Introducing the KC-48 Creepulator with Creeper Reverse Polish Language support. Need enemies to have that extra little bit of A.I. you’ve been dreaming of? Then come on in, and try out the latest in Creeper Processing Units!
Been wondering how events, waves, or custom maps might work in game 3? Then this video is for you… Map editing is straight forward and will lend itself to thousands of interesting combinations. But the new CRPLTower, with a built in KC-48 Creepulator…. well, that opens up Pandora’s box. I take that back. It doesn’t open the box, it blows the box to smithereens.
Cool looking. Is this the first comment?
Also Virgil can the tower create creeper in areas not adjacent to the tower? Also can you program it to change the terrain around the tower when units come into a certain range of the tower like if a unit came within range it would fluctuate the land around the tower making it harder to get at?
or creating a mini earthquake around the tower
Yes, you can change the terrain with SetTerrainCellLevel. So if you want a unit that builds up stuff or tears it down… you can do that.
You can also create creeper anywhere on the map. SetCreeper takes two arguments that are the X and Y coordinate. So you can emit it anywhere.
Are you saying that we can create edmiters or what ever to build terrain?!?
that was a very long waiting, but it totally worth it:)
good job, virgil
Totally worth the wait.
So if it moves… how do you kill it?
That becomes an interesting problem. I’ve made Nullifiers so you can build them anywhere. So you could get lucky with a nullifier. But, I am adding settings to the CRPLTower so that map authors can say whether or not normal weapons affect it. Snipers might even stun them….
Of course, an evil script could just monitor it’s own health and then teleport to some other part of the map if it gets too damaged.
Nothing can teleport away from dozens of snipers targeting it at the same time, if its health is less than the damage that’s going to be done.
Snipers take time to align on a target – barrel sweep takes time in CW3. Also, this is only true if the tower enters the range of two or more snipers at the exact same moment.
Nothing can “teleport”, can it? The CRPL-Tower can only move, right?
It can almost “teleport”, by giving it an enormous speed to move towards random/given coorinates.
Does this mean it can go up terrain?
Extremely high speed – say, a single frame to cross the map – isn’t really any different from a teleport, really.
Is there a way we could make a moving nullifier (following) that could take out the moving CRPL tower?
🙂 getting better and better
although it may be annoying on some maps for luck to play into it 😛
What do you mean? The movement of drones when they can’t reach your units is random, and can have a direct effect on the difficulty of a level.
Lovely to see this demonstrated – it’s looking beautiful!
That code is definitely unlike anything I’ve handled, and will take getting used to.
I think preparations need to be made to provide an area specifically for sharing useful CRPL scripts when Game 3 hits release.
Anybody can open a map and see what’s in a tower’s script, so I wonder if it might not be out of the question to require a ‘title’ for a CRPL tower’s script, and require it as a field, then have a compilation of scripts somewhere, listed by title and date and author, where people can leave comments, etc.
This way people who aren’t advanced in these concepts can look for already-built towers that do what they need done. Even a newbie can find things useful to their maps this way.
Many players will learn one step at a time, first with small tweaks to a script to fit their needs, later by repurposing scripts they only understand in part. This would make it very easy for players like this to find scripts that they can twist to their need, and also help them learn by providing the material for them to reshape.
We’re definitely going to need a tutorial to use this.
Will walls stop a moving CRPL? And can they move over open space?
If you want obstacles to stop a moving CRPLTower, you have to add logic into the script to define the obstacles. Other functions for determining a movement destination are also useful for working around walls and such.
Could the tower crash into or go through units that you have placed while it is moving?
If you add logic into the script for it to detect collisions and halt movement on that event, then it will do so. It does what the mapper programs it to do.
If a mapper wants it to crash into things, it crashes into things. If not, not.
Is there still going to be this one thing that makes creeper or anti-creeper move in a certain direction like in creeper world 2?
how about a draw line button instead of only free draw
ok just shut up and take our money!!!
With the map editor can you change the map size? Also can you eliminate ground with the map editor?
Yes to both
Interesting. Why have you decided to use custom stack-based language?
Stack based languages are very efficient to implement and to execute. They actually have reduced parsing complexity. For instance, there is no need for parenthesis in a stack based language (for function calls or for mathematical order of operations).
