At 1/20/09 12:25 PM, Tri-Nitro-Toluene wrote: Was I the only person who upon eharing Obama say that bit about ' You will be judged upon what you have built, not upon what you have destroyed' thought that he got his quote which he will now forever be associated with?

Perhaps yes. Those quotes are often the ones said in the beginning before they've done anything, right?

At 1/20/09 12:23 PM, Earfetish wrote: Woooo Obama! The others are nought but false prophets! Take us to a Golden Age!

Amen to that! ;D

Perhaps then the plan is to create a "war economy" for building green energy infrastructure. :p I know South Korea did something kind of like that (war economy) to build up their industry after the Korean War. Not to say that it was a good thing...

I saw that comic a few days ago. A good one. :)

Have you read the book Creation: Life and How to Make It, by Steve Grand? It's probably the best and most readable intro to the field of artificial life that I've come across, and it's all about this sort of simulation stuff and the metaphysics of it. I think you'd enjoy it.

Another book you ought to check out is Stephen Wolfram's A New Kind of Science. Cellular automata, computational equivalence, all that good stuff. :p

At first I thought you were talking about Molleindustria's game by the same name. You know, the group that made the McDonald's Video Game? Try it, hehe. ;)

At 4/24/08 03:23 AM, Skwirral wrote: I have an idea that could get addictive, if not a little frustrating.

Hmm, sounds like a good idea. I'm having trouble visualizing the way the orbs relate and are controlled by the mouse though. If you want it would be great to see a quick diagram of what you're talking about.

At 4/24/08 03:46 AM, andy70707 wrote: hmm.... I havent got any ideas but could I just have a physics engine? Ive been looking for one for ages.

I'm still working on my own engine, but there are a bunch out there already.

AS2:
- Flade

AS3:
- Box2D Flash
- APE
- Fisix Engine

I haven't tried any of them, but you might find one you like. Good luck.

At 4/15/08 07:09 AM, Jimbobsthebest wrote: This sounds like an awesome idea. However the obvious difficulties are with allowing the user to create somewhat original tunes whereby it is beneficial for the songs to sound good. If it was simply a case of placing a tower that will shoot a kick drum noise, the best tactics would be to create a somewhat gabberesque sounding piece for every level. I think you would need to have certain areas for kick drum placement and snare placement etc. Perhaps having a tower like a bass tower which will rhythmically vibrate all areas of the map and hurt enemies (giving the music some flow).

That's probably the main difficulty in designing the music and gameplay for this project. You've identified one possible solution, which is to restrict placement of different tower types to certain areas on the map. I like that idea. I think it might also be possible to do more complex rules too, like if you place a certain tower here, then it changes the map so you can place this or that tower to the upper left of it but not this other tower, which has to go at least three spaces away (or whatever, that's just a random example).

Another approach would be to allow tower placement anywhere, but restrict tower firing based on what towers have fired already and where it is in the beat.

I think your music would probably fit pretty well with this project. If you come up with any more ideas, be sure to post them here! :)

Separate levels and modes for the different music genres are definitely part of the plan. The idea is that each composer would choose their own genre(s) to work in, and they'd have their own game mode to go along with it.

At 4/14/08 02:27 AM, MackerelSalad wrote: okay, I've got an idea:

First of all, make sure the bpm of the interactive music will be synced to the frame rate, so that 1 frame = one 16th note which would, in the case of 120 bpm, mean 8 frames per second. So that 128 frames are one 'loop' of four bars.

Sounds like a good idea. The graphics frame rate would have to be around 24-30 frames per second, but the music could be set to a different interval, definitely. Hopefully Flash can maintain time consistently enough for that to work.

Second of all, a creep entering your gate should write down a time marker on the loop at the time it entered. So the loop basically repeats itself and writes down any incoming creep down for further looping.

Let me check if I understand this correctly - so when a creep appears on the screen, it adds a sound to the four bar loop that's currently playing? (and maybe removes it when the creep dies?)

Third of all, the objective of the game at this point would be to make sure the beat doesn't get too busy

Are you talking about the player's goal? I think the primary goal would be to kill the creeps before they get to the end, which could have the side effect of thinning out the beat.

