Wyrmsun - an RTS game inspired by Warcraft II

[X3M]

Whoaaaa!!, wall of text from others. That is something new :D

 

3. Agreed.

 

8. If it appears again, I will send you a screenshot.

 

9. Excellent.

 

10. Yes, they all look the same for me. When you look at other games. You see clear distinguish between units. Even Dune2 and Warcraft 1 had these major differences. But perhaps it is too small on my screen? Relatively, I am sitting twice as far as a normal player. MrFibble; how do you think about this subject?

 

Great to hear my saved file was of help. I myself can't open it any more :D. I dunno what happened there. The other file is still ok though.

 

Talking about pop ups. That is actually a great idea. When something new is happening in your campaign. A pop up with information should be given. And in that pop up a tick box for, not showing this particular info any more. And a tick box for not showing any information any more. Players should also get the option in options for resetting this. Maybe a bit of a lot of work. But it is worth the while?

You select a bura, you get the info. You select a tree trunk, you get the info. You build a certain structure, you get the info. etc. etc. And in the encyclopaedia, little achieved symbols should appear. Indicating you had some business with that particular part somewhere in the game.

Now this idea is derived for a major part from Dune2, where in the first 3 levels, you get pop ups. And your mentat also expands the "encyclopaedia".

[Andrettin]

Whoaaaa!!, wall of text from others. That is something new :D

 

3. Agreed.

 

8. If it appears again, I will send you a screenshot.

 

9. Excellent.

 

10. Yes, they all look the same for me. When you look at other games. You see clear distinguish between units. Even Dune2 and Warcraft 1 had these major differences. But perhaps it is too small on my screen? Relatively, I am sitting twice as far as a normal player. MrFibble; how do you think about this subject?

 

Great to hear my saved file was of help. I myself can't open it any more :D. I dunno what happened there. The other file is still ok though.

 

Talking about pop ups. That is actually a great idea. When something new is happening in your campaign. A pop up with information should be given. And in that pop up a tick box for, not showing this particular info any more. And a tick box for not showing any information any more. Players should also get the option in options for resetting this. Maybe a bit of a lot of work. But it is worth the while?

You select a bura, you get the info. You select a tree trunk, you get the info. You build a certain structure, you get the info. etc. etc. And in the encyclopaedia, little achieved symbols should appear. Indicating you had some business with that particular part somewhere in the game.

Now this idea is derived for a major part from Dune2, where in the first 3 levels, you get pop ups. And your mentat also expands the "encyclopaedia".

Which units in particular seem too similar? The Bura and the Erala? Does the version of the Erala with shield (used if Bronze Shield is researched) look more distinguished in your opinion?

 

By the way, at some point I want to a zoom mode for the game, like this:

 

The xBRZ scaler really does a great job with pixel art.

 

The idea of those little popups saying what does what for the player is pretty good. I think it would be enough if the game saved whether the popup has been shown for the first time or not, instead of requiring the player to turn it off. It would be quite a bit of work, but I think it would be worth it, since it would make it easier to new players to get into the game.

 

There is actually already code for achievements in the game, although the feature isn't available. I only didn't fully implement achievements because I was unsure of their value with achievements being stored locally.

[X3M]

The first 2 in the game look alike, yes. Although, with shield, there is some more difference.

I am afraid I do not know a good suggestion for this.

In warcraft 2, the peasant and footman had obvious differences. But the footman was wearing an armor.

In AoE2, there is also an obvious difference between the first soldier and the civilians.

 

Ehm, how about giving one sleeves, and the other no sleeves but a little hat of some sort? And these sleeves obviously have the colour of the players colour. Just like the hat.

Would that help?

 

I rather await the zoom function before we pry into the hat and sleeve business. Let me know when the update is ready. Ok?

[Andrettin]

The first 2 in the game look alike, yes. Although, with shield, there is some more difference.

I am afraid I do not know a good suggestion for this.

In warcraft 2, the peasant and footman had obvious differences. But the footman was wearing an armor.

In AoE2, there is also an obvious difference between the first soldier and the civilians.

 

Ehm, how about giving one sleeves, and the other no sleeves but a little hat of some sort? And these sleeves obviously have the colour of the players colour. Just like the hat.

Would that help?

 

I rather await the zoom function before we pry into the hat and sleeve business. Let me know when the update is ready. Ok?

 

One idea is that instead of being shieldless, before Bronze Shield is researched the erala could have the wooden shield used for the unupgraded "stop" button. The clothing of the units is supposed to be those used by the people of the Nordic Bronze Age. Here are some examples:

 

 

 

 

 

The skutan (archer) already uses a hat, while the erala uses a helmet (the bura has no headgear).