The custom part is because 90% of the work is related to the game and not the language. By making it custom, I can add interesting language constructs that make life easier when making a mission. That said, “if” “do loop”, etc. are standard concepts that are found in many languages.
I was a little surprised by this, too. Seems like there are a lot of languages you could have used – lua comes to mind.
Looking awesome in any case!
I needed something that could sit on top of the mono run time and that I could limit the functionality of. I have to do builds for windows, linux, and OSX and also integrate with the Unity run time. Plus, I have built in limits like not more than 10000 instructions per evaluation, a max stack size, limits on loops, etc. Al things to catch user errors more gracefully. In the end it is just easier to define a virtual creeper cpu with simple instructions and put a stack based lang on top. That easily sits right in the middle of the game’s c# execution environment and is instantly as portable to all platforms just like the rest of the game.
Those all sound like good reasons! I have not written an interpreter in .. decades, in round numbers. And I didn’t have the sense to do it stack based – even though I was also doing a lot of PostScript work at the time.
It was ugly, slow, and required 2 passes, but it did the job.
A few years later I learned [about] lex & yacc and felt like having a good cry. The things I could have done…
If you don’t mind saying – does Unity/mono give any support for scripting, and/or did you use any compiler tools to do this, or did you just crank it out by hand?
I cranked it out by hand. I made up a virtual cpu, defined some opcodes, gave it a stack, a heap, and some other custom ‘hardware’. So I have written code in C# that parses the script, turns it into opcodes, then runs it on the virtual core which is also written in C#. All very portable, and very efficient.
hi, i’m pretty new here, i’m a CS student and i’d be very interested to see sources for something like your custom language, is it possible? Or could you link me to some books/articles you read to help you out building it?(if it was needed).
I dont know if my request is accessible or not, but you did an incredible work, cant wait for the release!
that looks incredible. will there be any CRPL’s in the story mode?
Most likely… I’ll eat my own dog food when making the story missions.
Interesting…. he refers to a 4-course meal as “dog food”
the creeper is strong in this one……
welcome to woody’s roundup! there are a bunch of mover towers loose, and we need ya all’s help to round em up!
these tower can’t be destroyed, but if ye round em into the greeny barn over there, they become inert! be carefule though, they emit creeper if ye get too close! also, shooting em, causes them to go the EXACT opposite direction from the firing tower! YEEEEEEEEEE HAWWWWWWWWWWWWW
OH MY GOD VIRGIL THIS IS GENIUS… Of course someone like me would love being able to program within games :P. The type of person to make logic gates in minecraft.
Ahem okay so more on topic: Can you make CRPL towers spawn other CRPL towers with pre-defined scripts? I’m talking about moving towers that spawn digitalis placing (slowly)moving emitters along the way.
Yeah, you’ll be ale to do something like that (clone a tower).
Let’s see, what will I want to code up? I might try some coding. it would be a cool vid to just past code that people write and show what it would do.
First evil one:
RandCoords 100 SetCreeper
Done. Randomly place 100 creeper every tick, or 30 times a second.
Now an easier to beat one:
RandCoords 50 SetCreeper
Delay300
Done
So randomly place 50 creeper every 10 seconds.
Lets try a biger one:
CurrentCoords 20 GetCreeperCountInRange 200 lt if
Randcoords GetQueuedMoveCount eq0 if
RandCoords 1000 QueueMove
Endif
Endif
CurrentCoords 20 GetCreeperCountInRange 200 lt if
CurrentCoords 30 Setcreeper
Done
If done right, and there’s a GetCreeperCountInRange command like I hope there should be, than this will teleport to a new spot, make creeper until it sees 200 creeper in the area, then move on.
SetTerrainCellLevel you say? what would happen if the level of, say, the center of a collector got set 3 levels higher than the rest? I can’t see how to make it use the terrain as weapon as I don’t see how to make it do something to a building it finds, or how to make it get the coords of a building.
Let’s do try some terrain for fun:
#I hope you can do something like get a counter and do things based on it this uses it, and please help if there’s a different way
GetCount1 eq1 if
SetTimer0 30001
GetTimer0 eq1 if
SetTimer1 201
AddCount1 1
Count1 Add 1
#I have 2 in case I have fist one written wrong.
