We have been getting quite some questions about the status of our project. Everybody including ourselves were probably expecting more results sooner after our project's initial announcement at Expo 2010.
Unfortunately this is a hobby project for us and 2011 has been a busy year for everybody on our team. That's why we did not make the leap forward we were hoping for this year.
Software wise we took some big steps; we invested a lot of time to create a web based Team Suite which handles the data flow of animations, fonts, sound and music. Also we wrote an "extension" of the pyprocgame framework that connects to the Team Suite and helps coordinate the lightshows, animations, fonts etc. We see this as an investment that will also greatly streamline development of our future games.
Our sound guys are currently working on an original main theme for the Bride 2.0, which will be used as a base for other musical variations and sound effects. So far it's sounding quite epic!
On the dot matrix side we have created all new fonts this month. Also we are in the process of renewing all existing animations, since the rulesheet and accompanying story have changed, and we also changed framerate from 60 down to 32 (to increase performance and get perfect synchronization with the light shows).
We thank you for your continuing interest in our project and we hope we will have lots of exciting updates in 2012!
In the meantime here is a chronological summary of our activity this year:
January:
- Game launcher to choose between Williams and Dutch Pinball rules
- Start of a DP codebase / sub-framework
February:
- Prepared the game for the first public playing session
- Added old & new sounds
- Gave a workshop on P-ROC & pyprocgame programming
- Switched from 60 fps to 32 fps to sync animations with lightshows 100%
- We made a full 3D model of the Bride of Pinbot and were featured in an ad for the P-ROC.
- Added support for animated fonts
- Added easy transitions to our codebase
March:
- Started using the aux driven helmet lights, incorporated them in lightshows.
- First team meeting with the sound guys
- Played Steven van der Staay's Road Kings
April:
- Rulesheet being written and discussed
- Tweaked Multiball 2
May thru September:
- Started developing a webbased Team Suite where rulesheet, animation, sound, music and lightshows all come together.
- Synchonization of all these assets happens automatically via FTP.
August:
- Successful experiment to gradually fade feature lights in and out.
September:
- Introduced "Sequences" into the game, these will be the base for all animations, lightshows and sounds in our game.
- Loading our Team Suite up with our existing animations and sound.
- Implementing font management and previewing functionality for our Team Suite.
November:
- Played the Demolition Man "on steroids" by Dennis vd Pas.
December:
- All game assets come from the Team Suite now.
- Made fonts in all different sizes, spacings and alias versions.
- Music composed: First rough version of the main theme and a variation.
Check out our tweets of 2011:
https://twitter.com/#!/dutchpinball
The year's progress in code commits:
https://github.com/koenheltzel/dutchpinball-bride/commits/master
Thank you for the update.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure I'm not the only hobbyist and owner of a TM:BOP that is looking eagerly forward to seeing Bride 2.0 in his machine.
At the same time, I can well understand that this is not a full time job for you, and things will definitely take some time.
Please just consider updating the blog and/or twitter more often, even if there wasn't that much to tell at all times. And if there's ever anything that could be 'crowdsourced' (testing, for example), I'm sure you'll find volunteers.
Keep up the good work!
--JKu