My idea for a fighting game. (In progress, help is appreciated. :D)

[Tomo009]

Doesnt Marvel 3 count since all the models couldnt have possibly come from another game? Or were you talking about sprites?

Models are infinitely easier and faster to produce.

[Kaiten92]

Models are infinitely easier and faster to produce.

I know that I’m just stating that they have made more than 20 characters in a game but it actually depends on what he means. The models were made but the characters are not new nor are most of their movesets.

[Tomo009]

I know that I’m just stating that they have made more than 20 characters in a game but it actually depends on what he means. The models were made but the characters are not new nor are most of their movesets.

I’m pretty sure he meant taking their entire spritesheets, as I believe was done in MvC2

[The_Damned]

(Indeed.)

Ugh. That post of my came out even longer than I intended. Apologies.

Doesnt Marvel 3 count since all the models couldnt have possibly come from another game? Or were you talking about sprites?

I meant sprites, which is what I’m intending on doing (if it’s ever done and/or I don’t die) in like…five years from now at earliest, especially since I admitted in that same post I know next to nothing about modeling.

[The_Killah29]

Hmm…how to explain this without side-tracking this thread or giving too much away on my end while still getting the point across. I’ll use spoilers here since I’m doubtless going to fail when it comes to trying to be concise about this.

The Usual Abject Failure

[details=Spoiler]Let’s take Street Fighter’s Dhalsim. When you think of or see Dhalsim, what’s the first attribute of his that comes to mind? Is it honestly his Yoga Fire and other flame-related moves? Probably not. They’re definitely a good chunk of his arsenal (even if no one ever really uses Yoga Blast) and something that you would expect Dhalsim to have no matter what game he appears in, but they take backseat to his stretching abilities and, arguably, even his teleportation ones. Dhalsim can spend entire rounds just poking at you & jumping or teleporting away way whenever you get close and never using his fire-related moves and still generally do well/win. Similarly, there’s nothing in his visual design that even suggests he “should” be able to spit fire at you; pretty much every still image you see of him has him stretching in some bizarre, inhuman way with little, if any, flames coming from his mouth.

But perhaps Dhalsim is too atypical to be a good example since, due to the length his limbs and his general play-style, he generally doesn’t have to pull off combos or even use special (or super) moves at all to win; for this same reason, this is why I didn’t automatically use Kazuki or Sogetsu or a couple of other people from Samurai Shodown despite mentioning it just above: that game is very normal-focused as a whole.

So, I’ll instead use Kula Diamond. Right from the get-go, you can tell she probably going to be ice-themed from the blue hair and the ice skates that you can see in most still images of her. In-game, it’s even more apparent that is the case even before she throws a single move since, if you pay attention to her idle animation, she’s pretty much constantly surrounded by small swirls of ice. And, well, once she gets going, you literally have to blind not to see the ice theme, especially since she’s one of the few “elemental” characters who has a good deal of elemental representation going even into her normals, as seen in pretty much all her :c: moves. As much as she may annoy me at times, I can’t deny that Kula is a very well-designed character (visually).

Now, as for what I mean for “defined by elements”, it’s basically trying to create a game where every character comes across at least half as well as Kula from a visual standpoint, both inside the game (since otherwise some people are going to constantly be wondering how the character is representing what they’re supposed to represent, which is distracting) and outside the game (for marketing purposes and attempting get people’s attention with “loud” and/or likable designs). That automatically limits a lot more what you can and can’t do from a design standpoint. So now you not only have to worry about how a character will generally play (whether they focus on trying to get in, keeping away, multiple hits because they have low damage, power singular hits while generally being sluggish or otherwise limited in opening you up, a grappler, etc.), but you’re also generally more limited to how a character can enact that play-style when it comes to how their moves look and perhaps other properties.

However, you don’t necessarily have to go as extreme as having your Fire character be constantly ablaze like Cinder from Killer Instinct (mine isn’t, outside of maybe in her other “form”) or your Ice character having literally ever move of his (or hers) be ice hitting you like Iceman (mine doesn’t, even though he makes all his weapons out of ice). Your aims are a bit…odd compared to mine, because pretty much all my characters are human (or look human) sans like three characters, none of whom are in the first game. Additionally, the first game is only going to have 12 people in minus the two bosses–well, technically 13 with Flame character’s other form I mentioned–and so there’s less chance of (visual) overlap.

