#Voidseekers (Spooky co-op exploration FPS)

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vocal hollow
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I'm working on a cooperative FPS about exploring and looting ships lost in the edge of a deep-space void anomaly, and trying not to get killed while doing it. I started working on it as a way to learn Godot and I gotta tell ya, Godot has not disappointed.

Here's the freshly rebuilt mission hub/lobby to begin with

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If I was smarter I would have gotten invested in a project that didn't rely so much on lighting lol. But I'm figuring my way through it. Godot 3.5 currently, so I'm sure I'm missing out on a lot of good features in 4.x, but alas, my sad computer is incompatible with Forward+

stuck willow
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I like the visual styling and muffled soundFX

vocal hollow
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Thanks kindly! Its a lot of pretty simple models with some texture/normal map fakery for the most part. I was planning on going the low-poly/PSX route, but my respect to the lo-fi gamemakers out there because it's way harder to get looking right than I ever expected before trying it myself.

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now I'm shooting for solidly "mid-fi"

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current task is enemies, and sorting out pathfinding and AI

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I'm actually kind of surprised I haven't been able to find much in the way of (3D) zombie games built in godot, though I could absolutely be overlooking somebody's cool projects. I figured there'd be tutorials and examples galore for zombies, which is basically what I'm trying to get right for behavior/navigation

subtle shadow
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i really like it !
fact that you add objects that can be used and exist in an realistic environment too is an nice touch. When you also have some gameplay mechanics added to them that are nessesary to accomplish somethin some time is eaven greater. Bin that can have some loot or tools in them,some bins can be attached to an small puzzle to get some good stuff but also the time is not stopping so the enemy can attack you when you do the puzzle..... or the sink that can maybe wash up some tools that dont function with its dirt on it or wash something away to get an specific puzzle piece. @vocal hollow

vocal hollow
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Those are later on the todo list, but they're absolutely something I want to add

stray rapids
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reminds of Doom 3 | Quake 4

vocal hollow
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Oh yeah, those are high on the inspiration list. I'm a big fan of that whole era of scifi visuals 👌

subtle shadow
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@vocal hollow for the kind of puzzles that get you good loot or hints or even puzzle pieces imagine the player is out of ammo, the enemys are near and the player can hear them so he needs new ammo or he dont survive the next part of the map, he finds an locked up locker.
so it would be fun when the puzzle that you need to solve, is physic based so it can be fu**ed up by the player because he is nervous and cant solve it correctly because of it.
Also to make is more thrilling back in the old ps1 and ps2 days the resident evil oldschool games has an save system you only can use when you find an specific "ink roll" for an Typemachine that saves your game, without it or over use it ,the game dont gives you any savegame anymore and this made saving more tactical and stress full. People loved it back in the day

subtle shadow
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do player see only the mouse when they use something in first person perspective or do they see the hand they are controlling or something different ? @vocal hollow

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when the players just hack an locker lock the puzzle behind it can be made more creative, when its only an "i know numbers so i type them in" its only slow time that hurts you.... physic based puzzle for an lock can be something the same as the ols operation game where you cant touch specific things or you lose or at least lost an point and when you do to much fails the lock jams and cant be opened anymore

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starfield has the worst lock puzzle game i have seen in the last 15 years

vocal hollow
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oooh yeah, there really are some fantastic mechanics and lessons to be studied in those games. Resident Evil, System Shock, etc. And the mouse only has a reticle at the moment if you're using something like a gun or equipment. Might have to give it a really minimal pointer for just keeping track of the center of the screen though. Still working on all the GUI stuff

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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Starfiled is like "here are X layers of pictures,find the right picture thats can be fit by rotating an another set of layers".........

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its so boring and easy its only time consuming

vocal hollow
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just looked up a clip. Interesting. I can see what they were going for with a "digital lockpick", but yeah. Seems like it could get tedious

subtle shadow
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your inspiration can be Amnesia,Metal Gear Solid 1 from Playstation 1 era and SOMA. these 3 would be an perfect fit for what you want to do.

vocal hollow
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oooh yeah, i almost forgot about Soma. Definitely good games.

subtle shadow
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hmm an tier 1,2 and 3 lock would be nice

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tier 1 = just time consuming not physic based and easy
tier 2= time consuming,it can fail when you mess up the physics and medium
tier 3= can be solved quick with skill,but is heavy on physics AND you need an hint to start it or to know what to do. (the hint can be randomly generated like the password paper in old source engine games)

covert frigate
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This project kinda reminds me of Doom 3. Cool stuff

vocal hollow
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🙏 🙏 🙏

subtle shadow
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it reminds me more at Alien: Isolation in coop @covert frigate

