6 years ago

About Rock Beyond Time


psynthetixbandcolor.png

Hi, I'm NukeOTron. I make video games. Recently, I worked on something that was NOT a video game. It was a learning experience on its own. In fact, it's what motivated me to make that new Terry game. ...or at least, one world of it.

To be honest, Rock Beyond Time was a good story. As a game, well, I'm not fond of making top-down games. I love making worlds. I love creating and drawing characters. I love making big, weird plots that are actually quite simple. I also know what I like in making video games.

So, let me reveal the great, big plot of Rock Beyond Time!

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In the land of Trula, year 3042, there's a band called Psynthetix. They were getting ready for their Rock 'N' Rage concert in Centeria Hall. However, the first song, written by their understudy bassist Scaramouche Faust, summons a demon, much to the dismay of the rest of the band. This sets off a disaster where the demon BLZB wrecks Trula as they know it.

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Six hundred and seven years have passed since then. The societies of Trula had separated between the people of Granowitz, which became a medieval-inspired city that rejected the ways of old, and the Scavvers, scavengers who would actively search for relics of old to survive and for the curiosity of it. Susan Abernathy was an indie Scavver, separate from any gang of Scavvers.
Suddenly, a flash of light from Centeria Ruins appeared, and she sought out the source. There, she not only runs into opposing Scavvers, but she meets Myles Taylor, the lead guitarist of Psynthetix, who somehow traveled through time during the disaster.

mylesposeforward_0.png

He quickly learns from Susan that he ended up in the future, and that the demon that he unwittingly summoned back in his time still exists in this one. So, he makes it his mission to find a way to defeat the demon once and for all. However, Susan wants to go with him since she knows this time better than he does. Not to mention, she finds him fascinating as a person from before the disaster can help clear up historical inaccuracies.

So, Myles and Susan travel together to find a way to destroy the demon, and maybe find a way back for Myles to his own time...

Anyway, what do you think? This could work as a video game, but I think it could also work as maybe a comic or TV show.

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...huh.

Didn't realize that debug mode was different on that version of Game Maker. Also shows WAY too much for players to use.

You can also click and drag some of those elements.

On one hand, I'm getting there. On another hand, "No, I'm not."

Then again, I probably forgot something important about layering the old-fashioned way, and something about using a view as a texture.

Dang it. I got the math right.

The real trick now is to optimize it. It's easier to do since it's technically all 2D.

Here. Just to give you an idea as to what I'm going for.

The character and GFX are temporary, but they help me realize what I want to do with the engine.

Okay, so I'm doing something either crafty or questionable: drawing the objects with Draw GUI.

It works, doesn't it?

The floor's movement, being a view drawn onto a surface, is still one frame behind.

However, I figured it's more efficient to draw walls separately than to use blocks for indoor segments. They can stretch and keep doing the depth math accurately.

The character and movement tests are going well, but...

OH. THAT's what Draw GUI does. It's not crunchy.

Then again, I thought that drawing a view to a surface would work the way I expected, but it ain't.

Part one of my zany scheme for a new project worked.

Using two Views, I can draw one squished, rotatable View as a texture, meaning I can use tiles for an isometric perspective.

Now, the tricky part is where everything looks like a pop-up book.

On the plus side, the tile layer ISN'T overlapping, and Draw draws objects.

On the other hand, NOW the tile layer lags during camera movement.

I guess I'd better let everything else lag for consistency (somehow), or fix the lag.

It took a while, but I got rotating flat sprites going.

Technically, it's a polygon, but it works.

If I were to do sprite-stacking, I have a basis, but my primary use for this is rotating attack animations.