My second game in over 20 years... RetroStar™ (a sneak peak at a work in progress)

SinisterSoft · January 2013

RetroStar™ will (hopefully) be an arcade space combat simulator for iOS, Android and Windows Phone 8 (again, hopefully!)...

It will play at 60hz, the same as a real arcade game, it is not a 'serious' simulator - it is meant to be fun.

Currently only a few days old with not much time spent on it...

Working on making a hyperspace sub-game were you have to make sure you stay in the wormhole when moving from one sector to another.

This video shows moving around space, a few asteroids, a test of the hyperspace system, the beginnings of the wormhole subgame, it shows what happens if you exit as hyperspace starts.

The blue button increases speed, the green button decreases speed, the red button will fire, the yellow button will enter a menu system.

In the menu system you will be able to turn on/off shields (to save power), etc... the game will continue to be live as you use the menus - everything is realtime.

You will get only one life in the game, no score - just possibly 'trading' and a rating at the end to show how well you have done. It will save your data between plays so you can carry on with the game the next time you play (until you die).

Suggestions for more gameplay ideas welcome, help evolve it before it's published...

gorkem · January 2013

The whole scene is realistic. When I watched the video, I felt like I'm flying next to asteroids.

SinisterSoft · January 2013

Thanks, I'm going to take my time with this one I think.

ar2rsawseen · January 2013

Wow you must have hundreds of sprites on the stage, still it runs perfect without a glitch. Awesome job.

Ideas?

Asteroid collectibles/consumables (energy, raw materials)
Planets and space stations (larger objects to avoid when flying)
Maybe putting one big sun some where, to get a feel of relative movement (or endlessly trying to reach it)
Lots of easter eggs, like put a Felix Baumgartner some where there, or other stuff from TV shows and movies

SinisterSoft · January 2013

@ar2rsawseen great ideas, I was thinking of planets moons and a suns too.

Maybe blow up asteroids to mine for coins? spacestations to repair your ship and bank coins. Unless it's a rebel space station?

Next thing to do is add some kind of galactic map I think and tie in the worm-hole subgame so that if you don't get it right then you don't end up where you want.

Hidden easter eggs is a must I think.

thanhquan1512 · January 2013

wow that's cool!

I don't have headphone so I can't hear your video sound, if you implement asteroid shooting remember to make a good sound. I remembered the old day when I like an asteroid game just because it's awesome sound

SinisterSoft · January 2013

I will do.

techdojo · January 2013

Looks really smooth - what device are you running it on, roughly how many sprites on screen?

SinisterSoft · January 2013

@techdojo It runs at 60hz - like an arcade game. If you get to 60hz then everything is smooth and looks good. Every game should be 60hz on these devices (I'm used to 8Mhz machines!)...

Currently there are just less than 150, using a few tricks to make it seem like there are sometimes a lot more though. Tested with 2x that and no slow down. Works on a slow cheapo phone, a Nexus 7 and a Samsung S3.

Hopefully GiderOS will get opengl2 and I'll be able to add some nice pixel shader effects before it's released. If GiderOS also gets LuaJIT then I can put even more stuff on screen as it's tracking/processing objects that can take the most time.

Render to texture would allow me to build up textures for huge baddies that move at 60hz, but animate slower eg they animate once every 4 frames - like an arcade game. This way it looks like I'm moving lots of sprites - but really only a few.

SinisterSoft · January 2013

Hopefully if @atilim and the others in charge see what might be possible if they add things like Opengl 2 and LuaJIT then they might add them a little sooner...

techdojo · January 2013

@SinisterSoft - @Atilim and the others are well aware of everyone's desire to get OpenGL 2 and LuaJit support have no fears on that count

Looks like you've got the makings of something decent there - love the asteroid anims BTW.

PS. For the record It's Gideros (as in the region in Turkey - not GiderOS as in some weird OS)

SinisterSoft · January 2013

Ahhh... Didn't know that - won't do it again.

SinisterSoft · January 2013

2nd video: Spent about 3 hours on it since the last update. Got depth sorting in (thanks to @zvardin and @atilim ), asteroid to ship collision detection, explosions, speech effects (Lucy's debut in a computer game), more buttons for shield/computer, etc...

zvardin · January 2013

Looking great, especially with how little time you've put into it!

SinisterSoft · January 2013

@zvardin Not many changes, had to leave it running all day in case the new sprite remapping from table had caused a memory leak, my phone slowed down for some reason - but after all day no slowdown - must have been a different app running in th bgnd.

john26 · January 2013

Impressive. I could have sworn you were using a 3-D engine! Why portrait though? If you use landscape you can support Xperia PLAY as well.

SinisterSoft · January 2013

@john26 I did a bit of a survey on FB and portrait won.

It's getting better now, I'll upload another video later...

SinisterSoft · January 2013

RetroStar - 3rd work in progress video:

Added shields, vibration, a panel with a space 1999 font showing stardate, energy countdown, etc, a blue electrical shield 'explosion', it's starting to look a little like a game.

The basic game idea has been sorted out now, it borrows ideas from basically everything:

You play the part of a space bounty hunter. You kill enemies and then you trade your kills for cash at space stations. You can buy energy and better weapons with the cash at trading posts. This will let you go after enemies that you wouldn't have a chance against with basic weapons. You need energy to keep your spaceship, weapons and life support going. I might add a simple powerup that lets you mine asteroids for a little energy or precious metals, don't know yet.

You will have only one life in the game, if you die then you start again. The game will save all game variable as you leave and load them when you restart. The game will get very hard.

There will be a few sub-game type elements, eg the worm hole tunnel to keep things interesting.

I'll add planets, etc once the game is released.

If you have any ideas for 'achievements', etc then please get in touch and let me know.

SinisterSoft · February 2013

More work in progress:

Spent another couple of hours on RetroStar creating some strange classical music mix (same as the music from 2001) and getting the 3D system working for larger more important objects. Don't know how the planets, moons, etc are going to feature in the game yet though.

jvdm · February 2013

that's awesome @SinisterSoft! i'd love to hear more about your faux-3D environment. are you working off a big 2d plane with multiple layers?

GregBUG · February 2013

@SinisterSoft
Nice, really nice.

i also hope to release some videos of my current project (game) as soon as possible!

SinisterSoft · February 2013

@jvdm It's just 2D objects mapped to 3D space, they get bigger/lighter based on the z...

It's a slow 'work in progress' that I go to every so often when I have a spare couple of hours...

If the opengl 2.0 shader stuff comes then I now plan to work on a shader planet generator for it - to realtime generate planets/moons/suns based on some parameters.

So they stay 2D for speed - but look 3D because of the shader...

A background nebula shader would be nice too me thinks!

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My second game in over 20 years... RetroStar™ (a sneak peak at a work in progress)

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