Papilio [v0.9.2.5 Beta, now with True Last Boss!]

[BPzeBanshee]

Okay, this time I didn't even use the pause script and the background pic in the Game Over screen didn't appear on a second run, so I'm pretty sure this isn't pause screen related. In addition the spider picture the second time around was boxed and had a black stripe on the right side, the first time around I'm pretty sure it looked more "correct" in being at least centered if not completely stretched. If it's any help the first run I used the left-most option type and got up to Arachnophobia Lich King on Stage 3, then on the second run I picked the right-most option type and got to Queen Of The Bullshit Boomerang Hax.

I also nearly had an epileptic fit when I got hit and red/white flashes came across the screen. Visual indicators of getting hit are a good idea, sending Japanese kids into hospital from playing this game is probably not.

Also I figured out the gml command for fixing/borking Aspect Ratio for Wine. Pretty please add an option to use window_set_region_scale(-1,1) instead of the current fullscreen stretching (gml equiv window_set_region_scale(0,1)? I use an ini for my VirtualBox-specific stuff in GMOSSE, perhaps you could do the same or in reverse making it a togglable switch?

[S20-TBL]

Okay, this time I didn't even use the pause script and the background pic in the Game Over screen didn't appear on a second run, so I'm pretty sure this isn't pause screen related. In addition the spider picture the second time around was boxed and had a black stripe on the right side, the first time around I'm pretty sure it looked more "correct" in being at least centered if not completely stretched.

The black borders are my fault, those Continue BG graphics are at 320x240 and not 360x240. I didn't bother to retouch them for a long time since I last worked seriously on the project.

As for the Game Over screen, after running Debug Mode it turns out it's not due to any particular object function not being triggered, but a code block that deleted externally-called backgrounds from memory before returning to the main menu. Problem is, the Game Over screen is one of the few internal background files in the game, so...

Anyway, since the game will be ported over to GMS soon, the block of code won't be needed any longer and has been removed entirely.

Arachnophobia Lich King...Queen Of The Bullshit Boomerang Hax

Thank you, I will forever call them that now.

Re: the hit graphic, thanks for the heads up; I'd been worried about that special effect myself but needed some more feedback on whether it might have been too strong. In any case I've replaced the rapid flashing with a one time flash-fadeout effect that hopefully isn't as distracting (or seizure inducing).

The window scaling function you gave me has also been put into place at game start and the game is back to using fixed aspect ratio (now that I think about it, Papilio won't look half bad if I made it 432x243 but I'll have to adjust the scrolling and UI placement--no problems there though). The original from 2 years ago merely used the Game Preferences checkbox so that might have been the problem.

I also made a few more changes to the code, namely fixing the transparency flash effect that occurs when you get hit with a shield on, and properly triggering the "Astra Ready!" prompt if your item tally reaches 100+ gems while your shield is down.

Get the updated final version here, smoking hot! The link on the first page has also been fixed.

[BPzeBanshee]

One last annoying glitch my friend - fullscreen in main menu works flawlessly but fullscreen then going windowed with the pause screen results in black bars. If the rooms are running at the same res as the window with the same command this shouldn't be happening. Minor issue otherwise.

I managed to get blue orbs coming out everywhere but I got up to the snake queen again and actually survived until her health went red, gradually draining all 7 of my lives and powerups. Then she pulled some bullshit with red lines appearing and even though I wasn't in the red lines I suddenly died for no apparent reason. Murder by timeout?

[S20-TBL]

One last annoying glitch my friend - fullscreen in main menu works flawlessly but fullscreen then going windowed with the pause screen results in black bars. If the rooms are running at the same res as the window with the same command this shouldn't be happening. Minor issue otherwise.

I've been finding this odd myself. I tried looking at the resolution being set in both Options and Pause menus but they're both the same. I'll take another look.

EDIT: Crap there's one line of code I missed. Thought I fixed it before but it turns out there were two (due to the option for mouse input). It's been corrected.

