RohXel

[Tehforsch]

RohXel is a physics-based 2D shooter, currently being developed by two pupils from Germany (which is the reason for the page being written in german ... )
Our target is to create a game in which you can just win if you use the physics, and not just your weapon. We hope that the physics can replace scripted events because scripting always takes a bit of fun out of the game.

RohXel is currently work in progress, so all you can see from it are the videos posted on the page above (click on the image ). We intend to release no executables before the final release because this would destroy the fun, if you have seen everything before seeing the final game.

We'd be glad, if you post feedback (for the few things you can see on the videos), and/or suggested features, you always wanted to see in a game, or would be happy to see in this one.

The game is written in Java, so it will run on every OS, and is still quite fast.

It will definitely support:

• Vehicles, such as Cars or Helicopters ...
• A lot of weapons (not just normal firearms, also more exotic ... )
• A multiplayer versus,
• And a multiplayer coop game mode
• Due to the two points above : network multiplayer
• Dismemberment of bodyparts
• And something you suggest, if we like it

Download:
http://www.code.google.com/p/rohxel/downloads/list

Thanks for your feedback.

[felcro]

COOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!! Gonna get the demo if there is one....

[zalo]

From the description, it sounds much like Cortex Command, or Soldat.

From the videos, it looks like you guys are in serious need of a
Spriter/Graphics designer, but it shows quite a bit of potential already.

I suggest that the next thing you guys focus on, will be to increase the
visual appeal, and to create a sort of Terrain engine, other than flat ground.

Maybe Parallax scrolling backgrounds as well. I also like the mechanic of being
able to move the weapon around and to conk people on the head with them.

Felcro: "We intend to release no executables before the final release, because this would destroy the fun, if you have seen everything before seeing the final game."

[Tehforsch]

From the description, it sounds much like Cortex Command, or Soldat.

Yes, Soldat was one of the games rohXel wants to follow

From the videos, it looks like you guys are in serious need of a
Spriter/Graphics designer, but it shows quite a bit of potential already.

I suggest that the next thing you guys focus on, will be to increase the
visual appeal and to create a sort of Terrain engine, other than flat ground.

The actual versions really look terrible, but this will definitely get better with time but its just that we want to write the code before we make the graphics etc. This flat ground is also just a temporary thing, the levels will be more versatile. We will also deliver a level editor with the game so that it is not just our part to make good maps

Maybe Parallax scrolling backgrounds as well.

As mentioned above, the graphics will be improved a lot in the future

Thanks for your replies

[Skeeve]

I would so love to play this game when the full version comes out!
Im thinking that the game is two player.
Cant wait!

[samysam]

kick ass looking and the physics look cool ragdolls are funny!

OFFTOPIC: Have you guys seen the new crytech engine? looks kick ass and it will be used for console and PC

[daxter4392]

blood and gibs add to the gameplay, i think when blood is involved on a high scale in a game it tends to get the primal instinct in the gamer to start pumping furiously. this gets us into the game, makes us see were making a difference in the game. plus if its unscripted, making the injury factor on the game will be tough, but deff worth it. i dunno, look into it if you want.

[Yona]

Hi, there!
I'm the one who is going to fix these awesome graphics
I had not that much time up to now because i had to write several test at school ("abitur exams")
But now they are over an i can concentrate at things that are more important than exams

And here we go : (very) first preview of the new graphics.



But sure there is still a lot of work to do ! ( sprites, coding effects...)

[zalo]

Looks nice! Some Backgrounds would make it even better.

A note to the Programmers, though, make the arm that isn't being used for anything bend over to the right to help the other arm hold the gun because it just looks lame hanging out there, no matter how much graphics you put into it.

[Tehforsch]

A note to the Programmers, though, make the arm that isn't being used for anything bend over to the right to help the other arm hold the gun because it just looks lame hanging out there, no matter how much graphics you put into it.

