You may remember that I decided to start my own flash game portal in order to complement my flash games :)....well the site us up and running as we speak (and by speak I mean you read). The portal's name is Doki Games I have a few thoghts that I want to share about the development of the site...let's start!

Doki Games Current State

About the games on Doki Games

Since the "conception" of the site I wanted  to have quality over quantity,  I had to play hundreds of games to pick the +-50 that I have right now.  I  think that I forgot just how many bad flash games are out there :S. Just that experience will help me a lot when taking criticism for my own games :p.

Anyway most of the games are from mochi media, that is mainly  because the parser that I made  only works with mochi games (right now...more sources to come). I also added some other games "by hand" that I know are great :) like Bubble Tanks Tower  Defense  O__O I REALLY LOVE that GAME!.

I noticed that the update rate of the mochi streams is kind of slow...so I'll be adding lot's of "custom" games in the near future :) and I'll try to add some more sources to my parser too.

About the development process

I'm using Server Groove to host the portal, and I think that it's the best hosting for my current needs :) THE BEST. If anyone needs quality PHP web hosting I would recommend Server Groove.  Besides the hosting, I think that I managed to make the site very fast, the website was done in less that a month, that in itself is a proof that I'm not the same developer...I might be a little better now :p

The small development time also could be explained by my launching approach....right now instead of launching a "complete" site I'm just launching a minimum viable product.The current Doki Games has just enough  features to be launched :S NO MORE. It doesn't even have game pagination...but it  doesn't need all that right now :). In a few weeks I'll be launching Doki Games 1.1 with some features to improve 1.0.

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Ok. the sixth iteration is over. In this one I added some "solid" objects to the map and manage the collisions between the player and the map. Since the collisions are tile based this iteration ended way easier than I initially thought. Here is a small description of what I did:

In my last post I mentioned that most of the logic of the Pokemon maps is tile based instead of continuum. This is exactly why is so easy to use "look ahead points" to manage the collisions instead of going for a "pixel perfect" approach. I basically started doing this:

Instead of checking the whole avatar to see if it's colliding with some "solid tile" I just check the pink points n_n. Also I don't always check the four points. I just check the ones that are relevant to the direction of the player.

Later I noticed that having only one point per direction could lead to some wacky collisions don't being recognized...>_<. So I added two more relevant points.

And It was perfect ^_^...there is still room for improvement though. Here is a short list of things that COULD be done, but I wont now. (I'll probably do them in my first "complete" RPG)

• I think that the middle collision point isn't THAT useful now that I have 3 per side. It could be removed. But It must be tested
• Also, I noticed some bumps with the camera system when the player is colliding with a solid tile. Right now the camera want to ALWAYS have the avatar sprite at it's center.
  I could try to add a "smooth" value. So that the camera only moves when the player is actually moving.

That's all for now...the next iteration will focus on animated tiles. I don't really know how many iterations will take to finish the system...BUT there are only have 7 main features left :D so it MAY be 7-10 iterations :)

Ok. The fifth iteration is complete and after writing this post I'll start to work in the next one (which by the way will feature "obstacles" and collision detection in the map :)). As I said before...this iteration only deals with the animation of the player's avatar.

I'll just post the video...then I'll talk about something "interesting" that I noticed while programming.

So, logically I'm using Pokemon Fire Red as a "model" of the map system. Usually when I'm programming/designing something I play Pokemon and try to "reverse-engineer" the logic of the game and use that as a base for my own system.

After I finished the movement of the avatar I noticed that I couldn't exactly reproduce the "Pokemon movement". I basically walked over pallet town for about 15 minutes just trying to figure why. Want to know why? after the break n_O.

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So...I promissed to write a post about the reasoning behind the flash games portal. Here is it:

You see what I did here?. If you do you are awesome ;)

Even though right now I'm on the verge of launching my first flash game, my "global" plan involves launching A LOT more. Obviously I'm thinking about getting some kind of sponsorship for my games. But being as much of a perfectionist as I am, I really don't think that my first games will be "sponsorship worthy"...so, right now sponsorship is not an option.

