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Work in Progress / WarZone

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Conor B
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Posted: 22nd May 2008 02:25 Edited at: 27th Dec 2008 01:43
WarZone (Work In Progress)


Introduction


For the last few months I have been playing with the idea of making a battlefield style game in darkbasic, with lots of vehicles to explore the huge landscape of the world. Since I have learned alot more about combining arrays and UDTs this year, I have started actually developing the WarZone game engine. The work on this project won’t move at any great speed as it is more important to me that the progress remains steady, so keep an eye out for updates, although they most likely will be small updates, they will be often.

Description


WarZone is a battlefield style game made with Darkbasic Pro. It will feature big open ended landscapes to explore which use heightmap terrain. As opposed to walking for extended periods, you can just jump into any of the unoccupied vehicles that are scattered around the area, each having its own individual properties (e.g. Acceleration speed, Max speed, Armour etc). Although there is no definite storyline to the game, I can say that it will be set in the Middle East in the very near future. Currently the game features only a few main vehicles, but more vehicles will be added to the engine as it progresses. I won’t say whether it will have online capabilities yet as I don’t want to promise something I can’t be sure to deliver. I have been working on this game for quite a while now but I can't say when it may be released just yet as I really don't know.

Latest Video & Screenshot






I'm goin to post more screenshots and videos as the project progresses, so keep posted for updates!

Early game demo attached (3mb .rar compressed)

There are 10 types of people, people who know binary and people who don't!

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david w
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Posted: 22nd May 2008 06:09
Sounds pretty good. pic looks good. Good luck.
Conor B
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Posted: 22nd May 2008 14:31
In the pic you can see a few tanks, I have most of the "database" finished for the tanks, so that means that I can now have up to 50 fully functional tanks scattered around the level, which the player can jump in and out of and drive around, not to mention shoot the 120mm gun!



Don't look behind you.
SunnyKatt
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 13:13
looks good, but in the distance you can tell the grass is tiled. It is seamless, but you could make it even better by lightening up the brown patch.

Conor B
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 14:45
Thanks for the tip ZekeGames, but I'm not really going to worry about that as the ground in the pic is just a matrix as you can see which I am just using temporary for testing the game. Heightmap terrain will be added shortly.
Well anyway here is another pic, it shows the LOD system I have for the vehicle models. There is 3 stages of it; high poly, low poly and hidden. It helps increase the frame rate and doesn't take away from the game graphics so it's doing a great job .



You can also see that I have added a Scud launcher vehicle, although I am still working on its controls and still tweaking the controls of the other vehicles for the best experience. Anyway more screenshots soon, any comments?

Don't look behind you.
bergice
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 20:04
This looks good, hope it doesnt die


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Conor B
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 20:44
Well it's going good so far. Tonight I am going to try to get a very basic level editor finished and I am planning on implementing a level loading function into the game engine which will load the .txt level files created from the editor which will hold world file locations and positioning of each object. I think this would be the most flexible way of handling the levels, although if anyone has any ideas of a better way or just has a comment then please do post, thanks.

Don't look behind you.
nackidno
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 21:32
Nice Conor, so the Anarchy has been canceled then?

I like the tank model and texture. Made them yourself?

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
bergice
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 22:08
Quote: "Well it's going good so far. Tonight I am going to try to get a very basic level editor finished and I am planning on implementing a level loading function into the game engine which will load the .txt level files created from the editor which will hold world file locations and positioning of each object. I think this would be the most flexible way of handling the levels, although if anyone has any ideas of a better way or just has a comment then please do post, thanks."


I am making an editor, but it takes some time XD
One tip: Put alot work to the editor, so you can surprise us and easely create levels. Then it would rock


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Conor B
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 22:35
@nakidno: I don't know what happened with The Anarchy, I was just a programmer for it, but nobody was doing any work and it just fell apart, guess thats the bad thing about unstructured online teams. Oh and the current models are from darkmatter.

@bergice: Thanks for the tip, I will try to put alot of work into it. Just first I am developing it into a basic editor to like place models, clone vehicles, set level terrain file and sky file etc. I am using BlueGUI with the editor which is helping alot.

