A game about growing plants (beta 6 released!)

[bartbes]

So when do we get to play with it?

[Taehl]

All I've got working at the moment is the Sandbox mode, which I'm only sharing with a few people (because, let's face it, freeplay isn't that exciting to most people). When I have a working version of the "Breed This Plant" mode, I'll open it up for some public testing. Sound good?

[Robin]

because, let's face it, freeplay isn't that exciting to most people

Sounds exiting to me.

The sooner we are spoon-fed some love, the better!

[Taehl]

Oh? Alright then. Here's the latest stable version (no clouds or broken main menu for you ).

The controls are a left/right click scheme which hopefully you can figure out in under five minutes (thanks to the hint system if not their sheer simplicity). Keys aren't required to play, but include: Esc or Alt-F4: quit, Alt-Enter: toggle 1600x900 fullscreen mode, number keys: Spawn a new batch of that number of plants (Alt-number will spawn number+10 plants), F1: Toggle debug display, R: Reset the game (if debug is on).

We'd love to hear any and all feedback on this.

[Robin]

Oh, awesome!

Here are some images of my attempts to make very large and very small, straight ones:

Huge

trees.png (281.82 KiB) Viewed 4167 times

Tiny

trees2.png (181.46 KiB) Viewed 4167 times

One thing: I'd like some more playroom, especially when creating large plants this is a problem. So maybe arrow keys could move the camera? Then the tree limit could be upped too. And being able to zoom out to get some overview would be nice too.

[Ryne]

Maybe it could be like SPORE. Have a dedicated camera that would start of "zoomed in" as the plants grow, so does the camera. The just allow the player to manipulate the camera as they please, zoom in and out, up and down, etc.

[ShadowProtocol]

Maybe it could be like SPORE. Have a dedicated camera that would start of "zoomed in" as the plants grow, so does the camera. The just allow the player to manipulate the camera as they please, zoom in and out, up and down, etc.

What exactly is the technique of zooming in a 2D image/game? Can you provide an example of what the functionality would look like in real time?

I can picture camera panning, but not zooming in..

[tentus]

Maybe it could be like SPORE. Have a dedicated camera that would start of "zoomed in" as the plants grow, so does the camera. The just allow the player to manipulate the camera as they please, zoom in and out, up and down, etc.

What exactly is the technique of zooming in a 2D image/game? Can you provide an example of what the functionality would look like in real time?

I can picture camera panning, but not zooming in..

Have you ever played Eufloria? In it the camera can zoom out to a little greater than the distance your "empire" spans, effectively giving you an overview of the entire empire. You can zoom in to see the specifics of what's happening in a small area, and once zoomed in a little you can pan around to other places.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/41210/
http://www.eufloria-game.com/news.php

[Taehl]

One thing: I'd like some more playroom, especially when creating large plants this is a problem. So maybe arrow keys could move the camera? Then the tree limit could be upped too. And being able to zoom out to get some overview would be nice too.

More plants, ability to zoom out, high framerate: Pick two. Each plant needs to individually draw every piece, which is a few hundred setColor()s and draw()s per plant (multiplied by two while the plant is growing). More playroom is fine, I can do that if you think it'd really be worth it. I'd probably make the camera move when the mouse is near the edge of the screen, instead of or in addition to the arrow keys. But then I'd have the problem of occlusion... Ugh!

[Ensayia]

I'm experimenting with a new hand-drawn style where I pencil sketch the leaves and stems, scan them in, and tweak them to work with the game.

First, the new leaves and branches:


Second, FLOWERS! Right now they're a leaf graphic replacement, until Taehl works on flower code.


What do you folks think? Taehl and I are pretty happy with this art style and it may remain if everyone likes it!