WIP: 3D Sokoban Clone (Update: April 11, 2007 Alpha demo added)

Update (4-11-07):
First a little eye candy:

We’ve still got a lot of work to do on this thing, but we decided to go ahead and release an alpha demo anyway. Here are a couple of links:

http://teambio.blendenzo.com/Sokoban/Files/sokobanAlphaRelease411.blend (5MB blend)
-or-
http://teambio.blendenzo.com/Sokoban/Files/sokobanAlphaRelease411.zip (4MB zip)

To start playing:

  • Click “Play” from the menu, then “Select” (even though there is nothing to select…)

Controls:

  • Arrow keys to move
  • Click and move mouse to rotate view
  • Mouse scroll wheel or + and - keys to zoom in and out (keys give more fluid result)

There is only one map, and I hard-coded it into the .blend for the purposes of this demo (we’re still working on bugs with accessing external files on Linux and Mac). The menu is still very far from being finished, and I am aware that there should be more of a transition between clicking “Select” and the game loading. Also, in-game I am aware that the crates move in discreet steps instead of fluid motion. I haven’t fixed that yet, but it will be changed for the final game.

Right now we’re looking for comments and suggestions on the main Sokoban interface, as well as the updated textures. Personally, I’m wondering what you all think of the control system.

Original Post:
Clean3D and I are working on a 3D Sokoban clone that we plan to release under commercial license.

We’re planning to release it with at least 10 themes and 150 maps. Currently, Clean3D is working on the first theme (“Mechanical”), and I am programming the main Sokoban interface. The game will have unlockable features and it will also include the first (to my knowledge) 3D implementation of Hexoban, the hexagonal Sokoban variant.

We’re throwing around a few other ideas including an online ranking system. Currently we aren’t ready to release a demo .blend.

Here are some screenshots of the mechanical theme:

More news to come soon…

Looks great Blendenzo. Are you guys planning a cross platform release, or just an .exe? I have fond memories of playing this on my T-85 in class when I should have been learning calculus.

Great screens.

Looking forward to your twist on the great game that is Sokoban.

PS:

What happened to “Hunt the Wumpus”?

We’re currently planning on releasing Windows, Linux, and Mac OSX versions, so you should probably be able to play it.

Like Clean said, cross-platform will happen. Also, you all may be interested to know that I am actively switching to Linux. I was at Sam’s Club (a retail store) the other day and saw Windows Vista for the first time. When I saw three separate releases and the ridiculous price tags, I said “I think I’m done with Windows.” I’ll probably be using the Mint variant of Ubuntu.

Social:

I put “Hunt the Wumpus” on hold because I didn’t have quite the Python knowledge I needed at the time (generating random mazes, mostly. I was planning a remake of the Texas Instruments version from th 1980’s, not the original BASIC version from the 1970’s). I think if I picked it up again I could probably make it work this time. Also, I’ve learned some UV mapping tricks, so I can make the graphics look as good as I want them to. It would probably only be a week long project, but I don’t have a week yet.

Hi there Blendenzo,

It’s great to see that you’re taking a commercial angle on this - it’ll be interesting to hear if any issues arise around using Blender commercially.

Hopefully there aren’t any, and if it’s a success, it’ll encourage more of this type of project!
Mal

A stupid sentence of mine: too cavernous/dark overall style to be commercial!?

Anyway, good luck!!

blendenzo:
Nice screenshots man, I think this is coming along pretty well for the early stage that you’re in. I hope your project is successful because I would love to see a blender game go commercial. Any word on pricing yet? I’ll be happy to support you guys if the price is reasonable. (knowing you, it will be) Good luck!

