Android Sideral: Space Exploration (Android) [+ Development Blog]

Carloskhard

Member
About the Game:

Sideral is a 2D space survival and exploration game
With procedural generation of planets and physics system to create a galaxy to explore and conquer.


Control the rotation and trust of your ship. Learn to maneuver and land carefully on planets but be careful with gravity forces!
Rocks at high speeds,High gravity suns and all kind of enemy ships that will hunt you while you run out of oxygen and fuel in space.


Main Features:
  • Physic system
  • Complex landing gameplay
  • Procedural generation of planets.
  • Systems for health,shield,coins,oxygen and fuel.
  • Maps,levels,dialogs and menus
  • Multiple particles
  • Enemy IA
Future Game Features:
-Upgrading system for the ship trough a shop.

UPDATES & DEVELOPMENT BLOG:
Last Update!:
6/06/19 - Systems update

-Combat around enemy planets that trap you so you can't exit the fight once you enter.Also the planet moves to the background so you don't collide with it while fighting. Once you have destroy every enemy the forcefield will disappear and the planet will come back to the foreground.Check some of that on the gift for the next point..

-System for creating new enemy types easily.Right now I have 3 types: Pawn,Basic & waver. Soon I'l start working on different sprites for each one and a few more enemies for the alpha launch.

-System for bullets.This will allow me to create more types of bullets very fast, very recommended to create parent objects to program around just one model and then create children of that object and just change what you need.
-Added Joystick control and multitouch management.
-Improved procedural generation of planets.
-Added debug camera.Now I can acces a freecamera to watch whats happening outside the boundary, for debugging but also for creating cinematics.
-Portal for passing trough levels activated once all of the level objectives are completed.
-Shield!
-More particles(Rocas).
-Better gravity forces.Improved hit scripts(Take more or less damage depending on how bad you hit).
-Global pause system.

On this gif you can see the portal, some multitouch input from a phone and also the debug cam working as cinematic and debugger:


More updates:

As some of you know, GM1.4 was giving me a headache with android compilation so I bought GM2 these holidays with the sale and now everything work so much better!
Here some improvements I've been making:

  • Improved the intro menu
  • Button system improved (To click some buttons you have to tap and lift the finger at the same spot, buttons react when pushed(Game feel),...)
  • Added levels with objectives and portals to pass between them
  • Added joystick control(Player can choose between buttons or joytstick, which seems to be more comfortable for most testers)
  • Improved prodecural spawners which generate rocks and comets outside the view.
  • Added more SFX
  • Perfected camera system
  • Starting to work on the system to move at planets with your astroneer. Exited to start working on animations and gameplay on planets!
  • Added smooth and sexy camera transitions (We all love smooth camera movement)
  • Damage particles (In progress)
  • Improved interface system and minor bugs fixed
  • Added this simple intro to the game. (Background rock still need to be fixed

  • Pause menu now has "objectives" tab where you'll check your goals


  • *Sorry for bad English translations and some spanish text. I try focusing on making the game too much but I don't worry too much about texts since I'm pretty sure I'l be changing them. Also I didn't decide a name for the game yet so still testing ideas fo it, opinions are appreciated!
    1. First we start creating the object of the planet from our spawner at the start of the room.This planet just have a basic sprite in B&W which will be tint later.
    2. Now we set the type of planet,scale,color, mass (based on ratio) and number of moons.For this example I've pick a basic green planet.
    3. The 'Image_blend' of the planet is set to the one chosen.This color will be used for the planet,mountains, moons and also the aurea.
    4. Aurea is drawn as another object created with a high depth and just with code (Using "add color" draw mode and a colored circle from white with a little bit of the planet colour, and black on the outside,which won't be painted).
    5. Collisionable structures are created as individual objects attached to the planet.Each one will be colored with the colour of the planet.
    6. Non collisionable structures will be created all in the same background object that was used for the aurea.This time, they'll also have a shadow made with an alpha mask (If you guys are interested I will make a mini-tutorial for this).
    7. * Both Non collisionable and collisionable structures will be given a size relative to the planet size, and for all collision mask to work, a special fixture will be created after the size has been given.
    8. Lastly, moons are created and gravity added and we have our new planet ready to be discover!

