My Flash version of CrazyGame

I decided to start a Flash port of the game mentioned in a past thread.
It's a really simple game, just a small little ship and a bunch of bullets. Hit a bullet and you die. Your score is the amount of seconds you lasted.

I've programmed video games for the GBA using devkitadvance and C but I never attempted a Flash game before. Today was the first day I touched Flash and this is what the game looks like for 24 hours of work:

http://www.fragglegames.com/frazzle.html

The game above is playable and I named it Frazzle.
I plan on tweaking it to be better, adding better graphics from my artist friend, add a nice background starfield effect, adding an online high score list, and adding features you guys recommend.

Feed me ideas. It's too simple / hack-job of a game right now.

Oh, and the people that wanted the game for the PocketPC...PocketPC supports Flash and I should be able to port it easily that way.

Things to tweak would be the bullet count/spread, the size of the arena, bullet speed, and collision detection (Flash's built in bounding boxes wasnt cutting it).

Thanks!
-Fraggler
www.fragglegames.com
AIM: TrHeEv

:meh: not bad, but still not CrazyGame.

Yeah. It needs tweaking, have to play around with it tommorow.

Pretty cool. My only suggestions would be to make the bullets move faster, since I spent a lot of time just hanging out in a dead spot while the bullets just floated around in another zone, and have the scores or a timer be displayed on screen during the game.

Shall do. Was thinking the same thing.

I say have an option for low quality. People with sucky computers like me make the game run REALLY slow.
Otherwise, I vouch for a ship-speed setting. Though, I think it would be good for the score screen to mention the speed setting for comparisons.
High score tables wouldn't be a bad idea, either.
Pretty good for a first attempt, I must say.

Hmm... I noticed some funky collision detection over here. One bullet that killed me was a few pixels away, while another one went right through me on another game.

Great start, tweak away and keep us posted. :)

James

Link doesn't work.

Link doesnt work since I worked out the collision bugs, tweaked the game settings, and added online high scores! Wee! All in two days work without even touching Flash before. It's made me want to make more games!

Here's the NEW link:
http://www.fragglegames.com/flash/frazzle.html

Improved graphics to come. So far it looks like Centipede gone bad. :P

Please give feedback whether good or bad, but try to be constructive with the criticism. :)

Wow, some people are getting some huge scores:

AiZ and cigsthecat broke the 300 second mark.
I can't break 30, and it's my own game heh.

I wonder what I could do to even out the level of difficulty for people who are scoring low and people scoring high. I'm not a big fan of difficulty levels and/or making the game cheap. I rather find a gameplay element to incorporate. Though all it might need is tweaking of the number of bullets on the screen.

I dunno if these scores are beatable.
I wonder if I should post to Score Attack?

Whoo-Hoo! Made it to the top 6!

Geez. I think this is harder than CrazyGame. Screen is so small. :(

Yeah... make it larger... its too small, even at 800x600.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by fraggler

Wow, some people are getting some huge scores:

AiZ and cigsthecat broke the 300 second mark.
I can't break 30, and it's my own game heh.

I wonder what I could do to even out the level of difficulty for people who are scoring low and people scoring high. I'm not a big fan of difficulty levels and/or making the game cheap. I rather find a gameplay element to incorporate. Though all it might need is tweaking of the number of bullets on the screen.

I dunno if these scores are beatable.
I wonder if I should post to Score Attack?

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Either it's too easy (bullets are too slow), or I'm somehow running it too slow. I died on purpose because I got bored.

Very nice, and really good collision detection. Personally I'd like to see a lareger viewing area in the next version. I like space to move, even space that's covered in huge swarms of bullets.

Any chance of a variable speed level too? Same proportion of ship speed to bullet speed but maybe a hard mode?

James

Doh! I figured people would want the smaller screen like CrazyGame, so I've been working on a scrolling high score list. I could only fit 6 rows, so I made it scroll and fit 15 high scores. I will make the arena larger right now and wont need the scrolling high score list. Sigh and wee! :P

cigs, do you have an old computer? The bullets move pretty fast on my machine. Please list your computer specs for me.

Are the bullets moving fairly fast for most people?

Here's a test, it takes 4-5 seconds for the bullet to hit me without moving from the start.

Counting off on my fingers, I got 4-5 seconds for bullet collision too. I'm on a P3-1Ghz with a GeForce3 Ti500. Pretty crap by current standards.

The thing about screeen size in CrazyGame is that I'd have liked it to be larger there too. Not being able to talk to the guy who made that one, I'll pass it on to you instead. :)

No point imitating CrazyGame when you can improve on it.

James

Thanks for the help with making this game better. I implemented two speeds of bullets.