Thanks Venom. I’d like to take credit for the screens, but Clean3D actually took those. He’s much more artistic than I am, and I think he has a better eye for presentation. We haven’t decided on a price yet, but we have been looking at the competition in 3D Sokoban games and trying to get a feel for the market. You are correct, though. Whatever our price is, it will be reasonable.

hehe nice:D

Been away from this forum for a while - nice to see some cool stuff happening here.
Blendenzo and Clean3D - this looks great, and the choice of game works well with the engine. Good luck, looking forward to watching your progress!

it’s great blendenzo and clean3D! I love to play sokoban and I would love to see your game released

you should read john Carmacks (from ID software) tutorial on texturing.

it is very basic… 1 pixel to 1 US inch.

the above screen shots reek of “programmer art” ,
every single texture I see is stretched, or oversize-d .
you might want to try crystal space, it allows a feature called “Detail texture” in the shaders.
the detail texture will allow you to over scale textures,and have fine details.
Unreal ,unreal tournament, unreal 2003-2004 all use this method.

I like the models shapes, and the atmosphere you are attempting to produce.
Good luck on this project… sokoban is a very good game to nick. I bet you do well with this title (if you fix your visuals, screenshots are what sells games)

EDIT:

some fog would really add to this scene, in my opinion… not much, just a gentle mist

Since we’re planning on having at least 10 themes, so we’ve got the potential to have many different styles within the game. I’ll keep what you’ve said in mind as I finish up this first theme, though.

Thanks!

p00f: Yeah, I guess took quite a few shortcuts in getting these screens ready. You caught me. :o

If you have a link to that tutorial, I’d appreciate it. I searched, but couldn’t find it. I’m not sure that I’d be able to handle the 1 Pixel = 1 Inch measurements, though, because of the great amount of geometry to be covered (the entire environment is baked onto 1 2048*2048 texture :eek:). I’m hoping that I can make the textures high enough quality to distract people from the fact that they’re so low-res. I’ve got a long way to go before they’re that good, though.

I know that the different elements don’t fit together well, and I’m planning to work on that before I call this theme “finished”. I’m glad you like the models, though! If you’ve got any tips, tricks, or tutorials, I’d be very grateful for them!

I’ve looked at Crystalspace before, but I’m not sure how good the workflow is between it and Blender (not to mention that I’ve had trouble compiling it). In the past, I stayed away from it because, as far as I know, it doesn’t have physics built in (I could be wrong on this), but I don’t think we’d need incredible physics for a Sokoban game. I’ll look into it some more…

You could try lowering the bit-depth which should save on memory, and that would allow you to use higher resolution textures.

Medal Of Honor used 4-bit textures mostly. You could try 16-bit or 8-bit but it all depends if it still looks good. :slight_smile:

kit89: Is there a way to do that in the Gimp? I’ve tried generating an optimized palette, but when I view my image information, is says the “visual depth” is still at 24 bit, so I"m guessing that’s not what I want.

Thanks!

@clean3d

that is the tutorial…
1 pixel to 1 imperialistic inch.

constant scaleing is the key my friend…if you absorb anything from this post I hope it is what I said about scaleing.
everything in a scene should match … if you dont do this, you will get pessimistic posts from asshole artists like me.

make a scale key for your entire scene, and follow it…

BTW your above screen shots dont suck… I just wanted to help they are nice. better than I have seen here in a long time.

that sounds incredibly hard, p00f

i doubt that it could be done unless you devoted all of your time to it

maybe im missing something, but how in the world would you scale your textures like that?

also it would result in huge resolutions, and i don’t thing most computers would handle that with the BGE

Not sure if this will help you but in CinePaint you can change the bit-depth, however not when saving it but when creating a new texture.

As these are such simple scenes, you can easily afford to up the texture budget. There’s no need to change bit depth etc unless you really have too. The 1 pixel = 1 inch rule is actually probably quite old, we’re currently using around 128 or 256 per metre (which is about 3 to 6 pixels per inch). It’s not about the size of the individual textures, it’s how much area each pixel covers in the scene.
The key is in good tiling textures and efficient UV layouts. Layered with a lightmap and decal maps for specific grime effects, it all adds up to a reasonably varied environment, if your careful and patient.
Also, a detail texture is simply another tiling texture scaled very small and overlayed on your base texture, nothing fancy and easy to achieve in Blender (check the multi-texturing demos with the graphics demos).

cheers
Piran