  • Maps are now generarted procedurally however still need some work.
  • Working on new types of planets.
  • New pause window with scaled minimap of the actual scenario.Planning to add deployable mission details tab at the right.
  • Created very basic circular water wich hurts the ship.Planning to add terrain in water planets and a realistic water mask (Never seen anyone talking about circular water physics or mask so any ideas would be helpful).
  • Improved enemy IA with inteligence for:
    -Evading planets,suns or blackholes.
    -Evading other ships if close.
    -Landing and taking off their native planets.
  • NPCs have various states: Reposing on their planet, patroling or chasing and attacking you.
  • NPC ships evade planets smoothly and go back if they go to far away from their original planet.
  • NPC planets now have some extraterrestrial structures and special colors so they are more recognizable.
  • Now Comets will cross the map at high speeds.Be fast avoiding them! Multiple levels of difficulty will make comets spawn more often.
  • Nebulas are starting to take shape: I'm spawning nebulas randomly in the map drawing them in different sizes and colors.Do you like how the background is looking?
  • Minor improvements:
    -Asteroids turn red when they enter the atmosphere of planets fast.
    -Pointers for enemy planets now are red so you can know where you're heading before it's too late.
    -Added screen shakes and a few simple temporal sounds for hits.
    -Health and Combustible bars now turn red as they run out.
  • Asteroids now will come in waves in space,sometimes spawing near planets and suns in large groups or maybe just surfing the large space.
  • Nebulosas have been added to the background so it is easier to know how you are moving and also they look pretty cool! Will add some footage tomorrow morning~
  • No more difficult and bouncy landing: Spaceship now sticks to the planet on nice landings! The code is very similar to the moon orbiting the plant: The ship goes into x and y automatic reposition using trigonometry equations until you start rocket propulsion.
  • Moons orbit planets by following math equations (trigonometry) and the functions lengthdir_x(...).But now they also CRASH with your ship and loose their orbit, going out to space or crashing with the planet atractted by it.This is the code that makes the moon orbit,which is cut when the spaceship touch the moon:
    phy_position_x = attached.x + lengthdir_x(offsetDist,angulo + attached.image_angle*vtraslacion);
    phy_position_y = attached.y + lengthdir_y(offsetDist,angulo + attached.image_angle*vtraslacion);
    //angulo = angle; translacion = translation
  • Spaceship now includes a system that helps it point to the planet so landing is easier!


Contact:
If you are interested in becoming part of the team or any general inquiries feel free to message in the forum, PM me or email me at carloskatercbt8@gmail.com.

*References & other stuff:
-This game is inspired by "last horizon" but trying to be more sandbox and shooter like a 2D "No Man's Sky" or "EVE online".
-Want to know anything related to the game?? Go ahead and leave a comment! I'll do my best to answer them
 

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Carloskhard

Member
*New Update 15/12/17*: Comets,more Meteors,Nebulas and a few small improvements!
Check it out and leave some feedback if possible! :D
 
Looks great, but I can't for the life of me find any download link so I can check it out...did I miss something, or is the playable demo not posted yet?
 

Carloskhard

Member
Looks great, but I can't for the life of me find any download link so I can check it out...did I miss something, or is the playable demo not posted yet?
I'll be posting it in 2 or 3 days.I had an issue with Android export module but will be fixed soon :) Thanks for the intetest and feedback!
 
G

Guest User

Guest
oh lovely, im fond of space survival games. not sure if my poor old android phone would be up to it but it looks wonderful nonetheless.

i think what stands out to me are all your little features like landing assistance and particle effects. the little details just really come together to make the gameplay look nice and smooth. best wishes on this project.
 

Carloskhard

Member
25/2/18 - New Update explaining how I draw planets, showing improved pause menu and some work on new types of planets.
Work for next week is adding a start menu and then I think I will be able to record some Gameplay:p Comment your suggestions!
 

Carloskhard

Member
Hey guys,
I finally have some time to program, so here it is a new update:

(14/06/18) - Game intro - improved pause menu + objectives

  • Added this simple intro to the game (Background rocks still need to be fixed)
  • Added "objectives" tab to pause menu, a place to check your goals.