<nerd parenthesis>
Surely you don't know about this, but one of my favorite games of all time is Starcraft, right now I'm a Zerg Starcraft 2 player (HELL yeah! zerg rush kekeke). Starcraft is a strategy game (you don't say o_O) and a lot of the initial game plan relies on building structures. 

Usually it's important to try to make your build order in a way that every building helps you to accomplish something specific, and IF a building helps you to accomplish more than one thing you will surely get an advantage over your opponent.
</nerd parenthesis>

With the "starcraft 2 build order strategy" in mind I begun to ask myself  "What can I do with this flash game so that launching the game helps me to accomplish MORE than just launching a simple flash game".

It's clear that I'm not the  first one to think that it is a valid strategy to create a flash portal (even with the monsters that are out there like kongregate) and that coupling your flash portal with flash games is a great strategy. And just like that...my flash arcade idea was born. BUT! am I doing this JUST because there are two random guys over the internet doing the same?....well maybe...I mean NO U_U. I'm different, keep reading to know why ;)
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Ok :) My first flash game is COMPLETE :D. Right now I'm just beta-testing the gameplay. I think that I ended doing a very complete and professional game :) (at least for a first timer). You'll be seeing the game soon, but not too soon..you know why?....because.....:

I'm making a Flash Game Portal O__O

And I want to launch the flash game portal alongside the flash game :)...so....I won't be giving away too much information right now. I'll explain my reasoning behind this later. But don't despair :D, right now the portal is around 50% done ;).  Soon you'll be seeing it.

Finally, the RPG System. Since SFML doesn't have a class that can be used for animations. I created one from scratch. The class is complete right now :). And I'll start the next iteration next week :). Well....that's all for now :). I'll explain the reasoning behind the flash portal later :).

Ok, so we all know that this itaration should be renamed to iteration 1 again...but I'm going to keep the old numeration :). 

Since I had to start again from scratch... and  also since I wasn't feeling comfortable using Mappy to make the tilemaps. I decided to make a new map using Tiled and some Pokemon FireRed tilesets. I made the whole map in about an hour (counting the time taken to find/download the tiles and install tiled).The map is  really simple right now, but I'll be adding more details as I continue to work on the system. Here you have:

Then I wrote a simple C++/SFML program to explore this iteration requeriment : "Player can move in the map". To load my map I used a loader made by Quinns. I highly recommend the loader, it really is very easy to use and to extend :). I even made a few changes of my own.

The actual code isn't really that complex, it just deals with the scrolling of the map, and the player movement.Even though I can't say that the credit is 100% mine,some of the ideas an the "theory" of my code are from 8bitRocket's book.

Unfortunately since I'm doing the new system with C++ I can't just "embed" it. I'll leave a short video instead :).

(Sorry for the video quality...or should I say lack of video quality...it is my first screen recording...I'll try to improve that in the next video.)For the long awaited iteration 5 I'm going to animate the player's avatar, stay tuned :).

First of all I just want to make sure that there is no doubt about the status of the system, the development of the system continues is just the approach of the development that is changing.

Ok it's time to write about what happened with the development the RPG System...I think that this will be a long (really long) post. Let's by reviewing the objectives of the system:

• Gain experience with Role Playing Games design and implementation
• Make the engine good enough to be used as the foundation of "complete" games

By the Fourth iteration I really started to notice some things:

1. I was doing a lot of work that really wasn't helping to achieve my goals. I spent maybe a week worth of work just making the overworld map. I learned nothing by doing that...just spent time in something that I'll never use again.
2. A lot of work on the RPG System isn't really "RPG related", menus and transitions really are "generic" and could be used in ANY game.
3. A lot of the things in the RPG System aren't really "game programming related", the "core" of the system is actually an information system...and information systems is what I have been studying for a long time...so I really wasn't having problems thinking about how to make the "core" of the system.
4. I realized that I was actually doing my LAST semester in the university....the moment of truth is really close. And by moment of truth I mean the moment where I will start trying to make a living out of videogame development...that is actually a scary moment :S and a scary thought.
5. I was actually coding BY HAND lots (really lots) of things that I could easily let libraries handle.
6. By doing a lot of "busywork" on the system I was actually delaying the true making of my first RPG.

