http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php en-us CuteNews http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1332424886&archive=&{user-query}
1. The suns now animate (flicker) in real time. This was a tiny patch but it looks nice IMO.

2. There are now transition effects to view level changes similar to the old FreeBASIC version. I first implemented them in Unicodetiles.js with a simple example, then put them into Infiniverse, noticed it didn't work, fixed it and voila! I think they really make the game much nicer.

3. I started experimenting with multiplayer. I didn't think I would do this yet, but couldn't resist the temptation, so I setup node.js with the socket.io module, hacked for around two hours and suddenly I had working multiplayer movement. Meaning X number of players can join and see others move around and even different view levels / locations are handled correctly.

Now even though it appears very stable (node.js is awesome!) it's a long way from being an actual multiplayer game as NPCs, collectables and missiles are not synced. In fact, the server is under 100 lines of code and acts mostly as a message courier, so it is also trivial to cheat. To make it properly, I'd need to put the server to play the game. That's going to be a big task, and also make the server more heavy.

Anyway, the latest dev version (with the new effects) is available for testing online @ here.
Strictly speaking, it does contain the multiplayer bits, but I don't yet have a server running constantly.]]> 1332424886 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 14:01:26 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1332090415&archive=&{user-query} 7drl.org

Moments ago, I announced Infiniverse as a success in r.g.r.a. There wasn’t really time for balancing, so the game might be very hard and dull or very easy and dull. But I’m still happy about what I achieved in these 7 days. And the game is somewhat complete experience with a goal, ending, quite nice looks, and lots of places to visit.

Highlights of the last day’s development are shops in space station (pictured above) and combat AI. I’ll probably write a more detailed post-mortem later, but now I’m taking a pause from this.

Play the game online @ http://dev.infiniverse-game.com/7drl/
Or download and play offline from: https://github.com/tapio/infiniverse/zipball/7drl

The versions linked above are the challenge versions and are frozen. I shall continue development and might make radical changes such as moving to real-time in preparation of multiplayer version etc, but that won’t affect the 7drl version.]]> 1332090415 Sun, 18 Mar 2012 17:06:55 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1331855461&archive=&{user-query} 7drl.org)

Pic: here

What have I achieved since the previous update (about 1,5 days ago):

Square tiles – e.g. stars are now round instead of ellipses in the solar system view

NPCs – there are now space ships wandering in the universe, although there is no interacting with them yet (they do show up on sensors though)

Torpedos – can be launched and they move but targeting interface is missing

Early space stations – can we visited, but there’s nothing interesting there yet

Basic ground level generator – working, but not very interesting

More work on the planet aerial view generator – still not close to satisfactory

Sensor tweaks – contacts now sorted by distance; sensors need to be manually used and there are three working scanning modes (celestial bodies, artificial objects and combined closest ones)

Other UI tweaks


Less than three days left. Much work still to do.]]> 1331855461 Thu, 15 Mar 2012 23:51:01 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1331715112&archive=&{user-query} here

The development of the JS version is on going. About 2 and a half (full) days have passed and I’m making progress. I had forgotten how complex the universe generation in the old FreeBASIC version is and as such porting it has been exhaustive. I’m on the side of victory though, as I now have mostly working galaxy, starmap and solar system generators, and the basis of planet generator in place. What remains in the universe side is space stations, most of the planet aerial views as well as surface detail level.

In order to keep myself entertained (because the porting work is not always so fun), I have implemented some gameplay elements and a user interface. So almost everything you see in the picture above is actually functional (not a mock-up), and the ship can run out of energy, for example. There is even more features under several animated submenus that are closed in the image. However, it is not yet polished and will receive tweaks and additions.

Apart from finishing the universe, big features I still need to implement include: enemies and NPCs, homing torpedos and combat in general, economy (ship upgrade shopping, resource/”item” gathering and possibly trading) as well as the main quest.]]> 1331715112 Wed, 14 Mar 2012 08:51:52 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1329992701&archive=&{user-query}
It'll still receive some tweaks before the challenge, but I've already announced it to the public so that possibly other people could use it also for their games. More detailed explanation is at Roguetemple forums or at the project's website]]> 1329992701 Thu, 23 Feb 2012 10:25:01 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1328464471&archive=&{user-query}
As I've told before, me abandoning FreeBASIC coding in favor of C++ as well as web technologies has been rather fatal for Infiniverse. However, a few months back I did some HTML5/JavaScript experiments that produced something similar to the "noisedemo" techdemo, see picture below. It is very rough, proof of concept, but has potential.



Sadly further development was sidelined due to other projects, but now when I was thinking about what to do in the annual 7 Day Roguelike Challenge, I remembered this again.

I'm not going into details here yet, but unless something unexpected happens, by March 18th there should be some form of Infiniverse with actual gameplay elements and a goal, playable inside the browser.

Now the most hardest part is to wait until the challenge start (March 10th). :)]]> 1328464471 Sun, 05 Feb 2012 17:54:31 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1296473018&archive=&{user-query} https://github.com/tapio/infiniverse is actually the client's master development branch (not LEE), but since the networking code is located in the server's repo, you cannot build the real client, only LEE. I'll look into doing something about that when I have the time.

In the meantime, feel free to fork the code at github and send me pull requests for your amazing improvements. ]]> 1296473018 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 11:23:38 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1296471537&archive=&{user-query}
Regarding the status of the project, it's almost a year since last change. :( I've been preoccupied with coding other projects using C++, which I like a lot. This project's codebase being FreeBASIC has been rather fatal considering my shift in programming language focus.

The client is actually rather well suited for FreeBASIC, but as the server is quite a mess right now, I've been thinking of rewriting it in C++, which might wake my interest again.]]> 1296471537 Mon, 31 Jan 2011 10:58:57 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1270391443&archive=&{user-query}
Anyway, I am sorry for the mess and try my best to keep it from happening again.]]> 1270391443 Sun, 04 Apr 2010 14:30:43 +0000 http://aave.phatcode.net/infiniverse/index.php?p=news.php&subaction=showfull&id=1265916537&archive=&{user-query}
Why did I do this? As I have mentioned before, I want to release the LEE source, but not the server or networking (at least not soon). Now that the networking stuff is out of the tree, I don't have to keep a separate LEE-branch in sync with the master code. Also, after I publish the LEE code, I don't need to worry about accidentally committing or merging netcode to the LEE branch. On the downside, there are now some commits whose messages are confusing due to parts of (original) them missing.

I also coded a little: now LEE is present in the multi-player version and can be launched by giving the client a command line switch (stand-alone LEE can still be built).

All this gives me good basis for further development. Some things in the source are still embarrassingly ugly and the documentation isn't quite ready yet, so I don't publish the source now. We'll see if I'll do that next or if I take on the networking code.]]> 1265916537 Thu, 11 Feb 2010 19:28:57 +0000