Zafehouse 2, now with pathfinding (and outside movement)
I don’t have anything super huge to divulge this update, but I can say that, after many requests, I’ve added outside movement to Zafehouse 2. This means instead of taking a turn to move from one edge of the map to the other, it’s looking closer to five or six turns, as you dodge between buildings and the inevitable (and darn hungry) undead.
Currently, you can only move to entrances and zombie “hotspots”, as I didn’t really see the need to position survivors outside in the middle of nowhere. If someone can give me a really (really) good reason why it should be any different, I’ll think about it.
Implementing outside movement required me to confront my fear of A* pathfinding and, while it was a tortuous and many times frustrating endeavour, my work paid off.
I also took the opportunity to give the underlying graphics engine (which isn’t so much an engine as it is one of those tiny electric motors you get in a toy racecar) a boost. The game now supports double-buffering of the pixel kind, which has improved drawing performance by a metric arseload. Scrolling around the map is now smooth as buttery silk, even considering the sledgehammer-like approach I have to 2D visuals (read: amping the crud out of GDI+)
It’s time now in Zafehouse 2′s development for me to work on the meat and potatoes… or the “actual game” as it’s called in some parts. Which means details should get juicer, and the gameplay videos tastier as time goes on.
Again, thanks for bearing with me. There are moments when I wish I had whole days (weeks even) to commit to the title, instead of the couple of hours a night I have now. I’m not at the point yet where I’m willing to sacrifice my social life. :)
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I’m sure everyone who visits here appreciates the time and effort you put into this, be it a couple of hours or locking yourself away like a social recluse, it’s a cool project and I look forward to the next video.
-Tom
Tom said this on November 8th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
hmmm…. thats too complicated for my little brain to comprehend lol, so in stupid people laguage that would mean that basically what you are saying is that you have inplemented outside movement and you are currently working on rounding off all the sharp edges?
murray said this on November 10th, 2009 at 5:41 am
Yes! That is what i call a good news. I think that this feature was essential for the game. Congratulations. Hope we see this feature in some video later.
kulik242 said this on November 10th, 2009 at 10:51 am