Continued Improvements

[@admiral982]

always nice to see a pagodamonium update.

[@thelovebelow3378]

that’s not the name! stop calling it that!

[@admiral982]

😈

[@edhero4515]

When I'm very very old, I want to impress my friends at the weekend by streaming No damage runs of Mushido AND Pagodamonium!

[@ViridianMaridian]

"Sakurai now has the exact same job as me" omg that killed me

[@globalistgamer6418]

*A new foe has appeared!*

[@abcdentminded]

I can't tell you how wide I grinned when the character's wings came out during the crouch jump

[@abcdentminded]

They don't ever have to see the light of day but I hope the eventual animation conveyance solution involves cellphone footage of Matthew pretending to be a bug

[@subi7o]

Context Sensitivity fwiw was the most interesting discussion I've ever seen in gaming, I say that as someone who reads and writes on a lot of game design theory and heady concepts. Such a genuinely deep concept, which now I can't unsee when playing games now. Just wanted to say thanks for taking so much time and care making that video; imo your best piece yet.

[@ThePsuedo]

The first time I remember someone mentioning context sensitivity was Mark Brown(GMTK) when he was critiquing Red Dead Redemption 2

[@gusonian8637]

It was amazing, do you have any other game design stuff that you consider amazing that you could link? Always interested in more stuff

[@wari65]

For the too many frames of animation on the Flea, it might be worth looking at the GDC talk "Making Fluid and Powerful Animations For 'Skullgirls'". It goes over this exact same problem, and how they try to get the most out of as few frames as possible

[@zacharybrown3010]

When you mentioned a slow grizzled samurai who moves with some heft, I immediately thought of the walking animations of Nagoriyuki, a character in Guilty Gear Strive. He's unique in that game in that he's the only character who can't run, double jump or air dash, and his ready stance with his weapon drawn looks really cool too.

[@zacharybrown3010]

In fightan games, a "link" is when you wait for an attack animation to end entirely before starting another attack. And a "cancel" is when you 'cancel' the animation of your first attack by immediately starting a follow-up attack. They're easy enough to keep straight if you think of them that way, "link" isn't a very illustrative term but fortunately for us "cancel" is, at least in the context of "links vs cancels"

[@karpopper]

that's why its way harder to do combos in street fighter which has more links compared to guilty gear which has more cancels.

[@andresgomez8806]

@@karpopper Well technically, in Guilty Gear those are chains. They're pre-written to chain into each other. A cancel would be more like canceling a punch into a special move.

[@utuberz123456789]

links are really easy to remember when you try doing combos in street fighter and a 3 frame link is a generous amount of time.

[@Nofixdahdress]

@@andresgomez8806 No, we refer to them as cancels or gatlings. You are canceling the recovery of one move into the startup of another. What you're calling a "chain" would describe a target combo (such as being able to cancel Light Punch into Medium Punch in Street Fighter, despite those moves typically not being able to cancel their recovery) or strings, such as how Tekken or Mortal Kombat have a preset series of moves that pushing buttons in a particular order will give you, despite those moves not typically being accessible from that button (or at all.) The three basic types of button combo systems in fighting games are Links (Street Fighter,) Cancels/Gatlings (Guilty Gear, though Strive in particular uses a combination of Cancels and Links and has much stricter Cancel rules than most anime fighters,) and Strings (Tekken and MK.)

[@zacharybrown3010]

@@andresgomez8806 idk if that's true about guilty

[@username449]

On the Picross stream the artist said she wasn't happy with the look of the fleas at the time. Please let her know if the whole game looks as good as those fleas it will be a gorgeous looking game.

[@matthewmatosisextra]

She says thanks.

[@awesomefacts101]

The enemy ai is probably the most exciting thing I saw in this. It would be so cool to play mind games with your enemies and baiting them into certain attacks so you can kill them, or make them kill each other or something like that based on your stance

[@frankkubrick865]

Love seeing your progress, you have come so far in such a short amount of time!

[@kydeas4981]

I know these are programmer assets and you don't really post these videos to fish for compliments but that looping impulses / "stancing" system (gaining the ability to walk backwards while holding the attack button) already looks fucking great. Looks very satisfying.

[@huge_letters]

unrelated topic but just wanted to thank you for your videos - I've watched you for some time but recently I've rewatched a lot of your videos and my opinion on them has improved drastically and I appreciate your insight into gaming much much more. I really wanted to express my gratitude, I love the way you make me feel and think about gaming

[@utuberz123456789]

"Temper your expect-" HOLY SHIT WE'VE GOT A CHARACTER SPRITE

[@barryherbers6090]

"The movement speed is quite slow, and that's deliberate." I'm fucking sold. Kinda sad every action game feels like it has to be snappy. I loved the methodical pace in Demon's Souls, and I wish more games would experiment with that

[@matthewmatosisextra]

If that part's appealing to you, you should definitely try the new Ghosts 'n Goblins. I know I've recommended it a lot already but it's worth saying.