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what is also great

covert frigate
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For sure

vocal hollow
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Hey, I wouldn't turn down a comparison to either of those lol. Excellent games

subtle shadow
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the world need more games where stress can also be an fun factor in gamemechanics

vocal hollow
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And here's hoping it plays fun! one of the current tasks is getting multiplayer up and running. I've been testing solo, but co-op is always an entirely different experience

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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but pls NO JUMPSCARES

covert frigate
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I feel like there's potential in your game for using lighting as a stressor. That opening bit of the level that was super dark had me thinking that immediately haha

subtle shadow
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Jumpscares are the cheapest form of scaring an player and has nothing to do with real horror its an mechanic only to push adrenaline to make people more addicted

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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and metal gear solid 1 (ps1) like see and hear radius for the enemys and mecahncs to trick them + and hide mechanic from Thief: Deadly Shadows. would be great.

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@covert frigate

covert frigate
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Or some kind of mechanic that affects the player's flashlight

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There's also GTFO's mechanics that make the enemies sensitive to light

subtle shadow
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imagine one player is hiding in an locker and has no ammo and is at near death, the other player hides in the shadow and just throws an important item behind the enemys to distract him so that he search an another area so that the the first player can come out of the locker and get healed by the hiding player BUT now they need thier important item back.

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@vocal hollow

vocal hollow
covert frigate
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GTFO definitely has a fairly untapped gameplay loop that is a nice mix of horror, stealth, and shooter. Good game to take inspiration from.

I want to play it now haha

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Sounds like you're on the right track! I'll definitely be following development gdshades

subtle shadow
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it would make sense here that the players wera spacesoits that can be damaged too and you need to repair them when something damaged them to hard or the player will suffocate. this would set an counter as an pressure on the players.

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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hmm so to make it more horrible when an player dies in coop he mutates because of the "what ever is in the atmosphere" to an monster to that is not played by an player anymore. Bonus is this monster has the loot of the old player

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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and noise

vocal hollow
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absolutely, yeah. kind of trade between keeping that ammo and fighting, or chucking it and hoping you can slip by

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if you get caught now without that ammo though, tough luck lol

subtle shadow
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so players will always be like "shit i need this...... but i also want to survive SHIIIIT"

covert frigate
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Or maybe there's junk around the level you could pocket specifically to toss, but it takes up an important inventory slot

subtle shadow
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the cone of view and sphere of hearing for the enemy should be layer based with higher chances to be seen or heard by it as near you are and to spice it up, this chances variatet a little for every spawn of enemy so it doesnt feel the same evey time and is not very predictable for the players.It also would make every run more unique like random placed puzzles,items,lockers,doors and so on.

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shit i want to play it too now

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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its fun to think about the possibility's

covert frigate
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Unless it's just a juicy fun way to kill them in which case go off haha

vocal hollow
vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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thew fun begins when some items itself can also interact with other things when you toss them, for example toss an ammo box at an open energy cable that is also an damage source because its broken....... BOOOOM the ammo bock explodes and acts like an handgranade........ on the other side destroy an health box ,the liquit that comes out of it attracts in an very big area enemys around it for some time. there can be many tactical advancements with inventory items. Or the magnesium flare that can blind enemys for some time can also burn oben tier 1 lockers 🙂

covert frigate
subtle shadow
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when you have the first gamemechanics ready the possible mix ups gets chear endless, the balancing of them is the only hard part.

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i really like to see where this is going

vocal hollow
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🙏 🙏 🙏

subtle shadow
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and you can call me here when you need help with ideas, i am an game designer with no talent in programming but its also fun to help and share some ideas. @vocal hollow

vocal hollow
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Absolutely! and appreciated. I'm looking forward to getting the game "done" to a base, fully-playable level, because after that it's all player feedback and fun content/mechanic ideas. There's so much stuff I want to do with it

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probably more than i can actually manage, but I like to dream big lol

covert frigate
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Scope creep do be a demon in all of us

subtle shadow
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for progressing game mechanics just make the base mechanic
get one enemys done with all his behaviors
get at least 2 puzzles done
one map
some objects that players can interact with but are not important yet
the base feel,look and atmosphere of the game

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and not every gamer feedback is also an good one some people come from so diffrent background that they want thier own game in your game

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make an online survey https://www.surveymonkey.de/ and only ask on point questions link "is the game to dark,to bright or just right ?"
"how do you like the toss mechanic ? from 1 for bad to 5 for awesome"

SurveyMonkey

Mit SurveyMonkey bringen Sie Ihr Unternehmen auf Kurs: Erfassen Sie über unser kostenloses Online-Umfragetool die Stimmen und Meinungen der Menschen, die für Sie relevant sind.

