899 replies to this topic

[C-Dawg]

I've done more than anyone's share?  Strange way of putting it.  It's my project, after all. 

 

Anyway, if you wanna help, that's awesome.  What I'm thinking is that the strategy guide will have a walkthrough, and it will be illustrated.  So, page 1 is like "Getting the Pulse Hammer" and would be accompanied by a cut-out of the route through Aquarius from the start just to the hammer.  Then some splash boxes with information about the creatures and whatever.  Interior rooms can be described, including their contents, but not necessarily mapped out.  Just flip through an old Nintendo Power to see what I mean.

 

What would be awesome and helpful is if someone else wanted to start making those cut-out of screen shots or just of the raw maps from ZQuest.  One for each leg of the adventure.  That would give me a head start on the guide, since I have to design layout and additional art based on the size of each cut-out.  Does that make sense?

 

If you want to do that, Shadow, I could export the maps from the current version for you tonight in full size.

Edited by C-Dawg, 31 August 2015 - 10:55 AM.

[ShadowTiger]

Sure, that'd be grand. Anyone who wants in on this project should coordinate though. I can imagine a lot of people doing different things based on their own level of creativity and program access, so having a basic template for everything to work with as a foundation would be ideal.

I'll make a mock-up or two in Photoshop over the course of the night and we'll see where it goes from there.


-------------------------

Okay, how's this for a template? I don't consider this to be too much of a spoiler, considering that it's the path to the real main objective. Not much of a big deal, probably.

This is going to be a seriously massive image, so beware and such.

Spoiler

It's a first draft, really. The border of the map, as small as it is, is the standard inventory border from in-game. Red lines divide each screen, and the screens that aren't accessible yet, and therefore not relevant, are behind a translucent visual barrier. The Icon of the objective is displayed in the middle of the room.

It's a start.

[newstarshipsmell]

From ZodiacGS(09-01-15)Locked.qst:

 

Damn, did you beef up the Pulse Hammer boss? Or am I just sucking more than usual? First time I died fighting him in a long time. Last door I exited was Aquarius 5D before fighting him. When I continued, I dropped out of the upper-left corner instead of next to the door.

 

There was an item pickup sound when I killed the Missile Launcher boss, though I wasn't picking up an item as he died. (Same sound played when I actually grabbed the missile launcher.)

 

Also, that piece of Energy is still displaying on the pick-3 rooms while you're acquiring/holding up one of the items.

 

Not necessarily bug, but I think this is new behavior. If you jump along the top of a row 0 room without a ceiling, instead of bouncing off the top of the screen, you'll float along the top row for the duration of your jump ascent, then fall when you'd normally start falling from your max jump.

Edited by newstarshipsmell, 01 September 2015 - 10:58 AM.

[C-Dawg]

Oh snap. yeah.  The pulse hammer boss had a life bar snafu and I fixed it... but I think I added 100 hit points too.  Whoops!  I'll back that out.  I'll also check to see if some other early bosses that I fixed have the same problem.

 

And, you say there's a warp issue at (5,D), eh?  I'll take a peek.

 

Some bosses who have enemies as part of their attack spawn a Kill All Enemies item when they die - thats' the sound you heard.  I can move to a fully scripted way of doing this (for int counter = 1; counter <= Screen->NumNPCs(); counter++) and that will remove the item pickup sound.  Or I can just remove the pickup noise from that item... yeah... that's easier.

[newstarshipsmell]

If you can think of nothing else to do with the extra space:

 

Alternatively, if that looks ugly/cluttered, you could recode the existing display so that the numbers are colored green when energy or missiles are at max, yellow for less than max, and red when under some lower threshold or zero, which would indicate when they're topped off, without indicating the max otherwise.

 

Also, the 5-rupee tile is 5 crystals, as are the 50- and 100- rupees, while the 20-rupee is a recolor of 1-rupee. Could you simply switch the tiles assigned to the 5- and 20- rupees so it scales up better? Maybe make 5-rupees a pile of three crystals as well?

 

Yeah, I know, totally minor stuff, probably to be filed in the "not worth it, for the time being at least" bin...

Edited by newstarshipsmell, 01 September 2015 - 09:02 PM.

[C-Dawg]

No, actually, I really like the idea of maxed missiles and capsules being a different color. That's elegant. Let me think about how I could implement that.

 

EDIT: Fixed the boss life issue, made a few more tweaks to some endgame bugs, and redrew the missile and energy capsule drops to make it more apparent how much you'll get from each.

Edited by C-Dawg, 01 September 2015 - 11:22 PM.

[newstarshipsmell]

Pisces 3A/4A: F6 trap, I believe, if you come down here before gaining Dash Jets. I cannot jump up from 4A into 3A from the upper platforms onto the lower center platform without bouncing off the platforms above on the sides. This traps the player in the handful of screens below and beside 4A, forcing an eventual F6.

 

Please remove or add a combo as necessary:

 

Pisces 1C: None of these are bugs (pointing them all out in case its unintentional) but this screen seems designed to require the Dash Jets to pass; however, you can pass it without them if you time your jump from the lower block and hop up onto the higher one, then jump across the remaining blocks. If this is not desired then just move the lowest block down a row.

