Heh ^^;
Thanks for taking a look!
I've been making games in Bitsy Color 3D lately, and looked through the itch tags to see what others have done with the engine. This is amazing! Skewing a number of tiles together to construct models, like the bottles and the bugs, is something I've been experimenting with as well. It's crazy what this engine can do if you convince it to, and you did a great job taking advantage of everything.
There is some z-fighting in the canopy which could be fixed relatively easily, and I think the open ended nature of the world makes it a bit disorienting in first person 3D, but the atmosphere is great.
I was wondering how you managed to collect an item in one shot when its made of 3 tiles? The bottles and mushrooms I mean.
One option I would love is a horizontal panning limiter. I've been wanting to make a camera whee you do the dungeon crawler movement, but have mouselook limited to a 45 degree cone around your current facing position. This would be the best of both worlds I think. However with no horizontal panning limiter it's not possible.
Love Bitsy 3D! Thank you for this tool.
Hey Terry! I first played VVVVVV when I was 11 or so, and you've been a big inspiration ever since! Making games solo is a long tedious process, but you were one of the first people that made me say "Wow, maybe I could do this."
This game is tough for me. The sense of unfolding and discovery is great, but I did find myself just a little wanting for a more decisive conclusion.
Enjoyed this one, glad you're feeling better, looking forward to your future stuff. ( :
This game is fantastic!
First, I was inspired by the artwork. The way you use a ton of billboard sprites together with very basic shapes to create a compelling world is awesome. It's been my dream for a long time to make walking sim type games in 3D using my own art, and this gives me plenty of ideas for how to do it without having to learn blender lol.
Then I got really taken in by all the cool characters and fun little side things, including this one rare redshirt dude I kept finding.
Then I died, got turned around, ended up in the throne room, and realized there is an actual way to beat the game. This was at first disheartening, because the sequence was long and I had no way of knowing which sprites were the knights. Regardless, I got my pen and paper.
I walked around some more, trying the sequence on different folks, until I got to the last area I hadn't seen. It was a big house, and at the very top I found a red shirt guy. The game design was screaming at me, and I finally listened. My fingers flirted upon the lute, and the little dude zoomed away.
I then died, went to the throne room, and saw him there. Up to this point I was losing steam fast, having traversed the whole game twice by then. In that moment though, I was filled with an unmatched determination, and quickly got the other 4 using my mental map of the game.
The ending wasn't anything fancy, but that didn't matter. The game had not given me a tutorial, a map, or really even guided me towards the solution, but nevertheless I succeeded! You don't get that much in modern game design.
My main note is just a faster walk speed. Default is way too slow, so my pinky got quite tired.
Thanks for a fun experience! This is my favorite game genre, and I'm putting this one right next to Cryptworlds and Goblet Grotto on my shelf.
Definitely. The lack of any real complexity to the level is rough. You find the key, you open a door, level done. It seems like you could make it so that you start out without a weapon or with a weapon with 0 attack, and then a weapon could become a key of sorts to open a door which would be a destructible sprite, but I haven't experimented with that yet.
Right now I have it where each level is a location in which the player must find a new insight (The key, rendered as an❗) to an overarching mystery, which allows them to leave the location. Then the end screen is a journal entry where they discuss the insight, and how it leads them to the next location.
Enemies are NPCs that demoralize the player in some way, which they can heal by seeing scenes of positivity (which are designed to funnel the player onto an invisible health pickup). They can also find scenes of negativity in the level, which gives them conviction, which is used as ammo to neutralize said NPCs.
It's a bit silly laid out without the context the audio and visuals would give to those actions, but that's the fun of limitations right?
Once I downloaded this I sat down and read/watched it cover to cover. RGM is exactly the tool I've been needing, and this unreasonably thorough guide really sealed the deal.
Near the beginning you say this tool can only be used for FPS games where you shoot things, and that seems like a challenge. I'd been planning on making a narrative adventure game in RGM even before I read this lol. You laid out the exact limits of the engine so well that by the time I'd finished reading I'd already figured out the basic design.
Thanks! Your work is much appreciated.