You could try doing this with a new kit of samples each level (which I can provide)
Starting each level, make sure to have a new 'randomization propability list' ready:
which means the amount of chance that a specific type of creep is gonna arrive at the castle at a certain frame (which can be determined before sending the creep out of the other side of the field.
what i mean is this:
in most music nowadays for example, there is the standard of having a fat snare on every 2nd and 4th and some softer ones on the offbeat, a steady hihat rhythm of 8ths and maybe 16ths, a kick on the 1st and some more inbetween the snares. I'm pretty sure Flash is capable of doing this kind of propability work. for example, the list of the snare would be this (just one bar of 16 16th notes)
1 12 5 15 95 5 3 25 5 25 3 12 96 14 4 17

Definitely possible to do probabilities like that with ActionScript. So are you thinking that the creep would make a sound only when it gets to the end - meaning you lose a life? When would the sound for a particular creep play? I'm still unclear about that.

Anyway, it's great to have you sharing your ideas here. Any thoughts on how the tower firings would be turned into music?

At 4/9/08 04:54 AM, jimmick wrote: The second part of my game is a whole new idea

You have yellow, red and green dust

When yellow touches green both turn yellow
When anything touches red it all turns red
You have an anti gravity orb that activates when mouse is held down
All dust is attracted to other dust
The further distance one dust particle has travelled, the more suction or 'static electricity' it produces
You have to guide your yellow through a maze to the end
Extra points for more yellow at the end
Also walls are red

Okay, that sounds good. I wonder if it might be possible to make all dust particles attract each other in O(n) by storing a separate gravity vector field that they all influence and are influenced by... It might be fast enough in AS3. I'm still using AS2 though. :)

wow that's hard to read - let me repost...

Just to wrap up, I'll summarize all the (well-described) ideas that have been suggested to me so far.

From BunnyMolester, a game where you physically stab a ragdoll that says annoying things and sways to dodge your attacks. (through PM)

From FiendishDemon, a game where you control a ragdoll to get through maze-like levels. (through PM)

From ZiggyZack99, something where you customize a ragdoll as in a dressup game and then throw it around. (through PM)

From killslasher, a physics sandbox along the lines of Interactive Buddy and CitySmasher, where you can customize physics settings and effects.

From jimmick, a game where you use a repulsion force attached to your mouse to push around clusters of good dust to the end of a level while avoiding walls and bad dust.

From killslasher again, a physics sandbox along the lines of the falling sand games, but with more realistic materials than sand and lots of elemental interactions.

From Mercenary81, a rhythm physics game where you are running up a tree to get as high as you can without messing up and falling off.

From Coolio-Niato, a game where you control a ragdoll with the mouse and try to avoid drowning as various types of balls fall from the ceiling and water rises.

From tommattox, a physics sandbox with lots of achievements and unlockables, where you construct environments for a multi-purpose ball.

Hmmm, nine ideas - nice. :)

And I've come up with a simple idea of my own that I like a lot. It's a ragdoll game. I'll probably start on it in May.

I've also thought of a cool idea that's sort of like Interactive Buddy and also like Poke the Bunny. :) Not sure when I'll get around to making that, if ever.

Just to wrap up, I'll summarize all the (well-described) ideas that have been suggested to me so far.

From BunnyMolester, a game where you physically stab a ragdoll that says annoying things and sways to dodge your attacks. (through PM)

From FiendishDemon, a game where you control a ragdoll to get through maze-like levels. (through PM)

From ZiggyZack99, something where you customize a ragdoll as in a dressup game and then throw it around. (through PM)

From killslasher, a physics sandbox along the lines of Interactive Buddy and CitySmasher, where you can customize physics settings and effects.

From jimmick, a game where you use a repulsion force attached to your mouse to push around clusters of good dust to the end of a level while avoiding walls and bad dust.

From killslasher again, a physics sandbox along the lines of the falling sand games, but with more realistic materials than sand and lots of elemental interactions.

From Mercenary81, a rhythm physics game where you are running up a tree to get as high as you can without messing up and falling off.

From Coolio-Niato, a game where you control a ragdoll with the mouse and try to avoid drowning as various types of balls fall from the ceiling and water rises.

From tommattox, a physics sandbox with lots of achievements and unlockables, where you construct environments for a multi-purpose ball.

Hmmm, nine ideas - nice. Thanks everyone who contributed! :)

And I've come up with a simple idea of my own that I like a lot. It's a ragdoll game. I'll probably start on it in May.

I've also thought of a cool idea that's sort of like Interactive Buddy and also like Poke the Bunny. :) Not sure when I'll get around to making that, if ever.

Thanks for the clarification, LJCoffee, and thanks to TrierMusic for reposting the email. :)

At 4/8/08 10:04 PM, ectsoman wrote: The one thing Im not diggin is the creeps makin a beat of their own, in order for it to happenthey would have to be killed no?