 

 

The enemy gauntlets at S1E/S1F do not require Dash Jets to pass without getting hit (they are too slow / high above.)

Passing S1C allows you to trigger the switch at S2F, gain the Energy upgrade at S33, and then the Life Tank shop at S32 and Missile upgrade at S39, and you can also get the Energy x100 at S4F.

 

You cannot, of course, sequence-break and gain the Stun Beam out of order, since you still need Dash Jets to reach that screen.

 

Cancer 63: Continue bug. I beat Iron #2 at S7A, and without entering any other doors, went to S63 and beat the corridor, then fell down into S73 and F6/Continued. I resumed from the entrance at S46, rather than S63 as I expected to.

 

Scorpio / Sandblocks: Probably not a problem, but I discovered that jumping and slashing at the same time works your way through the sandblocks faster (because you'll move into the exploding sandblock while your Disintegrator Beam is still "swinging" and it'll destroy the next block, clearing two with one stroke, whereas swinging on the ground halts your movement so it'll only strike the one next to you.)

 

I discovered that if you break a sandblock on a screen edge, with a sandblock opposite it in the adjacent screen, you can jump and immediately scroll the screen, and you'll end up a half-tile or full row above in the adjacent screen:

 

 

 

I don't think it's possible to either get stuck inside a wall this way (since you need a row of sand below to get up, and you can just destroy it and fall out) nor can I see anyway to exploit it off the top of my head. If you'd set up any screens with blocks (or sandblocks that cycle to them) in the configuration below, it'd be possible to jump up into the block and walk out the side into another path, but I don't see anything like that anywhere in the Scorpio map. So I'm just bringing it up in case you weren't aware, and don't accidentally introduce any exploits if you fool around with Scorpio any further.

 

 

Scorpio 74: Continue bug too? I beat this corridor, walked left into S73 and F6/Continued. I resumed from S00 instead of S74.

 

Pisces 3D: Is this corridor/boss supposed to be near-impossible? I hate making "too hard" complaints, because usually that just means I'm playing sloppily and being too lazy/impatient to refine my game, but this corridor and boss both seem really excessively ramped up compared to the preceding levels/bosses. The last few times I've played through on the previous demos, I've given up and cheated my way through this corridor/boss (since you last reworked them) so admittedly I haven't spent much time practicing them over and over. But I beat the other Pisces corridor with little trouble, never came close to dying, and this one... I used two life tanks just reaching the boss, and the boss itself? Even having gathered all the other upgrades I could before tackling it, it still seemed really tanky and took very little damage from each shot, the ship special weapon was pretty useless against it, and I couldn't find any pattern that minimized getting hit, so I ended up using up another three tanks just to beat it.

 

So... not complaining, just making sure you intended for it to be that hard, and didn't accidentally up the HP and/or damage on it too high or something.

 

ETA: Does the Overcharge Adaptor make him easier? I already killed him so too late to check. I haven't really used that thing much, so I'm not sure how handy it comes in. I guess since you get like 4 or 5 of them, it'd make sense to use them on the harder bosses.

 

Gemini 43: The switch didn't make a noise when I triggered it. Not sure if that happens every time, or this was just some intermittent sfx-drop. I don't recall it activating silently in the past. Not really feeling like hitting F6/Retry and redoing a bunch of stuff to find out.

 

Sidearm: One of the really minor (but annoying) problems with the Sidearm is how the Efficiency upgrades work. After 10, it makes a big central shot with a pair of smaller shots on either side. But the smaller ones do less damage. Because their hitboxes overlap, oftentimes when you're firing at enemies it'll take more shots to kill them than it would with fewer Efficiency upgrades, as the smaller side shots are the ones that strike first. You have to be aligned precisely on the same row or column for the central shot to hit instead. For me, I usually hit 10+ Efficiency sometime in Gemini, at which point the Armos become annoying because half the time you wake them up and shoot them, they don't die with one shot (like they did when initially reaching/exploring Gemini) but instead run around with momentary damage invincibility and then run into you and damage you as they resume damage vulnerability.

 

Can you tweak it so that either a) the central shot always applies damage first if both hit an enemy or b) the smaller shots simply deal the same amount of damage?

 

Also, were you planning on leaving the upgrade tile with "ENG" on it or did you plan on changing it to "EFF" at some point? This is bound to confuse someone as-is.

 

Scorpio corridors: Are these still on the to-do list for getting a background makeover? It's one of the ones with a misaligned top/bottom edge that visibly glitch while scrolling.

 

Oh, and similar to the 2.50.1 bug with shots on the row below damaging you - you can also grab items like solo Sidearm upgrades sitting out in the open, if you're on the row above them and inch into their column, without actually touching them. Only way I can see this would matter is if you had one sitting on the far side of a barrier, with a solid combo beside and above it, but a walkable space kiddy-corner to it, that the player could reach - if they could jump slightly inside the wall above it, then they could probably grab it. So there's probably nowhere in the game where this actually matters, but another something to keep in mind, and I'll keep my eyes peeled and report if I find any exploits (since the shop/corridor prize boxes have quarter-tile unwalkable corners, they wouldn't be prone to exploiting this.)

