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.

The only thing better is color can be set through an expression

You can also do that in Construct. Right click where you choose the color and select 'Use expression'. <img src="smileys/smiley2.gif" border="0" align="middle" />

The expression is RGB(R,G,B), with values from 0-255 obviously.

What's wrong with the narration? I like it quite a bit!

But the engine, oh my... this surely will mean a revolution in computer graphics if any of the claims are true. Which I don't really doubt atm, but I'll have to wait to experience it for myself.

So get this done already, wanna play in the "real" world!

This has lots of charm already!

Especially the various effects look well done and the presentation is overall already very pleasing to the indie eye (title screen!).

What I'm not entirely sure about is how to play this successfully (in spite of the tutorial XD). It's very easy to drop down and "bam!" the game is over, hehe.

Also nice to have a wizard jumping around in a shoe, akin to Super Mario Bros 3. That can't come from any other place, right?

Will try to play some more, looking forward to future versions!

Btw your working title Boot Wizard makes me think of an application to change the OS on startup, rather than a game. <img src="smileys/smiley2.gif" border="0" align="middle" />

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!

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!

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!

I'd actually prefer to use this over Xaudio2, but I'm experiencing the same problem as tulamide: trying to play mp3s results in complete silence for some reason. <img src="smileys/smiley6.gif" border="0" align="middle" />

This is very interesting. Finally CC is moving forward in terms of online gaming. Would like to test this, I will be sitting in the chat. :)

My worry is that I want to create an infinite number of clones of my sprite "miner" but when I did it with private variables (or global), they obviously share the same variable.

Private variables work fine with different instances of the same sprite. They're not automatically the same throughout all instances. Just drop a few instances of a sprite in the editor, give it a PV and set different values. You'll see it'll stay individual for every instance.

So yeah, you don't exactly need hash tables, unless you want to add and remove variables at runtime.

I meant having a block with more than 4 images, like bejeweled has.

If it involves rewriting eveverything, i will stick at four.(I don't think my brain would be able to cope)

You can add more frames than just 4 of course for different blocks. All you need to change is the random generation, which foolishly looks like the following

Random(4)+1

this can be found once in the 'Startup' event sheet and also in the 'Spawning' event sheet.

Change it to

Random(Block.GetAnimationFrameCount)+1

and it'll work with any amount of different blocks (frames). The rest of the engine logic will still work perfectly.

One question i wanted to ask...can you use more than '4 frames' with the engine ?

Yes, you can. Are you getting at using more than 4 different types of blocks or do you mean animating them? Both is possible.

In a previous reply (see above) I elaborated a bit about using animations instead of simply frames.

If I'm misunderstanding your problem or you do need additional help feel free to drop me a PM.