a game

user92578

I bet once the game is out that definitely isn't the dream

user92578

It feels pretty awesome to be at the top 100 out of almost 2K games

there is really a lot of garbage but indeed being in the top100 is awesome

10:31 AM

certainly above average!

user92578

yeah

user92578

the thing is that really most games must be at really low votes

user92578

because I jumped from 6X% to the top 100

user92578

when games were lit

yeah, I don't think many people really browse greenlight

user92578

10:35 AM

People seem to be announcing breaching into the top 100 on their pages

user92578

Which to me sounds like a lame idea because I atleast dropped very quickly from there

user92578

10:49 AM

Every game I look at on GL there's @Leggy7 saying something super nice to the devs

I started looking at greenlight works as you put in your project

when I'm not over busy I try to give some useful feedback

some time every day, mostly

user92578

there are also often the same haters

sure

by the way I'm not always super nice

I really hate VR games

are so fucking horrrible

lol

and a lot of devs build up the same game with different environments

like you are stand still, with a ranged weapons and you shoot waves of enemies

TONS OF THIS SHIT

just cuz it uses VR

user92578

10:52 AM

all this time I could be spending on the game

user92578

but no, I'm looking trough random greenlight comments :P

ahahahh

user92578

I tend to mostly vote "yes", unless it's obvious garbage or an anime-style visual novel

I like anime-style visual novels. As long as they have actual gameplay or at least multiple interesting story paths.

I'm not a fan
I prefer action games :(

11:02 AM

On the other hand, I consider the "kinetic novel" style of "click to get next line of story, with some pictures and sounds" things to be kinda silly. I could as well read a book.

Especially books since those don't have head-sized boobs in every girl NPC

Neither does "Hatoful Boyfriend", to name a well-known VN as an example.

Ah well, I'm just really frustrated since most VNs on Steam is some Sakura stuff

Where it's almost zero story and 100% boobies

I love to thrust VR garbage with a downvote

and explaining them that they are building garbage

You're doing well

Because I'm hating too that people are doing any kind of shit in VR just to say "hey, at least it's something on VR!"

11:08 AM

same

and all these VR games are the exact same shit

you stand still, have a ranged weapon, shoot waves of enemies

stop. garbage. downvote

this is the last I checked
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=730134314

Sounds like my grandfather's experience on the Eastern Front ... (he was a machine gunner in the Wehrmacht).

user92578

I voted yes on that... it looked fun to me

The biggest problem on those VR wannabe is that they lack content

If it's a shooter you can't move

If it's an horror game it's not a horror game, it's jump scare time

And so on

oh boy another Vive shoot your bow at waves of enemies game

cool

take my money ples

@Tyyppi_77 what?

user92578

11:13 AM

I liked how the zombies looked

user92578

and there was a minigun

holy christ tyyppi

user92578

I'm a simple man; I see a minigun, I press yes.

lol

didnt notice that only in the few days something like 6-7 games VR with that mechanic werer put on GL? I don't think so, or you would have downvoted that shit

user92578

11:15 AM

I don't really mind

Steam is already full of bs

But they don't get enough attention, so it's OK

for the amount of employee time it takes to check something
for the amount of bandwidth it costs to distribute
for the amount of harddrive space it takes to host the files
if it makes the company (and the developer) money, why not

the good titles get talked about and shared, just like any creative distribution medium (art, music, movies)

Yeah in the end the "game sells itself"

depends on the platform's image you're trying to uphold too I guess
like GOG won't accept everything, they'll tell you "no" if they don't want ya

Ah well, there are better places for indies

If I ever release my game I'll keep it only on Itch.io and Steam GL

11:23 AM

when someone asks me if I like to localize software

pastebin.com/40adtpKy

user92578

umm, that's not how you're supposed to do it

i dont give a fuck at this point

does it build the string correctly

user92578

GetLocalizedText(Text.Info).ReplaceParams(amount, count, info, stuff)

fuck yeah

Making localization for every word seems a bit problematic

user92578

11:25 AM

Yeah that won't work for all languages

Creates a bubble around you, absorbing %DAMAGE% damage for %SECONDS% seconds., and let the translator figure out where to put the two numbers

Yeah, like Tyyppi suggested, it's better when you just replace the words that need to be replaced

I dont need it to work for all languages

user92578

Exactly what Chris showed

user92578

He's done this, you know

11:26 AM

I haven't done it live yet lol, but it's in there

user92578

Every language doesn't work in the same way

user92578

Like, Finnish doesn't really have prepositions

and then you get fun with plurals

user92578

oh yeah

Adjectives are the other way around in Portuguese

In Portuguese you don't say "blue car" you say "car blue"