I managed to get blue orbs coming out everywhere but I got up to the snake queen again and actually survived until her health went red, gradually draining all 7 of my lives and powerups. Then she pulled some bullshit with red lines appearing and even though I wasn't in the red lines I suddenly died for no apparent reason. Murder by timeout?

Now this is strange. Normally if you just stay between the red lines then you wouldn't be hurt, since the vertical beams only appear where the lines were positioned (it's a 1 second charged attack with a 24 pixel width beam, only used when all body parts are destroyed). I'll check, I might have deleted something in the code by accident, or if I don't find anything I could just increase the time needed for the attack to commence.

[mehguy]

How easy is it to make bullet patterns in gamemaker?

[S20-TBL]

How easy is it to make bullet patterns in gamemaker?

Just a little math. Game Maker already has a number of vector-related functions but you need to loop them in GML to make patterns.

Here's a sample:

Code: Select all

        var _x, _y, _bullet;
        for (i = 0; i <= 360; i+=30)
        {
            _x = x + lengthdir_x(10,i);
            _y = y + lengthdir_y(10,i);
            _bullet = instance_create(_x,_y,bullet_0);
            _bullet.direction = i;
            _bullet.speed = 3;
        }

That loop will create 12 "bullet_0" shots in an array (360/30 = 12), then fire them in a 360 degree pattern determined by the array i (in increments...each bullet fires at 30 degrees more than the previous) at a speed of 3.

In the end, I'd say intermediate-advanced difficulty depending on what you want to accomplish.

[S20-TBL]

A friend and I found a bug in 2P mode wherein the camera started scrolling up and down with our movement during the last segment of Stage 3 Path B, when you were only supposed to scroll left or right. I'll have to see what on earth caused this.

In the meantime, I've been contacted by the owner of Alpha Beta Gamer asking if they could feature Papilio on their website. That was a pleasant surprise.

[S20-TBL]

Minor update: I got the blasted thing to work in GM Studio, so thank God that's out of the way for now.

Next, find all the outdated functions and fix them. Some of the most crucial scripts (including the high score tables, key remapping and pause menus) got borked badly so I'll have to do double duty on everything. Something tells me GMS is getting confused by the encryption script, for one, but I think updating the functions should do the trick for some of them.

[BPzeBanshee]

The encryption script won't work as file_text_etc functions aren't binary safe anymore. I'll see if I can find the GMS functions I used for my last encryption test today.

Deactivation of objects should still work, background/sprite_create_from_screen however won't - you will need to use a surface for this now, and surfaces again work differently from how they used to. Make sure your fullscreen functions still work too.

[S20-TBL]

The encryption script won't work as file_text_etc functions aren't binary safe anymore. I'll see if I can find the GMS functions I used for my last encryption test today.

I see. That's what I was afraid of. I did see that GM:S had some data encryption functions available, but it mostly seemed to be used for streaming data. (EDIT: apparently they're not only for streaming data, but they're not strictly encryption functions either--just text encoding. I should read up on them while I'm updating the functions)

Deactivation of objects should still work, background/sprite_create_from_screen however won't - you will need to use a surface for this now, and surfaces again work differently from how they used to. Make sure your fullscreen functions still work too.

Yep, I read about the surface issue for drawing (portions of) a screen capture, so my goal this week is to look over all the code and change what needs to be changed, especially all the deprecated and legacy functions. I've also temporarily fixed the fullscreen function using the default global game settings for now, and all the non-working obsoleted functions had been dealt with in a single night.

Still have to figure out what the deal is with the new sound functions too. I read that the "music" functions got deprecated within a few GM:S updates for example. (EDIT: I originally said that it seems only .wav and .mp3 types were allowed, but that I could be wrong. Turns out I was right)

I AM quite pleased with the way GM:S handles object drawing now. Scrolling and movement are much smoother thanks to the new default surface drawing, for one.

