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Post date: 29-Oct-2010 19:40:15
Alright! It's Friday, so here's version 0.1 of the game, for now going by the name "Car Game LOL". Suggestions for a better name are welcome.
At the moment since things are all still quite early, the only way you can give me feedback is through the GameStudio forums in the appropriate thread under Projects. It is very rough. I just wanted to get something out there. Improvements are in the works.
The download is only 7 MBs. It'd be really nice if GameStudio had a webplayer, but whatever. You can trust me.
DOWNLOAD IT NOW.
How do I play it?
To start, activate each car you want to play by clicking on the coloured buttons in the menu. The controls for each car can be found and changed in the controls menu. If you're using XBox 360 gamepads (which I highly recommend), you steer with the left analog stick, accelerate and brake/reverse with the right and left triggers (respectively) or the A and X buttons (also respectively). The B button handbrakes (as does pressing A and X simultaneously, or pressing the forward and back keys simultaneously if you're using the keyboard). The start button pauses or unpauses the game. I imagine (and hope) it'd work similarly on other gamepads, but I only have XBox 360 pads. In future I hope to support as many gamepads as you can plug in to your PC.
Pause the game at any time with the ESC key (it can also be used to unpause from the main menu). The menu can be navigated with the mouse.
If you're using the keyboard to control several cars at once, you'll probably encounter key jamming. This is where only a few key-presses can be detected at any one time, so your car might not respond to some input while other players are using the same keyboard. There's nothing I can do about this. This problem depends entirely on the keyboard. If you're into PC gaming I strongly recommend getting one or more gamepads for PC. I've been a gamer for as long as I can remember, but never used a gamepad on PC until the beginning of this week for this game. My brothers and I have been using them for this game and others we already owned, and basically it is much better than mouse and keyboard for many types of games. Obviously if all you play is shooters or strategy games you'll have no need for a gamepad.
What are the rules?
Stay in the dirt patch. If you go out of bounds you'll begin to glow and expand, giving you a brief opportunity to get back in the ring before you explode. If you explode without bumping into any other cars you'll lose 5 points. If you bump into someone else before they explode you'll gain 10 points. The game currently has no victory conditions, but in the near future I hope to give the option of choosing Time Limit, Score Limit, Life Limit, and Survival to determine a winner in each round.
My brothers and I generally just say "First to 200!" and then when we get there we set a new limit and keep on going.
What are the mutators?
They add twists to the rules. They all stack. At the moment there are only two, but I plan on adding more soon. We have:
sapoi -- from the Fijian name for "Rock Paper Scissors". In this mode, each car is strong against one car and weak against another. This mutator is only active when there are three players. Each player has a ring around their car pointing towards their target and showing the colour of their target. Each car can smash their target easily, but will bounce off the other car with little effect. Basically everyone's chasing someone and running from someone else. It can get confusing, but just remember who your target is and focus on them.
tag -- when this mutator is first activated nothing appears to have changed. However, as soon as someone is forced out of the ring they become "it". Once that happens, everyone who is not "it" gains one point to their score every second. The person who's "it" needs to try and make someone else "it" instead, and does this by forcing them out of the ring, or simply making contact with them. The person who is "it" flashes and has a ring around them so everyone knows who to avoid. This can be played with any number of players.
What is replay?
From the pause menu you can hit "replay" to see a replay of the last 5 or so minutes of gameplay. Unfortunately it does not keep track of mutators, so while the score and outcome of all collisions will still work fine, there'll be no visual indication of who is "it" in tag, or who dominates who in sapoi. In future you'll be able to move forward and backward through the replay as you please, and hopefully be able to save your replays to view again later. The replay can be cancelled with the ESC key.
Why is the menu laid out as it is?
I kind of made it up as I went. It'll be cleaned up soon enough, but I really wanted to release the game today.
Why do some of the sound effects really suck?
I recorded some of the sounds in a rush today while trying to prepare the game for its first release. Some of them are placeholders. Some of them will probably stay as they are.
Why is the game so empty?
I think you get the idea. Work in progress.
What does the future of this game look like?
Here's a brief (and probably incomplete) summary of the things on my to-do list (in no particular order).
Online multiplayer.
Replay editor.
Improved visuals.
Improved sound effects.
Music.
Graphics options to accommodate for older PCs.
Unlimited offline multiplayer (up to four keyboard players + as many gamepads as you can fit in your PC).
Victory conditions.
More mutators.
I hope you enjoy this game and get involved as much as you can by giving me feedback and suggestions :)
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