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[Poonyen]

PROLOGUE (skippable): I am having trouble figuring out where to post this since it's not only about one artistic medium, but I feel like I should show something for the last year to a community that I feel such a part of. I also kind of feel like I owe an explanation to some people who have PM'd me and might have wondered where I went after 2012.

BACKGROUND (skippable): My name on here is Poonyen, but I also use the name Simon Swerwer to make music for DF.  I've been lurking mostly, and working IRL quite miserably but necessarily; all the while waiting to find a quiet place like my apartment in the Netherlands to concentrate, compose and record. I suppose that since I've started playing DF, I've been inspired by Toady and his brother to finally try to learn how to code a game, to push myself beyond just composing music to what I consider to be the next step in human narrative transmission: PC video games. I started out in 3D (like the masses of newby programmers thinking they can pull that off in the beginning), learning random midpoint displacement, quaternions and whatnot. Even genned a 2xEarth-sized explorable world with oceans (a la Outerra):

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

That thing in the center is an unassembled human. That orange horror is the sky. No comment on the "trees". Yeah, I'm not great with the GPU pipeline yet.

But when I started adding trees that mysteriously began to slow down everything^-1, I caved. I went to ASCII for a day or two. But finally I settled on a 2D platformer game. The planned features are written out. It'll be extremely hardcore survivalist (the obvious genre of our time) and, when I get to higher design phases, dynamically and sporadically story driven, but I'll keep that under wraps for now

One of the features, climbing, I was able to finish up to alpha in December.

THE TLDR (please read): I've uploaded an unlisted demo video of my attempt at indie game design here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pI0xJ_Awcgc. There's a improvised song along with it to hopefully make watching...uh...I called him "Skippy", bearable.

FEEDBACK REQUEST (please read): If possible, I'd love to hear what you'd fear in a game like this. Don't mind the rapid transformation from ragdoll to animation. I will start working on transitional interpolation soon. Same goes for the obvious and ugly square grips. In fact, ignore the visuals! It'll probably look less finished in the end. I might go for a Zeliard/Prince (orig.) aesthetic. The controls I used to move him around are literally only left, right, space and the left and right mouse buttons. It's difficult, but intuitive (with practice), I'd say. I'd also be willing to upload a playable version so you can clamber around (pointlessly, I'm afraid), but there's some cleaning up to be done first.

[De7ilx]

I liked what I saw. Will there be more physics ? I see you have basic one included when the Skippy fell down.
Where the game settling will be?

What I fear in a game like this? Game features, mechanics everything will be too basic and interest would go away after couple of hours to days when endgame is achieved.

[Shook]

Ooo, this seems to be pretty rad, i like how the climbing seems physics based. The main thing i'm fearing is that the physics might make it clunky, since it seems like it takes quite a while to scale a wall or climb along the ceiling, which might frustrate some people to no end. In a platformer, good controls are priority numero uno, since it's extremely difficult to have fun gameplay if the controls aren't up to scratch. While you obviously have kept the controls comparatively simple (a good thing), be careful that the ragdoll flailing doesn't interfere with gameplay too much. I don't know if this makes any sense at the moment, but hey.

[Poonyen]

I liked what I saw. Will there be more physics ? I see you have basic one included when the Skippy fell down.
Where the game settling will be?

What I fear in a game like this? Game features, mechanics everything will be too basic and interest would go away after couple of hours to days when endgame is achieved.

Thanks for the reply, De7ilx. The physics engine is pretty flexible, so I can theoretically make part of the wall collapse if I fracture is up a bit and switch the gravity on I have quite a lot planned for the setting, but I want to rely on some disorientation on the part of the player (e.g. where am I, who am I, when am I and wtf? etc.). There is a foundation for AI and Skippy has to eat something/one. I also dug out an space for some dynamic scripting and environmental events. Pure random burns out quickly, no? We want some stories, and I hope to deliver. The dungeons will obviously be randomly generated and kinda roguelike...but more lonely.

In terms of the mechanics, they won't stay basic, I promise. Much more will come, including, *sniff*, an idea I had for crafting similar to what can be seen in The Forest (man, what a bummergasm that trailer was to me). Attributes like strength and balance will affect everything, not your skills. No Archery Perks or nothing, kinda like a reduced Mount & Blade where your own skills determine your...skills.

Ooo, this seems to be pretty rad, i like how the climbing seems physics based. The main thing i'm fearing is that the physics might make it clunky, since it seems like it takes quite a while to scale a wall or climb along the ceiling, which might frustrate some people to no end. In a platformer, good controls are priority numero uno, since it's extremely difficult to have fun gameplay if the controls aren't up to scratch. While you obviously have kept the controls comparatively simple (a good thing), be careful that the ragdoll flailing doesn't interfere with gameplay too much. I don't know if this makes any sense at the moment, but hey.

Thanks as well for the feedback, Shook! I know exactly what you mean with the frustration of controls and I don't want that. And what you see now is hours and hours of fine-tuning and balancing (I have an absolute hatred for radians as a result), but in the end I wanted climbing to be primarily based on arm movements and only partial leg control. In fact, the arms are left and right mouse. Clicking and holding reaches out and releasing grips. Space is contract/expand limbs, depending on what the code guesses you want to achieve. Left and right tries to make him swing a little, but once you have the hang of it, it's not that necessary or difficult anymore. The mistakes you see are actually intentional (sorry, Skip).

What I have planned might be dangerous though: the climbing might be even more difficult because you will be able to slip without good grip/balance/strength etc. However, there will be many more possible places to hold on to. If the grips are closer together, you can climb like Pazuzu. Skippy's "stretching" in the clip is only laziness on my part because I wanted to quickly disperse the grips evenly on the edges to test everything out. Climbing along the ceiling will be very rare in the final product. I've tried that with rocks in real life and...just...no.