11:56 AM

I like that adjective order. You put a car in your mind then adjust it: "A car big blue." In English, you have to hold the adjectives in a buffer then apply them: "A big blue car."

user92578

oh true

Yeah it makes more sense in my mind too

the suspense of leading up to the noun

Or in German, the verb.

i better get to work talk later

Werk is for pussies, chatting is for the real men

11:59 AM

Yes, dutch and belgian people shouldn't work but english people should

(werk is dutch for work)

werk werk werk

Not pronounced like the warcraft orcs though =p

More like the e in egg

Aw, it was the most awesome part of playing as Orc in W3

Yeah

As for humans it were the "Ready to work" catchphrase when they spawned

12:07 PM

lol

those peons were awesome

"stop poking me!!!!!!!"

infoText.text = Localization.getLocalizedString("infoText").ReplaceParams(paramDict);

there happy now ?

I'm not happy, but you should be by having a better solution :)

I decided to go with a dictionary that you can build and pass it to the replaceParams

so now it works with multiple words/values

also I forgot strings are immutable for like 5 mins wondering what the fuck is going on :D

user92578

@UriPopov yes

user92578

All though String.Format would probably have worked just fine

12:15 PM

this looks better imo

12:33 PM

@ChrisMcFarland or the protoss observer... "A small step for... man... a giant step for... <radio channel switch noise> STOP POKING ME"

lol

or the griffin "This warhammer cost me 40k! Heh heh." Which they removed, but was still buried in the files somewhere.

"Not enough minerals" "Build more pylons"

Just got asked if I'm planning on releasing my sea trading game on mobile...

hahaha

I bet no, right?

12:35 PM

Hey guys it's been a month

:)

I've missed you all

Interface issues!

I've toyed with it.

hello

12:35 PM

it's something to consider, but it might really mess with your interface.

you got a month long ban or what ?

The problem is, it wouldn't make a good Free-To-Play game, and that's really all that makes money in mobile these days...

Hmm I have you on ignore but can't remember why, ah well removes from ignore

if you get lucky pay games can make a ton

Monument Valley, super hexagon, klopki or whatever it's called...

Basically, my thought has been that if I do good enough with my hopeful Kickstarter campaign someday, then I'll do it.

12:36 PM

that's a reasonable way to look at it

I'll put that as a $10,000 stretch goal or something.

Alan Tuning was that annoying guy that I don't remember his last nickname

If I'm going to release a game on mobile, I want to release it for iOS. For me to do that would involve investing $1000 or more. I guess I could use Unity Cloud Build, but...

looks at recent conversations Oh yeah that guy

user92578

I was like "WTF, why are there holes between Almo's messages, Mick is banned"

12:37 PM

Hmmm. I guess I'll look in to it some. Still...

You would have to test it anyway :P

why is Mick banned ? He was a cool guy

Yeah, at the very least I would have to buy either an iPad or a iPod Touch.

Probably both.

OMG Mick got banned

@UriPopov Let's not get in to it again

12:38 PM

tell me please

@PearsonArtPhoto naah, just release on android

From everything I've heard, iOS makes much more money than Android.

Details

On paid apps? Yup

Well, hopefully by August I'll be at a stage where I know if this is really going to work.

12:39 PM

What was Mick banned for?

Going for Mobile I'll have to do quite a bit of optimization...

1 min ago, by Kevin van der Velden

@UriPopov Let's not get in to it again

I don't care that you don't want to go into it..

That's okay

Can someone useful tell me what happened?

user92578

12:41 PM

I've been toying around with the idea of spending a weekend trying to get GunHero to build for Android... might be just a waste of time though, and probably would take more than a weekend

@PearsonArtPhoto we could consider a publishing deal like I have with jon for iOS

just looking at my sales data...
iOS makes me twice as much as Android

@Tyyppi_77 Probably yes and almost definitely yes =p

I'll toy with it.

Why was @MickLH banned?

12:42 PM

@AlanTuning don't insult people or you're next.

Can you stop being annoying?

Honestly, it doesn't surprise me he would be banned.

(Note that I had nothing to do with it)

@PearsonArtPhoto Do you know the reason? I'm not surprised either to be honest. I'd like to know specifics though

heh

Even if I did know the reason, I'm bound by the moderator agreement to not share those kinds of details.