Don't look behind you.
bergice
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 22:39
I use Blue GUI too
It is really nice, but make sure to keep the gui code clean, because your eyes will be confused


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Conor B
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Posted: 25th May 2008 04:59
I did alot of work on the editor GUI last night and tonight and although it is a very simple design it will help speed up the level creation alot. I have only started on the loading and saving of the level files at the moment though. Anyway I will post a screenshot of the editor GUI tomorrow.

Don't look behind you.
Conor B
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Posted: 25th May 2008 23:46
Tonight I am going to try to finish most of the basic functionality of the level editor and touch on the file access for saving and loading levels into it. Here is a pic of the editor at the moment:

[img][/img]

The GUI is basically complete apart from a few minor things to add. None of the GUI gadgets to the right of the screen are working yet though, so I will be adding functionality to them over the next couple of days. Anyway please keep posting you comments thanks.

There are 10 types of people, people who know binary and people who don't!
nackidno
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Posted: 26th May 2008 00:04 Edited at: 26th May 2008 00:04
Looks nice. How easy is it to use? Or how is easy is it planned to be?

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
bergice
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Posted: 26th May 2008 01:18
Nice, simple yet good


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Conor B
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Posted: 28th May 2008 04:01
Thanks guys. The editor is easy enough to use at the moment, but It is in its early stages as I plan to add more functionality to it later when I do a bit more work on the actual game engine itself. I will try to make a vid of the editor in action in a few days to show you what it is like, but don't expect anything amazing. Well anyway here is an ingame pic of a level I exported from the editor as a test.



You can also see that I have added a chopper into the game. Its controlling needs a lot of work, but atleast it shows that the game is progressing. Oh and by the way the models in that screen are positioned like that by me, there's no AI yet. As usual, any comments?

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nackidno
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Posted: 28th May 2008 09:54
The only thing I can comment is the screenshot, it looks nice.

It's in early stage I know, but it's a bit bland. A few rocks and a little grass randomly placed would look nice.

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
bergice
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Posted: 28th May 2008 15:52
OMG, i have made an earlier project with the exact name!!

Updates looks good


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Airslide
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Posted: 30th May 2008 02:09
Looks good. For your editor I see you have 4 buttons for the objects. I suggest you make a list view or a tree view for that, as you'll be able to add more without re-arranging the GUI. In my engine it searches for all the available profiles (files that contain data for objects) and puts them into a tree view, organized by folder, for easy access. Your engine might not be complex enough to warrant as much attention to this as mine has, but a tree view would still make manually adding objects much easier.

flickenmaste
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Posted: 30th May 2008 02:35
This looks very good!

Makes me want to play it!

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Conor B
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Posted: 30th May 2008 03:15
@nakidno: Yeah I know what you mean; the levels don't really have much character at the moment. Although it is not highest priority I would like to add in some sort of plant positioning technique into the editor maybe next week.

@Airslide: That’s exactly what I plan doing, as it isn't very flexible the way I have it at the moment. I think I will use a listbox feature for a while as the editor is not very complex and I would like to just get it working properly before I add some more features to it.

@flickenmaste: Cheers!

So, I said I would upload a video of the editor, but I haven’t actually made it yet so at least here is another screenshot of the game to keep the thread fresh. This is a simple level I made with a night sky and a simple fog effect.



I just want to make the editor a bit more stable before I make the vid, but it should be up within the next few days. And thanks for the comments guys and if you have any questions or suggestions I would be happy to hear them.

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RUCCUS
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Posted: 30th May 2008 03:43 Edited at: 30th May 2008 03:44
I would think itd be more efficient to have the vehicle selection on the GUI in a dropdown list instead of in buttons. This will make it easier for you in the future if you plan on adding or removing vehicles, as you wont have to add / remove buttons and change the entire GUI layout. This way you could also have another drop down list that lets you select what kind of vehicles are displayed in the main list, like "Ground, Air, Water" or "Heavy, Light, Infantry" etc.