On the one hand, you’re a lot more confined to visual designs when it comes to your six elemental characters just because they’re supposed to be outright incarnations and avatars of elements rather than just people who have that type of power (for reasons I’m not going to get into) like mine. On the other hand, when it comes to your other 14 characters, you have a lot more free-range (within reason) due to how abstract most of those concepts are. So you can have Peace be a Gentle Giant archtype who throws your ass around with counters like Goro Daimon or a moe-looking genki girl “loli” that constantly flashes peace signs…and throws your ass around with counters like Goro Daimon with equal reason; given that I have to agree with Divinus’s assessment being true, I would unfortunately suggest the latter. Of course this can backfire by having some concepts that are so open-ended, such as “Chaos” or “Order” or “Good” or “Evil”, that they could easily begin to step on each others’ toes. But I’ll get into that just below, especially since this was (of course) longer than I wanted it to be.[/details]

Is that what you meant? Or were you asking for more specific examples of what I had planned?

I think that covered more than enough on what i was wondering. And thanks for the ideas on Peace. I’ll probably do the ‘loli’ character one.
I did have ideas for ‘Chaos’ and ‘Order’ (at least gameplay-wise). Chaos’ attacks would all seem random and unlikely to combo, but does pretty decent damage to compensate. As for order, his/her’s attack are precise and to the point, and easy to combo. The downside would be that he/she is slightly weaker than most.

The thing is, though, Capcom has never, to my recollection, ever made 20 characters from scratch at once. Street Fighter (II) started out with 8 characters, then added the 4 bosses (as playable characters) and then the 4 new challengers. That’s only 16 characters over a course of years and several editions by the time Super Turbo came out–well, 17 including Akuma and obviously this isn’t counting the O. versions of anyone, partly because they’re not visually different at all.

Similarly, citing Marvel 2 as an example of “lots and lots characters” with sprite work being done is probably an one of the worst examples since, off the top of my head, Capcom “only” had to make up 8 sprites completely from scratch even in that game of 56 characters: Ruby Heart (how I miss thee), Sonson, Amingo, Tron Bonne, Servbot, Cable, Jill and Marrow. Literally everyone else’s sprite came from another older Capcom game, whether it was one of the versus games before that, Children of the Atom, Darkstalkers or, of course, Street Fighter (Alpha).

If Capcom had made all 56 characters from scratch in the relatively short amount of time in-between MvC1 and MvC2, then I could perhaps see your point, but they didn’t, so…yeah; there’s a reason that Morrigan’s sprite-work is so infamous. I don’t think any company has ever done that, actually, even SNK considering how a good deal of the characters in KOF originally came from Fatal Fury or even Art of Fighting.

Regardless, the fact is that you and whatever teammates you can scrounge up would still be doing more simultaneous work than Capcom (or any other company) has ever done just on sprites or models alone. Nevermind having to co-ordinate with those teammates, to worry about their schedules or what happens if they leave and to invest a good deal of time planning time-consuming things related to a large amount that isn’t related to sprite-work/model-work like match-ups, trying to make sure one’s characters playstyle doesn’t obviously obviate another and overall balance/coherence.

I get what you’re saying. Start off a little smaller would be wiser
Super Smash Brothers 1 and (arguable) Melee has done this (but with 3D models, not sprites)
I don’t plan on doing 2D sprites, not for any of my games, but for the purpose of showing what I mean, I’ll use M.U.G.E.N. as the example.
I’m also going to try to not go the Capcom route of making new versions of my game multiple times like they do Street Fighter, so I’ll take my time with the game(s) I make.

So, if you’re not doing 2D graphics, but are doing a 2D fighting game, I’m guessing you just mean a game where there isn’t side-stepping, correct? (Or free-roaming side-stepping or whatever. I’m not going to pretend I’m at all familiar with those concepts.)

Yeah, no side-stepping. Think of it like this, 2D stage like Street Fighter, but with the weapon choice system from Soul Calibur.

I see. Nothing much to say here except with regards to what I put in bold: If they’re all humans, then why are other planets involved at all?

This would hardly be the first piece of fiction where a threat to “the entire universe” were dealt with in such a geocentric fashion. So, yeah, I’m not sure I see the point of involving other planets if those beings are just going to be human as well.

I guess I should have changed ‘Human’ to ‘Humanoid Races’. :oops: But my ideas for the other planets would be stages. Usually the planets one topographical feature or a city/castle/town/village/etc in the background. Sorry if I caused any confusion. :oops: :lol:

Oh, I don’t think most people would be confused about Thunder even if you made it entirely electrical attacks. It’s just a pet peeve of mine, which is also why I gave you kudos for not making Good or Evil absolutist concepts, which most people would also be fine with.

