Grimm's Hatchery
by amaranthia · in Torque Game Builder · 01/11/2007 (7:23 pm) · 53 replies
After several months, my casual game is almost ready! Okay, so there aren't any chickens in it, but there are lots of geese, weird creatures, and monsters to keep players busy. The goal of the game is to start a pet empire. The player gets to buy, hatch, and sell pets and eggs. There is also a pet lab where the player can attempt to create new species of pets.
You can learn more about the game here.
The game is in beta right now, but here are a couple of screens:
:D
Amanda
You can learn more about the game here.
The game is in beta right now, but here are a couple of screens:
:D
Amanda
#42
If at all possible, do you think you could work up a TDN Page or something with all the problems, just listed out ... then come back and fill them in piece by piece as you have time? I don't mean to try to monopolize on your time, but I was unaware of some of the issues I've seen you run into, and I'm not really sure what else might go wrong, and I'd hate to release the game and then have to answer tons of support emails for it not working ...
Are any of the issues hardware damaging? ie; it tries to set resolutions that are not supported, and could potentially damage video/monitor devices for example?
04/08/2007 (5:34 pm)
Amanda, I'm currently working on a game that will, hopefully, reach a large target audience, do you by chance have an ETA on when you might have some of this "show stopper" information available?If at all possible, do you think you could work up a TDN Page or something with all the problems, just listed out ... then come back and fill them in piece by piece as you have time? I don't mean to try to monopolize on your time, but I was unaware of some of the issues I've seen you run into, and I'm not really sure what else might go wrong, and I'd hate to release the game and then have to answer tons of support emails for it not working ...
Are any of the issues hardware damaging? ie; it tries to set resolutions that are not supported, and could potentially damage video/monitor devices for example?
#43
Best wishes, Amanda! You are very generous to publish fixes for these problems. I'm certain it will save many butts and be graciously appreciated. Good luck on whatever your next project will be. :)
04/09/2007 (11:54 pm)
I ran into lots of video compatibility and just plain bugs, too, when I released the TGB version of Fashion Fable. I've got another project in the works using TGB (will be announced here soon), but I do not plan to use TGB after that in part because of these problems. (The other problem is that TorqueScript and I don't get along.) :P Lucky for me I had special circumstances where I could publish and leave the bugs in, but other projects may not be so lucky.Best wishes, Amanda! You are very generous to publish fixes for these problems. I'm certain it will save many butts and be graciously appreciated. Good luck on whatever your next project will be. :)
#44
-How to remove the 3D acceleration requirement from your project
-How to get your game to run on Windows 98
-How to get the Windowed mode to properly render each time
-How to avoid the black screen of death (several things to do)
I should have an outline on the TGB wiki next week sometime.
04/10/2007 (8:35 am)
Jason, I think the TGB Casual Gamers guide I'm about to write should help you with your next project. Here are some of the things it aims to show:-How to remove the 3D acceleration requirement from your project
-How to get your game to run on Windows 98
-How to get the Windowed mode to properly render each time
-How to avoid the black screen of death (several things to do)
I should have an outline on the TGB wiki next week sometime.
#45
Hopefully soon. As for games in the store made with GG products, right now 75% of the games are made with Torque, but that is NOT a requirement to get published with us, though it does help (especially for casual games where there are too many of them for us to publish them all).
04/18/2007 (7:13 pm)
Quote:When will we see it in the GG store? I'd like to see more games made with GG products on there.
Hopefully soon. As for games in the store made with GG products, right now 75% of the games are made with Torque, but that is NOT a requirement to get published with us, though it does help (especially for casual games where there are too many of them for us to publish them all).
#46
- Martin
05/02/2007 (9:14 am)
We have put a small interview with Amanda on our website www.twintalestore.com if anyone is interested in reading it.- Martin
#47
05/27/2007 (11:23 am)
Any news on the release of the TGB Casual Gamers guide ?
#48
Somebody can tell me how can I achieve that?
Thanks!
08/23/2007 (2:42 pm)
I see that the whole artwork of this game is hidden. Somebody can tell me how can I achieve that?
Thanks!