Mainly because of point number 3 I decided to start testing the waters by doing some small flash games. Not too long after that I noticed that I was really learning a lot more by developing the small flash game that by working on the system.

It is clear that the RPG system wasn't helping me to achieve my goals...so...what will I do to fix that?

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Back to game programming :)

So my last post was more than two months ago,that is a long time...:(. I haven't checked the stats of the blog but I'm pretty sure that I have 0.0000 traffic right now...well THAT IS ABOUT TO CHANGE. I have some news :D

• My last semester is over :). Starting today I'll focus almost entirely on game development for a very long time ;).  Next year I'll just have to do my thesis to finally have my degree (Computer Science btw). I'm hoping that the thesis won't be as time consuming as last semester (Last semester really wasn't that time consuming by itself...I just happened to be working part time...and that is one of the main reasons that this blog was forgotten)
• About the flash game I'm making:  The game is really almost the same as two months ago. I think that I'll be able to finish the beta version of the game in two or three weeks. After the game is done I'll post here a full fledged "post mortem".
• About the RPG System games...actually A LOT of things happened. I'm making huge changes in the approach of the RPG System. I'll write a complete post with the state of the RPG System soon :)

I think that's all :)

It's a shame that I can't share many of the things that I'm doing right now :p but please trust me when I tell you that I'm working a lot :) even if I don't post a lot. So...what did I do this last...month?

• First of all...university is taking way more time of my life than I initially expected...that is mostly because I'm working part time as an "assistant teacher" (I may be using a non-related name...but I really don't know the proper one...maybe instructor X_X). Some days I don't have time to work on anything interesting (;)).It really is a shame that I can't work on my projects as much as I would like but right now I'm satisfied with my work. Now considering the last point please read the next ones:
• The core gameplay of the flash game is ready :). If we think that a game is like...a hamburger you could say that I have the meat ready :). Now I just need to do...everything else -_-.  In order to test and debug the game I've started to ask friends to play the game and to give me "honest" opinions. If you are a friend of mine you can expect to see the game soon.
  

  I just have the meat O_O

  I'm planning to complete the game by December, but I really don't know  when I'll be "launching" the game. That depends on the progress of a third project that I started yesterday. I don't want to have false hopes about all this but I think that saying that "the (game + secret project 2) combo will be ready by the end of this year" is fine.

• About the RPG system...the fourth iteration is really complex (at least comparing it to the previous ones). I managed to complete a small spike of the iteration. Right Now I can display a fraction of the map onscreen. I'm working on being able to move through the map. I'll post a quick screenshot of the spike but don't get over-exited, right now It looks...boring. I really need more time :(.
  

So...that's all I'll come soon with more updates :)

Ok...since I have no news to report about the RPG System front....I'll better start talking about something else (this doesn't mean that I'll stop working on the system).

One of the hidden motives  that I have with this whole "flash projects" is to learn to create and manage a "game development team". So far it...has been a nightmare. I currently have two unfinished games "on hold" just because the designers that started the game can't/won't work, so far the main reason behind this kind of thing is the "lack of time" of the designers.

Being a college student myself I can understand that kind of thing.  I think that this rather than being about that graphic designers doesn't have time, is about "commitment"...allow me to explain myself ;)

Thinking about making games is fun....thinking about game ideas is...fuuuun. I think that most people that "want to get in the industry" are more in love with the idea of "making games" than the actual process of making a game. A process that is less like playing a game...and more like....how should I say this....ohh right...WORKING.

I won't work with anyone else without (at least) some kind of  experience making games. Actually for my next projects I'll go with freelancers.

But...I'm still working on a flash game right now O__O who is making the graphics?. That my friends will remain a mistery for now...Although I think that I gave enough clues in this post X_X