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Firlefanz
13-10-2004, 08:13 AM
Hi,

we are currently working on our new project 'Commando Xenidis' which is a space shooter, but you also have to do missions down on the surface of planets running around. Here are some space screens:

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/1210-1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/1210-1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/1210-2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/1210-2.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/1210-3.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/1210-3.jpg)

And here is the model of the players ship:
http://www.zapfsaeulen-huetzemert.de/menu/download/cx/gesamt.jpg (http://www.zapfsaeulen-huetzemert.de/menu/download/cx/gesamt.jpg)

The game is created using Delphi5 Standard with the Omega Headers.
More info on my homepage in the forum.

See ya!
Firle

WILL
14-10-2004, 01:36 AM
Wow, looks great! I hope to see more as it develops. Please keep us posted. :)

Traveler
14-10-2004, 08:38 AM
Indeed it does look pretty good already!

If I may be so bold: your previous project tombclimber. I understand you are selling it. What are your impressions about this. Have you sold many copies yet? And did you recieve any customer feedback?

Also, I read on a different forum that tombclimber was cracked early in the release. How did you respond to that and do you have any plans for future games to prevent this from happening (if possible)?

Thanks

Firlefanz
14-10-2004, 09:04 AM
Hi!

@Will: Thanks, of course I keep you informed, I hope to have some nice screens running on the planet surface soon

@Traveler: I sold 14 copies until now I think. So there is no big money to make, it is just a hobby, and we are a 2 person team and meet once a week and spend the few money we got :D
Yes, TombClimber was cracked (every new version) and I am absolutely not happy about it. But I now know what I did wrong and next game it will be harder, I promise :twisted:
I plan to ask some developers here or in the Omega forum to try to hack and cheat it before it is out, so maybe I find some problems before publishing.

Thanks!
Firle

WILL
14-10-2004, 12:34 PM
14 copies huh? Not bad for a first go I'd say. Especially considering you had minimal marketing scheme for the game. Perhaps some of your experiences from this could be shared to help others in their own commercial endevours.


I plan to ask some developers here or in the Omega forum to try to hack and cheat it before it is out, so maybe I find some problems before publishing.

Thats a really cool idea. A good way to make it more rock solid.

Firlefanz
14-10-2004, 12:46 PM
Hi Will,

TombClimber was the 2nd one, the first one was Xenidis, a 2D space shooter made with DelphiX & Powerdraw. Commando Xenidis will be a sequel to this one, only much better and more features.

We have a professional partner for selling the games called 'ShareIT', wo gets 15-20% and sells international the game via download-link, and we try to get it on many shareware-sites and in magazines, that's how we do it :D

We thought we'd sell more, but huh it's a hobby. maybe next time.

Firle

Traveler
14-10-2004, 01:13 PM
15-20 percent!?! I don't know whats normal in situations like these but that does sound like a lot to me.

Are there any productions costs involved (like burning cds, including a cdbox and shipping it) or is it a simple case of downloading the game and you get a serial upon payment?

I did btw checked ShareIT.com for the game but there was no mentioning of tombclimber :(

WiZz
14-10-2004, 05:59 PM
better choice is PayPal if Your country isn't in black list(germany isn't in black list), then You could have account and sell it there. Why it is Better?
1. they take only 2,5% (Max, it could be wrong becouse this isn't my range) and 0.3 ct.
2. Your game could be found in eBay

And other thing, no offence but Your web page is not like Proffesional's Game developer's. If you change the design, and default Language make English Your games could be sold better. Take Out all Your family photos (create another webpage for exaple www.your_site.com/family or sth.

Good luck,
Bogdan Kustan aka WiZz

cairnswm
15-10-2004, 06:10 AM
The fact that you feel their web page isn;t professional goes to show how good it is for them to have a partner that sells their games. Making a game is probably about 30% of the effort required to sell a game. Advertising, presence and availablity are the other 70% and if you can find a good partner to do it for you its probably worth a lot more than 15-20% of the price of the game.

I'm trying to sell some games now and am letting 60% of the income go to the marketing team.

WILL
15-10-2004, 07:03 AM
Hey guys, we are kind of starting a new topic here so I have made a new topic here (http://terraqueous.f2o.org/dgdev/viewtopic.php?t=1569) for us to continue it in.

So what kind of gameplay features can we expect when it's completed?

Firlefanz
15-10-2004, 02:10 PM
Hi!

We'll have 1-4 players on one PC using keyboard and or joysticks (up to 4), 4 different missions for each planet, one flying in free space, one flying inside the planet, one running around on the planet and one running in buildings.

We'll have shops with lots of extra stuff, and an online highscore list like TombClimber has. More screens of that soon.

Firle

WILL
22-10-2004, 01:22 AM
If you plan to market the game, I'd strongly suggest network play. Co-op is something that is either not offered or poorly offered(same thing as single, but doesn't offer a good 2+ player experience).