You'll probably want to put your moon onto a plain constantly being oriented towards the camera. This removes the distortion making it harder to realize you're inside a textured sphere, and also allows you to modify the moon more by moving it around your sky, scaling it, swapping it out with other moon or sun textures, etc.

flickenmaste
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Posted: 30th May 2008 03:44
Still looks great, cant wait for the video!
A few plants would look nice, also maybe a building or a factory since its a war game!

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Conor B
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Posted: 30th May 2008 03:48
@Ruccus: If you read the post above yours you can see that the buttons are very temporary, to be honest I shouldn't have even made them in the first place! But no worries it will be changed soon. And thats actually a great idea for the moon thanks.

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nackidno
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Posted: 30th May 2008 08:02
One thing that I would like to see in the editor is terrain editing, you can raise and lower, noice and smooth the terrain with just a click of button!

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
Conor B
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Posted: 1st Jun 2008 01:20
Hmm, I will think about adding something like that to the editor but I have to say that if I do it won't be any time soon anyway, sorry. But I will be adding a vegetation system soon hopefully. Mainly for little weeds or something like that.

There are 10 types of people, people who know binary and people who don't!
nackidno
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Posted: 1st Jun 2008 16:17
That's no problem. It was just a suggestion anyway! Can't wait for the next screen!

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
Satchmo
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Posted: 1st Jun 2008 18:52
Looks Great! Dark matter models? Sorry if that's already been answered. Level editor looks easy enough to use.


And Ruccus, might want to change that avatar....


baconboy2
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Posted: 1st Jun 2008 19:19 Edited at: 1st Jun 2008 19:21
Wow, I've gotta say, this is looking pretty good! I love the models aswell.
By the way, if you need any voice overs, I would be more than happy to do so!

edit: Oh yeh, The Anarchy kinda went down the drain, didnt it? lol

Good luck with it all mate
Conor B
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Posted: 1st Jun 2008 22:56
Thanks for the support guys. The models are from darkmatter yes. Oh and baconboy2 thanks very much for the offer of the voice overs, I want to get the core engine much more complete before I start worrying about things like that though. So anyway... tonight I'm just finishing the saving and loading of level files into the editor. It’s going well so I will be posting a short video of the basic editor tomorrow.

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flickenmaste
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Posted: 3rd Jun 2008 00:06
very cool..best of luck for you!

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Conor B
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Posted: 3rd Jun 2008 18:11
Sorry I took a while to get the vid up, I broke my collar bone yesterday doing freerunning and that didn't exactly make things easy to do! But anyway here is the vid. It isn't anything amazing yet but it's getting there. Just click the pic below to watch vid.



The editor now saves out the world file ready to be loaded straight into the game once all the media is in the engines directory.

There are 10 types of people, people who know binary and people who don't!
nackidno
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Posted: 3rd Jun 2008 20:59
Ver nice!

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
flickenmaste
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Posted: 3rd Jun 2008 21:29
dude i would buy that editor from you!! very sweet!

and that sucks about breaking ur collar bone

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C0wbox
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Posted: 3rd Jun 2008 22:30
@ Conor B
Now don't take this the wrong way, but I have to admit I had my doubts when I first saw this WIP. - But I've been following it from day 1 (secretly) and I have to say, I'm ever impressed with the latest updates. Truely well done. xD

I think the concept has been good since Battlefield 1942, and I await your interpretation of it all, with the amazingly nice looking level editor. (It's far nice than anything I'm using on Vision.)

So yeh, keep up the good work, I'd like to see more

Conor B
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Posted: 4th Jun 2008 01:59
Thanks guys, your comments are encouraging me to keep the game progressing steadily.

@C0wbox: Don't worry I’m not going to take it the wrong way. Your right to have doubts anyway, as nearly all of us have dropped at least a few projects before, but this one so far so good. And thanks for the compliment about the editor. Good luck on your game!

At the moment the level files contain data for the terrain heightmap/textures, skybox file, starting vehicle model, quantity and positioning for the vehicles, and y-rotation of each vehicle. Over the next few days I will be working on setting the water level, fog distance, terrain scaling, and starting the random tree placement system.

