RPGDX > Forums > Projects / Screenshots > Afterworld (C64-style RPG)

Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Sat Oct 25, 2014 9:58 am Post subject: Afterworld (C64-style RPG)

Last month, I participated in a small challenge to make a game in a month - I didn't come close to finishing, but that doesn't matter, as it gave me a good start, and I will just continue working on it until done.

The game is much inspired by an old Swedish table-top roleplaying game from the 80s, called "Mutant" (which I have recently learned is heavily inspired by the TSR game "Gamma World"), and is basically taking place in a future civilization where animals have evolved "Planet of the apes" style - so various anthropomorphic animals and remnants of our current day civilization.

I intend to try to make it in a style close to Commodore 64 - not in an "accurate emulation" kind of way, more just the general aesthetic.

The gameplay will be some mix between Dungeon Master and the Gold Box games.

I'll try and post a bit more about my progress so far over the next few days, and after that I'll do the occasional update - sometimes with a runnable build of what I have so far, for those interested.

Here's a screenshot of the title screen:

I had the idea to use stock royalty-free clipart as a base for this game, and rework them into the right palette/resolution. I think it might work out ok.
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Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Sun Oct 26, 2014 7:28 am Post subject:

So this game is going to have some sections where you walk around in first person. I have this collection of stock textures which I wanted to use for this - nice hires full-color textures. It turned out that it is rather tricky to get them into the C64 palette, especially as I ideally want it fully automated. I've been implementing a little image processing thing to do it, and this is how they come out:

I quite like that they're a bit noisy, but not using full dithering.
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www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

tcaudilllg · Posted: Sun Oct 26, 2014 7:53 am Post subject:

It's gonna be hard to make anything look good on on the C-64. I can't bring myself to play any games on the system... the pixels are just too wide. >_> There are probably people who disagree with me though... provided they aren't all saving up for their kids' college by now.

Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Sun Oct 26, 2014 8:09 am Post subject:

Well, I am not *actually* making it *on* the C-64. I just emulate some aspects of its aesthetics.

But, I do think that he double-pixel look has its charm, in that illogical rose-tinted nostalgia way :D

Anyway, making things look good has never been my thing, and this is just a small, free game for fun, so I think it will all work out ok :-)
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www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

tcaudilllg · Posted: Mon Oct 27, 2014 10:54 pm Post subject:

It actually doesn't look horrible. It'd look a lot worse on EGA, probably.

Though Arne's palette just might do the trick here.

Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Tue Oct 28, 2014 10:03 am Post subject:

So the idea for this game, is to have the same type of movement as "Dungeon Master" or "Legend of Grimrock" - movement on a fixed grid, 90 degree turns. But, I want interpolated turns and moves, so I decided to implement it in a Wolfenstein 3D kind of fashion. Here's a GIF capture of free movement with my base engine:

There's some flickering, especially in more distant pixels, but some mip-mapping should alleviate that a bit.
_________________
www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Tue Oct 28, 2014 7:32 pm Post subject:

If anyone wants to try the raycaster thing, there's a build here: http://mattiasgustavsson.com/temp/afterworld/raycaster.zip

There's still some mipmap flickering issues, and no CRT shader in this version, but the movement is the correct grid-based. There's nothing to do in this build but walk around, but still, it's there if anyone wants a look.
_________________
www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

tcaudilllg · Posted: Wed Oct 29, 2014 1:44 am Post subject:

Is there any particular reason you are using small textures from farther away?

tcaudilllg · Posted: Wed Oct 29, 2014 5:51 am Post subject:

I think you're packing too much detail into the long-distance textures. For example those walls with the brown dividers. From that far away it shouldn't be possible to see the divider line (well it should be, but not at that resolution). The texture should be flat from afar and increase in detail up close. But it SHOULD NOT be blocky, or otherwise look scaled.

Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Wed Oct 29, 2014 8:35 am Post subject:

Yeah, there's still some tweaks to do on the mip-mapping - especially the lower levels used at the distance. The reason to use smaller textures far away, is to reduce the flickering which happens otherwise, as pixels being sampled from the texture fights each other for which one should be shown as the viewpoint change. Some degree of blockiness is unavoidable with the C64 double-width pixels.
_________________
www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Wed Oct 29, 2014 8:36 am Post subject:

Mockup of the in-game section, lacking stats and controls:

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www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

Adam · Mage Joined: 30 Dec 2002 Posts: 416 Location: Australia

Looks cool, but where's the wide pixels? :P

Also I just noticed that your sneaky avatar changes.
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Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Mon Nov 17, 2014 7:25 am Post subject:

Oh, the screenshots above (not the textures) are using double-wide pixels!

I've been making an automated processing tool for my NPC renders (similar to the texture processing tool), to make my 3d renders look more pixelated.

It will be harshly mangled by the raycaster (and used at lower res) so won't end up this clean looking in the game.
_________________
www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

Mattias Gustavsson · Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2015 6:29 am Post subject:

CRT version http://www.mattiasgustavsson.com/temp/afterworld/crttest.zip

_________________
www.mattiasgustavsson.com - My blog
www.rivtind.com - My Fantasy world and isometric RPG engine
www.pixieuniversity.com - Software 2D Game Engine

tcaudilllg · Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2015 2:30 pm Post subject:

Well it's c64 so you will be able to play it without scanlines, right?