It's always good to criticise yourself in development(NOT too harshly! ;)). But pick points from the outside point of view that could be a feature that *sucks* if you were some random dude plaything this game you downloaded off of tucows.com... And if you can improve it so tht you really can't pick it appart, you've improved your game and others will like it more. You probably will too. ;)

cairnswm
22-10-2004, 04:58 AM
On the indie games forums there are often discussions on creating network play for shareware games and the concensus is that it doen't repay for itself through sales.

WILL
22-10-2004, 05:52 AM
Perhaps, but if Doom didn't have such catchy multi-player gameplay would we be seeing Doom 3 making sales for id Software as it is now? Nor it's CEO being able to fund private sub-orbital space ship test flights?

However, I'm not saying that they will MAKE your sales, but if you are going to have a feature in your game, don't pull an Activision and just toss it on top of the game like a sore thumb. The multiple people playing on one computer might be a great feature, but will your players really play your game like that?

However, this is only a meer suggestion or feature that I'd like to have in the game should I play it. Don't take any of this as a 'Golden Rule' or special claim to success.

Firlefanz
22-10-2004, 07:06 AM
Hi!

I am very thankful for new suggestions, but in this case (going network) I think we won't have a network option. Maybe I'll think about it later, but right now I would say no.

Here are two new 2 player screenies (the silver blue one was me) :D

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2010-1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2010-1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2010-2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2010-2.jpg)

Firle

Firlefanz
22-11-2004, 05:59 PM
Hello,

here some new screens, you can see some shots from the ground mission with (animated) water and (animated) lava :D , also some space-shots.

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-2.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-3.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-3.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-4.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-4.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-5.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-5.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-6.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-6.jpg)

Firle :wink:

Traveler
22-11-2004, 11:15 PM
I can see you're putting a lot of effort in graphics. There are a lot of different ships, animals, backgrounds etc. I was wondering though, how are you handling you're graphics? From the looks of it, you're using a lot of different styles.

The first couple of shots look pretty nice. Although, I think the ships could benefit from a bit more detail, to make them more interesting and a bit more variation in the textures for the asteroid will help too. But otherwise they're fine. Backgrounds are a bit too green, too 'nebula'-like, but thats me.
Some objects I can't quite place though, like the golden asteroid(?) in the first 3 shots. And that key-like object in one of the newer screenshots. What are those? Same with the blueish thing at the top of that last space screenhot. I can't make anything of that.

The last few screens however, those with the soldier, look,... to be honest quite bad. Without wanting to sound harsh, it looks as if you're using heavily scaled md2/3 models. It works for the soldier, sort of, but imo doesn't for the orcs(?) and definitely not for the critters(?). With the current textures, its very hard, if not impossible, to make out what they are.

I realize all this is still very much wip and that a lot will change, but this is how I feel about the last few shots. You have a lot of different style going on. It feels very crowded, if thats the correct term. In one hand you have very smooth, nicely rendered ships and in the other odd looking 3d models. It doesn't fit well together.

Dont get me wrong though. The game itself looks very promising and I do think you're on the right track, just not with the graphics.

Hope you appreciate me being honest.

Firlefanz
23-11-2004, 07:51 AM
Hi Traveller,

thanks for the honest critics, always good the get some of those.

The Playership is not finished, it will get some more different weapons, engines and wings too choose, and will so be more detailed.

the 'golden' asteroid is an older one and not in the current version anymore. the other asteroids have no textures, because my grafix maker decided so, but they are very nice rotating, looks good in motion.

the 'orcs' and 'critters' also look much better in motion than here on the screens, and the surrounding grafics aren't finished yet, maybe I'll have to think again about those models. The blueish think is a kind of jewel you find in asteroid fields and gives an extra if shot.

Thanks,
Firle :D

P.S.: And the nebula style is cool, I like it :wink:

WILL
24-11-2004, 06:25 AM
Hey Firle, very nice so far. I'd love to see how this one plays. :)

Graphics are awesome and I love the nebulae! :D


A minor request on the screenshots though; Can you resize the images so that they fix inside the constraints of at least 640x480? I don't mind the displaying of larger images so much as they do in fact make viewing the page harder as it stretches the page wider than it would fit nicely on a 1024x768 res screen with a maximized Web browser(IE and Mozilla).

I believe that it is possible to use the larger image and resize it for an in-forum view and then you can make it stay inside of a URL tag that can be clicked for the larger view(linked directly to the image it's self).

