Blog for Kyle Goodwin at GarageGames.com

Tuesday Dec 14 21:35

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-12-14T21:35:31+00:00

A video of the game I've been working on: http://firoc.org/glyph/GlyphMovie.mp4

Here's a video of the game I've been working on: http://firoc.org/glyph/GlyphMovie.mp4

Hopefully the server doesn't die under the load, it's not a hugely fast connection. Got soem positive feedback about the video after using it to illustrate a particle effect in another thread, so I thought I'd go ahead and share it.

Tuesday Nov 2 17:42

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-11-02T17:42:18+00:00

Glyph is getting wrapped up this week; we'll be submitting to the Student Showcase at IGF (deadline November 12th) and releasing Beta 1 on November 8th. We'll continue to use the same online and updater distribution system we've been using for our alpha tests, but additionally we'll we adding a complete bundle installer for Mac and Windows.

That brings me to the real point of this plan, where I'm going from here. Glyph is really a fun game to play and has far exceeded our expectations for our first game. We'll definitely be finishing up Glyph in the next few months and hopefully publishing, but it's time to start thinking about the next thing, too. Since we're a student team, it's unlikely we'll be able to keep everyone together for the next project, but I think what I can take away from the experience both as a programmer and as a project manager will definitely help with getting a new team together. My next project will certainly be with TSE, and will also certainly leverage our existing Glyph assets. Most likely I'll be looking to create a small-scale persistant game which will capture the fun of modern online games without trying to overextend myself on something like an MMO game. We have a lot of great multiplayer features in Glyph and I would like to continue to focus on multiplayer systems.

I'll be looking for artists (3d and 2d) and interior designers for the next game at some point. Check out Glyph ([url=http://firoc.org/glyph/]) and if you think another game along those lines is something you'd like to be involved with, drop me a line.

Thursday Oct 21 14:06

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-10-21T14:06:20+00:00

Second large scale playtest of Glyph set for tonight, 6:30pm EST.

The Alpha 3 playtest will occur tonight at 6:30PM in the College of Computing Digital Media Lab at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, GA. Remote connections will also be accomodated through the college internet connection for registered alpha test members. Signups for alpha testing will be considered up until half an hour before the test, please see firoc.org/glyph for details. The link to the Alpha/Beta test Information will allow you to sign up for the test if you have not already done so. Versions currently available include Windows and Mac client/server as well as a dedicated server build for Linux. The Linux client build will be available soon. Also on the website you may find a detailed version history and changelog covering the updates since Alpha 2 as well as other general information about the game.

Thursday Oct 7 17:24

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-10-07T17:24:20+00:00

Glyph alpha test phase 2 has begun.

Today marks the end of Glyph's alpha test phase one and the start of a much larger scale alpha test phase 2. I just cleared everyone who was initially accepted for the alpha test and the first large scale playtest will occur tonight at 6:30PM EST. Anyone in/around the Atlanta area wishing to take part in the local test may come to the Georgia Tech College of Computing Digital Media Lab (104A) at that time. The server will also accept remote connections from those not able to come to the local test and will go up around 6PM EST. If you are not a registered alpha tester and wish to partiscipate in tonight's envent, please sign up using the glyph web site at firoc.org/glyph and you will be considered this afternoon for acceptance before the test begins. Please use the time between ebing cleared and the start of the test to download the software so as not to overload the servers at the time of the test.

Friday Sep 24 15:20

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-09-24T15:20:29+00:00

Got overbright/overexposure working for Glyph...and it's not the lighting pack! ;)

Here's a quick screenshot of the new look of Glyph with my overexposure effect enabled, more info coming soon to a plan near you about the Glyph alpha test beginning shortly (you can sign up at firoc.org/glyph/ (and also see the old screenshots without the new lighting, read about the game, etc.).

Monday Sep 20 19:25

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-09-20T19:25:47+00:00

Tagged alpha 1 release of Glyph. Testing applications opened. http://firoc.org/glyph

I tagged the alpha 1 release today of the game I'm working on, called Glyph. The project website is located at http://firoc.org/glyph (it's a work in progress and may have a few compatibility issues with some browsers, let me know if you have trouble with it). On the website is an are where you can register to enter the pre=production test program in order to play in the alpha and beta test phases. Screenshots and other information is located on the website. Below is a brief overview of the game, taken from our design document:

Glyph is a network enabled multiplayer first person shooter (FPS) game based on the Torque Game Engine. Players are immersed in a 3D fantasy environment combining the adrenaline-induced elements of FPS game play and the tactical and strategic components of a more traditional role playing game (RPG). Players are wizards who can cast various spells based on the glyphs they have acquired through battle. Some power-ups are available to increase health, mana, or other special abilities.

