Via dropbox, here are the links to the exported apps.
Windows App
OSX App
Just run the .exe for Windows, and you OSX people...do whatever it is you do.
Have fun!
Tuesday 21 June 2011
A Beginner's Guide to Firearms Design
About
Arma Certatio, or Arms Race, is about a designer's dichotomy. The act of creation is fulfilling, but ethical dilemmas arise surrounding the effect your creations have on the world. The case of an arms dealer or manufacturer is a stark one which raises the point conveniently strongly, but the same could be said of working in the advertising industry or on a film which reinforces negative female stereotypes.
In the comfy and context-free workspace, things are bright and cheery and responsive. We don't worry about what happens once the weapon sells. But the battle results screen tells a darker tale both in palette and meaning, where both sides have really lost despite the numbers.
Motivations
I have a long-held fascination for firearms, and, as a deeply self-analytical person, an equal fascination for the dichotomy it presents me with. My beliefs are probably closest to what you would call Buddhism, and I certainly don't see firearms as a force of good in the world. But as objects of power, mechanisms that have been refined through the most powerful of selection processes - life or death to their users - they are still fascinating. Their impact on the shaping of the world is undeniable. This both troubles and tickles me, that I am such a contradiction.
I also really wanted to make steps toward the sort of things I want to spend the next years of my life making - computer games for intelligent people. Games that are creative not only in their implementation but in the very act of playing them. Games that create spaces where creation is swift and gratifying yet deep enough for fulfilling creative expression. While the Creation canvas is tuned to build guns currently, I see many wider applications for making other objects (wearbles, vehicles, general machinery) and then deploying them in a game environment to test and play.
Instructions
Arma Certatio was a tricky beast in some respects, so there are many types of useful player feedback that simply aren't present yet. Some of this information is present in the debug console output, but there are a few key things that are not easy to grasp.
The key idea of the game is actually to help both sides in an escalating war. In the beginning, side A (who is represented on the left in the battle screen) has asked you to build them a weapon to defeat side B. Side B starts with a default weapon that is supposed to be fairly poor, but the simulation is iffy so for some reason a rather decent weapon is required to beat them. Luckily, my semi-automatic pistol did the job in the presentation. Forever after, whichever side loses the battle will be the side you are supplying the next weapon to, and this is alluded to in the console when a battle takes place (you are informed if you helped the winning side).
Building a good weapon
When a gun is evaluated, it will tell you its stats in the console window. Weight is the number of blocks present in the weapon (stray unconnected Power Switches can mess this up), and affects a soldiers chance to dodge when fired upon. Damage is the number of bullets fired during one Fire Sequence, and is the damage done to an enemy soldier if the shot hits. Fire-rate is the number of actions in the Fire Sequence, and determines how long a soldier must wait between attempting shots (representing the complexity of the mechanism). Accuracy is made up of two parts, barrel length and barrel slack. The last bullet to fire in the fire sequence is the one that counts for these, and it will scan the barrel as it goes, noting if there is any space between it and the barrel, and how long the barrel is. Barrel length counts towards accuracy, and barrel slack against it. Accuracy in the simulation is the probability that the gun will hit when fired.
The UI
Arma Certatio, or Arms Race, is about a designer's dichotomy. The act of creation is fulfilling, but ethical dilemmas arise surrounding the effect your creations have on the world. The case of an arms dealer or manufacturer is a stark one which raises the point conveniently strongly, but the same could be said of working in the advertising industry or on a film which reinforces negative female stereotypes.
In the comfy and context-free workspace, things are bright and cheery and responsive. We don't worry about what happens once the weapon sells. But the battle results screen tells a darker tale both in palette and meaning, where both sides have really lost despite the numbers.
Motivations
I have a long-held fascination for firearms, and, as a deeply self-analytical person, an equal fascination for the dichotomy it presents me with. My beliefs are probably closest to what you would call Buddhism, and I certainly don't see firearms as a force of good in the world. But as objects of power, mechanisms that have been refined through the most powerful of selection processes - life or death to their users - they are still fascinating. Their impact on the shaping of the world is undeniable. This both troubles and tickles me, that I am such a contradiction.
I also really wanted to make steps toward the sort of things I want to spend the next years of my life making - computer games for intelligent people. Games that are creative not only in their implementation but in the very act of playing them. Games that create spaces where creation is swift and gratifying yet deep enough for fulfilling creative expression. While the Creation canvas is tuned to build guns currently, I see many wider applications for making other objects (wearbles, vehicles, general machinery) and then deploying them in a game environment to test and play.
Instructions
Arma Certatio was a tricky beast in some respects, so there are many types of useful player feedback that simply aren't present yet. Some of this information is present in the debug console output, but there are a few key things that are not easy to grasp.
The key idea of the game is actually to help both sides in an escalating war. In the beginning, side A (who is represented on the left in the battle screen) has asked you to build them a weapon to defeat side B. Side B starts with a default weapon that is supposed to be fairly poor, but the simulation is iffy so for some reason a rather decent weapon is required to beat them. Luckily, my semi-automatic pistol did the job in the presentation. Forever after, whichever side loses the battle will be the side you are supplying the next weapon to, and this is alluded to in the console when a battle takes place (you are informed if you helped the winning side).