#I’m guessing that mt would mean “more than”
GetTimer1 1 mt if
RandCoords (however you’d get random number between 1 and 10) SetTerrainCellLevel
Endif
Done.
If I did that right, it should randomize terrain, then wait for 1000 seconds, then do it again.
I feel like I have plenty now. So I shall leave you with that.
AH! You can’t put more than one space in a row?!
Or is it that you can’t put any as a start?
Also, the last one I forgot some Endifs.
#I hope you can do something like get a counter and do things based on it this uses it, and please help if there’s a different way
GetCount1 eq1 if
SetTimer0 30001
GetTimer0 eq1 if
SetTimer1 201
AddCount1 1
Count1 Add 1
Endif
Endif
#I have 2 in case I have fist one written wrong.
#I’m guessing that mt would mean “more than”
GetTimer1 1 mt if
RandCoords (however you’d get random number between 1 and 10) SetTerrainCellLevel
Endif
I’m debating how I want to expose stack local, tower local, and global variables…. But one way or another you will have access to a more generalized concept that you can use for counters.
So you already know how to program in creeper.
These are all guesses and hopes, and I think even if all of the commands I’m not sure exist did, I don’t think it would work.
I am curious as to if these would work, or if you might make a video using a bunch of code that people write up.
Wait, I forgot a few words in this, it sounded more like: “even if all the commands worked, I don’t think the last one would do what I planed” Oops.
Wow. I played creeper world 1 and 2 because they were a lot of fun. The custom maps were what really got me into the game. I cant even imagine what is in store for us with custom towers with scripts commanding their behavior. There are at least 3 map authors I can think of that will be making life quite challenging next month when you release the game 🙂 (I can hope right??)
Are you planning a custom weapon that can stun a moving tower? I can see having to build a LOT of nullifiers in the hope of getting lucky if you cant make a tower sit still and die!
I might make snipers be able to stun a moving tower. But, some moving towers will be able to be damaged by normal weapons, so you won’t always have to build nullifiers.
This comment was made while watching video:
Will the map be auto-set to be that big while going into the editor?
Why didn’t you use the keyboard to scroll the entire time when making the map?
30 FPS and emits every 15 seconds, eh? Its pretty easy to tell when, but maybe change it for if we go above the thousand place value in numbers.
I LOVE the way it starts the mission when you place down your CN, and how it stops when you take it to orbit again!
Hhmmm……New tower looks similar to other towers..Maybe add a triangle to one of the enemy structures?(:
Will the game come with in-game scripts? It seems like alot of work to add scripts each time…I would add scripts to whatever I would want to make more complex, but not add this everytime.
Wow! Lock on with the spores now! They can be a real hassle now 🙂
I like how unpredictable the new tower can make it, nobody will be able to complain about once they get a good defense, they already win.
Will that be a new permanent feature implemented into the game? How when pre-built units will not explode if in creeper?
*Franticly searches 12th grade calculus*
The…but…but…IT CAN MOVE!? :O
wow! that is interesting! Can’t wait to die by it lol
The map maker can do anything they wanted with this, huh? Its like hacking in a way 🙂
Whats all this about languages? Cant tell if you are talking about the script, a whole new language(Ex: Japanese) or something else.
I agree with making a forum or somewhere to start on the scripts.
Finally- I prefer cat food 😉
Language… as in programming or scripting language.
I don’t see much else you could add to the game now with that thing maybe other than some more titans but it looks close to finish. But i would like to know if you will add anymore titans and if so can you make a video of it?
More titans yes… video…. not sure. I want to save some surprises for the actual release.
ok but you should show us some new ones
OHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHYOUAREMYNEWBESTFRIEND!!! I should be sleeping or studyingfor exams tomorrow, I am instead watching this. Definitely worth it. Will we be able to make these spawn units, can they be given unique names, and how do you kill it if it keeps moving? Also, can we mark units with identifiers (kill the CRPL within ten minutes or Bertha 6, Mortar 7, and Reactor 2 get killed!)? I’ve recently been playing around with an RTS from 2001 or 2 called Impossible Creatures, and it has a ridiculously extensive map editor preloaded. It’s what the developers used, according to a game guide my brother got with it. One of the cool things about it is that you can take any units and/or structures and assign them to a group. Then, you can add triggers, so if Group1 NotAlive, add 5000HP to Group4, despawn Group3, and start Cinematic6, for instance. From my limited knowledge of Javascript, I can tell I will have a field day with this.
