Shadow of the Beast Legacy semi-project

[darkfalzx]

Originally Posted by Retro-Nerd

It indeed affects the look of the shader, but only from bad to worse. Maybe somebody here could help you with it.

It's the screen curvature effect that is messing it up.
I have just uploaded a new build, where the curvature effect is removed from the CRT shader.

Also - the continue system is now implemented - you can continue from the game's main menu - that is - if you have any continues left. Easy difficulty gets 3 continues, Normal gets 1, and Classic gets no continues at all, just as Odin intended: )

This feature needs quite a bit of testing to make sure all items and events carry over properly. It's been alright so far, but more people playing the game could definitely help.

I will eventually allow the player to continue directly from the game over screen.

Windows build
Ouya console build
General Android build (The touch-screen controls are invisible, and incomplete)
Ubuntu Linux build
Mac build

[Neil79]

___________________________________________
############################################################################################
FATAL ERROR in
action number 1
of Create Event
for object obj_kernel:

Push :: Execution Error - Variable Get 0.Shader(100019, -1)
at gml_Script_hiscore_save
############################################################################################
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
stack frame is
gml_Script_hiscore_save (line 0)
gml_Script_hiscore_load
gml_Object_obj_kernel_Create_0

PC win 8.1 ( Pressing ignore and I can carry on )

[Retro-Nerd]

CRT shader looks pretty good in windowed mode now, not really properly in fullscreen. But i don't moan more about it. Nice work so far. Much better than many other retro remakes i've seen so far.

[Adrian Browne]

shadow of the beast 2 could definately use save points and a general lowering of the horrendous difficulty level. It is almost entirely inaccessible to newcomers as it stands.

When I was 12 I could play this game for hours at a time and never be deterred by the sickening difficulty level. Youthful enthusiasm, pure and simple. The wow factor kept me and my bro playing straight for about 9 months, we really did live and breathe this game. It was the lure of seeing a new location and hearing another amazing tune.
No youtube and cd's were not popular yet.

[alexh]

"Window Size" seems to affect performance in "Full Screen".

[darkfalzx]

Originally Posted by Neil79

PC win 8.1 ( Pressing ignore and I can carry on )

Nice catch! This happens when the game runs for the first time on a system. Found and fixed.

Originally Posted by Retro-Nerd

CRT shader looks pretty good in windowed mode now, not really properly in fullscreen. But i don't moan more about it. Nice work so far. Much better than many other retro remakes i've seen so far.

So, do you want the curvature back, or you think it's better flat? The shader doesn't look right because of the resolution discrepancy of the window to screen res. No easy way to fix it.

Originally Posted by alexh

"Window Size" seems to affect performance in "Full Screen".

Yes - a little, especially if you use shaders. Can't help it.

Originally Posted by Adrian Browne

shadow of the beast 2 could definately use save points and a general lowering of the horrendous difficulty level. It is almost entirely inaccessible to newcomers as it stands.

When I was 12 I could play this game for hours at a time and never be deterred by the sickening difficulty level. Youthful enthusiasm, pure and simple. The wow factor kept me and my bro playing straight for about 9 months, we really did live and breathe this game. It was the lure of seeing a new location and hearing another amazing tune.
No youtube and cd's were not popular yet.

I have first played SOTB2 on Genesis/MD - and the game was far more reasonably difficult. I was eventually able to figure most of it out myself through just bloodyminded trial and error. At one point I could beat it even on the highest difficulty setting.
The Amiga SOTB2 was even tougher though, and don't get me started on that freaking text parser crap!
Still probably my favorite SOTB though. Saving it for last.

[Neil79]

Originally Posted by darkfalzx

Nice catch! This happens when the game runs for the first time on a system. Found and fixed.

.

[Retro-Nerd]

So, do you want the curvature back, or you think it's better flat? The shader doesn't look right because of the resolution discrepancy of the window to screen res. No easy way to fix it.

Nah, the curvature looked cheap. Flat it better. The scanlines aren't properly scaled in FullHD 1920x1080. Window size x4 looks best but far from any real scanlines.

[darkfalzx]

I guess at this point I could try making a scanlines "ghetto-shader" - a software shader that essentially does the same damn thing, but much faster and using less VRAM...

I also think that I will lock the game at x2 Window scale in full-screen mode, as it makes little sense otherwise.

[Retro-Nerd]

What happens if you scale the fullscreen to the actual x4 window size, so that there is a small black border then. windowed x4 looks pretty nice.

[darkfalzx]

Minor update to all builds of the game.
Mostly changes and polish to the menus.
Added another checkpoint to the tree maze - right after killing the skeleton boss.
Might still add a checkpoint on the plains... dying next to the castle and having to start back at the well will not be a fun experience.
Added ability to continue from within the game. Pressing 'no' will send you to the main menu, where you still have all your continues.

What do you think - should continuing reset your health to maximum, or should it only restore the amount you had at the beginning of that area to keep things challenging?

At this point, minor tweaks and extras aside - the SOTB1 game is done. Having unlockable extras, arranged soundtracks and achievements is definitely cool - but perhaps later.

Windows build
Ouya console build
General Android build (The touch-screen controls are invisible, and incomplete)
Ubuntu Linux build
Mac build

[robinsonb5]

Originally Posted by darkfalzx

What do you think - should continuing reset your health to maximum, or should it only restore the amount you had at the beginning of that area to keep things challenging?