I see the problem. Maybe creeps wouldn't directly cause sound actions, but would influence the mixing of some melody or background loops? Or we could always just check and prevent sounds being played too soon after the last one.

At 4/6/08 03:49 PM, tommattox wrote: Ok then. Goodbye

All right. Feel free to send me PM any time.

At 4/6/08 03:38 PM, MaestroRage wrote: ...

That's an awesome idea! I really appreciate the detail you put into the description. I could definitely code that.

I can't wait to see what the other composers have to say about it. :D I think there will be a lot of different approaches to the interactive music here, and we can incorporate them all into the game as different modes. This is going to be fun!

At 4/6/08 03:28 PM, Rig wrote: This sounds like a great idea. I've actually been working with a couple other musicians and animators on a game with kinda the same idea :D

If you need another guy, I'm in.

Glad you like it. Hmmm, so how similar is it to the game you're working on? :p I don't want to look like I'm copying an existing project.

Anyway, feel free to join in the discussion. :)

"What about a tower defense game where you create your own song that is played by the towers as creeps flow through?"

I'm a programmer and game designer, and Music Tower Defense is a game that I'd really like to make. This thread is for the composers I'm working with to discuss ideas for how it might work.

So far, composers TrierMusic, Exilement, LJCoffee, and possibly MackerelSalad have all expressed interest in working with me on this project. I don't want to get a ton of requests to join the project, but if you really think you would be a valuable contribution to the team, start by participating in this discussion and if you have helpful ideas we'll probably want to include you.

About the Music Tower Defense

I came up with the concept while playing Bloons Tower Defense. The polyrhythm created by towers firing at different rates made me wonder what it would be like if a tower defense game explicitly tried to weave the sounds of the game into a coherent musical experience. Try playing the game, and listen with that in mind.

Out of the ideas offered to me by my composers so far, a few are easy to explain here. Exilement thought that the game Electroplankton would be a good role model for the interactive, more or less random generated music. Each tower would play a randomly selected sound when it fires, and each creep would play a randomly selected sound when it gets hit, or something along those lines. Exilement suggested that Ambient would be a good genre of music to use for this approach.

As the programmer on this project, I can say that it is definitely possible to use more complicated rules to control which sounds are played. A lot of pretty cool stuff should be possible. Though starting simple, where each action in the game corresponds to a direct change in the music, would be a good idea at this point. For an example of some fairly complex interactive music, try my old game Braids. I've also done a simpler experiment with interactive glitch music in my recent game _dRive.

We were thinking that each composer would design interactive music of a different genre, each of which would have its own unique set of towers and creeps and upgrades, as well as its own graphical style. Each genre would basically be a different game mode, which the players could choose from. This should allow for a maximum of creative control by the composers.

As a final point of inspiration, listen to the song Assembly Warfare by Suspended-3rd-Chord. I think this song could be almost perfect for use in Music Tower Defense, and Suspended-3rd-Chord is more than welcome to be a part of this project if he wants to.

Let us discuss, and blaze new pathways into the unexplored wilds of interactive music design!

Oops, I replied to the wrong person here. This should have been directed at Mercenary81.

At 4/6/08 12:49 PM, axcho wrote: It's something I'll probably make eventually, as I've been wanting to do some sort of interactive music visualizations of my favorite NG songs. I think this is an idea that I can expand on, because just running might be kind of fun, but I think for a really good game there would have to be more to it.

Just to clarify, in this game would you be constantly pressing left and right or something like that?

To reply to tommattox now, I'd probably make the physics sandbox idea after I've made a bunch of other physics games and I've accumulated a good physics engine that I can just use and easily turn it into a game.

At 4/6/08 01:09 PM, KyrNelenar wrote: When you say "put an action to stop that same sound first," does that mean that it would stop the music already playing (which would seem like it would still cause a general flow disturbance), or stop the music that would start playing after going back?...

It would probably stop the music already playing. Try using the approach that the other guy suggested, I think that would work better in this situation. :)

At 4/6/08 12:54 PM, dyingtokill wrote: im making a platformer and im just doing basic jumping right now but the problem is that i cant seem to figure out a way to make the character fall down to the ground if he steps of a platform without jumping..

You need to apply gravity when the player is not over a platform and not jumping. Try replacing your two hit testing if-statements with this:

if(this.hitTest(_root.ground) or this.hitTest(_root.platform))
{
    jump=false;
    jumpspeed=12;
}
else if (!jump)
{
    this._y-=gravity;
}

This won't give you realistic smooth gravity or jumping, you'll need a separate variable to keep track of the current x and y speed for that. But then you'd have to basically rewrite your code, and I'm not going to do that for you. ;)

Let me know if that helps.