I played Impossible Creatures. Very cool concept….
o…k… uh there will be a guide to this right?
ok so could you make it that the tower will loose 1/10 of its hp any time it lands on an energy collection zone, but have 1/50 the chance to land there?
also, can you make it so it makes something else move, like a player building or a spore tower
could you make it so, any creeper covering energy collection zone disables energy?
could you make it so you, instantly loose?
and finally, you had me at introducing
by 1/50 I mean have a much lower chance to land there
He did mention that the code was documented.
This is amazing, Virgil!
Finally we got our so much desired auto-rebuilding creeper emitters, when the PZ is connected to digitalis and a runner makes it to the PZ (aye, a nice truck moving to build the emitter – that’s what I want!).
I’m amazed.
Is there already a list of available commands available?
It would be good fun to prepare some complex behavior in advance, as one might to keep using it for about every single map (I love the idea of having the CRPL towers placeable outside the map, so they just provide the logic for some interesting on-field fights!).
Anyways, I’m really amazed, this was well worth the wait!
Good job!
I’m sure it’s still very much a work in progress, but I also would like a list of the possible commands. The possibilities here are enormous, and I want to get started right away.
All commands will be fully documented. I don’t want to release the list right now since I am still adding to it.
Should change the timer to millisecond or better yet decisecond instead of frames. Would be easier to do timed events I would think.
Why would you need more precise timing than the game is capable of respecting?
Since everything in game is time by frames it would create complications if your code had different unit to measure time. And as far as I know smallest unit of ingame time is one frame 1/30S. So having millisecond which is 1/1000S So having milliseconds isn’t likely even possible because some number coudn’t be converted from milliseconds into frames at all.
It would be possible . . . just kind of useless.
Wow. Just wow. This has now just ensured that I will spend probably 10-20 times the amount of time on this game that I would have had it been released in the state of the last video. Which was already a whole lot. (Did you hear that pop? That was the sound of my future grades.)
Naturally, I have a few *whole ton* of questions and ideas.
1. Will we have access to global variables, such as the amount of creeper on the map, the amount of units the player has deployed on the map, the amount of energy production/storage the player has, time elapsed, etc.?
(The amount of energy production would definitely be fun to have, you could make the creeper spawn faster at higher energy levels, adding to the challenge and getting rid of that, “I’m-halfway-there-I’ve-basically-won” feeling. Call it dynamic difficulty if you like. It would certainly shake up the flow of the game and provide an extra challenge for those who have mastered the basic routine of things.)
2. Will we be able to set up units we make in a way that they will be able to purchase/deploy them? I was thinking of making some kind of balloon-esque wall. It would be invincible to creeper from the outside, and vacuum creeper inwards, but if the internal storage got full it would dump everything and explode, also rupturing adjacent balloon-walls, which would spell doom… (Now that I think about it, that would probably be better suited to a pre-placed terrain feature/hazard. But I digress…)
I’m sure players could come up with tons of fun and interesting weapons to use with their custom maps, and it would certainly add a ton of variety to custom maps.
3. Can custom towers/units interface with the player’s grid? For example; maybe a tower that would fly into your base, take the appearance of a nearby structure, link up, and then start draining all of your ore, convert it into creeper, and then putting it back into your storage tanks? (Muhahaha… it would certainly be a nasty surprise to see your sprayers start spewing creeper when you turn them on.) Or a pre-built structure that would open-close a terrain “Gate” by modifying terrain to wall off an emitter if you gave it a certain amount of energy?
4. Will we be able to select images from your gallery to use in place of the CRPL sprite? It looks nice, but I want to be able to tell different custom units and buildings apart at a glance, not by having to observe their behavior/memorize their locations.