Oh ok. The quotations will go on “Good” and “Evil’s” names but they will most likely be Angel and demonic in appearance so people could tell them apart.

[The_Killah29]

Damn, M.U.G.E.N. doesn’t work on my computer.

[Necrotrophic]

thanks.

but also you are saying c# isn’t a good way to go as far as designing a engine. I was going to do it for XNA, but the way it sounds, there is something about c++ that’s better. I understand it’s faster then c#, but again if you dont mind. If I make a game in something like XNA, the size limit aside, I’m I limited to what I can implement into within a engine in xna vs c++?

c++ is better because its more suited for low level programming, which means you can interact with the hardware more directly. also, memory management is handled by the programmer, as opposed to something like java, vb or c# that has the compiler do all of that.

and c is better than c++ for low level programming. if you want to make a game, c or c++ are the best options, you just have to know if you wat to use the object oriented model or not. if so, c++ is the best option.

[The_Damned]

(An earthquake now? Really?)

Use M.U.G.E.N. as the example? I’ve messed around with M.U.G.E.N. before, so I generally could understand what you’re trying to get if you wanted to just it explain it. I’m guessing you mean something along the lines of Dragon Claw perhaps? Or…?

I think that covered more than enough on what i was wondering. And thanks for the ideas on Peace. I’ll probably do the ‘loli’ character one.

And thus Japan did claim another victim.

I did have ideas for ‘Chaos’ and ‘Order’ (at least gameplay-wise). Chaos’ attacks would all seem random and unlikely to combo, but does pretty decent damage to compensate. As for order, his/her’s attack are precise and to the point, and easy to combo. The downside would be that he/she is slightly weaker than most.

This is actually part of what I was afraid of when it came to Chaos: being a slave to the RNG Gods. You can give a character unreliable aspects while giving them reliable means of damage otherwise as seen with Zappa and Faust and, well, I honestly can’t think of an example beyond both of those and they’re both form Guilty Gear. Making a character rely so heavily on “luck” is just asking for massive trouble.

As far as Order goes, that’s more what I was expecting since it’s indeed less troublesome than Chaos. I’m not sure it needed to be easy to combo as well, but if it has lower damage overall, I suppose that’s fine.

I’m also going to try to not go the Capcom route of making new versions of my game multiple times like they do Street Fighter, so I’ll take my time with the game(s) I make.

Well, it’s not like Capcom didn’t take their time with the game between versions or there probably would have been even more. Sometimes (overarching) revisions are necessary. Perhaps not as full installments, but mere patches, though of course that has its own problem of people then (of course) complaining about there being too many patches and it being forever-changing and… Not say that some of this isn’t valid complaining, but people are always going to bitch about something, so revision or multiple versions isn’t necessarily a bad thing just because some people might complain about that.

Regardless, yes, taking time with it or them is for the best. I don’t think anyone else expected anything less. No one wants another Tattoo Assassins due to rushed deadlines by people who have no idea what they’re doing.

Yeah, no side-stepping. Think of it like this, 2D stage like Street Fighter, but with the weapon choice system from Soul Calibur.

Weapon choice system? Sorry, I don’t think I ever really played anything besides Soul Blade, though maybe that’s just because the intro to that game is still so memorable:

Soul Blade intro

Spoiler

[media=youtube]Yxrpyv8SNS4[/media]

I guess I should have changed ‘Human’ to ‘Humanoid Races’. :oops: But my ideas for the other planets would be stages. Usually the planets one topographical feature or a city/castle/town/village/etc in the background. Sorry if I caused any confusion. :oops: :lol:

I see. I’m still not sure that’s “necessary”, but if it’s what you want to do, then I at least understand now. No need to apologize.

Oh ok. The quotations will go on “Good” and “Evil’s” names but they will most likely be Angel and demonic in appearance so people could tell them apart.

Yeah, unfortunately you’re probably best off going with visual stereotypes–even if what most people tend to think of as angels definitely are not the same ones that bibles describe–even if you’re not being absolutist about the terms.

[The_Killah29]

Use M.U.G.E.N. as the example? I’ve messed around with M.U.G.E.N. before, so I generally could understand what you’re trying to get if you wanted to just it explain it. I’m guessing you mean something along the lines of Dragon Claw perhaps? Or…?

I wouldn’t really know what to tell you. And M.U.G.E.N. (the creation tools part) doesn’t seem to work on my computer.