WILL
24-11-2004, 06:31 AM
Here is an example:


&#91;url=http&#58;//www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-2.jpg&#93;<img src='http&#58;//www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-2.jpg' width=320 height=240 border=0>&#91;/url&#93;

Example:
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/2111-2.jpg)



Try it with a preview and you'll see (just make sure you enable the BBCode and the HTML in your post ;))

Firlefanz
24-11-2004, 07:32 AM
Hi Will,

cool feature, I didn't know it :D

Ok, I'll do it next time.

Firle

Traveler
05-01-2005, 09:37 PM
Hi Firle,

Any progress made during the last few weeks?

Firlefanz
07-01-2005, 08:13 AM
Hi!

It moves slow right now, because I am learning true D3D for my planet map and for some demos in the game.

Here is a shot from the planet map (True 3D, you can switch the planets for the next mission and move the camera with the mouse):

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050105.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050105.jpg)

Right now I am having problems with the light, doesn't work like it should, so everything looks a bit like plastic. If it works, I'll try to add some animated clouds on the planet, some asteroids and maybe some bumpmapping, then the map is finished. Then I start to work on the first demo, where the troup transport enters a planet through a stargate, the models are already done but it is hard the first time working with D3D :evil:

Firle

Traveler
07-01-2005, 09:03 AM
Thats is soo cool!
What gfxcard are you using? 15fps seems a bit low to me.
Hope you don't mind me starting about the graphics again, but are you planning to change the background image? It's too blurred. Also I can see the borders from the cube in the lower left corner.

Looking forward to updates again.

Firlefanz
07-01-2005, 11:33 AM
Hi Traveller,

thanks a lot. this is an older screen I just had handy.


http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050105.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050105.jpg)

I had some Asteroids in it you can't see right now, they had above 2000 polygons, so this is the low fps. I now reduced them and have 139 fps right now. I am using a Radeon 9700 pro.
Right now I have 1 sun, 30 planets and 20 asteroids in my space, surrounded by a skybox (with stars on it), this skybox image is very small and will be replaced.

I want to add more stuff, but need to understand Lighting first, right now I am searching for an understandable Lighting tutorial for D3D.
If I find something, I'll have updates, know any?

Firle

Traveler
07-01-2005, 12:31 PM
Andy Pike's(http://www.andypike.com (http://www.andypike.com/tutorials/DirectX8/007.asp)) tutorials are pretty good. They're not Delphi based, but do make a nice read.

Of course Clootie also has a large number of samples on his site. (http://clootie.narod.ru/delphi/ (http://clootie.narod.ru/delphi/download_dx81.htm))

Firlefanz
07-01-2005, 12:54 PM
Hi Traveller,

I already know the site of Clootie, but AndyPike is new to me and the tutorials look very good, thanks a lot :D

Firle

WILL
07-01-2005, 10:54 PM
Hey Firle, very nice! :) But, eek, it's huge! Remember the trick I showed you? Can you make all of your previous post images smaller using it? This way everyone can see the full image by clicking on it, but it won't resize the page and we can all read the messages easier. :) Thanks


For nice starry backgrounds in my games I use some nice Photoshop plugins by Flaming Pear. Glitterato(no sure about the spelling there) is for nice stars and nebulae scenes... might wanna give that one a look at. I think these plugins can be installed on Paintshop too if you use that instead.

Their site is at: http://www.flamingpear.com/

Firlefanz
10-01-2005, 08:00 AM
Hi Will,

I tried to reduce the above 2 screens in my post and somehow messed it up. I don't have much time right now, but I'll have some nice new screens the next couple of days and will try to make it the right way then.

Perhaps you can change it for one of the posts, then I can 'edit' my post and see the exact code there, because I cannot open your post where the small image is, and the posted code seems to have an error somewhere?

Too bad I don't have photoshop installed, but thanks for the idea.

Firle

WILL
11-01-2005, 03:48 AM
Hey Firle, you did it right the first time. But the site wasn't set to allow img HTML tags. :? Sorry about that a silly oversight, It'll work for you now.

Your game is looking better and batter with each screenshot I see. When can we expect a Beta(or Alpha?) version? Can you estimate it at this stage or is it all pretty much still in the air?

Firlefanz
11-01-2005, 07:35 AM
Hi Will,

thanks for fixing my images. We already had our beta out, but not for the public. But if anybody is interested, he can send me a PM.

But since we started 3D stuff, it will take a while (end of the month or next month) until the next beta will be out, then including a 3d map and a first 3d demo sequence.

I'll have some nice new screens the next couple of days, I only need some D3D help, I'll post some questions maybe someone can help.

Thanks,
Firle

Firlefanz
15-03-2005, 09:11 AM
Hi!

This time no new screens (there will be some soon) but something else:

A preview teaser movie! :D

Thanks to Czar from Delphi sanctuary, he made it using our beta.
It is AVI (Xvid) and zipped 5,1 mb and shows some 3d scenes and in game footage:

http://www.ericbehme.de/download/moviecx_xvid.zip

Hope you like it. Next time it will look even better. :D

Firle

farcodev
04-04-2005, 09:37 AM
Hi Firlefanz, your project seem very cool, good work :)

Firlefanz
04-04-2005, 10:43 AM
Hi farcodev,

thanks a lot. New screens will follow soon (this or next week) and look even better.