[BPzeBanshee]

OGGs are supported out-of-the-box but there's no passthrough option, so GMS will always convert it to whatever's defined in the project even if it's the same format/specs.

The way the scripts I got off a guy from YoYo Forums worked, essentially was making the resulting strings from the encryption script binary-safe by using the encoding functions so they were not only encrypted but then also encoded in a binary-safe manner. Trouble is you can't just pass it through the same function again to decode as to encode unlike Ultracrypt (which doesn't like Steam running and is known to fail for no reason) and the script I found and use for GMOSSE. I found the project file in question, I'll send it over shortly.

As for surfaces, recent updates to it got rid of some of the stupid behaviour of the first iteration of the "new" system. Make sure you're comparing to v1.3 of GMS and also reading up the official tech blog because a lot of the resources I find in forum threads are for older versions of GMS, for instance "music" and "sounds" are treated the same now, first iteration of the new audio engine was giving them different treatment. IIRC there's a new surface tutorial in GMS tutorials section that should be able to help you out.

In the absolute worst case that you want to avoid using surfaces (apart from the application surface being made anyway) the only way I'm aware of making everything appear to freeze now is to actually do a with all statement and for all enemies/bullets/etc with a sprite to inherit that sprite and not animate, then deactivate all enemies and restore the "blanks". Done right the object count would be exactly as much as ingame and since they're not moving/animating/using any logic it shouldn't be too much of a performance hog after the with (all) statement is done.

[S20-TBL]

Thanks for the scripts, will take a look at it tonight when I get back to applying the GMS updates.

Re: pausing and surfaces, I think they added a new function that replaces the old screen_draw_background thingy the old Pause script used, but with surfaces. Unless the new event priority system screwed up drawing altogether (I know it did for one of my midbosses--had to remove his Step event and place it in Draw to avoid a fatal error), I think we *may* be able to use that also, but I'll take a closer look first.

For the time being, I put together a new demo version that adds Mouse shooting for Player 1 Keyboard in Single Player mode, an alteration to the default Player 2 keyboard controls for people who use laptops and don't have handy access to a Numpad, and addresses a fatal camera bug in Stage 3 that only triggers in 2 Player. It can be downloaded here (link in Page 1 also updated).

Part of me wants to cook more beer batter cream dory now. I am so stressed out.

EDIT: Replaced the link for now to address a Pause screen redrawing error, but discovered a more serious bug after that. Stay tuned for another episode of Days of our Lives.

[S20-TBL]

Update: a very annoying joystick slowdown bug from when you unplug a USB stick or gamepad after playing the game and then running it anew has been removed.

Lesson learned, for all you Game Maker users out here in the Shmups forum boondocks: do not over-rely on the joystick_exists() function, especially if it's being run during the Step Event. I found out while debugging that this issue has not only existed for a long time within Game Maker, it also persists through GM: Studio. Joystick_exists() is a ginormous memory hog that should be used very, very sparingly and cautiously.

I'll hold off on posting any changes here for a bit until everything's tested. The game still doesn't have 100% support for X360 controllers so I'll have to put that one in next.

[S20-TBL]

I put together a screen resolution diagram. I'm really thinking of adjusting the viewport size now since a lot of players are giving me feedback on how cramped it is.

Here we have the original (360x240) vs. 3 possible 16:9 sizes, and one CRT 4:3 size (which I think seems to be the most favorable option, though on modern monitors you may just end up with black borders on the sides)



As you can see, even adding 72 pixels to the default size would give you breathing room from the sides, leaving the vertical screen wobble as the only thing that needs adjustment. 480 seems to be excessive and would require the game to scroll horizontally at a snail's pace during slower levels like stage 1 and 3.

Conversely, I could also stick with a classic 4:3 resolution like CRT monitors of old, and put the game at something like 400x300. That way the horizontal ratio isn't too big, but the vertical size would give you much more breathing room, putting you closer to a NES style viewport with a large screen.

