[WIP] Katamari: The dark descent (Update 16/11)

[Apjjm]

Update: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vz5arnuC1uo

In short: Sound effects added, particle effects scale, player head now moves based on radius of katamari, some screen effect added as eye candy. I'm currently struggling making an outside level look good, so anybody who has some experienced with making nice looking outdoor levels please PM me if you want to help out.

[Statyk]

Haha! I was smiling the whole way, this is truly awesome! Keep it up man! =D

[HumiliatioN]

Speechless. Damn man!

[Apjjm]

I plan on posting a huge update soon when my internet situation gets a little better.
But for now, since i can't post the update yet, i might as well say the engine coding is done, finished & fairly well tested.

I am now working on building levels and fine-tuning things. I don't really know how long this will take. I have a plan for each level, but there are a few important details i need to figure out still and a whole lot of tweaking afterwards.

When i get my good internet back i am tempted to stream some development of levels (it will be an early level, so no spoilers of some of the surprises later) - would anybody be interested in this?

Also, the mod will set it's own "Custom Stories" folder up, and the katamari script will be split out from levels so that you can construct your own maps. I have written a fairly nice API for controlling events, all you have to do is call a few routines in the OnStart, OnEnter and OnLeave events, and define some callback methods and a katamari can be created in any map - so hopefully some custom levels for katamari TDD will be made

[Statyk]

I'd like to see that livestream. And the katamari custom stories sound quite interesting! I will definitely have to give that a shot =]

[xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

This is one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. I can't stop smiling ^^ Thank you for brightening my day!

[Acies]

Nice to see you make progress!

You can PM me details if you want modeling help of sorts :>

[Apjjm]

Small update, new video:
Youtube

In a nutshell - i made a tool which lets me load in amnesia entities (specifically, folders of entities) and render them to an icon (128x128) with transparency. This involves reading the .ent & .mat files as well as rendering the models - which in turn involves reading the resources file and loading in the resources.

Sadly, there were some bugs when i enabled alpha transparancy with textures - which is probably down to my rather primitive (hah) knowledge of OpenGL - so i've settled for disabling transparency for now (this makes the desk clock and plants look bad but i can always create these icons in a second pass with transparency later).

If you fancy taking a look at all the entities you can currently pick up in katamari:
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/64805489/icons.zip

This tool will be distributed with a "development pack" for the mod so users can add custom entities to "custom stories" in katamari (just run the tool and paste in the script it generates). This version will also include a base script which can be pasted into any map (given a script area and the right entities) to play katamari in.

Note that the names of entities in the icons folder are different as the mod uses a tonne of "fixed" entities (i.e. entities that are all rotated and positioned in a certain manner), and some fixed models for entities with missing faces - and entities of static objects.

The plan for this tool is to use the icons on a HUD to show you what stuff you've just picked up - huge thanks to palistov for inspiring this idea as i was struggling on how i could convey this.

[Acies]

Gaahk haak huff uff - the sounds I'd imagine someone would make if choking on awesomeness. Very nice Apjjm! Can't wait to see what you come up with next :]

[Apjjm]

Gaahk haak huff uff - the sounds I'd imagine someone would make if choking on awesomeness. Very nice Apjjm! Can't wait to see what you come up with next :]

Thanks .

Another little mini update video here. This video is showing off a HUD which displays the last item you picked up. The video also what happens if you pick up an enemy (This has been in for some time, i just hadn't recorded it yet).