[@m.z6610]

I can't keep myself from laughing every time Matt says "goblike"

[@henri3170]

That complex enemy behaviour is super interesting

[@BynineStudio]

i'm loving how the enemy reacts to the state the player is in! i know you mentioned not wanting to have too many animations per enemy but, in order to convey to the player why the flea isn't jumping, maybe it could look apprehensive (rear back and shudder?) while you have your sword drawn

[@matthewmatosisextra]

Yeah I forgot to mention this in the video but I'd like if the flea had the ability to shuffle backwards or forwards very slowly. This would be useful if they're waiting for the player to make a move but it would have another use too, when they land on the edge of a platform with their feet hanging in the air it looks pretty weird when they jump so it would be nice if they shuffled around until they had proper footing. I still don't know how much work each enemy will take to make though so we're using a priority system to determine which actions get made first. The shuffle would be nice but seems like a lower priority thing.

[@adamkahmann2937]

I know the sprite work is far from finished, but I want to say what you have now is a really good start! I'm really excited to see the final version.

[@gamesalot]

Always happy to see more of your game making journey

[@manny2684]

Man I love your channel, take all the time you need, your videos are worth it.

[@RoboGuy2K]

I think designing a game where even the creator who knows all the ins and outs of it, can be surprised and pulled in, is very impressive.

[@serpentingestor3]

thanks for the update!

[@itsgeal]

The fact that you had fun with the very early version is good! It means there's some nugget of fun gameplay you've created, so now you just need to be able to polish that nugget to make it shine. There's a saying passed around in game development, which is "if you can make 30 seconds of fun, you can stretch those 30 seconds out into a whole game"

[@gusonian8637]

I wouldn’t say stretch, rather grow and iterate. A seed may grow into a flower, but the flower is only interesting if every leaf isn’t a carbon copy of the next and former.

[@DATskorge]

@@gusonian8637 yeah stretch has a bad connotation but I think the correct spirit was there, just not the phrasing.

[@WillBoy182]

If you want there to be a delay on every attack maybe you could have the sword in the sheathe and holding the sword button makes the character get ready to draw it, iaijutsu style? And for every attack he re-sheathes it to give it that delay. Thanks for the update!

[@feuroux]

I'm wondering if the screen transitions are entirely necessary. For a slow, action type game where you want the player to interact with the enemies, a screen transition acts sort of as a "closable door" of sorts, where if they see an enemy that they don't want to deal with on one side of the transition, they can just go back to the other side of the screen transition and the enemy won't follow them (unless enemies can follow the player across screens). I think if it were structured to have objects load in dynamically around the player, it might be better at forcing that interaction between the player and enemies. This would come with its own set of challenges like level design and might be difficult to implement, but it might be worth considering. Love your videos, hope to see more from you!

[@baaaldur]

This feels like it's coming together nicely. Always cool to see more progress. Good job 👍

[@thelovebelow3378]

thank u for keeping us informed

[@inakilukac]

as others have said, seeing the little jumper stay still while you hold the sword up is so stunningly impressive that i will now make sure to add something like that to the enemies in my very own goblike i'm developing (mine leans a lot more towards ghosts n goblins than castlevania though)

[@tyler-xo3rb]

Just what I needed to end the night with, thanks Matt!

[@dead_yellow]

So hyped for pagodamonium to come out I wanna play on my knees in the middle of the floor at my wife’s house

[@morganlak4337]

Another thing to consider about semi solid platforms is dropping through adds a ton more in terms of level and encounter design possibilities. Sure it removes the possibility of a crouch jump, but it adds a ton of nuance to navigating a level and the types of strategies you might force a player to consider with a layout. I'm not sure a crouch jump adds nearly as much depth tbh, but it certainly adds things as well

[@ppp1p1]

Always nice to have an upload from matt

[@MAYOFORCE]

Funnily enough, the platformer I made doesn't let you pass through semi-solid platforms and also lets you do a higher jump by crouching first then jumping, but every person who tested the game complained why you couldn't pass through the platforms because that was just the expected interaction people have out of those things.

[@ViridianMaridian]

haha, kind of reminds me of the "take a penny, leave a penny" concept

[@MAYOFORCE]

@@ViridianMaridian Gonna be honest I still don't think I 100% understand the metaphor lol

[@ViridianMaridian]

@@MAYOFORCE I read it as, some successful game introduces a mechanic or concept that many others replicate, and over time it becomes the norm. Becomes expected. This expectation means that its absence is felt more than it would've been otherwise. In this example the first game to introduce passing through platforms left a penny and all subsequent games that do the same thing take a penny (concept) instead of leaving one.