Reset it, but keep track of what the health would have been - then award some kind of bonus if at the end of the game if the player would have survived without the health being reset?

[Retro-Nerd]

Just noticed that the game runs pretty smooth in 50Hz and stutters a bit in 60Hz. Is it intended to run better in 50Hz? I'm just curious, 50Hz is perfectly fine for me.

[darkfalzx]

Originally Posted by robinsonb5

Reset it, but keep track of what the health would have been - then award some kind of bonus if at the end of the game if the player would have survived without the health being reset?

Just resetting it is fine by me, but that whole business with keeping track of the HP internally for some sort of an achievement - I don't think I care for it. Maybe if I tracked the amount of damage taken by the player and then compared it against the total HP available in the Classic mode. With this data I could tell someone who beat the game on an easier mode that they could've technically made it on the hardest setting as well.

Originally Posted by Retro-Nerd

Just noticed that the game runs pretty smooth in 50Hz and stutters a bit in 60Hz. Is it intended to run better in 50Hz? I'm just curious, 50Hz is perfectly fine for me.

The game's internal framerate is set to 50fps to make speeds closer to the original. Not sure what might cause the stuttering though.

[Retro-Nerd]

A scrolling 2D game in 50fps@60Hz stutters, that's normal (or tearing in some cases). Good to know that it runs internal with 50fps.

[Zagrebista]

Just found out about and played this. Thoughts:

I dunno how easy this would be to do but I always though the monsters in Beast 1 die in a rather boring manner, falling into the floor. They should come apart like the monsters in the later Beast games. And the boss monsters could do with a bit more animation even if it's just, e.g., the arms moving on the weird skeleton thing the appears early in Beast 1.

Might be an idea to let people define what buttons do on their game-pads. Some people might want to have, for example, a shoulder button to jump.

Hi,

I have seen a few remakes of the first part of the trilogy which was mediocre at best. This one is nearly flawless!

Just a thought: what about decorating the in-game menus to be more Beast-ish? It looks ok but it's too simple compared to the game atmosphere.
There is a break in the loader music at the credits. Probably many people noticed but I didn't read the forum throughly.

I also find the physics of the second part a bit too dynamic but probably that's just me.

Also I don't know what technology you use but what about porting it to MorphOS? That would be inception (Beast-ception)!

Keep up the good work! You've just made the very first remake that really deserves to be called a remake!
Unfortunately the upcoming PS4 remake could be worse gameplay-wise :S

[darkfalzx]

Originally Posted by Zagrebista

Just found out about and played this. Thoughts:

I dunno how easy this would be to do but I always though the monsters in Beast 1 die in a rather boring manner, falling into the floor. They should come apart like the monsters in the later Beast games. And the boss monsters could do with a bit more animation even if it's just, e.g., the arms moving on the weird skeleton thing the appears early in Beast 1.

Might be an idea to let people define what buttons do on their game-pads. Some people might want to have, for example, a shoulder button to jump.

The goal was to recreate the original game with minimal changes, improving it only in the areas that affect usability (or in case of the added cutscene - consistency). I have purposely restrained myself from improving the games, despite really wanting to. At some point I thought I should make it an amalgamation of all versions of SOTB (with art edited to look consistent), but decided on keeping the look classic, as not one version has since came even close to its visual consistency. If I go down that particular rabbit-hole - I'll never finish this thing. Also - it seems to me the extra animation later versions of the game added were somewhat out of place.

The controller-redefinition might be something I will add.

Originally Posted by Artlace

Hi,

I have seen a few remakes of the first part of the trilogy which was mediocre at best. This one is nearly flawless!

Thanks man! I hesitate to call this a "remake" - it's probably more of a port in a classic sense. I wish I had the time (or was paid to?: ) remake these games properly.
Were there any remakes of the first game that got past replicating the overworld parallax effect?

Just a thought: what about decorating the in-game menus to be more Beast-ish? It looks ok but it's too simple compared to the game atmosphere.
There is a break in the loader music at the credits. Probably many people noticed but I didn't read the forum throughly.

As of right now this is mostly a code-project. I hesitated to throw any of my art into the mix unless necessary. Plus - I kind of like the strict, uniform looking menus - seems appropriately Psygnosis-y: )

I also find the physics of the second part a bit too dynamic but probably that's just me.

Not sure what you mean. Do you mean in SOTB2? I tried copying the movement as closely as I could, though I think Arbraan now turn faster. Also - SOTB2 and 3 aren't finished.

Also I don't know what technology you use but what about porting it to MorphOS? That would be inception (Beast-ception)!

I write this in GameMaker - and unfortunately it has no MorphOS exports.

Keep up the good work! You've just made the very first remake that really deserves to be called a remake!
Unfortunately the upcoming PS4 remake could be worse gameplay-wise :S

Thanks again!
I fear for that game as well - it's been far too quiet.

[bLAZER]

Nice work! I think I saw a spelling error in a cut scene though, "a dank passage" I guess it should be "dark".

edit: yes, I checked sotb1.dat and my eyes were correct.

[darkfalzx]

Originally Posted by bLAZER

Nice work! I think I saw a spelling error in a cut scene though, "a dank passage" I guess it should be "dark".

edit: yes, I checked sotb1.dat and my eyes were correct.

That's not an error - it's copied from the original.
dank
daNGk/
adjective
disagreeably damp, musty, and typically cold.
synonyms: damp, musty, chilly, clammy, moist, wet, unaired, humid
"the dank basement"