Hello, Everyone.

I've finally got a new game almost done, it's been weeks in the coding and years in the changing-of-headspace. I would very much like some feedback & bug reporting. It is an arkanoid/breakout clone, and the URL for the Windows download is

http://www.cfxweb.net/~aggrav8d/downloads/ifreakout.exe

The game takes it's inspiration from Arkanoid, Mutant Storm, and Break Ball 2. Some artwork and sound samples were borrowed with permission.
I personally find individual levels take too long to complete.
Thank you in advance for your time and effort. Keep up the good work! ;)

Cheers!

I played it through for a while. Some notes, sadly most of them negative: The weird moving viewpoint is, well, weird. I got used to it after a spell but that doesn't mean I enjoyed it. It was particularly annoying when there were two balls active, at opposite ends of the screen, and I was chasing after one of them. The view angle got way too acute.
The levels went on too long. I think games like this are fun because of their variety, which means you have to keep things moving along or the user gets bored.
On my P4 2.4GHz with a GF4 Ti 4400, at the default resolution (1024x768x32?), the main menu crawled. Like single-digit frames per second. The background is pretty, but it's not that pretty... I expect you could clear that up, 'cause Pompom (from whom I gather you drew inspiration) has a similar background in Mutant Storm and that runs just fine on the same machine.I guess it's just not my sort of game. On the other hand, the game is freeware, yes? So it's not like you should take any notice of my complaints.

For the record, I'm writing a similar sort of game, and that's exactly what my balls have looked like for six months. See for yourself: lch.ball.png (http://www.midwinter.com/~lch/lch.ball.png)
Great minds think alike? :)

On the ball style, you also might check Break Ball 2, and that ball style is one of the possible skins...that game came out in 2002...

Slow in the menus, hm? That's very interesting. I've only got ATI hardware to test on, but I'll see if I can find the bottleneck.

As I wrote before, I also find the game pace very slow. I'm working on punching it up a notch. well, several notches.

Some like the view, some don't. I have already decided to reduce the effect, but I'm not willing to remove it completely just yet. It worked in Mutant Storm and I think it can work here. There's got to be a metric in there that still looks good and doesn't make people seasick :)

Yes, that's right, Breakball 2 did it in 2002. But before them IIRC Bananoid (remember DOS4G/W?) had the same thing.

Thank you for your feedback!

Not a bad breakout game :)

You have the camera moving independently but also with the mousemovement - to the point that when moving the mouse it doubles the "seasick" motion. I think you might be able to find the balance if you don't move the camera automatically when the player is moving the paddle. I literally felt seasick after awhile.

Other thoughts:

1) The powerup posts get lost in the constant combo announcements, making it all hard to keep track of. You might want to find a way to distinguish between the different announcement types, perhaps combos posted at the top of the screen and powerups at the bottom.

2) I would recommend creating a custom icon for your executable. I don't know that it has any effect on sales but it looks more professional when developers go that extra step.

3) If you can, you might want to look into creating more standout and obvious graphics for your falling powerups, just to give it more production value.

You've got a good game going, you're basically down to the tiny little details to make up production value - but then those make all the difference when trying to distinguish yourself from other games in your genre. I hope this helps :)

Oh, also - you aren't giving the player of enough control over the ball. In most breakout-style games the rebound angle of the ball is controlled by where it hits the player's paddle. For example, if the ball hit's the right side of the paddle it rebounds to the right at a sharp angle, regardless of what direction it was travelling in when it hit. I know it's not "correct" physics but the player needs some element of control.

Right now you have it so that the ball simply rebounds and continues on it's current course and the player is basically along for the ride.

Originally posted by KNau
Right now you have it so that the ball simply rebounds and continues on it's current course and the player is basically along for the ride. I don't think that's true; the paddle seemed to give a little bit of English. Not very much, though, and definitely not enough for my tastes.

As for the view angle, Mutant Storm certainly does not do that! MS zooms in and out, but it never changes the view angle.

p.s. I remember Bananoid!

There is a change in angle, but only if the ball hits in the red part of the paddle. it is "real" physics, so if you want a sharp change in angle you have to hit on the very outside edge of the paddle. I'm going to replace that model with a curved one, so that it is obvious.