I noticed that Stage 1 has very limited vertical wobbling, leading to players (and even me!) colliding with unseen enemies on top from time to time; Stage 2's camera had already been fixed to use a 115 pixel view border at the top and bottom, giving you more room to plan your moves, but Stage 1 has the problem of the solid floor which would need some extra adjustment on my part (much worse when you reach the temple section at the end). I had already experimented with and implemented a solution using Stage 3 as a sample, so it shouldn't be too hard hopefully.

I forgot that you had to pay $99 to export for Macintosh. I thought you would automatically have it with the default product. Of course, I could just use a WINE build and not rely on GMStudio any further, though GMStudio gives me better options for redrawing the screen and handling sounds--Windows 8 has a very hard time running Papilio because of its faulty dmsynth.dll being unable to handle multichannel playback very well.

[BPzeBanshee]

I say either go with the CRT aspect ratio or tell folks tough luck. I'd think it'd look amazing on a tube TV with no border issues and it just scales up much better than other weird aspect ratios, and widescreen for this sort of thing has never ended up too well (were you around to see Sine Mora? if not you weren't missing out on much).

I thought you had the old GM:S "Standard" license the last time the offer was there to get free versions - if so the $99 cost of the new "Standard" licenses is irrelevant to you. Those have Mac support without paying extra, the only remaining problem there is actually having a Mac since it requires a Mac with Xcode to export to over a local wireless network or some weird bullshit like that last time I looked into it. I can do exports for you if you need since I have a Mac and said license but I'll need to check what GM:S is like with Snow Leopard compatibility.

[S20-TBL]

I say either go with the CRT aspect ratio or tell folks tough luck. I'd think it'd look amazing on a tube TV with no border issues and it just scales up much better than other weird aspect ratios, and widescreen for this sort of thing has never ended up too well (were you around to see Sine Mora? if not you weren't missing out on much).

True. 400x300 was my first go-to as well. Or i can go 360x270 to at least help lessen the issues folks have with vertical wobbling, plus that would actually keep me from readjusting so many graphics.

The 16:9 consideration is partially based on the resolutions most devices nowadays run in (not referring to phones. I'm not putting this game on a phone) and the A/V technological trend. I tried a 432x243 widescreen view for level 1 and while it did help lessen the stress from both sides (as well as look snazzy), the game began to look just a little a bit more empty all of a sudden:



A couple of people are asking for the 16:9 though. At first they asked for 480(!!!) until I tested it and found that not only did i have to readjust tiles and such, it was just plain gigantic. On the other hand, you're actually the second to ask for 4:3.

If I went 4:3, my choices are to the aforementioned 360x270 which isn't too much of a hassle to pull off (only need to readjust the heights of some backgrounds and the scrolling speeds in vertical sections), or go slightly bigger with 380x285 which would hit three birds with one stone without breaking the game so much. So many choices and I must decide soon.

As for Sine Mora, let me count the ways I became skeptical and was ultimately turned off just hearing the initial announcement and seeing the trailer from 2 years ago:

• 1) You do not namedrop Battle Garegga or Einhander as "inspirations" and expect to get away with it that easily.

• 2) Pretentious monologues in the trailer are a sure sign that somebody's trying way too hard.

• 3) Suda 51.

As an aside, I'm surprised some folks in here actually think that game is "mainstream" just because major gaming news outlets have reported on it extensively. In reality, very few people in the mainstream (if any!) seem to actually care about it, if at all.

Anyway...

I thought you had the old GM:S "Standard" license the last time the offer was there to get free versions - if so the $99 cost of the new "Standard" licenses is irrelevant to you. Those have Mac support without paying extra, the only remaining problem there is actually having a Mac since it requires a Mac with Xcode to export to over a local wireless network or some weird bullshit like that last time I looked into it. I can do exports for you if you need since I have a Mac and said license but I'll need to check what GM:S is like with Snow Leopard compatibility.