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and so on

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dont ask them what they would implement

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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i am an gamer too, but when i help people i also see thier position as gamedev to make thier game they imagine. so i only give them advice to make thier ideas bigger

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only when someone explicit dont know what to do in an specific situation and ask for "any" idea than i come up with my favorites that are outside the norm of the game mechanics the gamedev already had described

vocal hollow
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heck yeah, that's the way to do it

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and I'm always a fan of outside ideas

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helps keep the ol' brain cogs turning

subtle shadow
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i am afk now its late here and i am very tired

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ah and make list, list of things you find good and an list for each thing and how you would get there in gamemechanics wise

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than how you make this with godot

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and mindmap is alos an MUST !

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i am very creative and have some times ideas i very like but dont write them down in deatil and get angry when i cant renember this awesome ide with X that make Y because all depends on Z"

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happens to often

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so make list and an mindmap

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every little step an player experiance should be in the mindmap

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so now

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i go to bed

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see you tomorrow

vocal hollow
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oh yes, my idea/implementation list has been a constant friend through all of this lol. I'd forget it all otherwise. But yeah, let me keep ya from bedtime! And thanks for bouncing ideas around with me!

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peace 👍

subtle shadow
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ok i think about some things this morning:

  1. tier system for locks is not an good idea ,when the map is modular and random generated in the future,it can happen that to many puzzles of this kinds would be tidius for the player.
    So an simple physic based puzzle for locks that can variate in difficulty and only sometimes is locking chest,locker or even doors is enough.

2.Before an Map starts there are many static lights that render light and shadows for the map.
To not make an whole new code that let you harder detect in shadows, just use Rays (same tech for enemy vision) that are emitting from lights,when an raycast emitted from an lightsource hits an player character the "special" raycast of an enemy can see the player youtube.com/watch?v=_wFUaDf-Qyw
and
youtu.be/U0VBk2InzkA?si=MFTfvMwqIr2JMl4A
and
youtube.com/watch?v=4OYlmhpB9Ww

So to make it simple every enemy has eyes ,the eyes have an invisible cone shaped 3d object attached to them that is also the border of the raycast.
outside of this cone the enemy cant see you.

So i would make 1 raycast that is big but it rotates randomly in the whole cone alone real fast, this will spare performance AND would make an little delay for view detection.

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So an second cone slightly bigge and wider also has 1 raycast but moves slower and is thinner than the first one.Now an third one thats way bigger and wider as the second one with an thinner raycast version as the second one but also slower in moving and this three field of view cones simulate good vision for something that is very near,not so good for something far away and and bad vision for something really far away.
So any lightsource that emits light has also eyes but only one cone with an very fast raycast in it.
When an lightsource raycast hits you (this means you are not in the shadows) the "special" Raycast in the three cones of the field of view of the enemys can see you now.
To make this simple the normal Raycast in all 3 cones can see you every time they hit you,than there are also 3 "special" raycast in each cone that are gigger,faster and longer as the normal ones but this "special" raycast only can detect the player when an lightsource raycast hit the player.
like an switch "if the player is hit by an lightsource raycast,this "special raycast in the field of view of an enemy also can detects this player"

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this is the easyest way to make an system that let you harder detect outside from an lightsource using an flashlight,flare or whatever also would activate the "special" raycast detection.

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@vocal hollow

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when i thionk of it it would also work with real time light that changes where light and shadows are in an room where you can move big objects that cast an shadow

vocal hollow
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aaaaay, very nice. And sorry for a lack of response. Been out all day, but I dig it. and funny enough I just made a raycast vision detection system for enemies that's very similar

vocal hollow
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I watched a breakdown awhile back on how some stealth game did a really cool lighting system where they used a white shape representation of the player and had a camera viewing it to detect lighting level based on the white/grey value. I thought that seemed incredibly cool and indepth, but way too overcomplicated for anything I'd need lol. Just having a raycast in the light firing off at players in range is a very good middle ground

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for anyone curious, I did in fact end up aping GTFO's sleeping enemies mechanic using just a raycast for flashlight detection. I'm sure this isn't perfect, but so far it's working marvelously

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First attempt had a "light area" on the player's flashlight that would wake up enemies who were in it if the light was on, but that was a pain managing line of sight and passing back info back and forth between player/enemy when lights were turned on/off, or when multiple lights were on, etc.

