Operation: Forklift - music makes the war go round...

[Technocrat]

I must admit: I am shocked.

You promise something one week, and the next week you actually do it. This...this is outrageous! And the game now has actual bears, wow.

Also, I quite enjoy your graphics on the screenshots you have posted up to now, they look not only very functional but really nice.

When I say my game is going to have bears, it'd damn well better have bears in it! More than a veritable picnic-full of them.

My drawing skills are limited to "technical" and "knock-off", that's why there's been very little in the way of people in what I've done. After I've finished this game, I'm tempted to have a spell of learning to draw properly (can anyone recommend a good resource for that?). Can't spend too long learning though, I've got the next big idea in my brain already - a kind of "Tropico meets X-Com"...


...must finish this one first...*grumble*

[Monsieur OUXX]

Bear attack, eh?
So why is your squad labelled "attacker" and the bears band labelled "defender" ?
It's pure bears mistreatment. It has to stop.

I propose the label "no animals were harmed during the making of this point n' shoot the bear".

[kaputtnik]

I'd rather go with the super edgy and ultra manly "Six bears and one raccoon were harmed during the production of this game."

[Technocrat]

Bear attack, eh?
So why is your squad labelled "attacker" and the bears band labelled "defender" ?
It's pure bears mistreatment. It has to stop.

I propose the label "no animals were harmed during the making of this point n' shoot the bear".

But that would be inaccurate, and I'd be lying to players! I should instead say "many, many bears were harmed in the making of this bear-tastic slaughter-fest."

[Monsieur OUXX]

"Six bears (...) were harmed"

Aren't pandas VERY close to bears? ;-)

[Technocrat]

"Six bears (...) were harmed"

Aren't pandas VERY close to bears? ;-)

With the added weapon of opposable thumbs - even more deadly...


Also, playtesting a game becomes a lot harder now that the AI is actively fighting against me as I test it. With tanks.

[Jim Reed]

Also, playtesting a game becomes a lot harder now that the AI is actively fighting against me as I test it. With tanks.

This is just the opportunity to let me play...err, test the beta a bit =P

[Technocrat]

Well, since the AI can now attack of its own volition, I may well need some enterprising souls to test things like balancing and making sure it doesn't crap out under certain circumstances.

Though first, I need to make it buy things sensibly. Then maybe make the ingame editor able to tweak combat strengths etc. *Then* it's ready for skirmsh-testing.

[Monsieur OUXX]

Though first, I need to make it buy things sensibly. Then maybe make the ingame editor able to tweak combat strengths

Indeed, the first RTS (like Warcraft II for example) were relying on AI behaviors: agressive, passive, defensive; having an AI smart enough to find the balance between all that is difficult to achieve, so they cheated by setting it in advance, behind the scenes.

[Technocrat]

Indeed, the first RTS (like Warcraft II for example) were relying on AI behaviors: agressive, passive, defensive; having an AI smart enough to find the balance between all that is difficult to achieve, so they cheated by setting it in advance, behind the scenes.

At least with turn-based AI, I can break its activity down into "Movement", "Attacks", "Special Attacks/Capturing" and "Buying Reinforcements" in nice, clearly demarcated chunks of script. After so many complaints of my games being hard, I've decided to handicap it a little, so it won't take certain things (like terrain) into account as much as the player would, but I might have to cheat here and there in the campaign game to make it challenging.

[mkennedy]

Talk about the right to "Bear Arms", how about the right to "Arm Bears"? I assume the bears can only attack close targets and don't have ranged attacks? It would be funny if the bears suddenly learned how to pick up guns and shoot back at the soldiers.

[Monsieur OUXX]

I assume the bears can only attack close targets and don't have ranged attacks?

Can hives be considered as artillery and bees be considered as homing missiles? 

[Victor6]

It would be funny if the bears suddenly learned how to pick up guns and shoot back at the soldiers.

It's a slippery slope. 1 minute the bears have guns, next there's a couple of pandas wandering into a Chinese nuclear silo, and......BOOM! Bears rule the earth and the statue of liberty is half buried on a beach somewhere.

[Technocrat]

I should have just made it a game about the army versus nature in general, shouldn't I?

[GarageGothic]

Wait, so there AREN'T actually any forklifts in the game? Most misleading game title since Final Fantasy (a dozen or so sequels later)!

Looks great anyhow - and I'm sure I'll still have that MST3K song playing in my head whenever I read the title. The graphics remind me a bit of Raid on Bungeling Bay, the Will Wright game that inspired SimCity when he discovered it was more fun building the levels than playing the game, and also an old DOS game I used to play, with a red and a blue tank, forgot what it was called.

Very cool to see more non-adventure games made with AGS.

[Technocrat]

Barring major disasters, I should have a working demo on the go by the middle of this weekend (just replacing a few of the placeholder sprites for it), featuring the map editor and the skirmish mode (AI and hotseat). Because I can't keep playing the AI over and over again (otherwise it'll learn too much about me and try to take over my place), I'm obviously looking for foolhardy brave testers for the demo. Mostly bug-checking, but also stylistic issues are something I'm looking to address before the finale.

Once I can be sure that players aren't going to get errors complaining that a loop ran 15001 times, then I can finish up the singleplayer campaign.

[Jim Reed]

Me, me, me! Pick me!

[NsMn]

Me, me, Mr Technocrat! I'm so intelligent!

[Dualnames]

It would be funny if the bears suddenly learned how to pick up guns and shoot back at the soldiers.

It's a slippery slope. 1 minute the bears have guns, next there's a couple of pandas wandering into a Chinese nuclear silo, and......BOOM! Bears rule the earth and the statue of liberty is half buried on a beach somewhere.

Nice reference to the planet of Apes there.

On the game this looks wicked!!

[mkennedy]

Maybe have someway to use picnic baskets to pacify the bears?