PGD DogFight Competition comes to a close...

[savage]

I would like to thank everyone who decided to take part in our inaugural competition!

A page will be set up with links to all the entries and screenshots ( assuming they were supplied ).

For those who would like to test the demos before the results are announced, make your way to
http://www.vadertrophy.com/filemanager/

Type in the User ID of PGD and the password is also PGD ( case sensitive ). This will then allow you to download the entries.

Please post comments about the entries on this thread.

Thanks again to everyone who made this possible!

[tux]

let the judging begin

[Sascha Willems]

At last, so now I can tell my opinions about the other entries. I'll just do it entry by entry (alphabetical) :

• AirBlast
  The first one I tried out and one of the best I think. It sticks close to the dogfight theme and graphics and sound are rather nice (though the voice sounds a bit artifical). The only gripe I had with this was that the steering was kind of awkward, since it is more like in an ego-shooter than in a flight sim.
  
• Area52
  A bit too far off the dogfight theme for my taste, but still a great entry. It would have been fun to see this played over a network, since the AI is not very entertaining and most of the time just kills you cause he can fire so fast. Graphics are good, but only one scenario is not too much.
  
• Dragonduel
  The idea behind this is great, although something similar was already in a game called "Drakan" (which was also great btw.). Although it's about dragons, the dogfight theme clearly is in the game and it's also looking good. But I found the dragon models could have used some more polygons (maybe it's cause the MD2-format has a limit for number of polys) and steering isn't very easy to get on. But the AI is really a challenge (at least it's not blind nor too stupid).
  
• Fight arena
  Graphics clearly are top notch on this one, but as with Area52 I think that this game is a bit off the dogfight theme. It's a beat'em'up, and I enjoyed that kind of games years ago on my Mega Drive already (Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Golden Axe, etc.) so this was no exception. The only negative point I found is that the game is (dunno why) running very slow in the arena where that light casts shadows, which may be a Radeon-related problem.
  
• RunAWar
  Looking nice and also playing nice, the characters are looking good and there are also dozens of pickups. What I didn't like was that there are no sounds (or music) at all and that e.g. you just die when walking onto water.
  
• sodomaLite
  Just dl'ed this one, but since it is only playable over network I haven't tried this one out. At least from the UI it looks very professional, but since this is a team-effort it's no real surprise that it looks so polished.
  
• SpaceCadett
  The second one I tried out. Graphics are a bit simplistic and the enemy is kind of unfair, since he can shoot about 10 times faster than I can. But besides this it's a fun small game that could make even more fun if it had a network mode.
  
• Tankbusters
  This one often crashes for me with an AV at startup, but after some tries it started up and was rather nice to play (except some ominous graphics bug with flower tiles that constantly move around the map). The tanks could move a bit faster, but besides that it's a solid game.
  
• looh (edit)
  After downloading and extrating four different ZIPs (you should have put at least a readme in the directory to tell what ZIPs are needed) I could not test it, since it still tells me that the game needs OpenGL 1.1. So this is the only entry I can't say anything about.

So in the end all of the games are good (and playable/enjoyable) so one can see this contest as a great thing for the pascal game developement community.

[{MSX}]

At last, so now I can tell my opinions about the other entries. I'll just do it entry by entry (alphabetical) :

[list][*]AirBlast
The first one I tried out and one of the best I think.[CUT]
[*]SpaceCadett
The first one I tried out. [CUT]

Uh ? :scratch: :mrgreen:

[Huehnerschaender]

Hi people,

today the CeBIT ended and now I am back at home. My feet are history and I have no piece on my body which doesn't hurt.
But since I wanted to know whats going on with the contest I read the threads and played some of the games for a few minutes.

Very well done people!

So to give myself the feeling that my hard work on the compo was not for nothing, i decided to upload what I have until yet and finish my entry in time to give it to the community.

You can find it here: http://www.dino-it.de/warnrog.zip

This one is without sources, because I will change many things now I have no deadline waiting
I hope you enjoy it a little, even if it's not fully functional.

You need the following:
DirectX 9.0c installed
For 2Player-gaming you need a second PC and configure the server IP in warnrog.ini where you also can enter your players name. Didn't had the time to make it configurable in Menu, but this will included be in the final of course.

Keyboard-Commands:
Arrowkeys - move/turn
LSHIFT - run
a - throw weapon
s -cast spell
y - use item/potion
SPACE - pick up

I think this one could have been a good entry if only fate was with me and didn't steal me the time to finish it

But there are too many things left to do to enter it to the compo, so I decided to show my progress this way and then finish it without haste.

Please tell me what you think about it.

Greetings,
Dirk

EDIT:
I forgot to mention some things:

In menu chose character with Arrow left and right.

In game try finding the eye-item and use it It gives you a mini-map
In game hit a tree a few times, it will fall
Press d to see yourself dying... (not perfect yet)
Press w to turn on/off collision shape view
Use teleporters by just walking onto them
Explore the map a little. I added another statue to the one you have seen in the screenshots.

when playing with 2 Players some things don't work.
But you see the enemy on screen, maybe you can hit him, etc.

Ok, I guess thats it

[Sascha Willems]

Just tried your game HA¼hnerschA¤nder and it's really a shame you didn't make it in time, since the game (even in this not finished state) shows some clear potential. But since you now have no more deadline, why not make a nice Gauntlet-Style game with tons of enemy and co-op play out of it? That would be awesome!

[Huehnerschaender]

Thanks a lot, man!

Yeah, I was thinking about this, too.
The "Gauntlet-Clone" was my first intention when starting with the game. I guess I will try to restyle some coding and then add some kind of lower AI to get some enemys into the game.
There are so many things I have in mind to make a (in my opinion) cool game out of it...

Let's wait and see if I find the time :?

Greetings,
Dirk

[Sly]

We should change the news ticker at the top of the page. It is still saying that the comp is nearly finished and to click here to upload.

[Mad_Aeon]

@Sasha willems:
As was stated in the initial rules, dogfight was intended just as "2 entities fighiting each other, from bacteria to solar systems.."
I thought that a combat game would have been close enough to the theme..
If the rules were more restrictive, I would have made a fighting-airplanes game too.. Well anyway, forget it

If the game runs slow on some systems, you can disable shadows.
Just have a look at the readme (you'll have to modify settings.cfg)

[savage]

Hi Entrants, I have a query for you...
I got an update this morning from Marcus about his entry called Area52.
Basically the update is so that his entry has a particular AI feature turned on. He actually told me about the AI bug at Midnight ( GMT ) last night ( I can forward the emails to anyone who wishes to see them ), but since I was alseep I did not get his email until 7:30am this morning and only replied to him then.

I received the email with that updated exe link at 8:30am, but was obviously at work and did not get the message until this evening, when I got home from work.

I think his update should be included as I could not reply to his email until this morning, but I wanted approval from the other entrants before I fully accepted it.

The 1MB exe file in question can be downloaded from...
http://www.plasmacode.com/Area52_EXE_works_with_ATI.zip

Does anyone have a problem with this??