Competition Diary - neowert

A new entrant?

Thu, 08 Sep 2005 11:19:11 +1000

Is it just my imagination, or were there 25 people who finished by the deadline? It looks like there are 26 now.

If you want a few enhancemnets on my game..

Thu, 08 Sep 2005 08:07:28 +1000

There are a few mistakes I made in packaging that are easy to fix on my game. First, not being able to finish: Somewhere near the bottom of zombie.py there are 2 lines:
event_grid[27][114] = 2
event_grid[28][114] = 2

change the 114s to 113s. I forgot to account for the array starting at 0 :(. You will then be able to finish

Second, my engine supports sprite animation, but I messed up on the file format while rushing (I finished the game 16 minutes before deadline). open animations.pickle with any text editor, and after every # sign, add the number 300 on its own line. For example:

#
53
61

should be:
#
300
53
61

Here is the whole edited file for your convienience:
#
300
53
61
#
300
54
62
#
300
55
63
#
300
56
64
#
300
57
65
#
300
58
66
#
300
59
67
#
300
60
68
How this file works is # designates a new animation. The first number is how often in ms the animation updates. All the other numbers index an image in index.txt. So in the release I forgot to put in the framerate

Linux

Wed, 07 Sep 2005 08:53:15 +1000

It has come to my attention my game does not work under linux. If you have the proper dependancies, the only problem I can think of is the wrong case in data/graphics/index.txt. If you can tell me the error perhaps I could post a fixed index.txt. I was worried about this, but I do not have any unix variants avalible.
The problem is that data/graphics/guns/M16.png and data/graphics/guns/M1a.png should be m16.png and m1a.png. Once those files are renamed, the game works. Thanks to evil

To the east

Tue, 06 Sep 2005 02:01:36 +1000

It would seem that the manual says go to the west. Well, it is definatly east. Sorry about that. And when you start go fast, or a zombie will get you immediatly. The reason being the zombie placer in the editor has no delete command, so it is a bit of a pain to remove. And it may seem like you are not hitting the zombies, but you probably are. The thing is not all shots are head shots. It is hard to tell because we did not have time to put in a blood effect on hit. The pistol has a 1/3 chance of headshot, the other guns have a 1/2 chance.

oops

Mon, 05 Sep 2005 06:29:59 +1000

If you do manage to make it to the raft, just consider yourself a winner. It seems I placed the win event tile in the wrong place.

Zombies?

Sun, 04 Sep 2005 11:16:40 +1000

Some may be wondering what zombies has to do with power. The inspiration is "power in numbers". Although I dont think we put in enough zombies. See diary for earlier entry with more about it Another thing. It may seem that it doesnt take the same number of hits to kill a zombie. Well, it doesnt. It is a probability that every hit you kill the zombie. The point being not all shots are headshots. Although the 2nd 2 guns have better probabilities. Dont use e mthough. Too easy.

Well, we did ok

Sun, 04 Sep 2005 09:55:38 +1000

We have a playable game. We started 3 days late, and I could not write code every day. I probably should have used pgu instead of writing the sprite engine from scratch. The game came togather well enough. We did not have time to have weapon pickups (you start with all 3). We also didnt have time to make the bulldozer or menus. I recommend you stick to the pistol for a more authentic experience. keep an eye on mythicfiction.com (not up yet) for updates if you wanna see it done. It was fun. Good luck everyone. Special thanks to the artists (both good friends) Elijah and Sen (not real name) Also it is the hackiest piece of code anyone will ever see. I also wrote an editor. play around with that if you want Also we didnt have time for ammmo boxes. You now start with 2500. That was a key feature to add to the fear :( If you have an issue, saying it could load files, it is probably because we developed on windows and case sensetivity is not enforced. I dont know if this problem exists, but if it does you can go into data/graphics and make sure index.txt contains files with the proper cases.

chuggin' along...

Sat, 03 Sep 2005 18:06:47 +1000

We're still working on the zombie game over here at team neowert. we've had the good fortune of getting help from a 3rd person -elijah. he's done sprites and a title screen for us. the map, most of the sprites and the music is finished. the coding is coming along... most of the bulk is done. now its just making sure that it works and tweaking... lookes like we may slide in for a photo-finish tommorow. the game is a top down zombie shooter. map was done in tiles. we're trying to add a bulldozer... good luck all!

Finally

Wed, 31 Aug 2005 12:10:37 +1000

Since sen was busy and could not immediatly design the game, I took it upon myself to design it. With only 4 days left, I had to start on whatever. However I had still needed a game idea, and I got one. My thought process went something like: power->power in numbers->zombies(I love zombies)->playing as zombies would be boring->you kill zombies with firepower->power: though superior firepower. So yeah, it is a zombie survival game of some sort where you need to aquire the proper firepower and use certain tactics. Although I am still kicking around the idea of controlling a zombie horde. Although that would be too easy. The zombies always win. So at about the 4.1 day mark, I started code. I have most of the graphics rendering up, including animation stuff. Hopefully I can finish this thing.

I know python

Sun, 28 Aug 2005 15:52:50 +1000

I learned python just now (did not do anything in the 27 previous days), by glancing through "A byte of python" online. At which point I wrote a simple tetris clone in a few hours. I was lazy and did not make more than one type of piece though. But whatever, I need the time to write my actual game now. Thanks to the people on the pyweek IRC who answered some of my stupid python questions.

Just registered

Sun, 31 Jul 2005 05:19:29 +1000

I have just registered. I dont know python, but 27 days is more than enough.