And thus Japan did claim another victim.

Japan claimed me looooooong ago.

This is actually part of what I was afraid of when it came to Chaos: being a slave to the RNG Gods. You can give a character unreliable aspects while giving them reliable means of damage otherwise as seen with Zappa and Faust and, well, I honestly can’t think of an example beyond both of those and they’re both form Guilty Gear. Making a character rely so heavily on “luck” is just asking for massive trouble.

I guess giving Chaos more combo-ability would be better. :oops:

Well, it’s not like Capcom didn’t take their time with the game between versions or there probably would have been even more. Sometimes (overarching) revisions are necessary. Perhaps not as full installments, but mere patches, though of course that has its own problem of people then (of course) complaining about there being too many patches and it being forever-changing and… Not say that some of this isn’t valid complaining, but people are always going to bitch about something, so revision or multiple versions isn’t necessarily a bad thing just because some people might complain about that.

Regardless, yes, taking time with it or them is for the best. I don’t think anyone else expected anything less. No one wants another Tattoo Assassins due to rushed deadlines by people who have no idea what they’re doing.

I’ll more likely go down the patching route. And i realize people will bitch about anything, tis nothing new, my time on Unity showed me that all to well.

Weapon choice system? Sorry, I don’t think I ever really played anything besides Soul Blade, though maybe that’s just because the intro to that game is still so memorable:

Soul Blade intro

Spoiler

[media=youtube]Yxrpyv8SNS4[/media]

Basically every character will have a weapon to start off with and with a few unlockable weapons later that give different effects. It’s what Soul Calibur has done.

Yeah, unfortunately you’re probably best off going with visual stereotypes–even if what most people tend to think of as angels definitely are not the same ones that bibles describe–even if you’re not being absolutist about the terms.

Yeah it’ll probably have to be that way.

[PKSkyler]

You gotta have an over the top character who thinks hes bad ass and exudes that aura upon others always. even though he might be pretty weak. A Dan Hibiki/Bang Shishigami type. I think Fire or Thunder would be a good element for this character.

[Maxwell755]

Similarly, citing Marvel 2 as an example of “lots and lots characters” with sprite work being done is probably an one of the worst examples since, off the top of my head, Capcom “only” had to make up 8 sprites completely from scratch even in that game of 56 characters: Ruby Heart (how I miss thee), Sonson, Amingo, Tron Bonne, Servbot, Cable, Jill and Marrow. Literally everyone else’s sprite came from another older Capcom game, whether it was one of the versus games before that, Children of the Atom, Darkstalkers or, of course, Street Fighter (Alpha).

Actually much of the work was already done on Ruby Heart and Amingo. They were planned to be Dark Stalkers characters but never made the cut.

Also, I would love to see some of your sprite work. Toss me a link in a PM or something.

[The_Damned]

(Freaking sleep schedule.)

It still surprises me how much people have come to like Dan because I vaguely remember him not being popular until he came back in SF4 (where he’s actually amazingly decent compared to this other incarnations) about two years ago. And even that didn’t really seem to kick off until SSF4. Maybe it’s just a lot more visible than it was before.

Or, maybe, just like Third Strike, it’s just another testament that people can get used to almost any character design as long as it can stick around long enough.

Basically every character will have a weapon to start off with and with a few unlockable weapons later that give different effects. It’s what Soul Calibur has done.

Oh, okay. I think I know what you’re talking about since I think I might have played the very first Soul Calibur and none of the ones after it. Didn’t Soul Blade have the same type of thing as well? Some type of “Conquest Mode” or something? I thought those weapons couldn’t be used during versus mode, though. Perhaps I forgot, though. Or maybe you were just talking single player?

Actually much of the work was already done on Ruby Heart and Amingo. They were planned to be Dark Stalkers characters but never made the cut.

Ah, right. I remember hearing about that. I just forgot. Hmm…maybe they’ll show back up in Darkstalkers 4 if that ever comes to fruition. Let’s “hope” that game is good.

Also, I would love to see some of your sprite work. Toss me a link in a PM or something.

I don’t haven’t any, sorry. My apologies for making it seem like I did somehow.

I just kept mentioning sprites because I have no illusions on how difficult they are to do. If I actually knew how to sprite, then I would gladly send you at least a character since I’ve at least had this idea for the past two years, with nothing much to do for the past year and a half. So I’m pretty sure I’d be done with at least half of cast by now. However, I don’t (and I don’t have a very capable computer at present on top of that) and when or if I ever do learn how to sprite, it’s not going to be for fighting game sprites.