  • *Sorry for mixing some bad English translations and with spanish text. I focus on making the game but not too much on texts, since I'm pretty sure I'l be making changes. Also I didn't decide a name for the game yet so still testing ideas fo it. What are your opionions on what could be a good name? Let me know!
 

Carloskhard

Member
September Update:
  • Starting to work on the system to move at planets with your astroneer. Exited to start working on animations and gameplay on planets!
  • Added smooth and sexy camera transitions (We all love smooth camera movement)
  • Damage particles (Still need more work)
  • Improved interface system and minor bugs fixed
 
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Carloskhard

Member
Random fact Monday: Did you know you can push moons in-game and move them out of their orbits?
What others fun features do you think I should add? Let me know!!
 

Carloskhard

Member
October Update Aquatic*

So I've been working on high terrains in planets with liquid (lava or any kind of water) and some scripts for speeding up the process of adding new elements to planets and this is the result so far:




Some details about the code behind this for those curious:

Before this update water planets were just normal planets with water draw behind them.The water; as most of the stuff in this game; is drawn with code, making gradient circles behind the planet:


Detecting when the ship is in the liquid can be done easily with distances, and once the ship is known to be inside water it gets more friction and takes more or less damage depending on the liquid.

The problem was making terrain above the water so players can land.To do this I used vertices to draw portions of a circle above the liquid and then adding a ramp sprite at the extremes of every piece of land.

The result is very good in my opinion, the only problem I still have is making the collision with these high lands: With planets without liquid I just use a circlular collision, which is super easy to implement, but with there terrains with different hights I can¡t do that and right now I don't know if I should use code for faking the collision or use physics collisions for every piece of land o_O What do you think I should do?Let me know!

Next update will be very important since it'll cover some of the core gameplay: Spaceship Fights in enemy planets.
More updates soon!

*Yes,that was a stupid reference to minecraft jajaja
 
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Carloskhard

Member
11/01/19 - Proyect moved to GM2 and tons of improvements!
As some of you know, GM1.4 was giving me a headache with android compilation so I bought GM2 these holidays since it was on sale and now everything work so much better!
Here's some improvements I've been making:
  • Improved the intro menu
  • Button system improved (To click some buttons you have to tap and lift the finger at the same spot, buttons react when pushed(Game feel),...)
  • Added levels with objectives and portals to pass between them
  • Added joystick control(Player can choose between buttons or joytstick, which seems to be more comfortable for most testers)
  • Improved prodecural spawners which generate rocks and comets outside the view.
  • Added more SFX
  • Perfected camera system

    You can see some of these changes in this short clip here:


    Next task will be redoing the background since right now is 3 layers of stars as a background and since the images are very large it takes a lot of processing.I'll try some options and share the results here soon. Keep watching until then!
 
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Carloskhard

Member
6/06/19 - Systems update
Hey guys, these months I've been studying a lot but I've had some time to work on the game and these are the updates I've working on:

-Combat around enemy planets that trap you so you can't exit the fight once you enter.Also the planet moves to the background so you don't collide with it while fighting. Once you have destroy every enemy the forcefield will disappear and the planet will come back to the foreground.Check some of that on the gift for the next point..

-System for creating new enemy types easily.Right now I have 3 types: Pawn,Basic & waver.

-System for bullets.This will allow me to create more types of bullets very fast, very recommended to create parent objects to program around just one model and then create children of that object and just change what you need.
-Added Joystick control and multitouch management.
-Improved procedural generation of planets.
-Added debug camera.Now I can acces a freecamera to watch whats happening outside the boundary, for debugging but also for creating cinematics.
-Portal for passing trough levels activated once all of the level objectives are completed.
-Shield!
-More particles(Rocas).
-Better gravity forces.Improved hit scripts(Take more or less damage depending on how bad you hit).
-Global pause system.

On this gif you can see the portal, some multitouch input from a phone,the shield working and also the debug cam working as cinematic and debugger:


For the next update I'll be working on NPC sprites(Right now they all have the same sprite but tinted different), more NPCs and a shop for buying new weapons and mods.
Let me know what you think and what you'd like to see in this game!
 
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