Actually my version was gotten during a 2012 promo, and after checking doesn't have the OSX module.

EDIT: In other news, I did a complete overhaul of the game's keyboard remapping system based on a combination of the keyboard/joystick remapping algorithms from GMOSSE (a modified table array-based version which is already in Papilio) and Nocturne Games' old keyboard remapping scripts, as the latter no longer functions in GM:S and had to be heavily revised to work properly. Aside from a slightly wider array of key choices, you now no longer need to press Enter or Left Shot before inputting your desired key, which speeds up the process. The problem is, unlike the old script this does not yet prevent you from inputting the same button under multiple functions, and using an array to check for it as the old script allowed for only causes the whole thing to stop working and glitch out. The good thing is that this sort of accident isn't so easily allowed by the present script itself thanks to variable checking.

[S20-TBL]

Papilio v0.325 is now available for download!

EDIT: Forgot to put in a few fixes I had been intending to, but forgot. D'oh. The file has been replaced, my bad.

This version addresses most of the issues discovered in v0.3125, as well as some problems that have been persistent since 0.22:

• The massive slowdown caused by poor usage of a memory hogging joystick detection function has been removed. While the game no longer autodetects joysticks at all times, you can still use a stick or gamepad provided you plug it in before running the application. Additionally, unplugging a joystick during a playable stage will automatically pause the game.

• Level 1 has been slightly retooled to allow for a taller camera border to be used, reducing the chance of bumping into enemies should you fly up. Similarly, the camera border height during the boss battle has been increased. If this change is successful, I may no longer need to change the resolution.

• The increased rewards received once you hit Rank 4 have been slightly reduced to prevent mindless bomb spamming.

• Players who used to rep Zed Blade will be in for a small treat if they power up the Red Wisp + Homing Shot to level 3.

[S20-TBL]

I apologize for the past few demos I put out as they were all extremely buggy, especially with regards to 2 Player mode and the keyboard + joystick controls. There were far too many high priority or near fatal glitches in the game that I overlooked due to trying to beat the end of September.

The past couple of weeks were spent mostly debugging everything I put in the game, hunting down every single programming oversight made since my changes to the base engine were implemented. BPzeBanshee has been kind enough to let me study Nimitz' joystick/keyboard variable checking from GMOSSE and Zenodyne in order to fix the broken gamepad handling, so major kudos to him. Thanks to his help the game now properly accepts POV input from certain generic USB sticks and D-pads, though X360 controllers still need to be tested in this game (no trigger Z axis support yet).

There were many unseen bugs in 2 Player mode which caused the game to crash at certain events. Since very, very few people were able to give me feedback on 2P mode, these had mostly eluded detection, but most (if not hopefully all) of these have thankfully been discovered and repaired thanks to some solo doubleplaying tricks. Please let me know if you come across any more.

I also added some new graphical touches here and there and forced myself to learn tile creation and manipulation, which helped get rid of the hideous lag in stages 2 and 3 during the cloudy sections (previously they had been using objects to obscure background switching, which was nowhere even near efficient to say the least). Certain environmental effects were also redone to use less GPU power. The game should now run at least 10-15% faster on older machines if not slightly more.

I really hope this one is all fixed. If not...well.

Papilio v0.35 demo download

Here's to version 0.4...I hope.

NOTE: the game's constant Joystick autodetection has proven to be far too much of a memory hog. Instead, you must now plug in joysticks or gamepads before running the game in order for them to be detected and used. Trying to do this in game will not yield any results. Conversely, getting your joystick or gamepad unplugged somehow during a session will disable joystick support for the rest of the game until exiting, and will automatically Pause the game if you're in the middle of a playable level.

[S20-TBL]

Sample background for Survival / Score Attack, coming soon in v0.4.

