Rubymatt's Blog

A lot of progress has been made Breakthrough recently.  Enough has been (and is still being) added to the game that the next release will jump up to 0.2.  Huzzah!

The main feature of the new update is that any player will be able to construct and play on his or her own levels.  A number of premade levels will also be packaged with the game to show what can actually be created with the editor.  The editor is built right into the game, and will require no additional downloads.

For those who like to generate levels instead of playing on preset ones, these options will still be available with some new features.  Standard rectangular maps can now be given random “holes” where no brick is present.  These holes are reflected for both players and give randomized patterns to the brick field.

Several user interface enhancements have been made.  The menu layout has been improved and the colours of bricks now reflect that of the players instead of the default red and blue.

Along with a few other changes and features, this is roughly how update 0.2 is going to pan out.  The update will be available at some point in the coming week.

Only a small update today, but one that I think will be very much appreciated.  This is version 0.11, which adds the ability to pause by hitting the “P” key on the keyboard or the Start button on a 360 controller.

Enjoy.

Download

Whilst this is not a very original title for a first blog post, I think it is apt, considering the contents of this post, and most likely the entire blog.

First post, so let’s start things off well.  After two days of for some reason having a very strong urge to code more and more into this, I finally have a (relatively) stable and releasable version of a little game I started on Friday, under the working title “Super Mega Awesome Breakout Pong Wars”, or, as the project is titled “Breakthrough”.

The game works like standard pong, but with some changes.  Between the players is a large field of bricks which is destroyed as in Breakout.  Each player has his or her own ball (so even when all of the bricks have gone the game can continue and be kinda fun).  Bricks also drop powerups, most of which are to disadvantage the other player, rather than advantaging yourself. The game can be played with a friend locally (using either xbox gamepads or a keyboard, or both), or against what is currently a very primitive but accurate AI.

Download link can be found at the bottom of this post.  The game also requires the XNA Redistributable Framework to run (It’s only 6.7MB).

Feedback is very much appreciated.  While it is only at an “alpha” stage, the game is not without its bugs and it would be very appreciated if those who play it could report if problems occur, and how they did so.

Technical stuffies!

Current Version: 0.1

Features:

• A combination of two classic videogames.
• 2-player local multiplayer.
• Simple but difficult AI.
• Customizable games.
• Xbox 360 controller support.
• An immense audiovisual experience (not guaranteed).

Future Features:

• Additional powerups
• Enhanced AI and AI difficulty selection
• Different shaped boards
• A proper menu system and results screen, along with some nicer graphics.
• An overly epic soundtrack
• Improved collision detection.
• Adventure mode, perhaps?

 Download