Savage Vessels

[klausvdl]

Rogue-like 2D space shooter with pixel-art, physics and hard survival. Spiritual successor to Teleglitch.

This is the project I'm working on since my last project has been canceled. It's totally written in Pascal and I'm using SDL2 with OpenGL and OpenAL.

It has a Steam page (https://store.steampowered.com/app/912550/Savage_Vessels/) already and I'm using Twitter (https://twitter.com/SavageVessels) to reach those who might be interested.

Some ingame impressions ...

https://i.imgur.com/O3Rfkst.gif

https://i.imgur.com/IjOA6iQ.gif

https://i.imgur.com/aqvZZEB.gif

[laggyluk]

Looks neat and well into development, good luck!

[de_jean_7777]

Looks nice. Will follow the development. I like the visibility occlusion aspect of it.

[SilverWarior]

Looks nice. Will follow the development. I like the visibility occlusion aspect of it.

Same here I will also follow the development of this one.

BTW Is it just me or does dynamic field of view lag a bit after the player movement?

[klausvdl]

Thanks laggyluk, de_jean_7777 and SilverWarrior! :)


Is it just me or does dynamic field of view lag a bit after the player movement?

True, the field changes by means of interpolation, which reminds of a fluid perhaps.

[Matthias]

Great project.

Do you craft the pixelart sprites by yourself?

[klausvdl]

Great project.

Do you craft the pixelart sprites by yourself?

Hey, thanks! :)

The artist is WebGeist
(https://www.deviantart.com/webgeist)

[Matthias]

Incredible artwork by WebGeist, too.

I'd appreciate to promote your project over at my website again, if you're interested just drop me a line (preferably by mail) with the necessary information and some screenshots (or links to them), those screens above are a bit heavy :D.

[farcodev]

Pretty neat! Keep up the good work! :)

[klausvdl]

Thanks, farcodev! :)

[klausvdl]

The game is taking shape and will be finished this year.

Recently I updated Freepascal, Lazarus and SDL (incl. Pascal Headers) to current versions after years. Everything compiled smoothly.

I was also looking for a profiler, a simple tool without complications. I considered LazProfiler (https://wiki.freepascal.org/LazProfiler) but it requires trunk versions of Freepascal and Lazarus. Then I got Very Sleepy (http://www.codersnotes.com/sleepy/), a polling CPU profiler. It led me to the worst bottlenecks. All I had to do was selecting DWARF2 debugging infos in my project's properties.

Thanks a lot for your interest, your twitter-likes and so on. :)

And finally some impressions from the last months ...

https://i.imgur.com/wrpZ8hz.gif

https://i.imgur.com/EU8QICm.gif

https://i.imgur.com/akBTBSM.gif

[SilverWarior]

WOW! That looks very nice

Keep up the great work :)

[klausvdl]

WOW! That looks very nice

Keep up the great work :)

I keep going. Thanks for the kind words!

[farcodev]

I like the green-elastic like animation, so alive and bio-like! Good work! :)

[klausvdl]

I like the green-elastic like animation, so alive and bio-like! Good work! :)

Thanks! And good luck with your own space game project! :)

[Chebmaster]

I like the green-elastic like animation, so alive and bio-like!
I second that.
The physics variety looks fun, makes your game stand out. Magnetic buzzsaws, I don't think I saw such anywhere else.

[klausvdl]

I second that.
The physics variety looks fun, makes your game stand out. Magnetic buzzsaws, I don't think I saw such anywhere else.

It's encouraging to read that, thanks!

[farcodev]

Thanks! And good luck with your own space game project! :)
Thanks!
I'm not far to complete the modifications/addons of the universe generator.
The next step will be to recalculate Epsilon Eridani and finally starting to implement the rest of the factions of origin and new planetary systems!

Sorry for the lil' hijack of your thread ;D Keep up your good work! ;)

[Ñuño Martínez]

I didn't know about this game. It looks awesome!

[edit]I've found the demo in itch.io. Of course it is your decision but it would be cool if you update that version too.

I have Steam but I prefer GoG; may be you can talk with them. They're very nice people, they always answered me. :)

Also a Linux version would be nice too, and since you're using SDL it shouldn't be hard. ::)

[edit2] Sorry for so many petitions. ;D

[farcodev]

I didn't know about this game. It looks awesome!

[edit]I've found the demo in itch.io. Of course it is your decision but it would be cool if you update that version too.