Building a good weapon
When a gun is evaluated, it will tell you its stats in the console window. Weight is the number of blocks present in the weapon (stray unconnected Power Switches can mess this up), and affects a soldiers chance to dodge when fired upon. Damage is the number of bullets fired during one Fire Sequence, and is the damage done to an enemy soldier if the shot hits. Fire-rate is the number of actions in the Fire Sequence, and determines how long a soldier must wait between attempting shots (representing the complexity of the mechanism). Accuracy is made up of two parts, barrel length and barrel slack. The last bullet to fire in the fire sequence is the one that counts for these, and it will scan the barrel as it goes, noting if there is any space between it and the barrel, and how long the barrel is. Barrel length counts towards accuracy, and barrel slack against it. Accuracy in the simulation is the probability that the gun will hit when fired.
The UI
Tools Palette - This is up the top. Clicking a tool will highlight it and all blocks drawn will now be of that type, or if you select the eraser (left-most) you will delete blocks. The tools are: eraser, metal, moveable, piston base, piston arm, slider base, slider arm, power line, power source, switch, bullet.
Canvas - In the middle there. Left clicking will draw with the selected tool (or erase) and right-clicking will interact with the blocks. In general, you must first right-click a drawing to turn it into a working mechanism. Then, if the mechanism is allowed to move, you can drag it around with the right mouse button.
Switch Tester - Bottom left. Clicking 'A' will trigger all switches tuned to 'A'.
Fire Sequencer - Used to create a sequence of switch activations. Left or right click to tune the blocks, press FIRE to test the sequence.
Sell Weapon - Finalises the design and starts the battle simulation. What your gun is capable of each time it is 'fired' is determined by the Fire Sequence you have set.
Mechanisms
From left to right:
Pistons - Made up of piston base and piston arm blocks. Draw the fully extended piston first, then right-click the base to create it. Right-clicking the different base blocks will change the extension of the piston arm accordingly. Piston arms can be any shape, but piston bases are only evaluated as a line.
Sliders - Similar to pistons, but the arm connects at the side of the base.
Power Sources - Required for switches to operate. Right-click to create (must be made up of 4 or more blocks).
Power Line - Helps to connect switches to power sources.
Switches - Effectively, a switch triggers all adjacent blocks (not diagonal) when it is triggered. Switches listen on a channel, from A to G. Right click to change the channel. When that channel is triggered (normally by the Fire Sequencer) all switches listening on that channel will be triggered in the order they were created. Switches must be connected to a valid power source, directly or via power lines, in order to work. Switches are normally used to trigger pistons or sliders to move to a certain spot, or bullets to fire.
Bullets - Bullets must be made of two blocks. Right click to activate (create). Bullets can be RMB dragged around. When a bullet is triggered by a switch, it will fire. The block triggered 'explodes', and the other block becomes the projectile, which flies in the appropriate direction.
There are more than a few secrets and loopholes (bugs are features!) that I will leave to you to find.
Friday 3 June 2011
A (Potentially) Good Book
http://www.amazon.com/Texturing-Modeling-Third-Procedural-Approach/dp/1558608486?ie=UTF8&tag=procedu-20&link_code=btl&camp=213689&creative=392969
According to this blog (also an interesting read if you like procedural content), this book on procedural texturing and modelling techniques is peerless in its field. Ken Perlin and Steve Worley both wrote chapters in it, to give you an idea of the pedigree. I almost expected to find a chapter by JP.
:P
Buying instructional books for digital disciplines always feels inefficient to me, given the rate of change, but I think this sort of thing can be the exception given the solid theoretical underpinnings which can end up being used and tweaked for years.
According to this blog (also an interesting read if you like procedural content), this book on procedural texturing and modelling techniques is peerless in its field. Ken Perlin and Steve Worley both wrote chapters in it, to give you an idea of the pedigree. I almost expected to find a chapter by JP.
:P
Buying instructional books for digital disciplines always feels inefficient to me, given the rate of change, but I think this sort of thing can be the exception given the solid theoretical underpinnings which can end up being used and tweaked for years.
Tuesday 31 May 2011
Parallel Universes
Idea number three.
You have a basic avatar, and a room with several objects in it. One of them is a Universe Traversal Chamber. Entering the Chamber will transport you to a random parallel universe, where things change. Colours, shapes positions etc of objects will change, as well as the laws of physics (gravity most notably).
For this to be entertaining, there should be a wide variety of ways in which the environment can procedurally change.
You have a basic avatar, and a room with several objects in it. One of them is a Universe Traversal Chamber. Entering the Chamber will transport you to a random parallel universe, where things change. Colours, shapes positions etc of objects will change, as well as the laws of physics (gravity most notably).
For this to be entertaining, there should be a wide variety of ways in which the environment can procedurally change.
Images and their Secrets
This is idea number two. The core idea involves reading in an image (possibly room for Google Images API) and then generating a few 'species' on the image which will feed off it's colour information. The image will lose saturation as it is eaten, and the species will evolve/adapt various traits based on the colours they have been devouring. When coming into contact with each other, they will fight, and the outcome of battle will be determined by their traits.
It suggests that images have a secret hidden world of activity going on behind the scenes.
It suggests that images have a secret hidden world of activity going on behind the scenes.
Arms Race sketch
This just illustrates the basic loop of:
- Losing side asks for help
- Design them a weapon
- Watch battle simulation
- Get money if they win
- Losing side asks for help
Pixel Guns
An idea of the presentation of the guns for Arms Race. Each pixel means something, like black for metal exterior, blue for power, greys for pistons/moving parts, orange for explosive charge, brown for projectile, etc. This is how the device is designed simultaneously in form and function.
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