Version 0.5

An upcoming game about Electricity, Magnetism, and Cephalopods
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testtubegames
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Version 0.5

Post by testtubegames »

The latest version of TES is up on Humble!

The Electric Shocktopus v0.5

Changes:
-No longer 'development build' on Windows
-Full screen works on Windows
-Tiles that are off-screen are removed, and the editor no longer allows you to put them there
-Hint button pops up on all (of the official) levels, leading to an actual walkthrough, and a work-in-progress FAQ
-Foreground hides when you're editing the background
-Old level codes (that have been converted) no longer break the game (yay!)
-Press '=' to bring up a death counter, as I do in the FBF videos
-There are now 7 different switch colors... and you can only create 7 switches in any given level. (Old levels are grandfathered in)
-Switch creation is less buggy (though still not perfect)
-Missiles now flip switches
-Memory leaks have been fixed (at least those that I could find)

Known Bugs/Suggestions:
-"Development Build" on mac still
-'Secret' levels make you reset the level you left -- boo

-Secret level #2 is broken
-Secret level seeecrets
-Shortcut icon on Windows
-Easier way to change level titles
-Lots of stars lags the game
-Optimize so we don't get too-many-vertices error messages
-Want to create a way to show in-game when updates are available
-Get the game to position itself on the screen more reasonably
-Fix bug that prevents you from going to page 4 of user levels
-Hide 'pause' bar for FBF
-Lags after 60 deaths?
-Make controls less death-inducing when in tight quarters
-Electric field calculation problem fixed (weird conductor-volcano stuff)
-Robo-yeti sfx
-Various bugs in Robo-yeti level
-Introduce trail path to the player, feels like it could be a debug right now
-Basic in-level instructions
-Need to add a way for players to change the controls
-Prevent game from being interactive when another window is on top
-Export/Import levels to/from text file
-Allow moving the save files (not just trashing) ... did this with file system, for now, at least

-Hang on to wall a moment longer
-Bullets fly behind the door?!
-Adding switches in the editor is still confusing
-Polish the new updater-message
-Black lines around clouds, bug
-Standardize the UI
-No silent buttons... no buttons that beep twice

-Electric field problems w/ conductors (part deux!)

-Animate the lessons
?-Sporadic non-saving of level progress

Last edited: July 30
NealCruco
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by NealCruco »

I never posted here, did I? Well, I have to say that things generally look good. I haven't tried making a new level yet, but I did notice that the switches in my level 4348 were all uniquely colored now, so that's good. Also, the lag appears to be greatly improved. One suggestion...the window size persists across a restart, but not the last window position. So every time the game launches, a bit hides under my taskbar, even though the screen's small enough to be completely onscreen. Could you fix that?
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testtubegames
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by testtubegames »

NealCruco wrote:One suggestion...the window size persists across a restart, but not the last window position. So every time the game launches, a bit hides under my taskbar, even though the screen's small enough to be completely onscreen. Could you fix that?
I'll give it a go. It looks like I am able to control where the screen is from code, so there's some solution to this hiding around.

Also, in other news, version 0.5 is up and running on Humble.
A Random Player
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by A Random Player »

Re: = now shows deaths
Couldn't we already have done that in .41? ;)
Overall, this is quite improved, though I still get occasional crashes upon launch.
I think 7 switches is rather arbitrary though. Colors aren't that hard to make. I recently made a small game which required many distinct colors, and I used an HSL color system, rotating the hue by phi*360 degrees each time. This was rather successful (though after about 12 colors, colors were starting to get somewhat hard to distinguish). At least we should get to 10 or 12 with ROYGBP, and a "dark" and "light" variant of them.

Edit: Not hard, only slightly.
Last edited by A Random Player on Fri Apr 03, 2015 9:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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NealCruco
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by NealCruco »

Thought of another idea. You know how each user-made level takes up a slot in the level editor? Could you add the ability to move the levels around? I have imported every user-made level I could find into my copy of TES, and being able to organize them would be great.
A Random Player
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by A Random Player »

NealCruco wrote:Thought of another idea. You know how each user-made level takes up a slot in the level editor? Could you add the ability to move the levels around? I have imported every user-made level I could find into my copy of TES, and being able to organize them would be great.
We could have folders! Etc etc. Probably overkill for this though, just dragging around (or left/right buttons for the levels) would work.

Oh and you said guns activate switches. At first I though that doesn't make much sense, so he probably means buttons. But testing a level I saw that switches are indeed activated.
Do you realize what you've done?

Also, working on some levels.
$1 = 100¢ = (10¢)^2 = ($0.10)^2 = $0.01 = 1¢ [1]
Always check your units or you will have no money!
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testtubegames
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by testtubegames »

A Random Player wrote: Oh and you said guns activate switches. At first I though that doesn't make much sense, so he probably means buttons. But testing a level I saw that switches are indeed activated.
Do you realize what you've done?
Haha. Pandora's box has been opened, it seems!

And I like the idea of dragging to rearrange (iphone-app-style) the levels.

Oh, and as far as the 7-switch limit goes... that's in there not because I couldn't think of more colors -- but because each new switch has the potential to double the number of E-Field calculations needed. (All the calculations are done at the beginning of the level to cut down on the lag or recalculation). So with 7 switches (and one extra doubling needed for the 'timed' tiles), I need to potentially calculate 2^8 field configurations. 256 is quite a bit. Now, of course, it requires fewer calculations if the switches don't control charges/conductors... but that would be harder to regulate than just clamping the total number of switches.

(I discovered this was a problem when I drew a square of switches with the drag-tool ... 20, maybe?... and crashed the game)

I might be able to increase the limit by playing around with the algorithms, but, yeah, that's the reason it's 7 switches right now.
A Random Player
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by A Random Player »

So is this happening for anyone but me? I can only go up to page 3 of the editor, regardless of how many levels are on page 4 (n>=0).

Also check this out:

Code: Select all

[The Electric Shocktopus-"Volcano Shape"-eNqr1hkFgwcYGRCnAr86YtWYEbYQogSPKrCUGRjiUQYzA6wMn4lwKYhKPEpRhHEpwxDHpgpTM5BrbILENyQfVlcrlSjpRMcCUbVSGohVCwDvBpzj]
What's with the field on the top? Bug or just strange physics?
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testtubegames
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by testtubegames »

Oh, yeah, that's a really weird editor bug. I noticed the same thing, must just be some reused code from the official-level screens (since they stop at 3). I'll add it to the list.

And that top electric field over the volcano is strange -- but not totally unexpected. It's been a while since I worked out the actual algorithms that draw out the fields, so I want to dive back into them. I think a whole blog post could be in order about that kind of thing - fascinating and complex. As to whether it's a bug, or true physics, or -- likely -- somewhere in between (an approximation that keeps most things working right, but occasionally gets us into trouble), I'm not sure yet. I'll need to refresh my memory.

The basics of *why* you see this, though, is that surrounding the screen there is basically a ring of conductor tiles -- each set to what I figure to be an 'appropriate' voltage. That's what allows the calculations to work. And I think that's what's making strange stuff happen.
NealCruco
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Re: Version 0.5

Post by NealCruco »

So, Andy, the next version will be released...when?
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