This is the annoying thing about using the timeline (the music stopping/restarting when you go to a previous frame).

What I'd do is before the sound starts, put an action to stop that same sound first. Let me know if that works.

At 4/6/08 09:18 AM, tommattox wrote: Yeah... Let me know if you actually end up making this. It would be interesting to play. Alternatively if you are stuck for ideas give me an easier way of contacting you such as AIM, MSN or if neither of these are available to you just tell me to pm you if you need more ideas.

It's something I'll probably make eventually, as I've been wanting to do some sort of interactive music visualizations of my favorite NG songs. I think this is an idea that I can expand on, because just running might be kind of fun, but I think for a really good game there would have to be more to it.

Just to clarify, in this game would you be constantly pressing left and right or something like that?

Contacting me by PM would be fine - I've got a few people talking about ideas through PM already instead of using this thread.

At 4/5/08 05:47 PM, tommattox wrote: Possibly... Maybe like black terrain which is locked in place and there is an objective to get to or something. Also maybe spikes which if the ball touches it pops or just dies whichever. An alternative achievements in-game which can be unlocked similar to Xbox Live or Kongregate but in one game not spread over many. Also possibly the ability to unlock different balls which are heavier or smoother or jagged or have different attributes throughout the game. Some could maybe be unlocked from touching them in a level others for completing achievements or certain levels. Also moving objects to avoid.

Actually how about a free game option which is just a mess-about kind of thing then a story mode? Tell me what you think.

Including achievements inside a Flash game is something I've considered before. I think it might be interesting to have a freeform sort of physics toy/editor/sandbox, but with a bunch of special badges you can unlock by doing certain cool or difficult things. Not sure what exactly those things would be, but yeah.

I guess instead of levels or a story mode there would just be a ton of random unlockables. Could be interesting.

At 4/5/08 03:09 PM, Coolio-Niato wrote: Have a game with water and balls falling.

That's actually pretty similar to an idea I had last summer for the Ball Physics contest at Jay is Games. I haven't finished making it yet, but it's on my list. :) Thanks for the suggestion. You mentioned some new things I hadn't really thought of, which would also be a little easier than my other idea.

At 4/5/08 03:40 PM, Mercenary81 wrote: Maybe every few seconds a button at the bottom of the screen lights up signifying that you need to press spacebar, also increasing the speed you need to hit the buttons a bit.

Okay, sounds like a pretty good idea. It would work well to connect it with the music more, I think.

Im not sure if you should make it impossible to get to the top or not. If you make the top some insane amount of distance away then you could probably also put in a high score list (although i have no idea how this works)

That might be good, so there is an end, but most people will lose earlier so there is a purpose for the high score list.

You should also change the scenery every 500 yards or so, making the branches thinner and the background lighter.

Yep, that would be cool. Maybe the seasons change too over time.

And to top it off, you should have a jumping system to get over branches. I haven't entirely thought out th jumping yet seeing as your running up a tree/building/cliff (not even sure about what you want here) the gravitiy might be a lot different then normal.

That might be part of the pressing space bar thing. Or it could be separate. Nice ideas. :)

At 4/5/08 04:23 PM, tommattox wrote: How about a ball of any kind. Quite small.

Okay, so something like a physics sandbox, so to speak? Would there be a game attached to it also?

At 4/5/08 12:30 PM, killslasher wrote: "what does water do",well,think of it as what would water do if you were to *insert action and resource here* to the water?

I'm still confused about this part. I think I kind of get what you're saying, but I can't visualize it. Give me an example of an "action" and a "resource" and what the water does as a result.

So, based on this idea, how would it fit into a game?

At 4/5/08 02:46 AM, Mercenary81 wrote: Im really thinking both. It would feel like a classic track, but there's the subtle fact that you need to keep in time or else you'll fall off

Okay, I get it. Any ideas for how to elaborate on it?

Ive gotten that same feeling before while listening to certain music

:)

At 4/5/08 02:12 AM, Mercenary81 wrote: I suppose it would be a bit of both. I'm really no coding genious but wouldn't you have to add more gravity the further he goes up?

Hmmm. Are you thinking of a game where the physics of running up a tree or wall are similar to the real-life physics of it? Like, you'll fall off if you stop or if you push off too much? Or would it be more like running along a track that happens to be a tree?

