Between the Bubbles - a game concept

Hi DirectuX,

thanks a lot for the explanations!

I uploaded V2, it can be retrieved from the first post of this thread.

Features added?
- attempt at easening
- player is no longer represented by arrow, but by a water bug
- bubbles are little bit prettier
- you can both thrust and slightly turn
- the bug has energy indicator on his body
- if two bubbles meet each other, they merge
- you will get the survived time information in the game over screen, hehe

Of course, more to do. Like the high scores screen. I need to check the thinBasic game scores module for that ;)

Thanks a lot for the ideas - while not all of them came in V2, I have them all on the list.


Petr

I uploaded V3, it can be retrieved from the first post of this thread.

It (hopefully) fixes a crash which can occur with some GPU drivers.

Otherwise identical to V2 - if you did not download V2, you can download V3 directly :)


Petr

Caution!

There is a bug in this game !

Hi Petr,

played :) pretty much improved indeed ! and sure it looks prettier than v1.


Feedback :
Features added?

- attempt at easening visible

- player is no longer represented by arrow, but by a water bug kawaii ;)

- bubbles are little bit prettier made me think what about prettier (also darker) background ?

- you can both thrust and slightly turn I was not able to perceive both at the same time
- the bug has energy indicator on his body :)

- if two bubbles meet each other, they merge that's cool! Note: when the bug is attached to a bubble and merging occurs, surprisingly the bug gets dropped.
- you will get the survived time information in the game over screen, hehe yeah, unfortunately you can't survive for long, bubbles keep disappearing from screen and at some point there's no more bubbles :shock18:

Hi DirectuX,

thanks a lot for the observations - I will definitelly look at the mystery of disappearing bubbles, I think it is related to fact they used to flow right in the V1 and now they go in all directions.

As for the concurrent change of direction and thrust, it is currently separated in order to support the "struggle" feeling, however... I do realize it is a bit awkward.


Petr

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Petr Schreiber

As for the concurrent change of direction and thrust, it is currently separated in order to support the "struggle" feeling, however... I do realize it is a bit awkward.

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I liked more the feeling when the change of direction was correlated with the bubble drainage, I think it lacked only control over the direction (clockwise or ccw) and the speed of rotation (tell me if I'm not clear)
(sort of a 2-button game : [MAINTAIN][T]=thrust , [PRESS][R]=toggle direction and [MAINTAIN][R]=accelerate rotation , what's your opinion on this ?)

Concerning the count of bubbles, (I didn't check in the code) do you set an amount of energy at the beginning and it remains constant all long ( bug's energy storage + remaining energy in the bubbles = total energy of the screen ?) In that case, difficulty level is directly linked to the total energy.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Petr Schreiber

I will definitelly look at the mystery of disappearing bubbles, I think it is related to fact they used to flow right in the V1 and now they go in all directions.

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In function "MakeElementsFlow" you do a four-position check for the bug. For the bubbles, instead there is an inline calculation that is ok only if it goes too far at right (yes, like in the V1). Why not have a delayed "CheckPos" function that you can apply to all elements at once, like your futures "golden fish" :fishing:, "enemies to avoid" and stuff... ?

Hi DirectuX,

again, very valuable feedback. You made a very good point with the constant total amount of energy, to make the results comparable.

I discovered few TBGL design issues I would like to address before I continue. It is interesting to see TBGL with fresh eyes.

Stay tuned :) And thank you, sincerely, very much for to the point feedback :drink:


Petr

V4 attached to the first post :)

What is new?

• constant total amount of energy for bubbles at the start of the game
• corrected boundary checking, which should solve the effect of disappearing bubbles
• fixed the bug drop
• while bubble merging is preserved, one more behaviour added, hehehe!

Have fun,
Petr

P.S. Together with Eros, we start to discover interesting path to extend TBGL - this is one of the reasons for the delay, but definitely worth it.

Hi,

some feedback below :

while bubble merging is preserved, one more behaviour added, hehehe! — nice :)
fixed the bug drop — confirmed here
corrected boundary checking, which should solve the effect of disappearing bubbles — similar (rare) misbehaviour : while sticking to a bubble that goes off screen, the bug can disappear totally (not long).
constant total amount of energy for bubbles at the start of the game — see V4 picture below

Attachment 10067

I may be wrong, it seems to me that there is no bubble creation to compensate the bug's energy consumption (release) , so total energy seems not constant.

Gameplay feedback : today, playing had the inverse of the wanted effect : quite stressing. So, I tried with little bigger bubbles , (just size, not energy) and it's more relaxing, more slow paced: that's because by default the bubbles are to far from each other according to the energy consumption (static and moving) of the bug and vice versa. From my point of view, it has too much to count on chance.