Category: Cherophobe

A final Hero City update and a multi competition entry

There are three hours left until midnight in my time zone meaning that there are three hours left until the NintendoMax Wii Dev Competition closes for me. There is also a 6 day grace period during which people competing in the GBAtemp Bounty can update their already submitted games. But the competitions are essentially closed.

Which means that I am (for the time being) done with the games I was working on for them. It is in a way a relief.

First though I finished up one final unplanned update to Hero City.

Now when you attack you can actually hurt and eventually defeat enemies. The movement of enemies and the way they turn and bump into each other and you has been smoothed out. Now you get points for defeating enemies and your high score is saved when you die. You also get experience points which are persistent (They don’t get reset to zero when you die). Your health regenerates now and when it goes down to zero you die and get sent back to the title screen. The file size is smaller. I fixed some little things.

You can download Hero City v0.4 for Wii here

I also added the required splash screen to the Wiii version of Cherophobe (which I had made for and had already entered into the GBAtemp bounty) and entered it into the NintendoMax competition. I wasn’t going to. I liked the idea of having games made specifically for each competition and only submitting them to one. But Cid2Mizard sent me a PM reminding me that it was allowed and considering how simple Cylinder Dodge is and how unpolished and incomplete Hero City remains it seemed like a good idea to get something comparatively more complete into the NintendoMax competition.

You can download the NintendoMax copy of Cherophobe v1.0 for Wii here

I’m curious to hear what people think of Hero City, Cylinder Dodge and all versions of Cherophobe.

Cherophobe v1.0 – Wii & Windows

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPawiUOR-fg&feature=player_embedded]

Video provided by Cid2Mizard from NintendoMax.
You can find a screenshot here.

Here is an update to Cherophobe.

I’ve added a tile screen.
There is now a home menu pause screen.
The cursor is now a nice Wii style pointing hand.
Now when you hold down the A button you wont turn.
When you shoot the shots now go in the direction that the cursor is pointing in instead of simply going in the direction of the camera.
I tweaked a lot of number (you turn faster, enemies move faster, they do more damage, there are fewer health pickups, etc).
The controller now vibrates when you are being injured.
I’ve also added background music.

The music used in this game is Melancoly by Grace Valhalla.

Like its DS version I don’t intend to be releasing any more updates for it before the end of the competition unless someone finds a significant bug that needs fixing. I’m planning to spend the remaining days trying to finish Hero City.

Download the Wii version
Download the Windows version

Cherophobe v1.0 – DS

Here is a port/remake of Cherophobe for DS. Like its original Wii/PC version it has been made for the GBAtemp Homebrew Bounty.

Cherophobe is an original FPS in which you must defend yourself against the unending assault of smiley faces. For every Smiley face that you defeat you will be rewarded with ten points (the high score is automatically saved when you die). Your health drains away when a smiley face is too close to you and when you run out of health the game restarts. Scattered around the environment are health packs which will raise your health. There are also boxes containing additional ammo. Like the smiley faces the health packs and ammunition will infinity re spawn but always in random places that are out of view so you will need to continue wandering around the map to find them.

Use the directional pad or the A/B/X/Y buttons to move
Use the touch screen to turn
Use the L or R buttons to shoot

I’m considering this done. Unless someone finds something broken about the game then you shouldn’t expect to see any updates to it until after the competition. I’ve already spent more time on this then I probably should have.

Download the DS version

Cherophobe v0.9 – Wii & Windows

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7j_zenToigI&feature=player_embedded]

Video provided by Cid2Mizard from NintendoMax.
You can find a screenshot of the game here.

I seem to remember reading that it would be acceptable to submit the same game to both competitions but I thought it would be nice to make something unique for each. So here is a first draft of my entry to the Wii section of the GBAtemp Homebrew Bounty.

Cherophobe is an FPS in which you must defend yourself against the unending assault of smiley faces. For every Smiley face that you defeat you will be rewarded with ten points (the high score is automatically saved). Your health drains away when a smiley face is too close to you and when you run out of health the game restarts. Scattered around the environment are health packs which will raise your health. There are also boxes containing addition ammo. Like the smiley faces the health packs and ammunition will infinity re spawn but always in random places that are out of view so you will need to continue wandering around the map to find them.

Use the nunchuck analog stick to move, the wiimote pointer to turn and press or hold the B button to shoot.

and yes it was very much inspired by my first game.

Download the Wii version
Download the Windows version

A game of personal historical significance

Here is something old and seemingly random.

According to the earliest file date modified it was first made on or before the 26th of March 2005 and if my memory serves me correctly then this game was the very first piece of original stand alone software that I ever made. It was initially made using DarkBasic and later updated with DarkBasic Pro.

Its a simple first person shooter. You use the space key to shoot and the arrow keys to both move and turn. There are a few boxes that can be picked up for additional health or ammunition. The antagonist is a semi transparent smiley face. Both the ghostly smiley face and your shots pass through the environment without any collision detection. The game shuts down when either you or the smiley face run out of health.

Its worth noting that the title of this game is shitty shooter (which I apparently consistently misspelled as shity shooter). The purpose of it was not to be a good game but simply to be a game of self acknowledged low quality. I’m not sure that I gave it any thought at the time but retrospectively I believe that setting such humble ambitions played a meaningful part in why I’m still making games. Way too many wannabe developers get immediately burnt out by trying and failing to make an MMO. Although that’s not to say that I don’t have my own share of overly ambitious and inevitably abandoned games. You have likely seen some of them and I will likely post more of them in the future.

The source code is included.

Download the Windows version