I just know what I want most of my characters to look like by this point, partly because of the circuitous way–that I dub the “I Love You, Beth Cooper” Way–that I want to get this done if it ever does. Unlike all my other projects, I don’t plan to do this one by myself, at least currently. Going to need an army of [S]slav[/S] er…workers for this.

So basically every single thing I have now is textually based. Again, apologies for misleading you somewhere along the line.

[Maxwell755]

Ah it sounded like you are a bit of a pixel artist. You are at the stage I was at years ago on my game project. The best advice I can give is just start right now. Planning characters out on paper will only consume your time, you will constantly want to re-write and plan further. Usually you have to change things on the fly, and no amount of planning can prepare you for the obstacles you will face.

It’s usually best to start small then expand on it little by little. The details and character planning really only help once the hard part is over.

[Missing_Person]

Epic post is epic.

Seriously, thanks for bringing this up. I’ve been tossing around ideas in my head for a fighter, but have no idea how to write my own engine. I only knew of MUGEN, and KNEW that wasn’t what I wanted to use, so to see these options are epic.

[The_Damned]

(Well, that was quick.)

Must resist urge to kill people who overuse “epic”. Must resist urge to kill people who overuse “epic”. Must resist urge to kill people who overuse “epic”…[/mantra]

Ah it sounded like you are a bit of a pixel artist. You are at the stage I was at years ago on my game project. The best advice I can give is just start right now. Planning characters out on paper will only consume your time, you will constantly want to re-write and plan further. Usually you have to change things on the fly, and no amount of planning can prepare you for the obstacles you will face.

It’s usually best to start small then expand on it little by little. The details and character planning really only help once the hard part is over.

Ah, I see. I concur with this and will take it under advisement. Ironically, though, unlike the other things I’m planning, pretty much everything is coming together remarkably easily for this potential project. I haven’t had to really re-work anything all that much yet, much less done it multiple times unlike everything else I’m currently working on. Perhaps that will change in time.

That said, as I mentioned earlier, I’m working on…several other things now. As such, I’m probably not going to get around to this any time soon, which is why I’m being rather apathetic towards to starting it beyond a textual standpoint. I have a rather bad habit of not finishing things as it is, so I don’t really need to start up another project when I have like…three or four concurrent ones, all solo, on-going.

[Tomo009]

Ah it sounded like you are a bit of a pixel artist. You are at the stage I was at years ago on my game project. The best advice I can give is just start right now. Planning characters out on paper will only consume your time, you will constantly want to re-write and plan further. Usually you have to change things on the fly, and no amount of planning can prepare you for the obstacles you will face.

It’s usually best to start small then expand on it little by little. The details and character planning really only help once the hard part is over.

What was it that made you decide this? It sounds like a terrible idea. I mean you don’t want to get stuck just revising everything, but you should have a clear idea of everything you wan to be in the game. Even if you are working alone, writing a design document can only help.

[Maxwell755]

I only meant don’t overdo the planning. Of course you have to plan your project out on paper.
You seem to have taken what I said a bit out of context. I knew he already had some planning done.

[Kayame]

Update the OP with info like it’s going to be a 2.5D, weapon system
Death, Life, Good, Evil, Chaos, Order * Fire, Water, Earth, Wind <-Keeping it basic*

• Love, Hate, War, Peace, Mind, Soul, Time, Space, Thunder, Ice. <-extras*
  Combos: ( )mvc ( )SF ( )animu ( )SoulC ( )other
  I learned Mugen a little bit, it was good to learn programming logic but as an actual plataform it’s bad
  Observe SkullGirls development from the first build and you’ll see that the gameplay comes first the lifebars portraits menus is extra.

[CStatic]

Observe SkullGirls development from the first build and you’ll see that the gameplay comes first the lifebars portraits menus is extra.

As the saying goes, form follows function.

[The_Killah29]

Oh, okay. I think I know what you’re talking about since I think I might have played the very first Soul Calibur and none of the ones after it. Didn’t Soul Blade have the same type of thing as well? Some type of “Conquest Mode” or something? I thought those weapons couldn’t be used during versus mode, though. Perhaps I forgot, though. Or maybe you were just talking single player?

Well like SC there will be 2 modes for the weapons, a “regular weapon mode” using only the first weapon, and a ‘unique weapon mode’ for all the game modes such as arcade and online multiplayer. You unlock them by special means, such as ‘beat X’s arcade’ or ‘use X Y amount of times online’. Stuff like that.