I am still looking for some beta testers and somebody to create levels with our leveleditor, if you are interested, you are very welcome :D

Firle

Firlefanz
14-04-2005, 12:39 PM
Our 3D scenes also start to look better now!
You can choose a planet in 3D universe, and we started adding some 3d sequences into the game.

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-2.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-3.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-3.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-4.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-4.jpg)

In the game itself not much changed, we added some new enemies and hopefully there will be more soon. On the planet the monsters will be soon replaced with new ones that look better :D

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-5.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-5.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-6.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx050414-6.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050315-1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050315-1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050315-4.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050315-4.jpg)

Firle

savage
14-04-2005, 05:51 PM
This is looking mighty fine. When is a public demo likely?

Firlefanz
15-04-2005, 12:00 PM
Hi savage,

if you are interested I can pm you a link next week, but until a public beta is out it will take a few month, the current version is playable but lots of things have to be changed and added :D

Firle

Firlefanz
01-07-2005, 06:44 AM
Hi!

At least some new screens. We have a new interface, the 3D stuff is looking much better now, we switched to DX9 and got more enemies and grafix.

CX is a 1-4 player 2d space shooter with missions in space and on the planet and 3D sequences. We are using DX9 version of Omega Headers together with Clooties DX9 headers.

Here some latest screens:

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-2.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-3.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-3.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-4.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-4.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-5.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-5.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-6.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-6.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-7.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/050701-7.jpg)

See ya!

Firle

Traveler
01-07-2005, 07:38 AM
Wow, that is looking so much better than the previous shots!

How did you do the groundlayer in the 4th shot? I remember from previous posts you were having quite some difficulties with the blending of the various tiles.

Firlefanz
01-07-2005, 07:51 AM
Hi Traveller,

thanks a lot :D

We are now using only selfmade models, and as you can see we are still having a minor problem with the player model, it has some kind of 'border'.

We had a long talk about the tiles in the Omega forum (our headers), and it is basically some kind of mixing tiles with neightbour tiles, looking very good but right now it still isn't perfect (you can see in one with water screen). So there is still lots of work to do, but it starts looking like it should. :D

Firle

savage
01-07-2005, 08:07 AM
[quote="Firlefanz"]Hi savage, if you are interested I can pm you a ]

Wow, totally missed that post. Sure pm me the link.

Firlefanz
01-07-2005, 08:09 AM
Hi savage,

latest beta ran out, too old.
New beta next week, I'll pm a link then :wink:

Firle

lief
08-07-2005, 01:27 AM
hye
re: border problem
the player model has been antialiased while rendering to a black background, you need to either render the image to an alpha channel or do away with the external anti-aliasing (which would require pixel pushing to touch up the sprites)
bye

Firlefanz
08-07-2005, 06:16 AM
Hello lief,

thanks for the advice, but the omega headers have some problems with alpha channels in PNG files, so I need to remove those pixels, but that is no problem, I'll write a batch procedure to remove them!

Firle

lief
08-07-2005, 06:46 AM
hye.

good idea for batch program, i wrote one in the past for delphix which generated single pixel outlines around sprites.

the pixelpushing i was referring to is a 2d spriting technique to create the effect of an outline (zen outlining - there IS no outline) and to enhance the edge of a sprite. It was referred to on the pixelation forums as 'Selout' and if you do a search for that in conjunction with 'pixel art' or 'sprites' you may get a hit.

It uses darker colors in gradient fashion towards the end of a pixel-line before it transitions to next row of pixels in a curve... hard to describe but it works well. It seems to have been pioneered mainly by capcom sprite artists and the earliest examples I have seen are in Street Fighter sprites. I can post some examples from my own work if anyone is curious.

with the 3d render technique you are using it may be nigh impossible however. it is useful knowledge for anyone wishing to draw 2d sprites by hand however.

bye.

Firlefanz
08-07-2005, 10:52 AM
Hello lief,

I am using the Omageheaders for DX9.
They come with their own imagelisteditr (I wrote myself).

I will there add a function to remove all 'dark' pixels that are nearly black for all images in the imagelist and voila.

Firle

lief
15-07-2005, 01:01 AM
nearly... you have to remove all dark pixels that have a <$FF alpha value otherwise darkpixels inside the sprites would be removed.

you might find you could write something to do an alpha edge bleed, with a real-time preview so you could adjust the bleed amount and strength, this would spread the alpha back over the adjacent pixels by a certain strength and falloff, probably give a better effect and keep anti-aliasing, rather than just removing pixels.

