New Sonic Project

[Lightspeed]

Hello everyone. I am new to the fangaming scene, but I figured that I should start somewhere, so I will be making a sonic game in gamemaker 7 pro. It has no official name yet, but for now it will be called New Sonic. It uses a game engine that I bet none of you have seen before. It seems to have sonic and the secret in mind but it is also very similar to Damizean's engines. I have no demo yet, (I hope to have one soon.) but for now, I have some screenshots. Hope they don't look too bad.

(Being chased by a boulder)

(Running over water)

(Destroying enemies.)

(Running up the side of a mountain.)

Please comment and tell me what you think.

Edit: Also, the Engine features are:

1. Motion Blur

2. Loop de loops

3. Running over water

4. Charged jump

5. Speed Break

6. Time Break

7. Chaos Control (May be edited.)

8. Enemies

9. Basic Ringloss

That's all for now.

[Tweaker]

Eh... seems kind of generic. Generic engine, generic blur effects, generic test level.. just lots of generic. Generic.

I can't really judge anything until I see actual level material. Good job being generic though, I guess?

[Lightspeed]

This is just an extremely early version. There will be much, much more to come. Thanks for the input.

[Cuda Ahbuda]

I like where this game project is going

[Lightspeed]

Thank you Cuda. It might be a while before I get up a demo I feel is stable, so stay tuned.

[Minon]

I say you're off to a pretty good start.

I'm expecting you'll be spiffing up the HUD on the bottom left in the future?

[Lightspeed]

I'll see what I can do.

[Slingerland]

Shrink your avatar, Lightspeed.

Also, generic with huge resolution.

[Perry_]

Looks like a nice engine. Any plans as far as design goes? Like are you aiming for a sonic only genesis type experience or are you aiming for 2D sonic adventure with multiple characters? Or perhaps a mixture of both

[LarkSS]

Shrink your avatar, Lightspeed.

Also, generic with huge resolution.

320x240 dude.

And uh, you and dw should shrink your sigs while on the topic of big images. =/

[DimensionWarped]

What are you still using 800x600 or something? Bleh. I'll halve it.

[Lightspeed]

Ok, I shrank my avatar and @Slinger- What do you mean by huge resolution? If you mean that the game window is too large, so far I haven't found a better way to do it without seriously distorting the graphical quality. I will try to find a way to make it smaller. Also, to the people saying its generic, this is a very early version only meant to show some ideas. As the development continues I promise you there will be non- generic graphics. I already have a background and am now searching for more graphics. Be patient and thanks for the input.

[DragonXVI]

A lot of people working on Sonic projects correctly base their resolution on that of the original platform - Genesis, GBA etc.

For Genesis you're looking at 320 x 224

GBA I may be right in thinking it's 240 x 160, DS something whacky like 256 x 192

If these resolutions were good enough for the original devs, they're good enough for us

The reason is that the sprites and backgrounds many people use (Ripped from the classics) were created with these dimensions in mind, so you shouldn't be losing any graphical quality - Unless you're doing things HD or with original graphics designed with high resolution in mind. Ideally you should create original graphics (HUDS and the like) with this style and resolution in mind. Also, quite importantly -> The smaller the resolution, the faster the game'll run.

Part of the problem is you've got a GIANT screen with a very tiny character. If you end up with too many things on screen later on you'll confuse the player - Keep things small and simple.

[DimensionWarped]

You could always double them if you are willing to double the resolution of all your artwork. Of course, that's a damn lot of work and not to mention taxing on the computer if you aren't using hardware acceleration.

[Kain]

Tiny characters with huge game resolutions seem to be popular with amateur game makers. But the thing is it completely takes away the immersion whenever you're playing from a view-point which is some 1/4 of a mile away from the character.

[Lightspeed]

Interesting, thank youu for the input it really helps. And when people say that is looks generic, do they mean the objects or the ground sprites?

@Dragon- So this applies to the view in the room or does it apply to the resolution in the global game settings.

[Kain]

And when people say that is looks generic, do they mean the objects or the ground sprites?

Probably because it's not too far-along yet. All you have at this point is a Sonic Advance sprite Sonic with a little afterimage trail, placeholder level and enemy graphics, and a HUD. Nothing that anyone hasn't seen before.

[Lightspeed]

Well it is at an early stage, I just wish people would stop saying it. My engine seems to really mess up if I try to lower the resolution. The motion blur messes up the and the bottom HUD gets cut off. Should I just enlarge sonic and the enemies to scale the world better?

[Ayling]

You can move the Hud and fool around with the blur until it works...

[Slingerland]

Well it is at an early stage, I just wish people would stop saying it.

"LOL NO DON'T CRITIQUE IT IT'S NOT REEEEADY!!1!"

My advice is to wait until you amass more content and whatnot before making a thread or else you will be reading those comments for quite some time. Now that you've made the thread, you're going to have to deal with it.

[Cyber Rat]

I like how I never notice a game until I see drama revolve around it... Wait... that's actually not a good thing...

I would gladly comment something constructive about this, but other than the 'blur' effect that seems to be constant, I see nothing innovative or unique enough to comment on based off a few screenshots. When you're making a Sonic game on a Sonic Fangame forum, you have to keep in mind that certain basics are required for a Sonic game. Your screenshots only show that you did the bare basics for now, so in order for us to acknowledge this project as something unique and/or good, we need more.

Actually, let me put it this way:

if you are making your standard Sonic platformer, we expect you do something that stands out, so screenshots aren't usually enough. If you were to say, make a Sonic point and click adventure or survival horror, then screenshots alone would be enough to spark interest, since we don't get to see that stuff to often. As it is, I'm afraid your game is currently just another Sonic fangame. Sorry.

[Lightspeed]

No worries, I fixed the issue and the game resolution is 320 by 240. It is now a closeup view of the action. And I put in a background.

[Cuda Ahbuda]

Yeah I'll take that into account in the near future.

[Lightspeed]

320 by 240. Still glitchy with the hud though.

[Lightspeed]

Pretty much what Brad said. I make short posts too, especially in the art forum where I can't really contribute to discussion, and that's fine. But the majority of my posts have a lot more substance in them. Comment on specific things. Telling the guy what you like/dislike is more helpful than just saying "looks cool."

edit: oh, I didn't see your recent post. Well, looks like you and Brad resolved things. Lightspeed, if you want me to clean out the thread of all of this off-topic stuff, I will.

I would greatly appreciate it. Also, a little news bulletin, I will be working on a 2 player mode and will also be adding in some special effects from gamecave and the like. I will also be adding more screenshots so stay tuned.

Edit: I'm also working on a skydiving system and maybe online leaderboards. Just trying to find some innovation.