I'm bumbling my way through a lot of this stuff, so this kind of feels like a duct taped solution, but so far it's working well

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probably going to need to make the raycast look up and down to check for head and feet also though, for the cases where a player is standing behind something that's exactly at waist-height but is still obviously visible

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On piece of duct tape at a time

subtle shadow
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ok i think an enemy with vision that can see you and not see you when you behind something is the bare minimum to the system that should be work first.Than add more mechanics to it.
And yes the level of Gray detection is also an good way to do it but the question ist what would need more performance and is easyer to scale.

subtle shadow
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in my system the situation where the "special" raycast can see the player is triggered by raycast of an light source. this also prevents that player A is triggering it BUT Player B is easier detected even when he is not in the light. My System is an filter system for each Player and can be scaled up at the moment where the enemy "special" raycast work.
For example:
In you map are very different light sources like the light of an puzzle with buttons, this little lights also will cast an raycast, you just make them slow and very short.
And an Flashlight in your hands that wake up specific Enemy's is an cool idea.
When you also have an hear-system there can also be very dangerous enemys that only can react to sound, so in some parts of the map you can imagine an room with 4 of them, they are wandering or even sleep like bio-landmines and you need to avoid sound.When they hear something they wake up and charge in the direction where the sound was, they also grow spikes that will act like an morningstar is running directly to you.

Just an idea.

Back to the Raycast-Detect-System
When an lightsource hit an player with its raycast, more or less the player has an "condition" like you have after you touch poison in an rpg.
Its temporary and only last 2 secounds until an new lightsource raycast hits you,it can be the same from the same lightsource of course.And the 2 Seconds act like an countdown that begins from new every time an lightsource Raycast hits you.
So the main trick here is when only an very small part of an player is in the light,you dont want enemys to see you 100% better because of this very small part.So its Fair that the 3d Cone that is the border of the Raycast movement is always a little smaller as the height and length of the lightsource area.

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The 2 second countdown, and the detection area that is a little bit smaller as the real area that is flooded with light and also that an single raycast is just fast scanning the area, acts also as an delay system.
That means in Moments where the player runs from shadow to shadow, the chances that an enemy detects him is never 100% there is always an little chance to avoid that an enemy can detect the player even when he was an short time in the light.

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@vocal hollow

subtle shadow
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and i also already worked out how we can make very simple an hearing system too. but before this and everything gets to complex "we" i mean you need to have done the seeing system

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@vocal hollow

covert frigate
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That may end up becoming too jank now that I think about it.. hm

subtle shadow
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the raycast solution is the cleanest i think

vocal hollow
# covert frigate Could you give your enemies an invisible collider big enough that the raycast fr...

yeh, that's a smart solution to be sure. that's more or less what I had at first, but i ended up needing a raycast just to double-check anyways, so I figured why not cut the area entirely and just use raycasts.

Edit: You could almost certainly make a better/smarter detection system like you're talking about, but I've realized for my game scope I mostly just need simple, polished systems moreso than anything really impressive

subtle shadow
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i have an hear solution with raycast

vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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do u want to hear the hearing solution ?

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its only raycast

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its easyer as seeing

vocal hollow
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i am all ears lol

subtle shadow
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first of you already know i am not an programmer i just look at mechanics and find an solution, in theory.

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so
1.every sound source needs an number that represent how loud it is.
2.when an enemy spawns it connects with raycast automatically to every possible sound source in an area that is from logic point the maximum how far away he can hear.
3.the trick is the raycast send every secound an tick to the connected sources and give back how far they are away.
4.When an sound source is making an sound the script subtracts automatically the sound source number from the distance the raycast has send.The number that comes out will be compared to the maximum of hearing range of the enemy.
5.the magic now is also every thicc object an wall gets per script an number that shows how thicc it is. this number adds an number to the comparison too.

what you get is an system that hears something with the help of simple math that only connects with things that are in range and only gets activatet when sound is playing, because thicc objects has an positive number you simulate very quick only with math when an sound is in area in the same room without something between enemy and soundsource and an situation where sound gets quieter because an wall is between them or something else. Its an arcade simulation of sound.

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so no one needs an invisible sphere that goes trough every object in the map

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for me raycast has many other cool mechanics

vocal hollow
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raycasts are absolutely useful, and amazingly inexpensive where optimization is concerned. Though that is admittedly a bit more in-depth than I'm probably going to be able to work out, but I certainly like the of per-obstacle sound muffling.