Firlefanz
11-08-2005, 12:07 PM
The latest screens of Commando Xenidis. A lot of things improved, but also a lot of stuff to do!

A lot of screens here:

Our logo from the intro, Mission room, A 3D sequence, first page of the shop, Space Mission and Planet Mission.

http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Logo.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Logo.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Choose.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Choose.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Demo1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Demo1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Shop.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Shop.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Space1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Space1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Space2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Space2.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Space3.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/Space3.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/surface1.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/surface1.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/surface2.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/surface2.jpg)
http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/surface3.jpg (http://www.ericbehme.de/bilder/cx/surface3.jpg)

Firle

Traveler
11-08-2005, 01:47 PM
It appears you've made some great progress since last time! Nice! :D

btw, have you fixed the memory bug yet?

Firlefanz
11-08-2005, 02:19 PM
Hello Traveler,

thank you!

Memory bug?

Two problems with memory:

1) Some error after quitting the beta, not all objects could be free'd again, this one is fixed, haven't seen it for a while, only when quitting the game from outisde

2) the beta is using huge memory amount, this is still there, but I am not sure if I can fix it, the only way would be to use DDS I guess, but this is not supported by Omega, the problem is we have lots and lots grafics.

Firle

Firlefanz
14-08-2005, 07:31 AM
Here is a new teaser movie. Czar made it, who is member from DelphiSanctuary, and also here a member. Thanks a lot Czar!

You can see me and Buffolli who does the grafix introducing.

http://www.ericbehme.de/download/cxbeta07.avi

Firle

WILL
14-08-2005, 07:55 AM
Just downloaded it and I've gotta say, I'm really impressed. :)

I did find an unfortuante issue with the codec not syncing the audio with the video well. It could be the settings that were set when it was encoded into DivX.

I have yet to try out the game(sorry, I'm trying to find the time before this Monday), but form what I can see in the video the menus are impressively smooth aswell as the shooter mode of the game. I wonder how fast the character movement is however. I'll try it out tomorrow come rain or snow(snow would be scarry though ;)).

Firlefanz
14-08-2005, 08:23 AM
Thanks Will!

The game will be speeded up 10%-20% faster.
Somebody who played it said it is too slow. :wink:

I hope you'll like it.

Firle

czar
14-08-2005, 08:31 AM
@Will

The audio and video syncing was working fine on two machines that I tested it on. I can redo if others have same problem.

WILL
14-08-2005, 10:27 AM
Firlefanz: I'm glad to hear... I was thinking perhaps a 'running mode' where you hold down a run key or something? Or you could go one further and add the option to toggle the run mode besides just holding down a run key.

czar: Hmm... it could be that you set the quality up to a point where it will only sync properly on higher end(faster) hardware? This is a common issue with alot of DivX or other encoded video files where the audio and/or video will chop up a bit and throw the player out of sync.

What do you use to encode the original file?

Firlefanz
14-08-2005, 10:43 AM
@Will: For the space part in the shop you can buy engine upgrades to make the shipo move faster. On the planet you can press ctrl to sprint, only for a short while, then it has to reload.

But the game will overall be faster 10-20% next time.

Firle

Firlefanz
28-10-2005, 08:50 AM
So now we got lots of new screens.

Because the screens you can see above some posts earlier were direct linked to my side, I don't have to post them again, they are automatically updated, see above. :wink:

We worked a lot on the surface missions so you cannot see the tiles anymore. We also added Alpha support for some stuff like trees etc.

Now I'll try the stuff Sly added to Omega hopefully to make it load faster. :D

Firle

czar
29-10-2005, 02:46 AM
It is is looking goof Firle. Each itteration looks better. There still seems to be lots of repetition in ground tiles, especially in the water tiles.

Th planet does look pretty good though

Firlefanz
29-10-2005, 05:39 AM
Hi Czar,

thanks. The water is an animated 128x128 texture and I could use 256x256 instead, the texture tiles are also (splitted) 256x256 tiles. hmmmm. would look better of course, but also take more memory because I have 3 different waters and each is an animation of 16 images.

I'll think about it, thanks!

Firle

savage
29-10-2005, 09:02 AM
News item about the update has finally been posted. Appologies for the delay.

Firlefanz
29-10-2005, 09:25 AM
Thanks!

I hope it will be finished December. Lots of levels to make, some bugs to fix and some more enmies to add and lots of beta testing to do. :wink:

Firle

Firlefanz
15-01-2006, 05:55 PM
Hi!

Please visit my project website for the latest screens (lots of them):

http://www.ericbehme.de/comxenidis.html

I just uploaded the (maybe last) non public beta 0.98.

If anybody is interested in playing the game (and then please tell me some feedback) send me a mail or PM and I will send the link.

The public release will be in the next weeks I guess.