 

The zoom function will probably take a while, and won't be ready for the next version of Wyrmsun. The issue is that rescaling on the fly deals a huge hit on performance, so that the rescaled graphics would need to be cached. And there are some complications regarding that for player-colored graphics (for normal graphics, player color is applied on the fly, but the rescaling needs to be applied after the player-colored pixels change, because some pixels get a mixed color in it if they're in the "border" between two colors of the base image.

[MrFlibble]

Andrettin, thanks for the explanation! I've heard about the Lua language but have never used it. It seems quite versatile and flexible.

It's also great that the earlier versions of the game are available :D

10. Yes, they all look the same for me. When you look at other games. You see clear distinguish between units. Even Dune2 and Warcraft 1 had these major differences. But perhaps it is too small on my screen? Relatively, I am sitting twice as far as a normal player. MrFibble; how do you think about this subject?

I didn't have any trouble telling the units apart, but I have only played the game with 800x600 resolution. Maybe it's more difficult when the images are smaller at higher resolutions.

Admittedly, the peasant and footman sprites in Warcraft II are probably more different from each other, but then again, Wyrmsun is aimed at a bit more realistic theme with the Germanic tribes, so I guess the units' appearance is accurate in this respect.

 

By the way, at some point I want to a zoom mode for the game

That's some nice scaler :)

On another note though, a user in another forum told me that he had tried the latest version but it did not work under Windows XP for him. I suspect that maybe he's only got Service Pack 1, or is Windows XP unsupported?

[Andrettin]

Andrettin, thanks for the explanation! I've heard about the Lua language but have never used it. It seems quite versatile and flexible.

It's also great that the earlier versions of the game are available :D

I didn't have any trouble telling the units apart, but I have only played the game with 800x600 resolution. Maybe it's more difficult when the images are smaller at higher resolutions.

Admittedly, the peasant and footman sprites in Warcraft II are probably more different from each other, but then again, Wyrmsun is aimed at a bit more realistic theme with the Germanic tribes, so I guess the units' appearance is accurate in this respect.

 

That's some nice scaler :)

On another note though, a user in another forum told me that he had tried the latest version but it did not work under Windows XP for him. I suspect that maybe he's only got Service Pack 1, or is Windows XP unsupported?

 

:)

 

About the problem he had, I haven't personally tested it on Windows XP, but it should work for it as well (the game only needs Windows 98 or higher). It could indeed be an issue with Service Packs, as the engine uses some features of Winsock2 (WS2_32.DLL) (I think it was the second service pack of Windows XP which added support for that).

[Andrettin]

I implemented the popup tips:

 

 

I added tips for the first time a unit owned by the player levels up, as well as the first time the player selects a unit of the two playable civilizations, as well as gnomish units since they appear as allies in some scenarios, the goblin war machine (since it is a bit different from the other siege weapon in that it has a melee attack) and the wyrm. I also added tips for the first time a mercenary camp, tree stump, hole, wood pile, log, gold rock or gold deposit is selected.

 

[MrFlibble]

Regarding problems with running the game under XP, the user who encountered them says that he's got WinXP SP2, and the error message he gets is:

This application has failed to start because the application configuration is incorrect. Reinstalling the application may fix this problem.

I asked him about where he put the game files, might be something related to the install location (?).

[Andrettin]

Regarding problems with running the game under XP, the user who encountered them says that he's got WinXP SP2, and the error message he gets is:

I asked him about where he put the game files, might be something related to the install location (?).

 

Install location shouldn't be an issue (unless he changed the game's internal folder structure). Wyrmsun's executable is 32 bit, so it should work on older versions of Windows. cybermind (one of the developers of the mainline engine) played Wyrmsun on WinXP (although his WinXP is 64 bit), and it worked for him. Does that user's Wyrmsun folder contain a stderr.txt file (this is often generated when there is a bug)? If so, what does it say?

 

By the way, these are the game's minimum hardware requirements:

Processor: A 300 MHz CPU

Memory: 64 MB of RAM

Video Card: Any graphics card that can handle 16 bpp and 800x600 is supported.

 

These requirements are pretty low, so I imagine he fulfills them, but it could be worth asking.

[Andrettin]

Wyrmsun v1.0.3 has been released.

 

And the game has been greenlit! :)

[MrFlibble]

Congratulations!!! ^_^

[Andrettin]

Congratulations!!! ^_^

Thanks :D

[X3M]

Depending on who has given you the greenlit.

Congratulations :)

[Andrettin]

Wyrmsun is going to be released on Steam on May 22nd! :D

 

And on another note: Steam Workshop integration has been successfully implemented :)

[MrFlibble]

It has occurred to me that you might find a certain feature from another game interesting or useful for your Grand Strategy mode. In Eador: Genesis, the player obtains new technologies by discovering them during scenarios. On the global conquest map, you can preview what technologies can be discovered in a territory (well, "shard" according to the game plot, but essentially it's the same thing), what the starting bonuses are etc. Thus the players can plan out their tech tree enhancements as they progress through the game.