Yes, this is one of the things I will fix soon. Maybe the second arm will also get a function (holding a shield for example), or it will just hold the weapon.

blood and gibs add to the gameplay, i think when blood is involved on a high scale in a game it tends to get the primal instinct in the gamer to start pumping furiously. this gets us into the game, makes us see were making a difference in the game. plus if its unscripted, making the injury factor on the game will be tough, but deff worth it. i dunno, look into it if you want.

The damage done by weapons etc. will just come through the impulse of the projectile (speed times mass), and there will be a treshold, under which an impulse will make no damage. So a house with really heavy blocks falling on you will kill you even though the blocks are slow, and a fast projectile, which is light will damage you still.

[daxter4392]

sounds straight forward. know what? this may sound lame, but if you have ever played ratchet and clank, they had this gun called the Lava Gun, which would shoot an unscripted line of gooey burning lava. i always thought this concept to be fucking sick. maybe fool around with that idea, players would be shooting giant tendrils of amorphis acid at each other, maybe it does specific body damage, like burning off a peice of the face. i dont know, just an idea.

[lafe]

looks good,

also; good to see 2 new devs at the site

[rebirth12345]

Originally Posted by lafe

looks good,

also; good to see 2 new devs at the site

Fun motion has a way with bringing devs over.

[Yona]

thanks for the comments

@daxter4392:
such a lava or acid gun would be nice but the first thin i'm worrying about is the ability to synchronize it. i played with fluids and kind of softbodies ( here and here )
synchronizing about 1000 up to 10000 particles (which you will need to have some fun ) through the network is pretty hard i think (and may cost a lot of local performance)

but its a nice idea! maybe there is a simple way to implement it

[Cries]

Cool, I'm doing my Abitur right now, too! Long live Abi09

The most commong german-english mistake is to add too much commas (or whatever those little, penis resembling marks are called).

Also, the graphics kinda creep me out. I like work in progress with community-support. Keep it up.

[Shinji]

Will this game support gore like soldats? That always seems to make a 2D game more fun.

[Tehforsch]

Will this game support gore like soldats? That always seems to make a 2D game more fun.

I added dismemberment of bodyparts to the list (in the opening post), because it seems interesting to me. Letting the blood flow out of the wounds is not my part because Yona is working at the graphics while I am coding the physics.

they had this gun called the Lava Gun, which would shoot an unscripted line of gooey burning lava. i always thought this concept to be fucking sick. maybe fool around with that idea, players would be shooting giant tendrils of amorphis acid at each other, maybe it does specific body damage, like burning off a peice of the face. i dont know, just an idea.

As Yona said, compared to normal rigid bodies softbodies and fluids always take a lot of processing time and are much harder to configure (due to alot of parameters) and synchronizing over network is quite hard. This will maybe get implemented in later versions for singleplayer, but multiplayer will not be that easy.

[Wrestler#1]

I have got an idea for that fluidproblem, but since I can't speak english that well i have to explain it in german:

Im singleplayer könnt ihr ja ruhig die normale Flüssigkeit nehmen, im multiplayer aber könntet ihr eine abgespeckte Version machen, und zwar:
Die Partikel können sich gegenseitig nicht berühren, sodass der Rechenaufwand mal fürs Erste reduziert wird.
Die Partikel werden um einen bestimmten Faktor gestreut, fliegen dann ihre Wurfparabel ab und sobald sie auf etwas stoßen, springen sie einmal kurz ab und verschwinden dann nach so ca einer Sekunde.
Keine Ahnung, ob es das Syncro-Problem löst, aber der Rechenaufwand schrumpft um ein vielfaches, was schonmal nicht schlecht ist.

Vielleicht könnt ihr den Text ins Englische übersetzen, damit die Anderen sich nicht so diskriminiert vorkommen


Again, sorry for my bad english!