I have Steam but I prefer GoG; may be you can talk with them. They're very nice people, they always answered me. :)

Also a Linux version would be nice too, and since you're using SDL it shouldn't be hard. ::)

[edit2] Sorry for so many petitions. ;D

Even if I have a Steam account, a distribution on GOG would be nice yep! ;) Thanks for the itch.io tip, I found his game!

[klausvdl]

I pressed the release button on Steam on Monday. It's all very exciting - so to speak. :scared:;D

There was a closed beta test run in December and January which allowed me to remove almost all device issues, among other benefits of course.

I reached out to gaming press and youtubers in that time. Although I consider Savage Vessels to be an almost unknown niche game (like most indie games) it got a few nice previews. A news article on Rock Paper Shotgun led to a great impact for example.

This is the launch trailer:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZiTG9Y7cAY

[de_jean_7777]

Got the game. I suck at it :D, but I like it. Will spend some time with it these days.

[Ñuño Martínez]

Wishlisted because can't buy now. Good luck.

[Jonax]

Well done! Please keep us updated.

[klausvdl]

That's all nice to hear, thanks a lot! :)
Until then!

[paul_nicholls]

This looks great mate!! Keep up the excellent work :)
cheers,
Paul

[Chebmaster]

Looks very, very attractive, especially with Steam allowing for longer, detailed videos.

Added to wishlist. Not because I can't afford 299 Rubles but because I already keep trying so many things in parallel that I am almost like that boa who ate an alligator (hint: it burst and died). I don't want your game to become yet another I'll-play-it-someday-I-swear backlog entry.

[klausvdl]

Hey, thanks! :)

@paul_nicholls
Btw., good luck with your pas6502 project!

[de_jean_7777]

Played a lot, but the game is a bit too hard for me.

I tried to also play it in Linux with Steam Proton, but it doesn't go well, as shown below. The EConvertError is always different and seems random, like it's picking up garbage memory, but the line it happens on is always the same.


3/13/2020 - 22:33:05
v 15
An unhandled exception occurred at $0047F476 :
EConvertError : "\00l\00\00\00dll\00o\00w\00s\00P\00o\00w\00e\00r\0 0s\00h\00e\00l\00l\00\\00v\001\00.\000\00\00\00\00 \00\00\00X/\E0 \00\00\00USE\pipe\svcctl\00\00\00\00\00\00\00\00\0 0\00\00\00" is an invalid integer
$0047F476
$004E2BEB line 949 of sound.pas
$004E344E line 1173 of sound.pas
$004E3A03 line 1385 of sound.pas
$00460F32 line 28658 of savage.pas

3/29/2020 - 13:33:13
v 16
An unhandled exception occurred at $0047FA66 :
EConvertError : "" is an invalid integer
$0047FA66
$004E320B line 949 of sound.pas
$004E3A6E line 1173 of sound.pas
$004E4023 line 1385 of sound.pas
$00461522 line 28793 of savage.pas

[paul_nicholls]

Hey, thanks! :)@paul_nichollsBtw., good luck with your pas6502 project!Thanks mate!! :)cheers,Paul

[klausvdl]

I tried to also play it in Linux with Steam Proton, but it doesn't go well, as shown below. The EConvertError is always different and seems random, like it's picking up garbage memory, but the line it happens on is always the same.


Thanks for letting me know! My experience with linux is a long time ago. But you could send me your log file (Savage Vessels > output > log.txt) which might provide a hint for me. (kpas@posteo.de)

[de_jean_7777]

Thanks for letting me know! My experience with linux is a long time ago. But you could send me your log file (Savage Vessels > output > log.txt) which might provide a hint for me. (kpas@posteo.de)

Hey, I've sent you the log. If you don't use Linux then no need to look into it. Since Proton/Wine is basically a windows emulator it might be that they have a bug too. Was worth trying, since I switch between windows and linux a lot.

One thing that annoys me about the game, and I'm not sure if that is by design, is that you'll be swallowed by the void sometimes when beeing close to it, even without going into it. Though I'd quit playing it, but I try here and there :D So I recorded this, and it turns out it happens sometimes when you're touching the edge even a bit, which a lot of times doesn't swallow you into the void.

[SilverWarior]

One thing that annoys me about the game, and I'm not sure if that is by design, is that you'll be swallowed by the void sometimes when beeing close to it, even without going into it.