I'm not really sure how you'd be able to implement music into this game, logically anyway, but i'm sure it'd be real kick ass if you could :D

I hope it would be cool. The reason I thought of music is that several Dimrain47 songs and a few cornandbeans songs bring to my mind the visualization of running past a whole bunch of stuff, in some way or another.

Now that i think about it actually, it'd be a real good music game, if you could do it i mean. It's a bit of a hit or miss kind of thing. I'd be happy to talk about it more if your interested.
You do seem to have plenty of ideas being thrown at you at the minute though ;)

Go ahead, I can deal with the torrent. :) My inbox has a lot of room, and this thread is not even two pages long yet.

At 4/5/08 02:24 AM, jimmick wrote: Have only a few dusts on screen at any one time, and when dust connects, it joins into a larger (new mc) clump that has the cumulative pull of gravity
Also, maybe have a multi layered game, seeing as how the bigger the dust the harder it is, make the player have to use keyboard to control the player.... BRAINWAVE
The mouse controls a little orb of repelling gravity, you push your little cluster (5-10 dust) to the end, avoiding the red and collecting the green.
In order to maximise profit you also have to keep the other reds away from the other greens, AND your cluster and keep your cluster away from walls.
Your dust should also be connected to each other via invisible cords

Okay, that could work. It is getting pretty complicated, but I'll think about it and imagine how it might play. Or is that part after BRAINWAVE a separate idea? That would be pretty nice and simple by itself, actually. Hmmm.

At 4/5/08 01:47 AM, Mercenary81 wrote: Anyway, your running up a tree (or anything you'd like to make it for that matter, a tree's just the simplest form of the suggestion) and you need to keep pressing two keys in time with the footsteps. As you get higher up the tree the faster you need to press the two keys, or you'll fall off.

Hmmm, that's an interesting one - it would fit well with some of the songs I like on the Audio Portal to make a sort of music game. Would this have anything to do with physics or would it be more about rhythm? Feel free to give examples of the sort of things you might add to it.

At 4/4/08 10:42 PM, killslasher wrote: Umm,heres another idea.

Yep, I know about the falling sand games.

What you're describing sounds really interesting to me, but I'm having trouble figuring out exactly what you mean. Could you describe a game idea that uses the approach you're talking about, maybe?

Normally,people dont really like the fact,its all just sand.
They want some different type of physic.

Okay, you want more than just sand.

But the other section of physic,is great!

What "other section of physic"? Do you mean the interactions between different elements?

Try to copy off this,then use a little more realistic graphics and textures.

Okay.

For example,water isnt sand,neither is gas.
But the thing that flash did do good,is how water interacted with other resources.

What Flash? I thought that example was Java, not Flash. How did the water interact with other resources?

Get that?

D

Sounds cool, but no, I don't really get it.

Then,about that interactive buddy mode thing.
For example,I think a good setting would be,the less original,Gravity.

Are you talking the value settings of certain physics properties? Are you saying that you want to be able to set the amount of "Gravity"?

Or a more original,Impact level.
To measure how much something moves or gets startled from any action.

So you can set the value of the physical property called "Impact"? I think I get it. I'm still kind of confused though.

Just to get a better idea of what you're trying to say, how would it be different than the physics settings in this prototype?

Keep going with this idea. Describe to me what the game might look like. Maybe I'll understand it better. :)

Not my highest rated, but my newest and most polished and most original game: _dRive

At 4/4/08 06:02 PM, Hoeloe wrote: Use duplicated movieClips that run from a single for(){ loop on the main timeline, that way you aren't running hundreds of loops, also make stuff vanish when offscreen, because this does actually save on CPU.

The display is not actually the problem, but thanks for the tips. :)

The reason I'm worried about speed is that in order to make all the dust particles attract each other, you have to find the distances between every dust particle and every other dust particle. In computer science terms that's an O(n*n) algorithm, it's quadratic, because the number of calculations you have to do is the number of dust particles (n) squared (n*n).

If you have 10 particles, that's 100 calculations. Not too bad. But if you have 100 particles, that's 10,000 calculations. That's a lot. And 100 particles isn't even that many. With 500 particles on the screen, you'd be doing 250,000 calculations every frame, 30 times per second. I don't think most computers would be able to pull that off.

Basically, in order for this idea to work, I need to come up with a way of making the dust particles attract each other, without having to calculate the distances between every possible pair. Any ideas?

Try this:

on (release) {
karma = parseInt(karma) + helped;
}