Crypta 2011 (test release 2)

I don't know if anyone remembers, but I made a prototype of this game a while ago. After that my puzzle tutorial came into being, on which this new incarnation of Crypta is based.

<font size="4">How to play</font>

Mouse and leftclick controls everything.

<img src="http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2306601/skulls.png" border="0">

You know the deal: match three or more skulls of the same color and score points.

<img src="http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2306601/multiskull.png" border="0">

If you swap the multi-skull and make a match, all skulls of the same color will be destroyed.

<img src="http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2306601/hellometer.png" border="0">

Crypta has a little something special: the hellmeter. You can see it in the left bottom corner. When it's full, one randomly chosen skull will turn colorless and therefore can't be matched anymore.

You can recolor the skull if you manage to destroy skulls above it.

Click the center of the hellmeter to end the game prematurely.

<font size="4">Changelog test release 2</font>

• fixed a bug where it wouldn't register a 2nd place highscore
• fixed a bug (hopefully) where the game would mess up after making a highscore and clicking retry
• fixed a problem with Newline expressions in highscore name strings
• changed the appearance of the highscores screen
• changed the appearance of the game over screen
• changed the appearance and handling of the volume bars in the options screen
• adjusted the score calculation values
• lowered initial speed and rate of speed increase of the hellmeter
• added camera shaking
• added the multi-skull
• added a check of the desktop resolution on startup to prevent faulty gameplay
• various minor tweaks

<font size="4">Download</font>

Download link currently not available. Will return for test release 3.

<font size="2"><font color="red">WARNING: game features bright and flashing colors!</font></font>

This is the second test release which includes a working menu, options and local highscore board.

The included music track was created by Kevin MacLeod.

<font size="4">To-do-list</font>

• online highscore board
• logo and credits screens
• low effects option
• letterboxed fullscreen
• add custom mouse pointer
• find someone to do better SFX and/or original music

<font size="4">Feedback</font>

If you do take the time to try this game I would highly appreciate any kind of feedback. The game is quite effect-heavy, so it will also be interesting to see how it performs on different systems.

Thank you!

These type of games are certainly popular :)

Looks and plays well on my system, but I don't know if this is by design, but when I click on a skull, a skull 2 places to the right becomes the active skull, which is a little strange (piccy link below). Otherwise, nice!

zen

Click 4 Pic

Really good indeed! Too bad i suck at these games <img src="smileys/smiley11.gif" border="0" align="middle" />

Also plays good on my system, but i did not had the issue that zenox98 said <img src="smileys/smiley3.gif" border="0" align="middle" />

I like match 3, good thing with that hellometer. The game could finish when there are no moves left, I had to wait until the field filled up with skulls. In the main menu, the sound is deleyed when switching and selecting options, is it because of my slow computer?

Could be a good game when finished, will you make more levels?

Great looking game, love the graphics.

zeno98

'when I click on a skull, a skull 2 places to the right becomes the active skull'

I,m having the same problem, and the word 'view' with the letter'm' underneath appears in the top right of the screen. Might be something connected to the full screen settings?

I wonder if it's to do with the desktop resolution. I always run 1024x768, unless I'm sending over HDMI to the TV.

Also noticed that the 'hover' text at the menu is only partially visible.

Also plays good on my system, but i did not had the issue that zenox98 said

Thanks for playing! A little info about your system specs would help.

The game could finish when there are no moves left, I had to wait until the field filled up with skulls.

You can click on the center of the hellometer to stop the game immediately. You're still right, I should add some sort of check to kill the game when there aren't any viable moves available anymore.

Could be a good game when finished, will you make more levels?

This is a highscore hunt, so I guess there won't be a level progression in the usual sense. Other game modes are possible though.

Looks and plays well on my system, but I don't know if this is by design, but when I click on a skull, a skull 2 places to the right becomes the active skull, which is a little strange (piccy link below). Otherwise, nice!

I,m having the same problem, and the word 'view' with the letter'm' underneath appears in the top right of the screen. Might be something connected to the full screen settings?

I wonder if it's to do with the desktop resolution. I always run 1024x768, unless I'm sending over HDMI to the TV.

Is everyone having this issue running the game windowed with a desktop resolution lower than 1280*720 (720p)? Does it also happen in fullscreen? I suppose using a higher desktop resolution would fix things.

Thank you for reporting this problem!

Going fullscreen (which is tricky in itself due to the displacement) fixes the problem, and it plays as it should :)

Personally, I think all games should set the resolution based on the current system resolution (SysInfo.GetScreenHeight etc) or just force fullscreen. A resolution shouldn't be assumed, unless coding for a console, of course :)

Specs:

Windows XP, Geforce 1GB 9800GT AMD 64 X2 6000+, 1024x768 4GB RAM

Personally, I think all games should set the resolution based on the current system resolution (SysInfo.GetScreenHeight etc) or just force fullscreen. A resolution shouldn't be assumed, unless coding for a console, of course :)

The thing is this being a 2D game it's designed for a certain resolution. In this case 720p. So this is basically part of the system requirements.

Sure, some things could be adjusted to maybe fit 1024x768. But what if the next dude comes and insists on running it on his 640x480 desktop? Time to use a contemporary resolution!

One likely solution would be to stop the game with an error message if you try to run it windowed in a lower resolution.

Going fullscreen (which is tricky in itself due to the displacement) fixes the problem, and it plays as it should :)

You can quickly open settings.ini and set fullscreen to 1, so you don't have to start the game to change the setting.

Also let me mention that for this first release a few bugs have already been found (one being a pretty severe one), so there's enough to do already to warrant a 2nd test release, which should be done soon.

Thanks to everyone so far for playtesting this!

Okay guys, there's a download link up for test release 2.

There are various fixes and additions, including a new special kind of skull. Check the first post to view the complete changelog.

Amazing graphics / sfx, and the new stuff you added deff improves it.

I still have a performance problem running it on my ancient system <img src="smileys/smiley19.gif" border="0" align="middle" />

Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.00GHz

2 GIG RAM

GeForce 6200 256MB Graphics.

(not upgaradable due to asrock motherborad AGP limitations)

And my monitors crap!

It runs but with lots of delay, and i get the resolution message '1280 x 720' at the beginning.

Why is such the large resolution needed ? a lot of people will struggle to run it. <img src="smileys/smiley19.gif" border="0" align="middle" />

Edit...In saying that it might that my systems out of date !

It runs but with lots of delay, and i get the resolution message '1280 x 720' at the beginning.

Why is such the large resolution needed ? a lot of people will struggle to run it.

I honestly don't think it would run considerably faster for you if the game used a resolution of 1024x768 for example.

It's more an issue of a plethora of effects which are applied to a fair amount of sprites I would imagine. Also there are some unnecessarily big textures in the game, which might cause problems with weaker cards. Regarding that point I can (and will) improve.

One big performance issue that persisted even on newer systems is a short freeze that might happen when you manage to destroy many skulls at once. This is because the destroying effect will eventually force Construct to create 640 or more sprites at once, depending on the situation.

A big design flaw on my part of course, but I already cut it down to about 75% less sprites, while the effect itself still looks about the same. My own testing so far indicates that now those freezes are gone.

So there will be some performance improvements in the (hopefully) final test release 3. I can't promise it will make it run much smoother for you chrisbrobs, but I'm sure hoping it'll help some!