[@LochNessHamster]

The way he holds his sword reminds me of how I used to misinterpret Link's sprite in Zelda 2 thinking that his shield was his sword, and his sword was his arm.

[@the-mush]

maybe a good idea to save on complexity for the shooting scenarios is to just keep the shoots at "hip level". I don't know, it seems like a good fit since it looks more "western", the protagonist already seems to be handling them with the lower arms and might reduce context sensitivity (depending on how you look at it). Might introduce some sort of cover mechanics even, since the animation would convey that he raises his arms to shot over his shoulder, and that can be another source of back and forth like with the raised sword. I guess it depends on how much of a gunslinger vs. swordmaster he is, or if he's just cool in general.

[@reahslademhA]

We love you and miss you. Please come back.

[@Gordypow]

Love seeing the progress!

[@karpopper]

since mushido is about bugs one convenience is you have an excuse for having lots of flying enemies and avoiding having to animate as many walk cycles.

[@AkhileshShankar9]

You might want to implement a limit for the projectile weapon to get players to risk getting close an enemy for an attack , and for the purple platforms having a drop down from the platform option as well

[@seacat1342]

great video matthew

[@joe_mama__]

You should turn the crouch slash into an anti-air attack that has a lower hurtbox so you wouldn't trade hits when attacking aerial enemies

[@Kriss_ch.]

Maybe this doesn't make a ton of sense for something "grounded", but I think it would be cool with some sorta move for a lunge forward, the kinda thing where you dash forward and slash. I guess that could look pretty anime but it's also something people just did in those old Kurosawa movies to a certain extent, like for scenes where two samurai lunge at each other, end up past one another, and one guy falls down bleeding. Holding the sword at the ready to smack it downward is already a cool move, anyway.

[@atsurokihara5525]

Didn’t know you were making a game man - looking forward to when it comes out

[@joebailey8294]

The flea looks great

[@MAYOFORCE]

It would be really cool if you can reflect enemy bullets depending on how your orient your sword. When you had the samurai hold the sword upward to hold a strike and fired your gun at the same time, I immediately thought of a screen where enemies are on the ceiling dropping things downward so you're forced to hold your sword upward to shield yourself from the projectiles.

[@matthewmatosisextra]

Yeah I always forget to cover things in the video but this was another reason for the reflectors/deflectors, I'd like for the sword to be able to interact with projectiles in that way. It's not shown in this video but hitboxes and reflectors/deflectors can overlap with each other so the plan is to have those on the sword as well. This might also be used for enemies, like the spear wielder I talked about. As always this is subject to change though, it might be too powerful.

[@MAYOFORCE]

@@matthewmatosisextra Looking forward to seeing clever applications of it, from both player and enemy perspectives.

[@kie2]

You know what I think would be cool if you have the time or desire to do it? Other playable characters sorta like Maria in Rondo. I feel like they add a lot of replayability relative to the difficulty of making them.

[@thelawgameplaywithcommenta2654]

Action flags just sound like tags for unreal. Just that in unreal you would activate the enemy awareness on the specific state change not a check by the enemy on every odd frame.

[@Kriss_ch.]

"KZbinr Masahiro Sakurai" is the funniest shit lol

[@tritonmame1282]

Yes, indeed. Sakurai now has a youtube channel and Kojima - a podcast. No work left for you, sorry.

[@LilArquebus]

Big daddy game dev. Love to see such a thorough and cogent update.

[@kydeas4981]

You're right that if you could fall through floors by pressing crouch + jump, you would cause problems due to context sensitivity... but don't a lot of games duck around that by using a double tap down input on the D-pad to fall through semisolids?

[@GlowingOrangeOoze]

I've seen plenty of down+jump games but can't think of any down down games. Doubletap inputs come with their own set of problems, though. I usually try to avoid them. The most egregious is accidentally triggering them while trying to invoke the single-press function twice in a row. I did a lot of accidental running while trying to peek over ledges in Receiver - exactly what you DON'T want in that situation.

[@guitaridiot9000]

One thing about the flea, shouldn’t the cloth on it start drifting upwards as soon as it starts descending from the apex of the jump? Right now it stays static until hitting the ground and then suddenly reacts

[@GizouGitai]

Regarding your "impulse loop" at around 43:40 This movement with the primed sword overhead has a speed curve. !1. brief acceleration !2. a continuned movement !3. a brief deceleration !4. a brief stop !5. loop to !1 From what I'm seeing, you can cancel this progression of states seemingly with a bullet shot, and with a crouch. Theoretically: The player can prime the sword overhead, then press forward to go through !1 and !2, then crouching/shooting to interrupt/cancel !3!4. From there, standing and pressing forward again to !1 and !2. In doing this, one could exceed the attempted limitations you've placed on the game. More than reporting this, I'm curious what you think about this kind of exploit. Is it more of a feature than a bug for mastery? Or is it inelegant design?