#49
TGB 1.5 has a ZipObject, which you can use to create a VFS
08/23/2007 (6:02 pm)
Isaac, you can store the artwork in a Virtual File System, such as a ZIP Archive ... possibly with a password ... the artwork for Grimm's, if I remember correctly, is packaged inside of a proprietary format specific to the publisher Amanda used ... but I can't recall specifically and could be wrong ... most likely, it's a form of 'zip' archive though ... TGB 1.5 has a ZipObject, which you can use to create a VFS
#51
There is no 'stock' built-in way to do it in 1.1.3, and I believe that 1.1.5 still doesn't "officially" support it ... but the code is there ...
Amanda most likely received a publisher specific SDK, which she then integrated into TGB ... to launch the game ... or 'wrap the game' ...
Some publishers have launcher apps that actually launch the game from inside of a virtual file system ... picture how running applications or opening documents from within a ZIP works ... without the need to extract the ZIP ... thats a 'virtual file system' for the most part ... Windows treats ZIP files as Folders ... for example.
Without an official response from Amanda, I don't think you'll get the answer you want ... cause I'm pretty sure they all require you to A) upgrade to 1.5 or B) add in custom C++ resources and recompile ...
and even with an upgrade to 1.5, there's still a recompile required to do some of the more interesting things ... pretty sure they are disabled by default (such as password protected archives, etc)
Search the forums for 'Virtual File System' or 'VFS' ... sure you'll find a few topics of interest.
08/23/2007 (6:33 pm)
Use the C++ Resource for 1.1.3 that adds the same ZIP functionality that's in 1.1.5 ... There is no 'stock' built-in way to do it in 1.1.3, and I believe that 1.1.5 still doesn't "officially" support it ... but the code is there ...
Amanda most likely received a publisher specific SDK, which she then integrated into TGB ... to launch the game ... or 'wrap the game' ...
Some publishers have launcher apps that actually launch the game from inside of a virtual file system ... picture how running applications or opening documents from within a ZIP works ... without the need to extract the ZIP ... thats a 'virtual file system' for the most part ... Windows treats ZIP files as Folders ... for example.
Without an official response from Amanda, I don't think you'll get the answer you want ... cause I'm pretty sure they all require you to A) upgrade to 1.5 or B) add in custom C++ resources and recompile ...
and even with an upgrade to 1.5, there's still a recompile required to do some of the more interesting things ... pretty sure they are disabled by default (such as password protected archives, etc)
Search the forums for 'Virtual File System' or 'VFS' ... sure you'll find a few topics of interest.
#52
Thanks Again!
That seems lots of extra work :(
And I need to finish this version for a show. I will try that later :)
08/23/2007 (6:36 pm)
@ David,Thanks Again!
That seems lots of extra work :(
And I need to finish this version for a show. I will try that later :)
#53
Did you ever get around to writing the wiki for this??:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-How to remove the 3D acceleration requirement from your project
-How to get your game to run on Windows 98
-How to get the Windowed mode to properly render each time
-How to avoid the black screen of death (several things to do)
It would be very useful to many people including myself! Thank you!
08/29/2007 (8:05 pm)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Did you ever get around to writing the wiki for this??:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-How to remove the 3D acceleration requirement from your project
-How to get your game to run on Windows 98
-How to get the Windowed mode to properly render each time
-How to avoid the black screen of death (several things to do)
It would be very useful to many people including myself! Thank you!
Associate amaranthia
TGB was a good tool to use, but there were some video issues that I think Garage Games needs to fix. I'm pretty sure that most portals will not accept a TGB game if you don't tweak video problems that are in the engine by default. I had a couple of show-stopper video bugs that my publisher would not look past until they were fixed. I'm not really a hard-core programmer, but luckily my boyfriend is. So, I had him clean up some parts of the engine that needed to be fixed before I could get approval to have the game go live.
No worries, though! After I take a little break, I'm going to write up a guide to help casual game developers get the engine ready for casual game development. It will contain important video changes that you'll probably want to make to the engine, a list of gotchas to look out for, and lots of advice from developers on this website that have way more experience than I do with the engine.
If I make a Grimm's Hatchery II, I'll definitely be using TGB. Now that I've got it customized for casual gamer machines, it's a nice piece of work.
@A
I hope it will be up there some time soon :)