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flickenmaste
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Posted: 4th Jun 2008 03:08
I wanna see fighting soon!

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nackidno
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Posted: 4th Jun 2008 08:06
That's gonna take awhile i think, a week at least

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
Conor B
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Posted: 5th Jun 2008 14:49
Well there still isn't any AI in the game so it will take a while to see a proper fight, but I have programmed it so that it should be easy enough to add basic AI because I have functions for each vehicle, for example TankTurnLeft(ID) and TankBarrelRaise(ID) which you can call in the code. The ID parameter is basically just the ID number of the tank you want to apply the function to.

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Conor B
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Posted: 8th Jun 2008 02:52 Edited at: 8th Jun 2008 02:55
Seems like time for another pic . Added water to the game today, I still need to work on adding the "set water level" feature to the editor but that should happen very soon.



I have also implemented a terrain limb culling system, where it hides the limbs of the terrain if they are a certain distance from the camera. In the pic the distance is set to the fog distance so that it hides the parts of the terrain that you can't see due to the fog. Oh and I am working on some basic AI to, so as far as the fighting goes it shouldn’t take to much longer for me to get a pic or video up showing some of the basics.

There are 10 types of people, people who know binary and people who don't!
Phosphoer
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Posted: 8th Jun 2008 04:35
That looks quite excellent, I've been waiting for a true 'skirmish' type game to arise around here.

Nice job, loved the video! ^^

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Conor B
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Posted: 8th Jun 2008 22:29
Thanks man. I should have another video up in a few days showing some of the tank AI with me up against a computer tank. I'm also adding a small explosion animation when the shell collides with an object. Oh yeah and you can now set water on/off and the water level in the level editor, and once this is done the engine sets up the water automatically. So anyway if you have any questions or suggestions or even just comments then please do post .

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nackidno
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Posted: 9th Jun 2008 00:21
The water looks great! Can't wait to see the AI!

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
Conor B
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Posted: 9th Jun 2008 01:40
Thanks, the water is actually just a ghosted matrix with a very basic water texture and the parts of the terrain texture that are below the water level are coloured blue, making the water effect really stand out.

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Valkynaz
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Posted: 10th Jun 2008 00:30
Looks great Conor! When is the expected release?

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Conor B
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Posted: 11th Jun 2008 02:30
Got the random tree placement working in the editor, just needs a bit of tweaking and I have to finish implementing the file IO of it into the level file, should have that finished by tomorrow though. Here's a pic of it:



The tree model I'm using at the moment is low poly (70 polies). I plan on adding billboarding for trees to the game engine at a later stage and thats when I can increase the quality of the trees a bit and also increase the maximum density allowed in the editor.

@Valkynaz: Eh well I can't really say when the release will be to be cause to be honest I really don't know. The most I can say is that it will probably be a few months, but that is a rough estimate.

As I said the other day I will be uploading a video soon showing some of the basic tank AI and movement so keep posted, thanks.

There are 10 types of people, people who know binary and people who don't!
nackidno
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Posted: 11th Jun 2008 10:09
Looks great!

- Elias, Damezean, Nackidno, Wonderboy

AntocGames - http://antocgames.se.nu/
bergice
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Posted: 11th Jun 2008 13:27
That looks cool, a question:

Could you just save that map and run it with the game and play it?


Programming Recorder: 2,5 months of dark basic
Conor B
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Posted: 11th Jun 2008 23:24
To answer your question bergice; at the moment you create your level in the editor which is quite easy once you have all the media you want. After creating and saving the level you need to put the level.txt file in the engines levels folder and the associated media in the appropriate folders (e.g. heightmap file in games terrain folder). You have to also make a minor change to the level.txt file but I won't bother trying to explain as I would probably end up confusing people, anyway it won't be long before I post a video showing the process of creating a level and getting it working ingame.

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bergice
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Posted: 12th Jun 2008 00:40
Cool


Programming Recorder: 2,5 months of dark basic

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