[@matthewmatosisextra]

This is why the stance walk actually starts its impulse curve on the stopped part of the curve. (!4 in your description) In other words, when I had the sword and press left or right, I don't start moving immediately, there's a delay before the movement happens to combat the kind of tech you're describing. I actually wasn't sure this solution to the problem would feel ok but it doesn't bother me at all when I'm playing. My only real concern right now is that players might not discover they can walk while holding the sword because they have to hold the direction for a moment before it begins. Maybe an animation can signal it somehow. Anyway, as you probably guessed from my answer, I do think that kind of cancelling just for slightly faster movement would be inelegant but I'd like to build in as much nuance as possible so players aren't left wanting for things to master. It's just that the balance is very important for a game like this.

[@kydeas4981]

The "press vs hold" system you're talking about is pretty similar to charging a smash attack in smash bros

[@f1nneganswake289]

Forgive the unrelated comment but just a friendly notification that Hyper Demon was released, a spiritual successor to Devil Daggers. Devil Daggers was a top 3 game for me but Hyper Demon surpassed it hard.

[@coffeedude]

This is exciting!

[@rudolf.h1259]

release 2023?

[@MiguelMarques1402]

Hey Mathew, i know this is mostly off the topic of the video, but i dont know how i can contact you so i'll write it here. I really want to thank you for everything. I got into game development because of your channel, your videos have awaken in me a passion for game design, analysis and critiques of games and made me look at them in brand new ways. Just after having watched a few of your videos back in the day you instantly became my favourite channel and i've always saved your new videos for special ocasions because i liked them that much. Your videos helped me discover what i really want to do in life, and i cannot thank you enough for it. Thank you for all the incredible work you put out. Dont think i'm begging for more videos! I'm fine with you quitting making them, i hope everything goes well with your game development adventure and i can't wait to see what that brain of yours will come up with! That said, i think i got a understanding on what type of games you like, and that's why i REALLY want to recommend you to try out the Megaman Zero series. They are some of the best 2D Action platformers out there, and for me, no other 2D game that i know of has better combat and bosses than these games, melee combat no less. These games are quite difficult and your first run will be mostly you doing your best to survive through the encounters, but you can achieve a level of mastery and style not unlike games such as Devil May Cry and Bayonetta, in a way Megaman Zero is the closest translation to 2D of that type of game we can probably get, which i know you enjoy very much. On top of that the games are short, very replayable, with great music and a engaging story with some thought provoking moments. Maybe it would even give you new ideas for your game on the gameplay side! I recommend you to just buy the game and refund it if you dont like it, the games are short and the introduction to the first game is so good it will hook you for the entire franchise, you can get a good taste of the game in about 30 minutes, trust me, the steam trailer does not do the games justice, it's better if you try it yourself. I'm doing this recommendation because i'm 99% sure you'll really like it, but thats up to you, either way once again, thank you for everything and good luck! :)

[@kageakiminato8536]

when is the Atari 2600 port?

[@zacharybrown3010]

fastest click of my fucking LIFE

[@foowoo1225]

🔥🔥🔥

[@AndrewChumKaser]

I was far more concerned by your ominously worded pinned comment on the context sensitivity video. I didn't want to jump to conclusions but to me it sounded far more likely that you'd contracted a terminal illness rather than set time for focusing on your game development. Seedless to nay I'm very pleased that you are not only not in any serious health risk (I hope anyway) but that you're making a game yourself! I wish you luck and I'm curious and excited to see what happens.

[@matthewmatosisextra]

Didn't mean to cause alarm, I just wanted people to take the context sensitivity video for what it was rather than thinking of it as some big return with more to follow.

[@joebailey8294]

The Hyper Demon video is really going to slow down development

[@ToastieMcMuffin]

cute pet flea

[@cokeMONSTERps3]

55:00 hmm.

[@xBINARYGODx]

Hey, it's the biased guy who claims he is not, but it's easy to show he is. 'I don't don't care about that one franchise from that one dev but care about every single one from before, and the PS game this is very much like that franchise is totally work talking about and playing' uh huh - sure, this example and the rest are just happenstance and you are magically the only non-biased person the planet.

[@Rislear]

I too am schizophrenic

[@MightyTheGreyWolf]

Least schizophrenic Matthewmatosis viewer

[@abcdentminded]

I'll get you a glass of water

[@zacharybrown3010]

schizo

[@durchfaII]

Schizophrenic PS fan