12:42 PM

@ChrisMcFarland I'd heard that a couple years ago, didn't know it still held. Not surprised though

@AlanTuning I think that especially mods will agree with me on the let's not get into it bit

he probably said bad and mean words that offended some guy and he got flagged

or he called a admin a cunt

many peoples buy droid phones because they're less expensive.

one of the two

so it's hardly surprising they want to spend less on apps

12:43 PM

Ye he deserved it whatever he did

@Almo wouldn't be surprised if Android piracy had something to do with it

could be.

It's fairly easy to find out that he hasn't been here for 3 days.

@ChrisMcFarland yeah that's what I was gonna say. It's easy to sideload apps on android

ios piracy exists, but it's not as easy to do

12:43 PM

yea

eheheh, I knew that guy is a bit butthurt :)

chat.stackexchange.com/users/87783/micklh

Whatever you can pull from that link you are welcome to have, but that's as much as I'll give.

And a general statement to be respectful. While sometimes it is less enforced, it should always be considered.

Strongly considering going f2p for mobile for my sequel, ads for rewards, and couple in-app purchases to unlock online multiplayer and open up some save slots or something

Yeah, it's not like this site doesn't have a transcript or a search function

woah chris, sounds like a well thought idea but also a little risky

12:46 PM

well, I'm looking at my premium mobile sales data compared to my Steam sales
I dunno, either way is a gamble :)

It didn't even say anything bad wat

Oh, and if you really want to figure something, this was his last message before being banned. chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/31272115#31272115

@ChrisMcFarland Personally, I wouldn't F2P it.

Tallowmere is perfect for premium model, and if you keep building your audience it may work out big time.

But that's me. :)

it's more just to get more people playing it
and most ppl like to play online
and if they like the singleplayer, should seal the deal maybe

I have one F2P concept I have on the back burner... it's a harvesting-clicker called "Abstract Tender" Or something like that. Usual farmville type click-wait-harvest, but abstract and with geometric gameplay elements.

12:48 PM

So he got banned for saying "bullcrap" ?

8 mins ago, by Kevin van der Velden

1 min ago, by Kevin van der Velden

@UriPopov Let's not get in to it again

I'm sure that was not enough to get him banned

could you explain me what is a premium model?

premium = pay up front

pay $5, get the game

not get the game free then get needled to pay thousands of dollars over the years.

12:49 PM

ahhhhh kk thx :)

the stat that lots of people who pay in F2P think they've paid less than they actually have is a real problem

A part of me is just curious really

and you don't know til you try :)

they think these games are cheaper than they are, so they get an inflated notion of what premium games cost, when in fact they are WAY cheaper.

haha yeah

though I guess the large number of people who never pay a dime is an important bit, too.

12:50 PM

I mean

I look at my data

like I play hearthstone also because its free

my listing gets like 5,000 - 15,000 views a week
and I get like < 10 sales per week

a friend of mine paid over than 100€ purchasing cards

feels like I'm missing out

what's your listing?

12:51 PM

wow that's a lot of views

itunes.apple.com/us/app/tallowmere/id927350422

you're still getting sales btw

Though I wouldn't buy that on iOS because of the controls (I hate platforming on a touch screen) not because of the price.

It was an insta-purchase for me on Steam

because I could use a controller.

yeah
I just wonder what sort of revenue could be had if it were free up front
Not gonna touch the original game, but keeping my design ideas open for the sequel

The game is a bit chaotic for a smartphone to me, but I liked playing it on Steam

12:53 PM

I think $4 is very reasonable for that game. But I make games, so I know how much work it was. :)

yeah like, some of my customers buy an MFi controller just to play my game on iOS

Anyone been playing Pokémon Go?

o/

That was me raising my hand

(For some definitions of playing)

got fuckin demoted in lol again. hit silver 2 finally, lost 6 in a row after

hopefully that streak will end soon

like... tonight

:)

Yesterday I lost all 3 games I played in LoL

12:54 PM

drop lol, fucking time consuming!

lol

those ranks aren't gonna raise themselves though

ahahah

I play dota half ranked, half unranked I'd say

that's a real truth

I never played ranked yet :P

12:55 PM

ranked is cutthroat

I should beat my laziness and open up unity. got boring stuff to do

but laziness is strong

though I need to take advantage of children sleeping

I've been revamping my item attributes all evening

the game won't build itself too

I'm somewhat considering a model similar to Plague.

The game is free, but you pay to unlock features.

You pay less to unlock them if you unlock them in game first.

plague inc?