 

The difference is that, because of the aforementioned game plot situation, the player has a bit more freedom in selecting a territory to invade and conquer. However, I think this is still a viable idea to a certain extent.

[X3M]

Starcraft 2 has this too.

[Andrettin]

It has occurred to me that you might find a certain feature from another game interesting or useful for your Grand Strategy mode. In Eador: Genesis, the player obtains new technologies by discovering them during scenarios. On the global conquest map, you can preview what technologies can be discovered in a territory (well, "shard" according to the game plot, but essentially it's the same thing), what the starting bonuses are etc. Thus the players can plan out their tech tree enhancements as they progress through the game.

 

The difference is that, because of the aforementioned game plot situation, the player has a bit more freedom in selecting a territory to invade and conquer. However, I think this is still a viable idea to a certain extent.

You mean that the technologies which can be researched in Grand Strategy mode should be available per province instead of per player? Or something else?

[MrFlibble]

No, I did not mean that there should be a province-dependent limit on technologies. The system in Eador seems nice to me because the player's decisions on what shard to capture next depend on multiple factors, including enemy strength, available bonuses, but also tech tree advancements. This, in my opinion, provides an additional dimension to the macro level strategy.
 

Starcraft 2 has this too.

Frankly I haven't played Starcraft 2 much (only the old SP demo), but aren't the global decisions on tech always a choice between mutually exclusive options? Either you get unit/upgrade X or unit/upgrade Y, but not both? In Eador, it is the sequence of technologies to obtain that the player decides upon, i.e. what should be acquired first.

 

In fact, this is why I remembered Eador in the first place, because the system of spending tech points in Wyrmsun seemed somewhat similar to me, in that the player prioritises early acquisition of some technologies over others, and this in turn affects further playing strategies. I'm not sure how the two concepts could be properly combined though.

[Andrettin]

No, I did not mean that there should be a province-dependent limit on technologies. The system in Eador seems nice to me because the player's decisions on what shard to capture next depend on multiple factors, including enemy strength, available bonuses, but also tech tree advancements. This, in my opinion, provides an additional dimension to the macro level strategy.

 

Frankly I haven't played Starcraft 2 much (only the old SP demo), but aren't the global decisions on tech always a choice between mutually exclusive options? Either you get unit/upgrade X or unit/upgrade Y, but not both? In Eador, it is the sequence of technologies to obtain that the player decides upon, i.e. what should be acquired first.

 

In fact, this is why I remembered Eador in the first place, because the system of spending tech points in Wyrmsun seemed somewhat similar to me, in that the player prioritises early acquisition of some technologies over others, and this in turn affects further playing strategies. I'm not sure how the two concepts could be properly combined though.

 

Ah, I see, but the tech points are not present in Grand Strategy mode - there technology is acquired by generating "Research" (how much is generated per turn depends on the proportion of provinces with manufacturing buildings like smithies and lumber mills), which then can be spent on any available technology. Although some events give an opportunity to go through a scenario, any adjacent province to one of yours can be attacked (they do not provide research when conquered, though).

[X3M]

@ MrFibble

What I meant is that in Starcraft 2, you can't reach the max possible tech (whether it is a choice or not) by just playing the maps.

You need to search for the hidden secrets for gaining the points. In fact, it could be that your play is so sloppy, that you don't get any advantage in the tech tree at all.

 

However, I prefer a game where ALL can be upgraded, not a choice.

But, I also prefer a game where you need to work for the upgrades on a side quest (like in warcraft 3).

[Andrettin]

Wyrmsun now available on Steam!

[MrFlibble]

Congratulations! :)

[Nyerguds]

So... on Steam, what's the difference between the "Wyrmsun" and "Wyrmsun 4 Pack" items? I can't find any information on it. Not as much as a simple description of each.

[Andrettin]

 

So... on Steam, what's the difference between the "Wyrmsun" and "Wyrmsun 4 Pack" items? I can't find any information on it. Not as much as a simple description of each.

 

Hey, the difference is that by buying "Wyrmsun" you get one copy of the game, and with the "Wyrmsun 4 Pack" you get four of them (if you want to gift copies to 3 of your friends).

[Andrettin]

The game has suffered quite a few improvements lately, including German voices for the Teutons and Proto-Germanic ones for the Germanic units :)

And, there are now day/night cycles in Wyrmsun!



Human units now see farther at day and less by night, while for goblins and kobolds it is the reverse. Dwarves and gnomes have constant sight regardless of the time of the day.