Thanks,
Firle

Firlefanz
17-02-2006, 09:33 AM
Hi!

So here it is, took much more time then expected: the public beta!

http://www.ericbehme.de/download/setup_cxbeta.exe

Too bad the english manual and readme is missing, there is only a german and we are currently working on a translation.

But in the extras menu there is a help page, please take a look there.

If you find a bug, or something not working right, please tell me.

If you think a mission is too hard or too easy, please tell me.

Your opinion if you like the game would also be very interesting for me.

It would be great if I could get some feedback. :D

Thanks,
Firle

Traveler
17-02-2006, 09:35 AM
Great! I'll give it a shot this weekend :D

Huehnerschaender
17-02-2006, 09:56 AM
When I find some time this weekend, I'll take a look at it, too.

Good to hear that some people get something to work and don't just start a project and never finish it.

Greetings,
Dirk

WiZz
17-02-2006, 11:08 AM
wow, downloading...

Huehnerschaender
17-02-2006, 02:23 PM
Download finished... I'll try it out now 8)
Greetings,
Dirk

Firlefanz
17-02-2006, 02:41 PM
Hi!

The collision detection in the surface missions with trees etc. is not very good and I will try to improve it, I will perhaps download a small patch later. If you find other things or like/don't like something please let me know, thanks :D

Firle

Robert Kosek
17-02-2006, 03:02 PM
Downloading, I'll comment a little later.

Huehnerschaender
17-02-2006, 04:58 PM
Hi,

I just played it for half an hour (didn't had more time till now).

First of all, the game leaves a solid and quite professional impression.

Here are some things I recognized by now:

Graphics:
When you use 2D graphics like buttons, asteroids in flying mission, the trees in ground mission etc. they have a black border. They seem to be rendered/drawn on black background using Antialias and then the alpha channel when rendering on screen is set to pure black. This gives the look like the characters, trees etc are glued to the background, because the borders of the drawings are dark.

Gameplay:
Flying mission:
I didn't understand why some of the "normal" enemys in flying mission are sometimes transparent and sometimes not.
The mission itself is quite difficult, I needed 3 tries to get through the first mission. But thats ok, its possible to make it quite fast.
The enemys which are coming from the top and shoot are a bit too hard to get, because you can't hit them without getting hit yourself (they are shooting too fast).

Ground mission:
The "dogs" killed me and I was not able to do something against it. They come to you and stand within your character. Your gun is firing at the position of the pistol (of course), but thats too far away from your body to hit the dogs. So they bite me, I tried to shoot them, the bullets are flying somewhere but the dogs didn't get hurt.
As you mentioned yourself, you should adjust the collision detection a little to be more precise.

Ok, thats what I found out so far. Don't understand this as a bad statement. I just want to show some things which could be improved. The game itself is quite funny, well designed and has many features.

With little improvements, this could be a successful game which brings you some cash, too 8)

All in all, nice gameplay, good looking graphics and a well polished user interface.

I will give it another try later on this weekend. Don't have the time today.

Greetings,
Dirk

Firlefanz
17-02-2006, 06:35 PM
Thank you all for the interest:

@Dirk:

I didn't understand why some of the "normal" enemys in flying mission are sometimes transparent and sometimes not.

It is a cloak mechanism some space enemies have, when they are transparent they are cloaked, they won't shoot at you and cannot be shot.

The collsion will be improved on the surface, I'll also look at the spikedog problem. :wink:

Thanks a lot for the feedback. :D

Firle

AthenaOfDelphi
17-02-2006, 06:48 PM
Hi Firlefanz,

I've been waiting all day to try your game, but its not playing :-(

Downloaded and installed ok, and the configuration dialog worked as well, but when I click 'Start Game', I get an error.

Commando.exe - Unable to locate DLL. d3dx9_28.dll could not be found in the specified path.

I've scanned my main system partition and its nowhere to be found.

If its any use, my machine is an Athlon 800, 1GB RAM, 32MB GeForce 2 GTS. OS is Windows 2000 Server, DirectX is Ver. 9.0c (IIRC).

If you need any more information, PM me.

savage
17-02-2006, 06:53 PM
Commando.exe - Unable to locate DLL. d3dx9_28.dll could not be found in the specified path.


If I am not mistaken this is one of Clootie's dlls and will need to be added to the game's installation to ensure that the game runs correctly on everyone's machine.

Firlefanz
17-02-2006, 06:55 PM
Hi Athena,

Microsoft does not allow to deliver single DLLs.
If they would, I would havbe included it.

Please download the latest DX9, it must be newer then Dezember 2005.

I must say I think your PC maybe too slow, but it would be interesting if you set lowest detail to know if it works.