I upped the bullet count using the same bullet size, and the game crawled even on my 2.6GHz lappie. Which is probably the way cigs saw it on his system. It did make the game quite trivial. In order to not make the game even more laggy, I slowed the framerate to a lower setting, but still just as smooth. I was basically telling Flash to move each frame really fast, which lags the CPU, when I could be moving the objects faster instead. So I increased the sprite sizes to help fill the screen and make it easier to view, made everything a bit more optimal speed wise and performance wise, and its now a 500x450 arena. I really dont know if the arena size is as nice for you guys as it is for me since Im on a 17" laptop screen with a weird widescreen view/resolution. I'll try it at 1024x768 on my other computer in a bit. I also started a new high score table for this version of Frazzler, but have the old scores still if needed.

Keep the feedback coming, and feel free to msg me on AIM: TrHeEv

Oh yeah, you might need to refresh the Frazzler page or clear web browser cache to get the new version. You can tell if its the new version if everythings bigger and better. :)

Oh, on this new version I made it a little more clear about the scoring. The score has been based on how many seconds you last before collision. So no need to count on the fingers. ;)

Good work!

Yay I'm in first. :D

The bigger screen makes all the difference.

Good stuff... wish I could play it at work.

Is there a version I can download?

P.S. Any chance you could put in a pause button? I suggest the enter key.

Nice.

Pause version on the way.
To play it at work, you either visit the site, duh heh, or you can use a web browser and load a saved HTML file and Flash file from your harddrive.

I put the two files in a .zip that you can download at:
http://www.fragglegames.com/flash/frazzleroffline.zip

When playing Frazzler offline, your score will be reported, but you will not be able to view the high score list since it will fail to connect to my site.

Oh yeah, do you think I should add a starfield or fireworks particle effect to the background? Or will it probably get in the way or just not needed enough to be worth it?

Just get in the way.

My computer's an HP Pavilion, Intel Celeron Processor, 63 MB ram. I don't know how to find out any other specs. It seems to run a bit faster/smoother now. Bullets take 4-5 seconds to hit if I don't move.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by fraggler

Pause version on the way.
To play it at work, you either visit the site, duh heh, or you can use a web browser and load a saved HTML file and Flash file from your harddrive.

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My work doesn't have teh internet... unless I can hax0r someones wireless connection, and I'm only in a location like that about once every week.

If I get a rocking score, can I upload it when I have a connection? That would be rad.

63(64 I think actually) RAM? Must be a pretty old Celeron with that kinda spec. I had 128MB of RAM when I had my Celeron 300MHz.

Might want to try upgrading that PC if its your only one.
The upgrade would be a new PC though.

Probably have to spend around $500 for a cheap, but still much much faster computer, Dell though.

I will keep tuning it to add performance. By looking at your score, you're either doing really well or its running slower than others which would give you an advantage. The bullets take 3 seconds on average to hit me without moving so I need to figure out how to even things out more for slower speed computers from getting an edge.

Icepick...Hmm only thing I could think of is the practice of taking a screenshot and having me upload the score manually.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by fraggler

I will keep tuning it to add performance. By looking at your score, you're either doing really well or its running slower than others which would give you an advantage. The bullets take 3 seconds on average to hit me without moving so I need to figure out how to even things out more for slower speed computers from getting an edge.

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Have you seen his shooter scores?

I'm gonna fucking play this all day tomorrow. Thanks for the zip file. :)

This is honestly quite good... I'll try to get it linked off on www.elliottingthemorning.com ... he likes the flash games.

Seen his shooter scores, meaning on my games high score list, or his shooter scores in general? I'm new to TNL so I dont really know much about anyone except a good friend who visits here.

This game/style, and others like it are my fav since its beauty is in its simplicity. I like simple arcade (sometimes puzzle) games that you can just pick up and play. Most games I have bought have a high learning curve, sometimes because theyre challenging, but to me, mostly because they have over complicated gameplay or (even worse) complicated controls. I sometimes get pissed off at a game when I cant remember what each button does. I have a bad memory though.

Unless you guys have a better idea for me, I'm thinking my next game will be like Buster Brothers, but thats in the near future.

Oh yeah, just checked out the link you posted. It had an extra "g" in it.
For those who want to visit the site its: http://www.elliottinthemorning.com/main.html

AHHHH!!! Addictive.

And I suck at this.

Its worse that I suck at my own game. I'm still trying to get a high score. Heh.

Me too. I can't seem to break 40, though.

Oh, and welcome to the board. May your stay be extemely fluffy.

Oops, wrong forum. Never mind. :)

James

Glad to join your cult. ;P

What are some things to possibly add/change to the gameplay?
...Powerups?

What about graphic effects?

I left the graphics pretty bland. The text and such will be improved most likely.

Oooh, much better than yesterday. I like the bigger screen; before I used to get hit within 2 seconds if I didn't move. This also explains those ridiculously high scores (slower computers). I knew I wasn't that feeble (not saying I'm not feeble, just not that feeble).

Couple things I'd like to see:

1. A way to try again without using the mouse (Enter key?).

I loathe the mouse and avoid using it whenever possible. In this case though it's an especially big annoyance to have to move your hand off the keyboard and click "try again" after every failure (being right handed anyway). Also, the cursor remains in the middle of the screen after you click unless you make a point to move the mouse away each time.

