Discussion on jermgame

[rust...@gmail.com]

Hey if nobody else wants to take the job, I'll be good for composing
music and sound effects. Also, art if it needs to be done.

[Cyris]

I can aid in music composing and sprites. If you need some simple
programming, I can do that too.

[djf...@vt.edu]

I would be gald to aid in the art and definitely music! Sounds like a
sweet game idea though.

[Fardan Iqbal]

EDIT: Being a n00b to Google groups, I accidentally posted this under
the wrong subject. I meant to post it under "jermgame", so here it
is:

Art, music, story, and the like are definitely important, but what's
gonna make or break a Metroid-style game like this are 2 things: (1)
controls/physics/general "feel", and (2) map design, and basically how
progression works. That is, is it level-to-level progression, like
megaman? Or is it one huge, seamless world with item-based
progression, like Metroid/Zelda/Castlevania?. Level-based progression
makes for a more action-oriented game, whereas item-based progression
makes the gameplay more focused on exploration.

It looks like Jeremy pretty much has number 1 taken care of. Might
need some tweaking, but it looks pretty solid overall. For number 2,
map design/progression, I do have a couple ideas in my head right
now. I'll draw up some simple map layouts and post them later, when
I'm less drunk. Let me know what you all think.

[Jerm]

I agree. It doesn't matter how good a game engine is unless you have
something to do with it. I think the item-based progression route is
the way to go (at least, that's what I have had in mind since I
started).
Anyway, not entirely related, but one idea I had was to have something
similar to zelda 2, where you have a top-down overworld map, but when
you enter a level it goes to the side view. That way, we would be able
to have a wide variety of locations, some far to the north, some east,
some west, etc, rather that being on the sidescrolling view and just
running to the right or left all the time. Then on the overworld we
can spread things out, and give the player a sense that he is actually
traveling a great distance instead of just going a couple screens away
to a country the size of someone's back yard. Anyways, just a thought.

[Fardan Iqbal]

I'd really like to draw and animate the sprites for this game, but I
don't think I'll have time, since I'm busy with the map editor. So,
if someone else can do them, I've collected a bunch of sprites that
fit the art style I have in mind:

http://people.cs.vt.edu/fiqbal/handlebar/reference-sprites/

Use these as a reference when making sprites for our hero. I think
they're also fairly well animated (especially the sprites of vanessa
from KOF), so if anyone is doing sprites, use these as a benchmark for
animation quality.

We'll need animations for at least:

* Idle standing animation
* Idle crouching
* Run cycle
* Walk cycle
* Jump animation, moving up (i.e. sprite that's used when in mid-air
with positive y-velocity)
* Falling down (i.e. same as above, but with negative y-velocity)

We'll also need animations for attacks and whatnot. Jereme has the
list of moves our hero can do. Jereme, if you can post them here,
that would be great.

[Fardan Iqbal]

Oh yeah, forgot to mention what size we're going for. When standing
in the idle pose, our hero should be 126 pixels tall (so that way, if
the sprite is 128 pixels in height, there would be a row of
transparent pixels at the top and bottom).

[Jerm]

Let's see, here's what we know we need:

Basic Actions:
-Standing
-Crouching
-Running
-Dashing (the double tap left or right move)
-Sprinting (running at full speed)
-Jumping (animation to go through before player actually gets off the
ground)
-Rising (moving up through the air after jumping)
-Falling
-Double jump (animation before double jumping)
-Flipping
-Wall grab / slide

That looks like plenty for now. Before we do attacking art, we still
need to come up with a final move set.

[Jerm]

One other thing, before we start on the character art, we might want
to try making some more concept sketches. I really like Fardan's, but
one thing that has been bothering me is that the character is not
symmetrical, which would mean if we didn't make double the character
art, his features would switch sides depending on what direction he
was facing (like how megaman's gun arm switches arms).

[Fardan Iqbal]

I couldn't go to the last few meetings, but I've been working on
sprites/animation. Right now, I'm almost finished with the hero's
idle cycle. I'm using an art style similar to that of Street Fighter
Alpha and Street Fighter 3. Here's a preview to give you all a
general idea:

http://people.cs.vt.edu/fiqbal/handlebar/style-preview.png

Let me know what you think, or if you have any suggestions, etc.

[Fardan Iqbal]

Oh, also, here's a preview of the idle pose:

http://people.cs.vt.edu/fiqbal/handlebar/style-preview-2.png

I haven't shaded or antialiased anything from the neck down, so it
looks like crap at the moment, but it should give you an idea of what
the final thing will look like.

[Jerm]

Dude, that looks awesome!