[Tehforsch]

Originally Posted by Wrestler#1

I have got an idea for that fluidproblem, but since I can't speak english that well i have to explain it in german:

Im singleplayer könnt ihr ja ruhig die normale Flüssigkeit nehmen, im multiplayer aber könntet ihr eine abgespeckte Version machen, und zwar:
Die Partikel können sich gegenseitig nicht berühren, sodass der Rechenaufwand mal fürs Erste reduziert wird.
Die Partikel werden um einen bestimmten Faktor gestreut, fliegen dann ihre Wurfparabel ab und sobald sie auf etwas stoßen, springen sie einmal kurz ab und verschwinden dann nach so ca einer Sekunde.
Keine Ahnung, ob es das Syncro-Problem löst, aber der Rechenaufwand schrumpft um ein vielfaches, was schonmal nicht schlecht ist.

Vielleicht könnt ihr den Text ins Englische übersetzen, damit die Anderen sich nicht so diskriminiert vorkommen


Again, sorry for my bad english!

This would be a normal particle system and I'm pretty sure that I'm going to implement it. But particle - particle interaction costs alot of computing time and fluids definitely need them so this is going to be a thing for the future. It would also work only if we don't synchronize the particles over network, so there would maybe be some server <-> client differences, but I think we will test this
(Das wäre ein normales Partikelsystem, das wir auch ziemlich sicher einbauen werden, nur kosten Partikel-Partikel Interaktionen sehr viel Rechenzeit, und Fluide brauchen solche Interaktionen, sodass das noch Zukunftsmusik ist. Es würde auch nur funktionieren, wenn wir die Partikel nicht übers Netzwerk synchronisieren, d.h. es würden wahrscheinlich kleine "lags" zwischen Server und Client auftauchen, aber ich denke wir werden es erstmal testen. )

[Wrestler#1]

Mmh, ok, and what about prerendered 3D characters? I mean, at the moment they look kinda...

And for the ground I would try to implement a nice little bumpmap. Every rocket/shot could be a lightsource. It would make the game look nicer, if done correctly.

EDIT: What I mean by saying prerendered 3D characters:


Something like that. Yeah, I know, the mouth doesn't look right, but I have no time fixing it now. Maybe later.

[Tehforsch]

Mmh, ok, and what about prerendered 3D characters? I mean, at the moment they look kinda...

And for the ground I would try to implement a nice little bumpmap. Every rocket/shot could be a lightsource. It would make the game look nicer, if done correctly.

The graphics will be much improved in further versions, Yona just began to rewrite some of the code for the graphics, and the sprites are not the final ones, they are more to test if the code works. Generally speaking at the moment we are mostly writing a game/graphics/physics system to allow us to play around with these things whereas the real specifying into the game will come much later. So it should be clear, that at the moment the graphics are not that nice, with these screens we just wanted to show that it is possible to make them nicer

[Yona]

next preview.
+background
+smoke/fire
+explosion effect

Not all sprites are drawn / rendered yet. I think "prerendering" characters or weapons are a good idea. It looks more real than hand / mouse drawn things, at least i'm drawing it . So Blender will be very busy now

[Confused111]

How about a "One more chance" thing? Like in Minotaur China Shop, you can get knocked down, but you can get back up and live on. And when you get knocked down, the screen gets blurry and shaky. And I don't mean that CoD crap, I mean you can get up by button mashing. But, please don't use the shooting key as the key to get back up. That, and you should be affected by rigid bodies. And getting hit by a rigid body should hurt you.

[Tehforsch]

How about a "One more chance" thing? Like in Minotaur China Shop, you can get knocked down, but you can get back up and live on. And when you get knocked down, the screen gets blurry and shaky. And I don't mean that CoD crap, I mean you can get up by button mashing. But, please don't use the shooting key as the key to get back up. That, and you should be affected by rigid bodies. And getting hit by a rigid body should hurt you.

I think the plan is, that you have an amount of Healthpoints, like in nearly any other shooter, that regenerates slowly, so there must be no medikits etc.

Being affected by rigid bodies comes directly through the physics engine, everything that hits you will affect you. A damaging system is implemented already, the damage you get is defined through the impulse of the body hitting you.

[Shinji]

By any chance would you be able to add vehicle deformation? I've seen it done in 2D games before, such as Alec Rivers' physical war.

Here's a link if you need any reference.

http://www.alecrivers.com/projects/physical_war.htm