12:58 PM

Yeah, that one.

that made the boom

I did pay to remove the ads. I'm increasingly getting to the point where I'll pay to remove ads.

developers thank you

Plague inc largely made money because it was a good game at the right time.

just like any product in life :)

12:59 PM

It's kind of inspired me in a lot of ways, trying to take a realistic model and make it work for a video game.

user92578

Everytime I'm making sounds I end up randomizing a weird "hit" sound, which if played with the correct rhythm, sounds exactly like the beginning of the Bob the Builder theme song

ranked is the only way to play, unless you're trying something new. :)

I'm going to try to do that with a lot of future projects.

But despite being serious about climbing, I'm still zen and relaxed as I play. It's still "fun".

I find the higher my rank, the more fun the game is. This is why I still play after nearly 4 years.

@Tyyppi_77 haha

I would love it if dota had a ranked mode for All Random Ranked or Single Draft Ranked

1:02 PM

hahah

ARAM really doesn't lend itself so well to ranked play... it's too chaotic.

Lots of fun though. :)

or AR, whichever

I just love it how nobody can go in and pick their favourite

yeah :)

half the time I draw my main on ARAM someone dodges :(

I've won many games I thought I would lose based on the initial makeup

aww

if I get to keep, I really kick ass.

1:03 PM

long-range ADC with a long range poke that hits every target in its path

Here's my random attributes thingy so far

ARAM in LoL is all mid too just one lane

so anyone with solid AOE or mutliple-target spells is really good

user92578

What is "Fear Single"?

I need to create a Fear AoE

SingleTarget would probably read better

^ this is an over-the-top example, but I want a lot of RNG

user92578

Sounds and looks pretty awesome

1:06 PM

so each attribute will have its code as to what it should do, but will pull the stats for its chance, duration, cooldown, etc from a reusable class

lookin good dude

cuz I dunno

I play diablo or whatever
and you just get the same build and items for a long time

user92578

do you think you can still do the same thing as in TM1 and show if the item is better then your current?

user92578

isn't there a system like that in TM?

@ChrisMcFarland hehe yeah

user92578

1:10 PM

Also, the most important question: Will your rename Tallowmere to Tallowmere 1?

Tallowmere is definitely more "crazy shit" than Diablo is.

@Tyyppi_77 yeah, in T1 the default was just based off the star rating, though you could change it to check against other stats

makes it really fun

@Tyyppi_77 nah

@Almo :D

@ChrisMcFarland That looks OP but fun lol

user92578

1:11 PM

oh no, I hate it when there's a "2" of something, and the first one is just called <name>

user92578

but it's okay because I like you

you get something from a box and sometimes you say "HOLY SHIT"

lol

@AlanTuning thanks, yeah, loot-based games strive off of RNG-rolled stats

and not because you're beyond godlike

user92578

have you thought about modifiers and stuff? like "attach this gem to your axe and gain 25% more crits"

1:11 PM

I imagine certain item types will have required attributes, but the rest can be a gamble

Yeah I need gems and sockets

user92578

stat-track axe

user92578

with red stripes

I hope the modifiers will breathe a lot more life into the randomness of the game
there's only so many base mechanics you can implement, attacking, teleporting, stealth, jumping, knockback, poison, fire, explosions

melee combat, ranged combat, and spells
I am looking at lots of games for ideas :)

user92578

yeah

@ChrisMcFarland your items attribute definitions are prefabs, aren't they?

1:14 PM

yeah
I started hard-coding them in script, but I refactored to this prefab system cuz it will be easier I reckon

I wanted enums and consts, but cuz I add things haphazardly, the enums would never be alphabetical

and creating string consts for each attribute was annoying
so now each prefab's gameObject.name is the defining value lol

so with this, like, you could have
"On Kill: 35% chance to Poison all nearby enemies"
which I think would be fun

and saves me from having to design anything by hand

I can see room for set items, unique items, where I give something a nice name and choose some guaranteed attributes, but probably won't be too common

nearby enemies at fixed raius?

I'm thinking it will be based on the item's rank

(like 1-7 stars)

so how do you handle graphics with the radius variation?

not something I can easily choose without testing

I will tackle that once I start coding in the mechanics

like poison the shit around you. the poison aoe should match the desired area. how do you handle this scale?

1:21 PM

once I figure out a base radius, would be a matter of scaling I think

particle systems could be a sphere, not sure if I can modify ParticleSystem stats at runtime, might need a few systems at the ready

In Unity?

yeah

I think everything can be modified.

In fact...

I can't find it, but I know I saw that explicitly mentioned in a release notes I read recently that all particle system parameters can be edited at run time.