2. WASD controls.

That would be ideal but really, anything aside from the arrow keys which are just awkward to use (again, a bigger problem if you're right handed; prolly fine for lefties). WASD in addition to, rather than instead of, the arrows would be the best solution. This would mitigate the above problem too assuming you can't implement the Enter key for "try again".

I was getting annoyed by having to use the mouse to restart too. It use to reset the game with the ENTER key, but got removed. I'll implement that now. WASD controls can be added along with the arrow keys. In a bit I'll add a pause to most likely the SPACE key.

I added WASD support. I also made it so you can press ENTER instead of clicking the TRY AGAIN button. I work quickly. :)

I changed the Frazzler page layout to match the rest of my site:
http://www.fragglegames.com/flash/frazzle.html
Same URL as before.

I also updated the download of the Flash game for offline use:
http://www.fragglegames.com/flash/frazzleroffline.zip

Poor Icepick will probably lose his job from playing the game all day. :P

wow, that was fast. god, how great would it be if i could get hotkeys added to morrowind with so little effort. i'm still baffled (and will forever remain so i suppose) that i have to hunt for the "Goodbye" button with my mouse every time I want to end a conversation.

thanks!

I'm thinking of adding a Frame Per Second counter, and if it dips below the set FPS that runs on capable PC, it speeds up the bullets to the correct speed.

yeah, there needs to be something to that effect. even ignoring slower computers for a second, what stops someone from using moslo or a similar program to slow down their cpu to an absolute crawl, thereby allowing them to get the top score with ease?

but perhaps this is too much headache to worry about; maybe it should just be left on the honor system.

p.s. is there any way to get this to work with a game controller? prolly asking for too much i know. that would be cool though.

Yes. Check the thread about the original game for a link to "JoytoKey" or something to that effect.

Very well done :D
86 secs here with 1.7 Ghz 512 MB Ram.
I suppose it's full speed. Maybe.
Wish the collision area was smaller (lol)

I have a an unfair advantage. The bullets take about 12-15 seconds to get to me, if I don't move. I'm the guest wiyth the 248 score... and I could have lasted longer, but it was too slow, so I just killed myself.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Icepick

Yes. Check the thread about the original game for a link to "JoytoKey" or something to that effect.

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cool. downloading now. thanks.

jawbreaker... i used to be way into them. last jets to brazil i bought was pretty ack though.

NEW version. If your FPS dips a bit below the normal setting, it will add a little speed to the bullets and player. If it dips far below it adds even more speed.

I tested the game out at slow FPS and high FPS and it seems to level the playing field. It slightly penalizes really really slow computers since the game looks studdered instead of smooth, but thats because theyd have such a slow computer it cant handle Flash. :(

I saved the previous versions high scores for reference.
New high scores are being recorded.
You'll know youre running the new version since it will have a Frames Per Second count in the upper left hand corner.

I'm really sorry for having to start a new high score list for this version but this update fixes the problem of an unfair playing field.

Here were the old versions scores:
248 Guest
246 AiZ
213 cigsthecat
211 Guest
206 Rib
186 Lia
157 AiZ
140 Guest
138 Guest
132 Lia
125 Guest
123 hax
122 AiZ
114 SXA
109 Rib

The FPS on a good computer should hover around the set 31 FPS.
I'm logging (but not displaing in the high score list) the FPS along with the scores so just in case the FPS becomes an issue again, I can just pick out the bad scores, so no more resetting of the high score list.

frazzleroffline.zip has been updated as well.

Please let me know how this version handles. :)

I took down the game. I noticed the Frazzler I see, looks nothing like what other computers running it see. What you've seen is UGLY. So I'm going to fix it and make it look right for all people. BRB

Sigh. Its 3AM and Im going to get some sleep.
Basically the problem is Flash doesnt handle a lot of sprites well with consideration to the CPU power.
When I raised the playing field, I increased the sprite count to help fill dead zones.
Well it runs fine on my 2.6GHz P4 laptop, and 1.4GHz Athlon PC. But a friend with a 1.1GHz (not sure whether it was Intel or AMD or the processor type) ran the game he was getting 14 FPS instead of my 30 FPS. I got his FPS up to 17 FPS by tweaking code but thats not good enough. So I thought I'd make a large version of the game and a small version. Since if I reduce the size of the large screen in half, and reduce the sprite size in half, and the bullet count in half, the FPS go (more than even) twice as fast. Its basically the same game just smaller. So the high score tables could be mixed, but I was thinking to add a "+SML" to the username of the people using the small version. The small version should run at full speed on an Intel P2/3 400MHz.

I'm kinda getting sad now that I have stupid limitations of what seemed to be the perfect Flash.

I'll get the large/small versions up tommorow after I fix a small bug.
If you have any ideas/input on this problem or any other ideas lemme know, and I'll implement the idea tommorow.

Night.

Yeah, I was getting 2.2 FPS on my 300mhz celeron.