Pithman Development Thread - Source released!

[SuperSonic]

Are you good at blender modeling?

[Jagmaster]

Er, getting there. I've gotten pretty good with the interface, and can model pretty good imho (for most part anyways xD). Still got a lot to learn. Anything worth learning takes time. I also had to unlearn Milkshape 3D, and I'm pretty sure if I opened that program again, I'd be completely lost.

Here's a tron-ish car I did a while ago. I added a leftover normal map I had as a result of a tutorial.


I still have to practice getting good loop flow (i.e. topology), which just takes a little planning ahead. A lot of times I fail at unwrapping cause of it. But yeah, blendernerdish I have become nonetheless. This site http://cgcookie.com/blender/ and others like it are really useful for learning this type of rocket surgery.

Actually, blender can be a pretty good option for 2D animating as well. Just apply the bones to 2D planes instead of a mesh!

[happyjustbecause]

Oh wow, It has been too long

I've been uber busy with all sorts of things lately. Sorry for the looong silence. It's been ages since I picked up the old ge, and in effect, Pithman. Progress was going at a snail's pace, so I decided to take a break late April. It's by no means cancelled though. I've already been working on this for about a year now, so I by no means want to see this go to vaporware.

One thing I will do once I get back going, is flesh out my design document a little more as it wasn't quite as well thought out as I liked. That will also get myself familiar with it all again. Then I'll try to figure out a more efficient way of making my graphics. Right at the moment, I've got them all hand drawn and hand textured, which takes a killer amount of time to do. I also planned for a lot of animations, which I underestimated the time needed for that as well (or maybe the time spent procrastinating ) The overall script is pretty much playable though. Still missing some AI, bit it's getting there.


And I'll also keep you guys posted on this, either through this thread, my site, or (if I get around to it) a blog or vlog of some kind. The progress will probably still be slow, but when I do update, you guys will know about it. I do appreciate the the very motivational people here. It's not something you always find in internet land!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand....... Here's a screencap of the most current build!





So good to be back anyways! I have been playing around with other stuff in my free time while I've been gone, most of them either blender related, or other animation/drawing/synfig practice.


My friend and I also hope to get a 3D game built (no, not stereoscopic 3D haha) which, would make use of blender modeling. I think I've been becoming a blendernerd over the past few months

Thanks for the update on Pithman. I love your hand drawn graphics. It's a good idea to get back into the document and organize/add to it, an idea I should follow. I've got high hopes for this game =D. I like your robot animation as well. Nice movement and I like the colors used for him.

[Jagmaster]

My sincere apologies for being a week overdue.

@happyjustbecause:
Thank you my friend, It's humbling to see people that care and take and interest in this project. And it really does help motivate things at crucial times.

And yeah, the design docs are crucial to any project and should have as much detail as possible. I've been reading a lot about design docs in particular, and I'll be the first to admit that it's generally the place that I tend to slack off on more. So, fleshing out the dd at this point in the project is, a little backwards, but it at least gets me back to where I need to be mentally.

A good plan does not necessarily ensure success, but lacking a plan ensures failure.

I'm glad you like the animation as well, was kinda tricky getting the inkscape file into synfig studio at first, but after I toiled around with it, I (of course) found a quicker way of doing it. The drawing was sort of a visualization of an "upgrade" to the character in my older game "H.R.T."


Nooow, I need to learn the mysterious trick of getting that sucker in my signature (from my dropbox).

[Bee-Ant]

I'm not good in making opening chatter, so here I'll just tell it to the point...

Concerning Graphics
+ Professional looking
+ Love your background filling, those dull/dim/dirty effect give them both shading and rusty looking
+ AppStore level for sure
- Judging the random shape of the background sprite, I guess you don't use tile map? sure it makes it more natural... but beware, it will swell your game file size more
- I dunno if it's just me, but... your characters sprite are a bit brighter than the background sprite...
- The top indicator text is kinda hard to read, maybe make it has black outline with bright brown/yellow color (like the player box color)? Something like this:


Concerning Ideas
Is the jungle weapon idea still needed?
As for me, maybe old broken spear?

For the healing item, maybe some fruits?
Where's the place it takes? tropical jungle? in that case Banana looks yum

You can use it as weapon too:

[Jagmaster]

Concerning Graphics
+ Professional looking
+ Love your background filling, those dull/dim/dirty effect give them both shading and rusty looking
+ AppStore level for sure

Wow thank you! That means a lot to me! I'll consider the appstore too, though I'd need to get a mac!

- Judging the random shape of the background sprite, I guess you don't use tile map? sure it makes it more natural... but beware, it will swell your game file size more

Yeah, this has been a concern of mine. I wanted this to have a natural look, sort of like Braid, but I'm not sure how to get that effect in the most efficient way.
I haven't had any performance issues so far, but I fear that might happen on larger levels with this approach. I will at least need to divide the background into smaller pieces if I want it to go on a mobile device.

- I dunno if it's just me, but... your characters sprite are a bit brighter than the background sprite...
- The top indicator text is kinda hard to read, maybe make it has black outline with bright brown/yellow color (like the player box color)? Something like this:

Yeah, that lighting does seem a little off now that you mention it, but it does give me an idea for some dynamic lighting! I will also make the text more clear, will probably even redesign the whole hud.

Concerning Ideas
Is the jungle weapon idea still needed?
As for me, maybe old broken spear?

Hm, good idea! didn't think about that. That was rather silly of me

For the healing item, maybe some fruits?
Where's the place it takes? tropical jungle? in that case Banana looks yum

You can use it as weapon too:

Bananas are something I will definitely add. I am thinking of the best way to make them be that versatile. I'm thinking the monkeys should throw large bunches of them, and then they would scatter a bunch of peels all over the place! Then there could be pickup bananas that could be used for health, and then be placed as a trap! Muhahahaha It's perfect!

Thank you for your input, I appreciate it very much! +1

[Jagmaster]

Updated main page with links to source code and my beta executables.