2.5D Keen

You can discuss anything about fan-made Commander Keen games here.
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Ronnie
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Post by Ronnie »

More Garg progress
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I'm thinking he'll have to gobble Keen up like that Pat Pats. :dead2
Keening_Product
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Post by Keening_Product »

Far out, that running animation is surprisingly scary. Nice work.
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Post by chrissifniotis »

:garg We are amused.

Looking nice, can't wait for the skin.
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Grimson
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Post by Grimson »

For the idle, standing animation, perhaps the Garg could move his eyes around like in the ol' sprite figure? (in chris' post)
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Nospike
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Post by Nospike »

The running animation is pretty darn scary. Might be cause he has no pupils. Still, looks awesome!
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Post by troublesomekeen »

Great work, Ronnie! It's exciting to see updates again!
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Commander Keen in... Canteloupe Quest!
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Post by MoffD »

He looks so adorably homicidal running towards Keen tilted back slightly to counterbalance his lil' pudgy legs :o
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Ronnie
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Post by Ronnie »

New Build: http://josephmcarney.com/test/KeenTest36.html
Linux: http://josephmcarney.com/test/KeenTest36.tar.gz

Garg is in with full functionality! He'll charge at you whenever you are in range so watch out. He's just in that 3rd level, so you'll have to hoof it to see him in action.

Next up is the Vorticon, and I've been avoiding him for a while now, haha. Not really looking forward to making a dog-person-thing in a uniform. Anyone have any good ideas of how he could look translated into 3D?[/url]
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Post by Keening_Product »

I like the Garg a lot, great work! I do question its patchy colouring though. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, I was just wondering why you chose to colour it like that.


Not really looking forward to making a dog-person-thing in a uniform. Anyone have any good ideas of how he could look translated into 3D?
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Post by guynietoren »

Ronnie wrote: Next up is the Vorticon, and I've been avoiding him for a while now, haha. Not really looking forward to making a dog-person-thing in a uniform. Anyone have any good ideas of how he could look translated into 3D?[/url]
This has been up for debate for a while, as there's not a whole lot to interpret from the sprites.
Recently it's been discussed here:
https://pckf.rigeltechnical.com/viewtopic.php?t=3060
But has before that also.

My interpretation is this:
http://guynietoren.deviantart.com/art/V ... -349159815
The number of fingers and toes is a good question also.
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Post by Roobar »

Keening_Product wrote:I do question its patchy colouring though. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, I was just wondering why you chose to colour it like that.
I don't understand that. It's green and it looks like a garg.

Anyway, it's not as scary as it should be. And don't behave exactly like a normal garg in the way that it starts to chase you the moment you jump on the floor on which it is.
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Post by Ronnie »

I do question its patchy colouring though. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, I was just wondering why you chose to colour it like that.
Texturing is my LEAST favorite part of game development. I'm not very good at it, and I don't have much time to invest in getting better at it. It's still my hope that I'll be able to rope one of my 2D artist buds into doing the textures, but no luck so far.
Anyway, it's not as scary as it should be. And don't behave exactly like a normal garg in the way that it starts to chase you the moment you jump on the floor on which it is.
Thanks for your input! I realize the behavior of the Garg isn't true to the original game, but at this point, I have a code base that's working for me and I don't want to deviate too much from it, since the project is getting larger all the time. I'm just started to worry about all the scripts and behaviors piling up and becoming too much for me to manage on my own. I realize that might sound like a cop out, but I guess I just have to make this game in a way that's most comfortable to me. And if that means I have to deviate from the original plan of a straight-up copy of Keen1, so be it.

Oh, and thanks a lot for sharing the Vorticon stuff. I'll be sure to share my progress as I go.
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Post by CapnClever »

Ronnie wrote:
wiivn wrote:Anyway, it's not as scary as it should be. And don't behave exactly like a normal garg in the way that it starts to chase you the moment you jump on the floor on which it is.
Thanks for your input! I realize the behavior of the Garg isn't true to the original game, but at this point, I have a code base that's working for me and I don't want to deviate too much from it, since the project is getting larger all the time. I'm just started to worry about all the scripts and behaviors piling up and becoming too much for me to manage on my own. I realize that might sound like a cop out, but I guess I just have to make this game in a way that's most comfortable to me. And if that means I have to deviate from the original plan of a straight-up copy of Keen1, so be it.
I wouldn't want the original AI from the Vorticon games anyway, it's much too random to be handled in any useful form. Based on my own observations, they're all quite basic:

1. By default, most enemies are in a walking state: direction is randomly chosen when first animated and changes depending on actions (or if they bump a wall, which always reverses direction)
2. Every frame, decide if an action (e.g., scan, shoot, jump) will occur
3. If it will occur, randomly pick which action
4. Once picked, execute that action's script
5. Repeat after action finishes

Some sprites (such as the top-hat/train fellow) lack even this complexity, but most are fashioned in this way. Actions can be any of the following (and always halt walking, so any non-movement actions freeze their movement):
  • Shoot: brief pause followed by attacking with some ranged weapon. Pausing time and number of attacks can vary.
    Jump: immediately perform a jump of random height, maintaining their horizontal velocity as they do so: jump heights and number of possible heights can vary (and can be zero-height).
    Scan: Essentially a "do nothing" move, but will additionally reorient the sprite to begin walking towards Keen: time spent in this action can vary. Is often chained from jump and shoot.
    Charge: increases walking speed, can only occur if Keen is in the same horizontal area as the sprite: speed increase can vary.
Many sprites can be modeled from these bits alone. For example, Gargs are an enemy with Scan -> Charge as their single action chain. (That is, they walk around and will randomly scan; if Keen is the same horizontal area, then will then immediately charge towards Keen, and will otherwise continue walking but in Keen's direction.) Vorticons can Jump -> Scan and Charge; Yorps can Scan and Jump; Guard Robots can Shoot -> Scan.

All in all, you can use a really simple state machine to govern the AI in Commander Keen. There are subtle exceptions (Vorticon Women in Keen3 always change direction after shooting; Vortininja in Keen3 stand as a default state instead of jumping) but other than, say, Scrubs in Keen2, nothing would require a huge investment after the states are already written. Gargs also do a jump if they're about to fall off a ledge, but I wouldn't worry about that for a while.

As for why I wouldn't want the original AI: there's no time buffer between states, so forcing some set amount of time before they can change states would be nice. And ultimately, if you want to focus on the mechanics and animating and modeling, by all means do that first. It all looks rather incredible so far, and AI can be the icing put on the cake at a later time.
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Post by Plasma Captain »

Holy crap. The running Garg animation is... cute. It reminds me of Domo or something. Anyway, I like it.

As for the Vorticons, here are my opinions (just throwing them out there):

For this sort of style, maybe make the torso kind of small with long limbs? Probably just some kind of anatomical adjustment to make them look humanoid but also monstrous. While they do have but two fingers in the sprites, I feel that the addition of a thumb would make more sense.
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Post by Ronnie »

Lot of work left, but here's what I got so far. Comments and critiques are more than welcome. Definitely still tweaking his proportions, so lay it on me if you have a suggestion. I'm starting off with a sort of werewolf/alien hybrid, but want to hopefully whittle him down to something you described, Plasma Captain.

Image

Capn, my state machine for Yorps and Gargs are much like you describe. I have an Idle, Left and Right for Yorps, with a chance to jump while moving, super basic. Gargs are the same with no jumping, and will charge when Keen enters his 'attack zone'.
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