So I recorded this, and it turns out it happens sometimes when you're touching the edge even a bit, which a lot of times doesn't swallow you into the void.


I haven't tried this game yet so I'm not exactly sure of what you are talking about. But based on what you say I think it might depend on the way colission detection is being handled.
So I recommend that next time you pay a litle more atention to ship rotation for when this occurs. Perhaps colision box for the ship needs a tad bit of adjustment.

[de_jean_7777]

Perhaps colision box for the ship needs a tad bit of adjustment.
Yeah, it's likely. It's not an easy game, and this makes it somewhat unpredictable. But I do like to go too close to the edge.

[klausvdl]

Hey, I've sent you the log. If you don't use Linux then no need to look into it. Since Proton/Wine is basically a windows emulator it might be that they have a bug too. Was worth trying, since I switch between windows and linux a lot.

One thing that annoys me about the game, and I'm not sure if that is by design, is that you'll be swallowed by the void sometimes when beeing close to it, even without going into it. Though I'd quit playing it, but I try here and there :D So I recorded this, and it turns out it happens sometimes when you're touching the edge even a bit, which a lot of times doesn't swallow you into the void.

Thanks for the log, and sorry for the delay!
Ok, I was able to roughly localize the problem, but I cannot get closer without trial and error. If I ever have Linux on my PC then I know what to do at least.

When it comes to the void you have to pay attention to the nearby edge of the red-blue halo. As soon as the center of your ship crosses that line your are void fodder.

[de_jean_7777]

When it comes to the void you have to pay attention to the nearby edge of the red-blue halo. As soon as the center of your ship crosses that line your are void fodder.


Ah, that was the problem. The halo was not that noticeable on my laptop screen, and I only paid attention to the black void edge.

[de_jean_7777]

One other thing, I've reached save point 3, got the achievement for it, yet I need to start again from level 4 instead of level 6. And sometimes starting the game under windows will give an error "no appropriate audio device available". Here's the log file (https://pastebin.com/agHkNHam).

[klausvdl]

One other thing, I've reached save point 3, got the achievement for it, yet I need to start again from level 4 instead of level 6.

The achievements are unlocked live when the conditions are met. But only when you finally quit the game the savegame file is written (including your current level) and after that synchronized with the Steam cloud. So it's possible that something happened after you unlocked that achievement; did you remember if the game terminated normally? Or perhaps the savegame has been out of sync next time?


And sometimes starting the game under windows will give an error "no appropriate audio device available". Here's the log file (https://pastebin.com/agHkNHam).

I'm using OpenAL for sound. I output that error only when OpenAL can't find usable audio devices. Perhaps I made a mistake somewhere but at the moment I know of no other computer (from many hundreds) where this error occurs. However I'll keep this in mind.

[de_jean_7777]

But only when you finally quit the game the savegame file is written (including your current level) and after that synchronized with the Steam cloud. So it's possible that something happened after you unlocked that achievement; did you remember if the game terminated normally? Or perhaps the savegame has been out of sync next time?
Maybe because I used ALT+F4 to close it.

[klausvdl]

Ok, this is a bit unusual but nevertheless the program should execute all the exit procs including writing the savegame file.

Hm, for now it's an exceptional case, sorry! But thanks for letting me know anyway!

[SilverWarior]

I'm using OpenAL for sound. I output that error only when OpenAL can't find usable audio devices. Perhaps I made a mistake somewhere but at the moment I know of no other computer (from many hundreds) where this error occurs. However I'll keep this in mind.

Looking at the log de_jean_7777 provided it seems rather odd that just after audiodevice was loaded it gets closed (8th log entry). Shouldn't audiodevice get closed only on application shutdown and not before?

[klausvdl]

That's ok. After line 7 (desired audiodevice loaded) the sound system tries to init itself. One of the first things it does is to add an exit proc in order to ensure it's own cleaning up on shutdown. Then the init fails although we can't see it here. The program terminates with an error message which is always printed in the last line (ERROR: no appropriate audiodevice available). And all the lines from #8 to #19 are part of shutting down already.

[de_jean_7777]

I've finished the game. Took me around 36 hours I think. Needs a bit more patience than I have and trying out the various items and weapons, and to not run into situations. Even though I wasn't good at it at first, it's addictive. Worth the money :)

[klausvdl]

Wow, I'm happy to hear that! And congrats! :)