Firle

jdarling
17-02-2006, 08:28 PM
Download URL for the proper DX version:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=3F2828FA-0E3C-4837-AFC0-6C67DCAA54BF&displaylang=en

AthenaOfDelphi
17-02-2006, 10:12 PM
Thanks for the link jdarling.

I downloaded a full install the the latest version... as an aside, has anyone else tried to run the setup exe and have it unpack to a Samba share? I got an 'Unsupported cluster size' error and it refused to unzip.

Firlefanz... it fixed it, I should have read the manual I guess :-)

Overall, I think you guys have done an excellent job. It looks neat and seems to play nice.

I had it running on Medium detail and it was very playable and I have just tried it on Ultra.. only the first level, but it seems to be ok, maybe one or two minor jumps, but still very playable.

The cutscenes suffered the most jumps, but they were still pretty smooth once they got going. If anything, I thought the sound was jumping considerably more than the graphics, but that be my soundcard.

I have a feature request :-) Is there any chance you can add joystick control options? I find it really difficult to play scrollers with anything else, other than that, great game.

Firlefanz
18-02-2006, 07:00 AM
Thanks JDarling, I forgot that. :D

Firle

Firlefanz
18-02-2006, 07:03 AM
Hi AthenaOD,

thanks a lot! Did you have cloud and nebulae in Space Missions?
They are only drawn in FPS is over 50. There is also a FPS Switch in the Commando.Ini.

If you are in the Start Menu there is a button 'Player setup' and in that screen on the top you can choose the control, 1-4 joysticks are supported.

Please tell me if it works out, thanks :D

Firle

AthenaOfDelphi
18-02-2006, 08:11 AM
Hi Firlefanz,

Wooot... joystick worked. But, I couldn't seem to fire any weapon other than the plasma gun. I have a PS2 Dualshock running through a PSJoy USB I/F. First time around, it worked sweet... second game it didn't work, so I'm guessing it didn't retain that setting. Regarding the joystick, I assumed it didn't have that option because there was no mention of it on the control config page of the startup dialogue, so in-game I didn't even look for it, even though it turned out to be right in front of me.

Could you make it so that the player settings are retained? I have to admit, putting my name and selecting joystick everytime would drive me nuts to the point where I'd stop playing.

I set FPS=1 in the INI file, but couldn't see any mention of my framerate anywhere, so I can't give you any idea of how fast it was running. I don't think I had cloud and nebulae, so I'm guessing its below 50. I like the idea though... automagically drop the bits that slow it down. I wish more commercial games would do things like that.

In terms of the game play, I had it on medium difficulty, but some of the enemies are practically impossible to kill because they fire too many shots. So far I haven't managed to get past the end of the first space mission.

Firlefanz
18-02-2006, 10:16 AM
Hello,

http://www.ericbehme.de/download/cxupdate0995.zip

Collision better and spikedogs are not 'on the player' anymore.

Just copy into the CX folder and overwrite the old.

Firle

@Athena: I'll answer soon, urgent-must-leave-now :D

Firlefanz
18-02-2006, 11:25 AM
Hi AthenaoD,

setup your player(s), start a new game, watch the intro and in the shop save the game at once before buying.

Then you have an empty game with all your settings you can load everytime.

If you have FPS=1 in Spacelevel and Surfacelevel on the top left there FPS should be displayed I guess.

Okay, it seems the space level is a bit too hard. How was the surface level?

Thanks,
Firle

AthenaOfDelphi
18-02-2006, 12:22 PM
Hi Firle,

I didn't make it to the surface... I don't have a lot of time to play... working on our competition entry :-)

When I get a bit more time, I'll give it a good beating... I'll try and get Spirit to play it too... she's normally pretty good at breaking stuff, then again, that could just be my code ;-)

Firlefanz
18-02-2006, 12:28 PM
I'll upload another package today with Space Level 1 easier and some minor bugs fixed. Anybody else found a bug or found something bad?

Thanks,
Firle

Traveler
18-02-2006, 02:04 PM
Hi Firlefanz,

I tried your game just now. I've played it for about 45 minutes or so. During that time I made a list of things that came up.
(Note I played on medium level)

Menu and options.
=======
- setup menu: the music tab is still in german.

- I noticed you've changed the menu since last I played it. Quite nice, though there are a few minor glitches. The hints and tips menuitem appears to be too small as the text doesnt fit.

- the hints and tips menu is not at the same place as the main menu.

- the + button for graphics doesn't go past 2, though I can go to 3 while pressing the bar next to it.

- When changing values of, for example, the sound and music bar, the background image seems to be changing place a few pixels.

- the texture of the mouseover image on the buttons isn't placed properly as it gives an extra line next to the button.

- The music and sounds buttons appear to do nothing at all

- I have selected just one player, but at a lot of places I have to opportunity to go to a next/previous player.

Pre game
-----
Upon chaning my playername, colors and such, I am unable to start the game. It simply wont load. I am able to start a game when using default settings.