Rozyrg and I discussed randomized enemy generation algorithms and he gave me some pretty neat ideas for my proposed schematics, most of which had already been put in this weekend. Major kudos.

[BPzeBanshee]

Oooo, pretty!

[mice]

Yep, nice indeed!
I always feel like doing a NMK tribute each time I start the game...and now with that bkg I want to do it even more.

[S20-TBL]

I always feel like doing a NMK tribute each time I start the game...and now with that bkg I want to do it even more.

Thanks!

I actually never realized how much of an influence Operation Ragnarok had on me until now. I guess I just got that history covered up in layers of Mega Drive games, but 1994 and Zed Blade really left a big impression. Especially that wavy laser. And that Lunar Walker boss.

EDIT: IndieDB approved my submission. Waiting for Desura to respond to a query now. http://www.indiedb.com/games/papilio

EDIT 2: Just when I thought I was done with the demo, this time my errant mouse strikes again. Apparently one of the enemies has had its "Persistent" parameter turned on by accident which resulted in the game aborting from a variable checking error if you happened to die while said enemy is onscreen. It has been fixed. The new download can be found here.

[S20-TBL]

Got Survival Mode up and running, though it has yet to be eased in properly through the Wisp Select screens. If a Caravan game mode is good for anything, it certainly is for finding problems in game balance:



That's Survival Mode at 30 minutes with Rank at level 7.8. The nullified bullets in the second screencap are actually revenge/suicide bullets (they begin appearing at Rank 7 and vary between enemies). I swear the green weapon is overpowered. Also, high contrast backgrounds need to be toned down.

I might just give bombs their own ammunition supply separate from your gem count (though still replenished by gems / wisp-nullified bullets) to make it somewhat closer to a YGW game. It's kind of near impossible to die when you're simply bombing every 4 seconds at Rank 7+ and harvesting craptons of blue crystals to quickly make up for the 100 gems lost per bomb.

EDIT: don't think I'll revamp the Blue Crystal generation method just yet. I was thinking something like survival based medal chaining, but that would be too cheap the way the game is designed right now.

[BPzeBanshee]

Keeping the view completely still and not moving at the spider boss just made its last pattern bloody impossible using Ice Wisp. Is that intentional?

[S20-TBL]

Keeping the view completely still and not moving at the spider boss just made its last pattern bloody impossible using Ice Wisp. Is that intentional?

The camera might've gotten stuck somehow. I've been trying to fix that thing for weeks last July and thought I'd come to a solution, but the best you can do as of now is to avoid skirting the sides a lot because the camera goes bonkers if you do (it slides erratically along the invisible camera-only walls and fails to follow your movement at full speed--as a side note, neither of them are solid objects). I'll try to fix it still.

[Rozyrg]

Holy shit, that looks amazing!
I'd be genuinely conflicted on whether to destroy them or not...

[S20-TBL]

I'd be genuinely conflicted on whether to destroy them or not...

No worries, they're background objects.

If anything, the stage description reads "Protect the caravan!"

[S20-TBL]

I'm no Twitter user, but I discovered some gamers want Papilio on Ouya. ) Oh dear...

In other news, more survival mode screens:



Made a separate set of scripts to handle Survival time recording and scoring, and it now has its own leaderboard. Hopefully this week I can put some existing bosses in there to harass you at intervals, to break up the action.

[S20-TBL]

After wrestling with Fraps and its CPU overhead issues for a bit, I got to record this run:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZIGROe6lxE

Not my best run but it'll do for now.

In other news, the Survival bosses are now in:



Right now there are 4 bosses culled from several sections of the game, and I plan to add a couple more soon hopefully.

This isn't a strict Boss Rush however. These bad boys only spawn every 3 minutes to break up the action.

[kurismakku]

I love the idea of dynamic difficulty ! So better the player is - more challenging the game becomes.
How much did you test this ? Does it actually work ?
And what variables you track when calculating current difficulty ?