Performance issues resolved?

Or was it never there to begin with?
When playing around in the asteroid field my laptops frame rate drops since the implementation of the new pixel perfect collision test.
My other pc is fine though so i guess it is due to the fact that my laptop sucks.

Enemy Movement during combat

Yesterday the enemy movement in combat was implemented.
Basically three different behaviors exist:

• Going straight for the player.
• Circling around the player.
• Fleeing from the player.

These basic behaviors can be customized by changing parameters and mixing/switching them according to certain conditions.

The game also now uses a custom font I created.
This screwed up the planet screen but I will have to redo most of the UI anyway.

Improved collision detection

Today I finally implemented pixel collision detection for transformed objects.
I was approximating hits with rectangles before which was fine with the asteroids.
But since the introduction of enemies it became clear that it wasn't enough.
Unfortunately this really messed up my code which was very clean before.
Whatever it was a necessary step!

First enemy

The first enemy has been implemtented.
It is a freighter. It moves from one side to the opposite side.

So much time and nothing got done

I can't seem to motivate myself.

At least i have improved the hud.

As one can see in this screenshot.

Weapon implementation

Every weapon in the game has a type.
There are weapons that fire bullets, others fire rockets, some fire lasers and some are very special in what or how they fire.
Today I have implemented a few of different behaviors.
Bombs, rockets, bullets, mines and a special weapon have been implemented.
The lasers are giving me a little trouble since implementing them will be a lot more difficult than the other weapons.
Once all weapons and enemies are implemented, the fine tuning of damage values, fire rates and other values can begin.

Equipment and items

I have now added all items, weapons and ships of the game. Every single one of them except for the ships has a unique icon. The equipment state will later be acessed through a context menu of a non hostile planet. Right now the equip state looks like this:

There are three tabs one for weapons and the other two for ships and items. It works pretty much like the planet state right now. Only differences will of course be that you are also able to equip all this stuff. The level of research and fortification of the planet will determine what and how much the planet is offering in the three tabs.

I also encountered a serious bug since I implemented the fleets on the map state. Since the fleets are neither completely implemented nor tested yet, I am positive that the bug will be fixed.

I am looking forward to ask some "test users" if the coloum icons are good.

Fleets

I have been working on the map state and the strategic part of the game.
I am currently trying to at least implement the very basic AI of the fleets.

Update on the planet UI/state

I noticed a while ago that my calculation of the screens safe area was wrong.
Only the planet UI was affected by this as I had to draw everthing in a tiny space.
I have redone the UI to better fit the new dimensions and also added functionality.
It is now possible to buy and sell stuff if you have the money and/or items.

It is also possible to invest into the categories of the planet. Although this does not do very much at the moment except cost you money.
The invesment and the needed resources to level up is what I will be working on for the rest of the day.
Also I am going to at least define very loose what a planet is offering and buying in accordance to its levels.

Farewell for now asteroids

Looting in the asteriod state is now possible.
The exact drop rates will be set during polishing.
As well as the making of the decision if loot should move and dissappear after a while.
I intentionally left out the influence of the destroyed number of asteroids on the quality of dropped loot as it just did not feel right.
Some minor changes where implemented as well as usual, e.g. by pressing "Start" the asteroid state pauses.

Loot

So the day is over and I have improved the asteroid state a lot.

It is already at a playable state and a lot of the classes will be reused in other action states.

Below is a screenshot that shows the asteroid state as it was this evening.

Most of the functionality missing belongs to the loot portion of the game.

The destruction of an asteroid triggersthe drop of a crystal.

The crystals quality is depending on luck and the number of asteroids destroyed by the player.

If picked up the crystal can be sold later to a planet.

Pistol and Shotgun

I have used the pistol and shotgun in the asteroidfield today for the first time

A lot of fine tuning will be needed concerning fire rate, damage, range and other variables.

Once the whole asteroid state is finished I will let someone else besides me play the game.

I hope their opinion will help me find the right values.

Asteroids

The first action state is coming along nicely.
It is the asteroid state in which the player can blow up asteroids and collect their crystals.
Crystals can of course be sold and diffrent kinds have different drop probabilities.
The Asteroidfield/the state can be left by leaving the so called mission zone, meaning travelling to far to the top bottom, left, or right.
When the player approaches the border a warning is shown so the player does not leave by accident.

Project hosting

Since yesterday I am using a free Unfuddle account.
My laptop has reached an age where a loss of data seems possible.
That and the fact that I had no backup of my work anywhere made me nervous.
I asked myself: "If I were to loose everything I have already done, would I start over again?"
The answer was no.
So I goolged for project hosting sites and found unfuddle which seems nice.
I have used google code in the past for university projects but it is only for open source project so it was not suited for my game.
Unfuddle is free to use and comes with some features.
Most of them are useless to me since I am the only one working on the project.

Slow progress

The equipment screen is now fully functioning, but looks unpolished like all the screens.

I also had to code the inventory and item components again as I wrote them quickly the first time around.

Back again

After a long break I continued coding today.
I noticed that two states should be added.
The one I am currently working on is a Equipment state allowing the player to select the ship he will use and to configure its weapons.

A very basic draft of what I am thinking of... very basic!

The other one is a popup state pausing the current state and informing the player of something.

Planet UI

The Planet UI has change a little and is making good progress.

I have also inserted the products for trading and given them names, descriptions and prices. Formulas are being used, so that a planet with a high level of agriculture will have other products than a planet with a low level of agriculture.

Dead Pixels

I have spent the whole morning playing Dead Pixels. A great gamefor just one dollar!

The first assets

I have created art assets for all the products the player will be able to trade and the weapons he can buy along with the icons needed for the planet state. Right now I am coding the UI of the planet state which totally sucks since it takes forever and is boring as hell.

A new NPC

In order to immerse the player I have decided to try and produce the illusion that he will play the game with his ships AI as companion. What I have in mind:
Game starts in main menu screen and a robot voice welcomes the player. Some sounds like "not enough money" or "low energy"will be replaced by speech output.
This also allows me to give the ships AI a character and throw in some famous movie quotes.
I am going to use an application called espeak to turn text into speech.(Type text, export as audio file)

Visible progress

I have added the missing states, but more importantly have started working on the universe. At the beginning of a new game a new universe with 100 planets is created. Some of them hostile, others are neutral. Each planet has values for population, agriculture, research, industry, education and so on. The player will be able to trade with and invest in neutral planets making them friendly over time. Hostile planets can be attacked.

But for now I am working on simply showing the complete galaxy and selecting planets.
This reminds me that I will soon be needing assets. Although I would love to already produce final assets, placeholder art will have to do it for the moment.

The Map state shows the universe the game takes place in.

GameStateManagement

Today I have been working on game state management, so I can't show very much.
I don't like the sample Microsoft provided at App hub probably because I don't like to read others peoples code.
I am planning on making every state a GameComponent.
The states I have planned so far are:
- Intro
- Map
- Asteroid field
- Menu
- Combat
- Planet
And I hope they will suffice but know already that Profiles and Options states are missing.
I also wrote a class to manage the transitioning of states. Most of these classes are a work in progress as the game design is still not finished.

The first blog entry

For the first blog entry I am going to post the first screenshot of the game I am currently working on in XNA.

There's not much to see yet. I am still uncertain about some details considering game design/mechanics and curious to see if I will be able to produce anything fun and playable before the next semester starts.