Dreams (PS4)

[ESPOMAN]

I really just can't make anything in this game. It is like way too deep for me. I also couldn't make anything good on Little Big Planet so I'm not too surprised. I do like playing other people's levels.

[Blzer]

I have a few ideas of games that I'm going to try and make first. They will be simple, but yes this is super deep. I never bothered creating in LittleBigPlanet because I'm not creative enough to make levels. Make games, though? The sky is the limit.

I'm currently in the Logic tutorials. It is getting way overly complex with the amount of things that can be tweaked, which in a way is good because it probably means that you can pretty much create anything that you want to, heh. But yes, this is quite a bit.

As far as playing games, a lot of them have been fun. Cubric is very, very well done. I've played it about a half hour and I'm probably not even 20% finished with it.

[ezio]

Quote: Originally Posted by ESPOMAN

I really just can't make anything in this game. It is like way too deep for me. I also couldn't make anything good on Little Big Planet so I'm not too surprised. I do like playing other people's levels.

I am the same way. I can't create anything good either. Some of the stuff people have made has been amazing thought.

[Picci]

Quote: Originally Posted by ESPOMAN

I really just can't make anything in this game. It is like way too deep for me. I also couldn't make anything good on Little Big Planet so I'm not too surprised. I do like playing other people's levels.

Quote: Originally Posted by ezio

I am the same way. I can't create anything good either. Some of the stuff people have made has been amazing thought.

By no means would I consider myself a professional with some of the recent game and art releases in Dreams by I do have a degree in design/graphics so permit me to suggest a finer way if you haven't. It depends on if you own move controllers. If you do, then it will feel strange at first, but you'll be whipping them suckers as sooner than not, once you get the hang of it and enjoying it more.

Thought this on Dreamverse was useful;

Dreams How to Move Controllers tips and techniques

;

[allBthere]

I have a very narrow focus for this game. I'm going to try to create muay thai animations with a generic puppet. From there if I can get to a place I feel good about I'll either collaborate with someone good at sculpting or sink a ton of hours into that. I'll also be working on impact/effect results and I thought of a really cool unique way to do that.

If all of that goes well I'll move to environment. If that goes well or a collab goes well I'll try to collaborate with different scenes which would impact the core gamplay - like RPG interactions with food, excersize, gym's etc.

So if anyone is good at sculpting or other 'meta' logic let me know. I'm going to primarily focus on the animation because I'm into film in real life and have a history in martial arts including muay thai and boxing/tkd so I know the balance to create something at least semi-true, that also looks cool and powerful and also how it will relate to speed and timing of the rest of the move-set to keep it CONSISTENT. This will take a long time and I'm ok with that! lol

[Picci]

For those who purchased the early access, there's a free Dreams bundle in the PS Store you can download. It includes the Dreams Dynamic Theme, Dreams Official Soundtrack, and Dreams Digital Artbook.

[ezio]

Quote: Originally Posted by Picci

For those who purchased the early access, there's a free Dreams bundle in the PS Store you can download. It includes the Dreams Dynamic Theme, Dreams Official Soundtrack, and Dreams Digital Artbook.

It looks like you can download it if you pre-ordered the game as well.

[allBthere]

animation is good - progress is decent. I made a fighter have a resting fighting stance, then animated a jab, cross, hook and uppercut as well as lead left kick and back right kick to the head. All of those mapped to the controller. Punches look pretty damn good and chain together well- the kicks are just OK, there is wonky bits and it stems from your avatar being 'anchored' to the ground and having to 'move' it rather than adjust joints is where it becomes really tricky and things start to get rather tedious and sometimes unsolvable (at least for me).

So I have no doubt I'll have a full nicely animated move set in short order!

The problem is impact and I can see I'll likely be disappointed down the road...I'm looking into all this now simultaneously but the game seems to lake a few key factors for a more sim fighter.

1. I don't see that I can apply damage to single areas which was my plan.
ex. hitting the arm I don't see a way to create damage to the arm so that it can independently be hurt. It seems overall damage until it gets to 0 is the only option (at least that I can see)

2. Although you can cause material to 'collide' the result is disappointing for the most part. It looks good with slow nudges but not big fast hits. This is an issue because it looks like I'll have to animate 'reactions to hits' rather than have them happen procedurally. The tech seems semi-there; for example a hook from left to right if landed properly can cause the head to move in the direction of the hit and the hand to cause that motion - but it's not exaggerated enough and maxed out it isn't much to see. Also, other areas of the body simply push the whole avatar around rather than cause a realistic impact. An example would be a body hit moving the character laterally like it's jumping sideways rather than the body folding and any balance being lost. So it's going to be tough to 'sell' the hits.

3. Logic
this is where it gets REALLY confusing and where smarter people win lol. I'm sure someone else could help me with this but to try and keep it simple I'll give one small example. I had the idea of ragdoll'ing someone if they got hit enough on the chin, but just momentarily - then I thought how cool if I could ragdoll other indivudual parts of the body just momentarily as well - more on that in a bit - the chin is doable - I'm not sure exactly how but it's super complicated. If you have enough 'if and when' switches combined with randomizers and the a trigger for the ragdoll, I'm sure that could happen - but to actually do it and work out which gagets are appropriate for each step in the long chain reaction ....??? lol But I can also see my individual limb thing won't work because you can't apply damage to a limb - you might be able to do it if each part of the body is tagged differently but even then I'm not sure you that would work. It seems like 100% ragdoll or none, and even then I can only get it to work on a clone which isn't helpful.

I've learned A LOT in the past few days hahaha. I think platforming games will shine the most over all - for me though I'm going to at least get a full realistic moveset of kickboxing/thai animations. I may even create a whole suite because the way the characters move by default would make for a neat taekwondo game.

I hope to see other make some 'niche' games and/or animations/characters - this is truly a rewarding experience even though ultimately I don't think I'll be able to create exactly what I imagined.

I'll post a video in a week or two when I get a chance to record a bunch of my animations to see what you guys think.