arf i have mistaken xevious for zaxxon sorry (it was thex, die the x!)

OrangyTang -

I thought the image you posted referred to Zaxxon but now I realize it is the Neo-Geo game "ViewPoint". Thanks for posting it!
Checking out previous work really helps me and inspires me, and this game looks really promising.

Roy

Ahh, Zaxxon that brings me back, I remember playing it on my old commodore 64. Zaxxon, dragon''s lair, and legend of black silver, they eat many an hour of my youth.

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Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document

One important thing to think about - you''ll notice every object in Viewpoint casts a shadow against the floor. This is important since if you''re playing an isometric viewpoint then its more difficult to judge where your shots are going to end up. Even bullets cast a shadow to help with this (and if the bullets aren''t actual solid objects like energy balls, have them cast lighter areas instead of a shadow).

Viewpoint only scrolled in the single direction, although theres no reason why you can''t have corners and have levels switching between the four diagonals for scrolling Just to keep the player on their toes..

I noticed the problem when playing Zaxxon. It''s hard to tell what''s going on because allot of the visual cues we use to manage around a 3d environment are either false (The shadow remains the same no matter how high I fly) or nonexistent (Objects do not have shadows and the bitmaps hardly describe what height they are in).

I think ViewPoint did smart in that it doesn''t have height. It could be possible to allow two heights - Ground level (to land) and 1st level to fly.

I agree with you OrangyTang, and I think that it could be possible and fun to make a game where the ship is free to rotate 360 in the isospace!
They probably didn''t allow it in the old days because maps would''ve been too large to load at once.

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Original post by royk
They probably didn''t allow it in the old days because maps would''ve been too large to load at once.

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That and it''d take a shedload of sprites to work smoothly. If you had your objects as proper 3d object but fixed to a 2d plane it''d be much easier

Download Hell Fighter (freeware). It is not isometric, but it is an overhead 2D space combat shooter that may or may not be similar to what you are thinking of.

Do a search for game developer Housemarque...back in 1997 they released a iso shooter named The Reap.


Honestly, as a huge fan of these sort of shoot''em-up twitchy type games...I think that allowing the player to scroll around as they wish is a bad idea...it kills the tension, and changes the game focus to a more exploration basied role..

Interesting.. My original idea was to make a top view spce shooter (Something similar to subspace), and let the ship rotate 360, but in an environment of tunnels and rooms, so there isn''t too much empty space to get lost in.

Did anyone mention Fire Fight yet?

[edited by - Chentzilla on October 28, 2003 5:50:47 AM]