 

Overcharge Adaptor / Life Tanks: So when you use up an expendable item, apparently ZC by default swaps the button assignment to the next item in the menu, rolling over to the beginning, and skipping any items already assigned to the other button. With the Overcharge Adaptor, this means it will usually swap in Life Tanks - yet another way for the player to accidentally/carelessly waste them, if they fail to swap out the item for something else and press the wrong button. Is it possible to force ZC to instead leave the assignment empty when using up the OA or LTs?

 

And again, it would be really awesome if your Energy meter could be replenished when you die. It's really tedious when you're repeatedly fighting and dying against a given boss with your meter depleted and waiting for it to recharge before trying again. This is most noticeable once you've gained Dash Jets but before you gain any Energy Dynamos, and you've got a continue point right next to the boss's screen (e.g. Iron #3 in Gemini.)

Edited by newstarshipsmell, 02 September 2015 - 04:36 PM.

[C-Dawg]

Scorpio sand issue is interesting, but I think I'll leave it alone.  That's the kind of insanely esoteric exploit that sometimes existed in NES games and allowed speed runners to find secrets without really wrecking the game for everyone else.  I can't imagine that anyone will speedrun Zodiac, but hey, if they do, there are probably lots of holes in my code for them to worm their way through!

 

By comparison, I did fix a similar issue that Chocobotheif just pointed out.  He pointed out it was theoretically possible to kill a boss and be flying right on the edge of the screen, allowing you to nudge to another screen on the "victory" dance animation.  This is possible to do randomly, so I did fix that issue.

 

The Cancer continue bug you pointed out didn't put you anywhere you were not supposed to go, so... that's fine.  I think there's some strange interaction with Save points and Continue points when you die on a different DMap, and frankly, I don't want to spend the time to figure that out right now.

 

Made it impossible to pass the Squids at 1E without eating damage unless you have the dash boots.  Left the rest untouched.

 

I'm working on something that will let you see a menu of what corridors and bosses are left, but I don't like your suggestion (too cluttered.)  Be back in a moment with my solution...

[Deedee]

One thing you could do is

• Have the missiles be red if there are missiles in your current area that you can access (based on your current items) and haven't collected yet,
• Have the missiles be yellow if there are no more missiles in your current area that you can collect at the moment (based on your current items) but there are missiles you can collect in other areas you can currently access,
• Have the missiles be blue if you have collected all the missiles you can access with your current items in all the areas you can currently access, &
• Have the missiles be green if you have collected all the missiles in the game.

You can also do a similar thing with money (energy, whatever):

• Have the money be red if you do not have max money and you do not have the biggest wallet,
• Have the money be yellow if you have max money, but do not have the biggest wallet,
• Have the money be blue if you do not have max money, but you do have the biggest wallet, &
• Have the money be green if you have max money and the biggest wallet.

You can probably do something similar with upgrades, probably the same way you can do the missiles.

[C-Dawg]

Naw, I don't want to give that much information away.  I may implement a counter that I can use to give the player a completion percentage, but first I need a good final number of how many items are in the game to begin with. 

 

I did add a Level 2 Scanner, though.  If you find it, you get a new ability.  On the screens with entrances into different Zodiac zones (the blue doors) you can hold "Up,"  If you do, you will see a menu that shows you which corridors and zodiac projects you've completed already.  There's a little prompt that you can do that, too.

[ShadowTiger]

Naw, I don't want to give that much information away.  I may implement a counter that I can use to give the player a completion percentage, but first I need a good final number of how many items are in the game to begin with.

How would those "Take one of three items" rooms be handled though? Like the Sidearm upgrade rooms.

[C-Dawg]

Well I envision just adding a script to every item pickup, not counting random drops or Life Tanks.  So, you get an item, it adds to your "completion counter."  Items that have scripts on pickup already just get an additional few lines of code, and those without a pickup script get a generic "counter+" script.

 

Then, I just make sure I know for sure how many items there are in the game.  The completion counter is the numerator, the set number I counted is the denominator, and you get a percentage.  Easy peasy once I have an accurate count of the number of items in the game.

 

Choose 3 rooms are not a big deal; whichever one you pickup will give you +1 and the room just gets tallied as 1 when I'm counting the total.

 

Does that make sense?

[Deedee]

I can't wait for the "walkthrough" to come out. Will it handle all the upgrades, or just what you need to complete the game?

[C-Dawg]

Got most of the Fighter Rush set up, but there's still bugs to work out.  The upgrade and downgrade system is working great (yeah, you don't get to bring your Bomb/Jets/Cannon upgrades; you need to collect them as random drops and you lose em if you're hit during Fighter Rush).  Probably will finish that and link it up to the game properly by the weekend.

[ShadowTiger]

Nice. It's rare that quests give you an after-game activity to do. Pretty awesome.

What did you think of the snippet of strategy guide map I made in the post above? Is the 15% or so transparency of the non-visible stages okay? Should they be blacked out? Should the frames be larger? Should the map be half the size?