I'm getting excited about Turbo Explorer

[jasonf]

I'm in france at the moment, on vacation, trying to come to terms with an azerty keyboard lol...

When I get back, I'm gonna get Turbo Explorer and pick up 'Guns Reloaded' where I left off...

Hopefully, this time, I'll get it finished...

It's written using a suite of classes called the CBCFoundation which wrap SDL. I'll be releasing the Foundation with the game.

It's sad, but I'm actually wishing my holiday away so I can get to work :lol:

[savage]

woohoo!

[jasonf]

Sodding typical!!

I get back from France,
I unpack,
I de-mould the fridge, (things went evil while I was away)
I download the Win32 version of Turbo Delphi, (it took 30mins... BTW, in France, In the sticks, They have 7mb broadband :shock: )
I was informed I need a registration key... fair enough.. I asked for one..

An hour later, I'm drumming my fingers.. I've for a lovely screen up asking for a Serial Number and Authrisation Key and no bloody email!..

Why is it small companies like the Guy behind Milkshape can get back to me within the hour yet a big company like Borland needs a run-up, a jump start and 3 weeks of planning with estimates, budgets and CEO approval before I can get my email?...

OK, I'm ranting.. OK.. I admit it, I'm impatient. I just wanna use it!

Guess I'd better do some graphics while I'm waiting..

[Traveler]

I'm actually still waiting for it to come. I was under the impression that it was an automated process, could be wrong though.
Anyway, perhaps I should try a different address, instead of my crappy spamsucking hotmail account :(

[Legolas]

Mmmm... strange indeed. It was sent in a bunch of seconds here :?

[Robert Kosek]

I got mine immediately. The problem most likely lies with your email address, as I got mine at Gmail just fine and dandy within a minute.

[jasonf]

Attention... Hotmail is blocked.. I repeat.. Hotmail is blocked..


I just changed my profile to point to my work email... I got it in seconds. This must mean that they're not sending activation codes out to Hotmail accounts. Possibly because it's easy to set up a bogus hotmail account and get lots of activation codes... Gmail.. if my memory serves me correctly is via referral only. So you can only set up a Gmail account if someone reccommends you.

Looks like I've got a busy night ahead ;)

[Robert Kosek]

I have 100 Gmail invites. PM me your email and I'll send you one. :roll:

[jasonf]

Cheers, I've already got a Gmail account.. But I rarely use it 'cos I'm lazy and MSN messenger told me when I'd got a new email... and it was doing a fair job of killing the spam. until recently.

[WILL]

Hey Jason! Glad to see you back here with us again. :)

And I'm looking forward to a new version of Guns... any chance for enhancements to the control system though? Original is very hard to keep up against the computer. :P (Handy-cap the AI, man! :lol:)

[jasonf]

I managed to get Turbo Explorer installed last night (including installing the J# patch to fix a bug in the IDE, which I thought I wouldn't need... it's pascal.. why does it need J#?)

Then I set about trying to compile my code... Oh dear, looks like the version of the source on my Windows drive is quite old and the newer one is hidden away on a ReiserFS partition on another drive... at 1:30am I gave up and went to bed after wrestling with a command line ReiserFS tool, copying files to my C: drive.

Still, hopefully I've got the most recent version of my source now so I can get moving with it.


Any comments on the control system and AI will be welcomed with open arms.

The AI in Guns Reloaded is much better than the old DelphiX example. For a start it uses a set of sensor objects around each gun to detect immediate threats. It still cheats a bit, (it knows where you are so it aims for you directly) but my math is a bit crap when dealing with projectile arcs with different origin and target altitudes so there's an amount of random offset involved..
I'm going to change that though an implement a more realistic guessing algorithm, which mimics more what a human player would do... Up a bit, Fire.. oooh, too far, Down a bit... there ya go.. KABOOM!

The current system allows the enemy guns to take evasive action like raise shields or fly if there's a threat.. or to change target if a closer gun appears near its sensors.. It's still too stupid to prevent it blowing up its own guns though... Unfriendly fire is rife at the moment.

I'll probably include some sort of Radar too to give the player some idea of where the enemy is and make targeting a little easier.

There are some tactical improvements too, you can call for extra shields, fuel even reinforecments. I might include an air strike too..


The original was WAY too hard beacue the enemy knew where you were and began shelling you immediately but with practice, it's very easy to beat.. the enemies in the original cannot move or use shields so you can win with a single gun by flying over to their island (with careful use of shields) and blowing them up from behind enemy lines.

[jasonf]

Yipeeee... I managed to get GUNS Reloaded to compile.. eventually...

Runs quite nicely too, although I've noticed there are some differences between the compilers.. another game I started but never finished compiles but crashes when the game starts with a memory problem :(

Still, GUNS seems to work. Now to get those annoying bugs out.

I'll post progress as it happens. Even may treat you guys to a demo 8)


My Wife was watching me playtest it, she said.. Where's the enemy?
This version suffers from the same "Who's firing at me?!" problem as the original Guns. In so far as, it's difficult to see where the enemy is without relying on the bullet tracking camera. So I'm going to build in a Radar.. just where to put it so it's not intrusive.

Perhaps some Arrows at the edge of the screen indicating where the baddies are.

She also noticed that the baddies look the same as my Guns...

more work...

[tanffn]

How about some screen-shots jason? :) im waiting to see your game for ages!

(don’t know if you remember me, you’re the one who inspired me with catapults. We didn’t chatted for ..4 years)

[jasonf]

Hey buddy 8) , I do remember you.

Funny thing is, last night I was thinking about you as I drew some goats (they'll be innocent bystanders to be blown up by the bombs and explosions) I remember the sheep conversation we had ;)

How are you getting along?

I remember that Catapults game, you did a LOT of work on that in a very short space of time. I remember being very impressed. You even had a tutorial mode in there..

I've not been an active poster on PGD for a while, but I have been checking in from time to time... but I'm back now. :twisted:

Screen shots will follow.. I'll put a post in the Projects section

[JernejL]

OOH, look, you can now completely legally install custom components in turbo delphi!

http://beeography.wordpress.com/2006/09/12/just-wanna-let-you-know/

[Legolas]

OOH, look, you can now completely legally install custom components in turbo delphi!

http://beeography.wordpress.com/2006/09/12/just-wanna-let-you-know/

Seems that this trick works only with the very first version of turbo delphi. Borland guys have replaced the old installer with a new one patched to prevent this workaround :(

BTW, somewhere on the net I have downloaded a little tool (turbomerger) that allows to install all turbo packages you want (eg I have installed delphi win32 and delphi .NET) :D