ProtoTactics - A Prototype Tactical RPG Engine WIP

[Koruten]

Thanks. Until I can figure out how to import 3d models into gamemaker properly, the battling part of development will be at a slow pace, which is fine, cause I still have to work on party setup, jobs, abilities, items, gil, brave story, (not gonna bother with tutorials), and other map stuff.

[Koruten]

Good news! I managed to import a 3D model into GameMaker.
Here is a screenshot.

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Do you see it? Let me point it out if you don't.

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But hey, at least it's a step in the right direction! I'll show you a screenshot of what this map is supposed to look like.

[Vaan]

That is actually Great news, because height and distance are very important in FFT.

[Koruten]

After some playing around with values, I managed to get it up close.


Here is the model at a 45 degree rotation on the Z axis. The texture is a bit messed up, as it was supposed to be the grid map, but oh well. Also I'm not sure what's going on with the random holes in the object either.

It turned out my model was very very very small. I'm probably going to have to write up a scale document of some sort to help those who want to import their own models. But that will wait until I figure this out fully.

[Jumza]

o.o Lot's of effort? Nice! Keep it up!

[Koruten]

So due to some frightening issues with copyright and such, the name of this engine has to be changed, possibly as well as content in it. I'll be working hard on changing things to make it more original looking, but hopefully I will be able to keep the same sort of feel.

[Angel]

All you really have to do is make an empty engine with customizable parameters. Just because you CAN make FFT with it doesn't mean that you have to include all of FFT's formulas and what have you. You've at least proved that it can be done, which is a huge awesome plus. I'd suggest working extraneous features into it, though, like the ability to make it two side turn-based, a la Disgaea.

[Koruten]

Yes I suppose I could just do that, which I most likely will. I don't plan on adding every sprite, or job class in the game. Users will have to do that themselves, but I will add the basic stuff such as throwing items, moving, attacking, etc.

Also with the new name change, I figured it should have a new logo.



What do you think?

[Vaan]

Looks pretty epic

[Jumza]

It's the female mime! (right?)
Looks great

[Koruten]

It's the female mime! (right?)
Looks great

Yes it's the female mimes mask.

[Koruten]

Hey folks. It's been a long time, and you're probably thinking, why is he posting in his own dead topic that hasn't shown any sign of an update in over 2 years? Well, I wanted to share a bit of info.

When I started this project, I was an overly ambitious teenager. I was technically jumping into something super advanced with no knowledge of what I was actually doing.

The project was later scrapped and lost.

But then, 2 days ago, I decided I would try again, and I would like to share some progress screenshots.

I decided to base it around how FFTA worked, with it's simpler sprite work and restricted camera.

Day 1:

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I started with grid movement and height.

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Then I started adding tiles.

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Then came the basic UI elements.

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Then I made some FFTA-styled robot characters.

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Unit directional facing.

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More UI elements.

Day 2:

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I thought my little soldiers would like to move around a bit.

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Water + depth.

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I thought it would be better if they didn't teleport everywhere (without the said ability)

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And finally, I've started work on some AI. There's a lot to do in this category.

So to summarize, even though I had abandoned the original project, I didn't give up my initial dream and restarted when I felt ready. I feel like I learned quite a bit over the past 2 years.

What do you think of all of this? I'd love to hear your opinions.

[3lric]

Well done, especially if this amount was achieved in two days. Don't lose that steam

[Koruten]

Thanks. I'm quite happy with myself that I've exceeded what I had done previously in just 2 days.

[Angel]

Really though, that's some awesome work done in just two days. If you said it took two weeks, I'd still say you were making great progress. Not only did you lay some great foundation, you already have some impressive, quality tangibility.

[Koruten]

I've started working on a built in map-editor to make the production process a lot quicker and easier for myself.


Here's a map I threw together in about 2 minutes.

[Koruten]

Map saving and loading.

EDIT :



Setting up the battlefield.

[HowDoGameDev]

First off, good work. You've accomplished a lot in just a few days.

I'm not familiar with your engine or how you're storing maps, but if it's a 2D array, you could potentially allow rotation by changing the render order of elements in the array based on camera angle. The unit facing could also be calculated based off camera angle. Additionally, it looks like some of the tiles occasionally get shifted too high by a pixel every two columns or so. Might be a rounding error of some sort or something like that.

[Koruten]

Thanks HowDo. Maps aren't saved as a 2D array, but more that each tile and entity's properties are written to a binary buffer and exported to a file.
Also the tile shifting is an issue with the camera renderer. The game is rendered at 320x180 and then upscaled to 640x360, but I haven't upscaled the rendered, only the window, so everything looks choppy because pixels are trying to be between pixels.

Battles on custom maps now work!


EDIT :
Had to rework the save / load in my map editor because when compiled, the original didn't work.

[Koruten]

https://xnblank.itch.io/prototactics if anyone wants to play around with the engine in it's current state, here you go.