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you could get a very impressive stealth system out of that sort of thing.

subtle shadow
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other games has an real time sound simulation going on .......... and thats just to much knowlage for me to understand

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you are free to use my ideas

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when i get an demo taste of the game 🙂

vocal hollow
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oh yeah, some of those games you read about where they spend months working on incredibly complicated systems for all this stuff are really impressive. And here's hopin' I'll have one fairly soon (and by that I mean in time for the steam spooky fest) gdpicardia

subtle shadow
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you have the motivation and coding skills, it will be all good

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other reason why i love stealth mechanics is i hated this open world games where you are 2km away shot someone and at this point the whole world knows where you are on the point, like you have an GPS in your ass........

vocal hollow
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thanks kindly! I'll be excited for people to try it out

vocal hollow
vocal hollow
subtle shadow
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also gps pathfinding also sucks, at least aaa companys can make the movement a little bit more random

covert frigate
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But it's definitely a good motto

subtle shadow
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when you some time need help to think about solutions or gamemechanics, just ping me here. @vocal hollow

vocal hollow
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You got it, amigo 👍

vocal hollow
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hard not to want to put in every feature your heart desires

subtle shadow
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in my mind you build the lego blocks first and when you have all blocks you need ,you build with it the game

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never make to much at the same time of different systems

covert frigate
vocal hollow
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lol yeah seriously

subtle shadow
vocal hollow
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Interesting watch. This really does feel like it's become a major problem in a number of industries in the past 10 or so years. I can tell ya from personal experience it's quite bad in science/research as well.

On the plus side though, I do like to think that does leave the door wide open for indies. Seems like there's been a flood of creative risk taking in the indie arena recently.

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plenty of great projects in this own server, even gdsalute

subtle shadow
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👍

errant dock
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I almost thought this was Void bastards (or whatever that game is called) looking at the post embed and the name. Looks very nice ! Would love to play one day

vocal hollow
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Thanks kindly! And haha yeah I'm helping grow the increasingly large pile of "Void Somthing'ers" titles on Steam lol

vocal hollow
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it is no longer Wednesday, but I got the enemy alert system workin' great gdpicardia

subtle shadow
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subtle shadow
vocal hollow
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👌

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I have heard many a good thing about Jolt. Currently not an option for me with 3.5, but it's definitely one of the 4.x features I'm looking forward to diving into when I either get into a new project or port Voidseekers to 4.x somewhere down the line.

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but even more than that, I am really eager to see AI assisted animation/mo-cap take off. It's right on the edge, not quite usable without some serious tools currently. But that'll be a gamechanger when it becomes more widely usable. My respect to talented animators, because that stuff is hard to get right

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In other news, I've been out for some family stuff for a bit, but the work continues

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the "wednesday my dudes" yell is quickly becoming my go-to placeholder sound. Also needs effects on the weakpoints themselves and some hitbox fixes, but i'm having fun with it so far

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Haven't had much time recently, but outside of fixing that guy up I've also got enemy behaviors to a point where they're probably 'good enough'. AI overlord managing spawning and hordes and all that fun L4D stuff. Two enemies in now, just lacking polish and animations.

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little guy who does very little damage but can alert hordes and grab you to slow/hold you in place for bigger baddies. Exploding guy who lopes around and tries to blow up on ya, can be blown up to take out other enemies, but also makes a lot of noise.

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probably needs a third to round things out, at least for demo purposes, because i'd love to have more down the line. current thinking is a stalker type enemy that puts lights out and looks for an opportunity to ambush. I'd love to find a good way to make use of godot's negative lights, feels like it could make for some cool effects

covert frigate
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Using meme sounds as place holders is genius kekw

errant dock
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I’ll remember that, pretty good idea, don’t need to constantly open up audacity gdpicardia

ebon folio
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this would translate well into VR, great idea

subtle shadow
vocal hollow
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Internet has been out for a couple days now. Good excuse to stay productive at least lol. Immerse sims are one of those genres that always impress me. Especially the devs that put all that work into fleshing them out. Very cool stuff

vocal hollow
ebon folio
cinder trail
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Yeah on my GitHub is a good deal of flat screen projects that I converted to VR if you need some ideas of how a traditional flat screen game can be made into VR with the Godot Xr tools assets that are available. The good thing is you can see the change logs to see the evolution of the original game and what stuff I did to convert them over. They aren’t probably anywhere near as complex as your game but hopefully will give you an idea. https://github.com/teddybear082

vocal hollow
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Many thanks to you both! I love me a good Github read, and this is some really cool stuff to dig through 👍