Hey everyone, Steven from “Sterile Studios” (two men in their bedrooms) here with a video and some screenshots explaining the start of our new game project, Perfect Specimen.
Game Concept (In brief) A first person action puzzle/platformer with a sinister undertone. You take on the role of elite military personnel, undertaking training in a ‘Super Soldier’ training program, in which you must pass a variety of physical and mental tests/puzzles… But not all is as it seems… (That’s all we will reveal for now ;))
DEVlog
(Latest!)
Gameplay sneak peak #2!
Introductory DEVlog (Developer Vlog) #1
This video is (Matt) explaining what we are planning on doing with our game and our YouTube channel.
Level Editor Update #2!
Steven (I) show you some new updates on the level editor!
Screenshots
Screenshots of the level editor I am currently working on (pre-pre-alpha stage of development :)), pretty buggy and unoptimised at the moment, more in depth videos on it’s progress will come shortly
Let us know what you think, we’ll update the thread (and post) as more progress is made, an ‘in depth’ look at the level editor in it’s current state will be added very soon.
Hi (Matt from the video here), the video has audio and works on our end as well as other computers, it must be something on your end, or your volume is turned right down.
Yeah at the moment it can be quite laggy when the size of the level increases, we need to optimise how the level editor works to see how large the levels can be - the lag (at the moment) comes mostly from the grid generation part of it, so I have some theories on alternate ways to go about doing this to reduce lag, whether they will work or not we will see
Though how can the Levelarchitecture profit from that Editor? And how can your Game profit from it? It looks like it takes one eternal Span to make this lil’ Corridor Part seen on that Video. If you would instead simply would use Blender to build your Levels you could duplicate the Walls instead of setting them up each Time again.
Well, I can understand that you want to give Players the Possibility to make own Levels.
But as I can see towards the End of the Video, your Editor is capable of setting Objects bigger than one Grid Unit. So, you could as well implement some Prefabs for the Walls. That would increase the Speed of makin’ one Level dramatically.
Though altogether, that is some great work. I am not sure whether it is so suitable for a First Person Game. Platformer, very well, but First Person? But the Editor is still great work – that is, when you also can save these Levels (which has not been shown yet).
We want players to be able to create custom levels, and we also want the levels to have a consistent sort of style throughout the game, which the editor is already doing even in it’s current state.
Further, the level editor is in it’s veeery early stage of development, as I said (in the video) the brush (as in the green square) will have the option to be increased in size (custom size in all directions) , this will make walls, floors, roofs a lot quicker to make leaving most of the time to be spent on the details of the map, and we may also have some presets like you suggested.
It’s also more of a puzzle game (think: inspired by portal - will have no portals, however :p) with platformer elements, also saving isn’t implemented yet, but it’s coming
Thank you for the critiques, we really appreciate it and need it so we can improve the game
the previous way of generating a grid was terrible and made having large levels impossible…
…Now, however, it can be a lot bigger without any lag thanks to a much smarter way* of generating the grid (I’m actually an artist, not a programmer So this is a big learning experience for me)
*Still not completely optimised, I have some ideas to further remove lag.
Hmm… I think you need to stop - and rethink how you want to create your level editor. A level editor is good in it that it can help you generate levels much quicker and helps keep tweaking a large number of objects by simply changing one object. But the approach you have on your level editor is not taking consideration to what level editors are used for. Creating an insane amount of objects from boxes to create a floor is ridiculous. However you do need to start with a grid. Next you need to create tools for your editor (cursor, rotate, translate, select, deselect) simple things. You can get inspiration from Blender’s interface. You have to understand the approach you have now is the most inefficient way possible of creating a level. Um, I don’t really know where I would start to create a level editor… but this isn’t it. On a different note this project looks extremely promising. Lots of dedication. Lots of passion. Lots of teamwork. In fact - if you (Sterile Studios) is willing to recreate a new chum like me, I’m willing to help you guys out part time! Of course it will be a learning experience for myself as well. I’m mostly into programming, but I’m also an adept artist. Are you guys in need of any extra team members that you can give tasks too?
Awesome start on a promising project overall!
Hi and thanks for the comment! I have done a lot of dumb things creating this level editor I will be the first to admit that as I’m learning on the go. The floor/walls (Cubes with gaps between them), however, is key to the game’s puzzles (floors, walls etc will move) as well as the game’s aesthetic, the levels will for the most part be quite small so the amount of objects shouldn’t* be a problem (hopefully*).
I really appreciate your offer to help! But this is something that we want to do by ourselves (and we mean no offense to you or anyone else in this community, we are definitely not the most skilled here - not by a long shot - but by doing it ourselves we will learn from our mistakes). I hope you understand, and I hope you don’t feel like I’m just shooting down your criticisms, I’m definitely keeping them in mind, I wouldn’t ignore advice from someone more experienced than I (But I may challenge it in order to learn).
Hey no problem. Actually, just to give you a heads up I started to work on a open source level editor. Anything I work on in my level editor you can definitely use. Um, another thing, I don’t think you’re using the mouse as your cursor. Using the keyboard is maybe a challenging way of using a cursor… But it’s up to preference I guess. I might still good ideas you get for your level editor. Keep up the good work!
Hi guys, I’ve just finished a rough drawing as concept art for one of the characters that will be in the game, just a profile sketch with a more detailed front shot so I can start modelling it.
(It won’t be green in the game I just like to draw in colour, haha)
We’ll hopefully either have a video of some models or some updates soon and appreciate all feedback/criticism.
Long time no post, we’ve been working hard but have been set back by exams, work, school as well as crippling bugs (but they have been dealt with so far) and so I present to you our fifth DEVlog (Development Blog) the gameplay sneak peak!
Here myself (Steven) and Matt create a “quick” level and play through it, showing off some of the possibilities the level editor gives us…
as well as a couple of screenshots (not from the above level/video)
Small texture sizes mostly, 64x64, stationary Cubes have no logic running etc I am going to do further optimization in creating set ‘wall’ and floor sizes as well for stationary blocks or moving walls (which someone suggested earlier) as well as some form of LOD system (none at the moment )
At the moment the last stress-test type thing I did I was up to around 4000 cubes before it becomes rather unplayable, with further optimization we’ll be able to increase that number. Levels won’t be too large anyway so as it stands I think it will be usable but further optimization will definitely be done
So this is a big learning experience for me)
I will be the first to admit that as I’m learning on the go. The floor/walls (Cubes with gaps between them), however, is key to the game’s puzzles (floors, walls etc will move) as well as the game’s aesthetic, the levels will for the most part be quite small so the amount of objects shouldn’t* be a problem (hopefully*).
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