After a level I have to opportunity to save my game. Its says there I have a difficulty 1. What does 1 mean, if I have selected a medium level difficulty?

space mission
--------------
This is too difficult. I died on my first try, made it a second time, but that was only because I was able to evade most enemies and bullets.
The cooldown on the primary weapon is simply annoying. I'm wasting a lot of time, waiting for it. It takes a lot of the action away.
The enemy fighters are tough too. They shoot a lot of bullets, and with gun working only half the time, its IMO pretty near impossible to get even 25% of all fighters.

The end boss is alright. Not too hard, not too easy.

Second level got even harder, only lasted for a minute or two.

I was also surprised to see that there's no extra ships. When you die its over. A bit of disappointing.

Ground level
-----------------
I found this way too easy. Perhaps even a bit boring. There's little action to be found here. Most of the time there's only one enemy to fight. Sometimes the little spike(?)dogs dont even move at all while shooting them. Those little guys with the guns are okay, but still easy to kill. Their aim is sometimes off tho, as they appear to shoot at places where I dont stand. When they appear from the bottom, near the end, they almost always first go past you and then start shooting apparently in a random direction.

My health never got below 90%, mainly due to the many health packs that lay around.

Another thing I noticed in both the space and ground level is that all texts have little lines above nearly each letter.

conclusion
-----------
Overall, I think its a pretty solid game. Still there's quite a bit of room for improvements though. Especially in the gamebalance and quality of graphics. While the space missions are really difficult, the ground missions are really not. As for the graphics, little things like menu items being off placed, textures that dont fit nicely and texts that have these lines give it a bit of a sloppy look.

Firlefanz
18-02-2006, 03:03 PM
Hi Traveler,

thanks a lot. I will take a look at that minor bugs you told about, you are right. :D

Perhaps Space levels are bit to hard and Surface bit to easy, I will try to work on that.

I will think about that plasma weapon thing.

But no graphics will be changed at this point, the release will be within the next days, maybe even tomorrow.

Thanks a lot

Firle

Robert Kosek
20-02-2006, 03:01 AM
I just found time to play and I have to agree on the difficulty of air/ground battles. I was able to reach and conquer planet 1, but could not even reach the 2nd planet.

I like the variation in enemies and ship types, and the squad-looking troops.

The controls are a bit sluggish on the ground, have you considered aiming and firing with the mouse but moving with the arrow keys? Most keyboards have trouble with more than 2 or 3 keys being pressed simultaneously. You also might want to look into making the ground missions a little more compact, since 60% of the first level was just reaching the first building. After that, the rest passed quite quickly.

Firlefanz
20-02-2006, 06:36 AM
Hi Robert,

I made some minor changes in the final version, I release right now to make planet levels a bit easier.

I hope now it is good if not, I have to make them perhaps even a bit more easier.

A lot of people asked for Mouse aiming, this is not possible because of the multi player (up to 4) on one PC opotion and because we wanted it arcade style.

Thanks,:D
Firle

WILL
04-01-2007, 06:26 PM
So how well did Commando Xenidis do on the Shareware market? :)

Firlefanz
04-01-2007, 07:29 PM
Extremly bad, TombClimber is a year older and sells better still today. :(

WILL
04-01-2007, 07:46 PM
I apologize if this question is a tad embarrassing, but how many copies?

And since it's brought up, how many and how well did Tomb Climber do?

I only ask as I'm going to be entering into the shareware market myself with my own title.

Firlefanz
04-01-2007, 08:20 PM
We got our costs back (Delphi 7 Pro, Truespace 6 and 7) but nothing for our time, it is a hobby and we have fun.

Okay no scret 5 of CX and about 50 of TombClimber.

Of course we hope for more with our current Project 'The Innominate'.

But if not we still do it for fun and to be creative.

firle

WILL
04-01-2007, 08:28 PM
Ah ok. Great to know. :)

Well I hope CX2 or X3 will do better, the next time you revisit the Xenidis world. ;)

Be sure you make a post about your new project once you've got something to show.

Firlefanz
04-01-2007, 08:55 PM
I've got a lot to show but I am not satisfied right now, very soon...
Nope there will be no Xenidis stuff anymore no more space shooters.

Innominate and then maybe 3D TombClimber.

Soon a new project here.

Firle

WILL
04-01-2007, 09:11 PM
Yeah, thats probably why Xenidis didn't do so well. Very saturated is the Space/Sci-Fi game themes these days. You really have to stand out with something beyond what most put out these days or end up blending in with the crowd.

For what it's worth though, it seemed like a rather neat game concept dispite it's commercial acceptance overall. ;)

(Oh and I was going to ask about a Tomb Climber 2, but we'd be stepping off-topic all over poor CX with it. :?)