Players begin with only one basic spell and are spawned at random points around the map (spawn points). Players must compete to kill monsters in order to acquire glyphs granting them more powerful spells. Players are constantly competing against each other balancing current fragging with the increased fragging potential available by acquiring the more powerful spells. The game ends when a server-defined condition in terms of frags or time is met and the player or team with the highest frags wins. A score screen is shown to all players before the next level loads to display frags and other statistics.

Glyphs are acquired by killing a monster and picking up the glyph dropped after death. Spells require a certain number and combination of various glyphs and are granted when all required glyphs are in a wizard's possession. When a spell is granted, the glyphs used to create it are consumed. When a player is killed all carried glyphs and persistent power-ups are dropped to the ground. However, spells already granted to the wizard are not lost upon death. There will be five main glyphs in the game which correspond to the ancient four elements: Fire, Water, Earth, Air, and a new fifth element Spirit. In addition to the elemental glyphs, there will be six "difficulty" glyphs that are currently lettered in increasing rarity, A through F. The difficulty glyphs may be used for only one spell while the elemental glyphs are good for all spells. For example if two spells require the Fire glyph, once the player picks up the Fire glyph both spells are granted. On the converse is the difficulty glyphs can only be applied toward one spell, if two different spells require the A difficulty glyph, then the player must find two A glyphs in order to use both spells. Higher power spells require more glyphs to form and some glyphs may be dropped by harder to kill or more rare monsters. Below is a chart containing descriptions of the spells and which glyphs may be combined to "learn" the spell.

In addition to glyphs, the game will also contain various power-ups that affect the players abilities or status. Consumed power-ups, health packs for example, are periodically repopped at their spawn locations. Persistent power-ups are not repopped since they stay in circulation by being dropped upon death. Some examples of persistent power-ups are: increased max health, increased spell damage, increased speed, increased mana regeneration. Glyphs are repopped when the monsters holding them are repopped which happens periodically and on a per-monster basis. Mana is consumed when a wizard casts a spell and regenerates over time. Spells can cause damage in a variety of ways (targeted bolts, homing bolts, direct damage, area damage, etc.), make another wizard susceptible to a certain kind of damage, dispel effects on a wizard, protect a wizard, or heal a wizard. Buttons can be configured to select a category of spells and then a gui is used to select a specific spell in that category.

The engine and networking will be implemented using the Torque Game Engine. The game will be multiplayer only and first or third person.

Score keeping will follow more traditional FPS multiplayer games. Each time a wizard kills another wizard, the killer gains a frag or kill. Proposed game modes will be "Free-For-All" where players compete against each other, Team Deathmatch, where two opposing teams try to kill off each other, and, time permitting, a Capture the Flag mode. At the end of a time period or when a player/team gets enough frags, the level ends and the players are ranked according to their frags.

Thursday Sep 9 15:34

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-09-09T15:34:34+00:00

Mac optimization tutorial added to resources.

As promised, I've added a resource about optimizing Torque for mac. You can find it here: http://www.garagegames.com/index.php?sec=mg&mod=resource&page=view&qid=6393

It covers altivec, gcc flags, parallelization, etc. and also has some backgropund information on how the G5 works and why certain flags are useful. All these optimizations combined give me a frame rate average around 100 on a G5 1.6GHz with Radeon 9600. I've seen frame rates as high as 140 in certain situations. All frame rates are quoted based on the demo level.

Wednesday Sep 1 23:34

Kyle Goodwin — 2004-09-01T23:34:26+00:00

Ever wondered why TGE was sluggish on mac? I've just completed a rewrite of the texture blender for mac to use altivec extensions on the g4 and g5 processors with quite astonishing results. Profiling before and after indicates the percentage of execution time spent in the texture blender went from nearly 80% before to around 5% after and framerates show similar improvements: on my 1.6GHz G5 with Radeon 9600 pro the framerate on the demo map went from ~15-25fps to ~45-115fps. I'll be submitting my code for incorporation into HEAD once I'm satisfied that no more improvement is likely. If you have a burning need for it before then feel free to shoot me an email and I'll see what I can do.

The Glyph project has passed the prototype phase and met its minimum functional target this week, we're now forging onwards towards our desirable target. Except a press release and some dev screenshots coming soon. I'll have another .plan with details within a week or two, as well.