Sonic: Empire of Nightmares [NEW Version 2.02 Released!]

[CrimsonTheDarkBat]

No worries people - sorted out everything now, and a new working download of Sonic: Empire of Nightmares is live!

https://rapidshare.com/files/4025911649/SonicEON110.rar

Enjoy!

[lcl]

I finally took the time and played through this game.
I enjoyed playing it, you have done very great job with the game. You may have heard this a million times
but the cutscenes are very nice, it must have been very hard to make them. It is clearly visible from your game that
you have spent a lot time making it as good as you can.

Things I liked:
- cutscenes as I already mentioned
- boss fights
- level designs
- musics

The boss fights were nice because one had to find the right tactic before being able to beat the bosses.
And in level design there was one thing I really liked. It was that one can run through the level pretty much with no worries of going to the right direction
because of that you had planned the levels so that one can find the end of the level without ending up to multiple dead ends. I also liked the level where you had to collect the three keycards, it was nice challenge and added some uniqueness to the level. The winter level was also very nice surprise. As a Finn I enjoy snowy landscapes and games that have snow in them =D
And the musics... I know they are not yours, but you have chosen them well, I like metal music and, well, I was able to find quite metallish songs in this game ;D
(Do you listen metal?)

And then some things I didn't like:
- HUD going under the level
- gravity problems
- boss fights

Well, the first problem is self explanatory... the HUD went under the graphics of the levels and that's not very professional.

And about the gravity problems, well, I already explained that in my older post, but it is that when Sonic is in the air and you release right or left key he stops
falling and begins to gain more yvelocity again. So, when you're jumping, from a spring for example and you release left or right key, your jump gets to be very low. And when you're falling and you release right or left key, your falling stops for a little moment and then you begin to slowly fall again.
Test it by jumping high to the air and then pressing left, right, left, right, left, right, etc... quickly. You'll see that Sonic falls much slower than normally.
It seems that for some reason yvelocity gets set to 0 when key left or key right is released.

And about the boss fights.. Yeah, I already said I liked them, but there is also something I don't like.
When I finally found out the right strategy for the fights, it turned out to be a very simple way how you defeat all bosses except the final boss.
I found out that all bosses except the final one can be defeated just by using the second move and restoring some health when needed, and then when the boss had only a little health left, I used some more powerful attack to beat him. And that was how I was able to defeat all of the small bosses..
I also found out that the boss chooses his attacks by what attack I just used. I think that's not very professional. It'd be better if the boss made his moves more randomly, so that there was no simple rule that he follows. This way it would be more interesting to try to defeat the boss.

But those problems were just something I wanted to point out so you can avoid the problems when making your next game. =)
Once more, amazing job, you are a great game creator! =)
I have never been able to finish any game even nearly as large as this is, so I appreciate your work very much! + 1 for this great game!
(I think I have already given you one for this game, but that was when I had not played the whole game =D)

Thanks for this great gaming experience! =D

- lcl -

EDIT:

I have to thank you about one more thing..
The music at the first level gave me a very nostalgic feeling but I wasn't able to remember why it sounded so familiar and gave me that feeling.
And then.. I took a look to the readme file and the list of songs you used... And found Klonoa 2 from there!
Then I watched a youtube video of the demo of Klonoa 2, and yes, that was the game that I used to play at my friend's place when I was little.
I never got to play the whole game, just the demo and now, thanks to you, I know what game I am going to buy next! =))

[Hblade]

This is amazing

[CrimsonTheDarkBat]

I finally took the time and played through this game.
I enjoyed playing it, you have done very great job with the game. You may have heard this a million times
but the cutscenes are very nice, it must have been very hard to make them. It is clearly visible from your game that
you have spent a lot time making it as good as you can.

Thank you very much for the feedback, lcl! +1 for such a thorough report! Hearing that things were mostly favorable really boosts my motivation and morale when making titles.

Regarding those few bugs you mentioned, you'll be glad to hear that every one of them has been addressed in my next game, Sonic: Velocity. HUD has correct Z-Depth parameters now. In EON, the issue was caused by the HUD being parented by the view actor. But as the BG of the level was also parented by the view, I couldn't set the Z-Depth of the view to be dominant or else the BG would overlap everything on screen. But now I'm better with GE and it's tricks, and have programmed the new game from scratch to overcome its predecessors setbacks. The physics and motion code is all new, and bug-free I'm glad to report - along with proper AI for the bosses (check out the progress log in the Sonic: Velocity thread to see what I mean)

And Klonoa 2 - you are going to fall in love with that game dude. The graphics are genuinely beautiful for an early PS2 title, and the soundtrack is just amazing.

All in all, this feedback is really appreciated and I'm delighted to hear that you enjoyed and beat the game. Thanks for playing! ^^

[lcl]

Thanks for the point! =)
Hey, great to hear that you've solved those bugs!
I'm now looking forward to Sonic Velocity!

And Klonoa 2 - you are going to fall in love with that game dude. The graphics are genuinely beautiful for an early PS2 title, and the soundtrack is just amazing.

Hahah, I already fell in love with it when I played its demo with my friend =)
The graphics are really nice and the music... ♥ It tells much about the quality of the music that I still remembered the theme after all those years. =)

Good luck with Sonic Velocity!

[MrJolteon]

And Klonoa 2 - you are going to fall in love with that game dude. The graphics are genuinely beautiful for an early PS2 title, and the soundtrack is just amazing.

I agree with you there. It was a great game.

[CrimsonTheDarkBat]

Good news - I'll be releasing the latest version of Sonic: Empire of Nightmares, 2.0, sometime in the next few days!

This update is the biggest one yet, with many improvements to the game made right across the board. Numerous bugs in the engine have been resolved, and many cutscenes have been redesigned or improved.

Keep your eyes peeled!

[CrimsonTheDarkBat]

Sonic: Empire of Nightmares Version 2.02 has been released! Check out the first post for information! Come get it while it's hot!

https://rapidshare.com/files/1228651835/SONICEON202.rar

[DeltaLeeds]

I love Sonic EON Only a few bugs,but I still love it.
I love the boss fights and levels,and the music you picked for the levels are greatly picked. I'd give this game a 9/10
There are however,some bugs that I should advice you to fix Crimson:

-The rings: If u hit an enemy with more then 1 ring,you usually lose rings first,then if you have no rings,you die. In here we just die even with many rings. I'd advice this bug to be fixed.

-The animation bug: Meh,I don't think anyone really cares about this one,but I still advice it to be fixed if you can.

-Not sure if this is a bug, bug my game doesn't have enough memory sometimes (Thats why I'm stuck at the 2nd boss battle with Touketsu)

Other then that,I love the game. Keep it up Crimson +1

[sonicforvergame]

Man touketsu is way to Strong
can't you give me an advice for this

and by the way characters are pretty awesome like the enemies using original ideas from sonic games and make new character is the best .

and i really want some advice i can't beat that lieutenant of ice

[CrimsonTheDarkBat]

Download link fixed, folks.
http://www.mediafire.com/?lviav9utfw04bdi

[Hblade]

SWEET! =)

[CrimsonTheDarkBat]

Couple of small bugfixes. Nothing huge, just thought I'd state so for the sake of newcomers~ :3

[Hblade]

Cool!

[arcreamer]

I don't want to be that guy but, don't you need special permissions from Sega to make a Sonic game and say it's yours?