Hey everyone, this is my first post in this forum. My co-worker Steve recommended this forum so I thought I'd join and see not only what I could learn from others, but possibly teach others from my experiences.
I have a fairly decent shmup/bullet hell game engine I've been working on, but I'm having a bit of trouble thinking of new bullet patterns. Oh, and before I forget, I'm a C/C++ programmer (preferably C) and I've written a few basic bullet patterns before. Since I'm at work on my company's laptop, I don't have access to my source code atm.
Doing a spiral and what not is rather easy, and others are just a bit of common sense (i.e. for every bullet within a burst, make the next one move a bit faster), but has anyone ever written an article on creating the more extravagant patterns?
Also, I'd be happy to share one of my shmups, but that will have to wait until after work I'm afraid. Thanks for reading.
Shogun.
Bullet pattern algorithms.
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BPzeBanshee
- Posts: 4859
- Joined: Sun Feb 08, 2009 3:59 am
Re: Bullet pattern algorithms.
Hi,
Once you have the basic processes of bullet behaviour working in your favour, anything goes. The key part I find is to have multiple spots or areas to actually create said bullets - leaving it to a single spot, or a single object in some cases, may be limiting you from what you may want to do. For instance, one of Evacaneer Doom's patterns involves bullets creating bullets in a offset direction from its own.
As for articles, I can't say I've seen any that really go into detail, especially in C++, but I ran into a thread that led to covering pattern scripts a while back and it's taken me on quite a ride since: http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=34142
Once you have the basic processes of bullet behaviour working in your favour, anything goes. The key part I find is to have multiple spots or areas to actually create said bullets - leaving it to a single spot, or a single object in some cases, may be limiting you from what you may want to do. For instance, one of Evacaneer Doom's patterns involves bullets creating bullets in a offset direction from its own.
As for articles, I can't say I've seen any that really go into detail, especially in C++, but I ran into a thread that led to covering pattern scripts a while back and it's taken me on quite a ride since: http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=34142
Re: Bullet pattern algorithms.
In general, "extravagant" bullet patterns are built from very basic pieces.
You can layer multiple independent bullet patterns (e.g. multiple cannons, or the traditional combination of curtains and sparse aimed shots), change the behaviour of bullets or bullets groups over time (e.g. spread fast, stop, drift towards the player), create multiple bullets with varied behaviour (e.g. general morphing of bullet formations through velocity differences), spawn and destroy bullets anywhere at any time (e.g. to give the illusion that a bullet splits into multiple bullets).
You can layer multiple independent bullet patterns (e.g. multiple cannons, or the traditional combination of curtains and sparse aimed shots), change the behaviour of bullets or bullets groups over time (e.g. spread fast, stop, drift towards the player), create multiple bullets with varied behaviour (e.g. general morphing of bullet formations through velocity differences), spawn and destroy bullets anywhere at any time (e.g. to give the illusion that a bullet splits into multiple bullets).