(Maybe a few extra unused sprites should be included that map creators could use for this? That way we could avoid confusion with ‘Vanilla’ CW3 objects like emitters. I hesitate to suggest that map creators should be able to upload their own sprites and textures.)
5. Will there be a way to unlock certain units by collecting/killing a certain unit or otherwise reaching a certain condition? Or improve/tweak their stats upon reaching a certain condition? For example, maybe we could tell the player that there is a blizzard happening currently on the map that shortens the range of all of their weapons, but if they can provide enough energy to fuel a giant shield, they can stop the blizzard, (As long as the tower gets energy, that is), and restore their units range?
And lastly, how feasible do you think it would be to create a unit that implemented the idea I had about a rouge structure stealing resources? For example, have something that acts like a runner, (but it does not depend on digitalis), that would attempt to sneak into your base, impersonate one of your structures, and leach supplies/cause general shenanigans?
Regardless of whether or not you choose to reply to this, just know that I am extremely excited for this game, and I believe that you are easily one of the most talented developers I have ever seen, indie or otherwise. Thank you for making such high-quality games, I look forward to supporting all of your future endeavors.
2 sounds like half the job is more suited to fields. If the total creeper in this range of cells is greater than x, deactivate field.
You’d get a lot of flicker that way, though, so some delays should be included.
1: Global vars? most likely
2: Purchase these guys? Not sure about that.
3: Interface with player grid? Not planned.
4: Custom images? Yes.
5: Unlock Units? Yes.
I’m really pressed on time, so sorry I can’t be more complete in a reply.
You, sir, have created a monster. There’s going to be so many really horrible maps, ranging from frustratingly hard to utterly undoable. Thankfully, there’ll be enough really awesome maps, too.
Balancing your custom map is going to be hard. With the ideas people are having already, I wouldn’t wonder if some custom maps will need at least half a year of beta-testing.
This feature is going to be every mapmod’s nightmare.
I doubt it’s as bad as you imagine. Creating a map that only the most advanced player can complete is really only a matter of dumping enough annoying crap on the map. Making it FUN and challenging is a different story.
This won’t solve bad design – or design aimed at very advanced players. (Which, to be fair, is necessary.) But this will at least not be present in most amateur design, due to its learning curve.
I’m hoping that learning curve will limit its use to those who (as a coder must do) are capable of knowing what their concept is before they begin building it.
If upperkees knows how to script…I’m legitimately terrified of what he’ll make when this game goes live.
I’m sure we’ve got other more diabolical map creators in the community, but I still remember how long the thread on his pinball map for CW2 was.
Yeah, I hope he comes back for a visit after game 3 is out.
Don’t we all.
No worries. 😉
Just been reading/watching all blogs of the past year and I am ABSOLUTELY stunned. This game is going to be everything I ever hoped for. The best features of CW1+CW2 and so much more. I don’t know where to start praising, so I won’t.
But of course this CRPL-tower is the gate to paradise for any map maker. In 1990 I had to write a RPN (reversed polish notation) calculator in 68000 assembler for a uni assignment, so I learned the basics for this kind of scripting 23 years ago. Can’t wait to lay my hands on it!
Wow Virgil, you did an amazing job last year. Still working with MadMag I see. Just great! I am 100% sure this is going to be THE game of 2013!
Great to hear from you… I still marvel at your Liberation Pinball CW2 map. Seeing what you did with that map was one of the inspirations for adding more advanced scripting to game 3.
Glad to have inspired you. Works both ways. 🙂
It was a hell of a job (more than 2 months work if I remember well) and I’m glad it will be a lot easier in CW3, because it certainly was a 1 time project in CW2.
My second CW2 map (done for 90%) is still waiting to be finished….
Interesting ideas for Level design are now possible:
Capture the Emitter: When you have a number of units a certain time close to an emitter it becomes an AC emitter.
Capture the sporetower: Same idea
Creeper Rain: Randomly placing little amounts of creeper on the map to make building anoying.
Terrain mess up: A Tower can mess up the terrain, so you will have problems to move units there without a terraformer.
And my favorit: The more units you have, the stronger could the emitter be.
Great job virgil. Endless ideas.
Suggestion for possible ways to deal with moving CRPLs:
They take damage from AC.
Since all moving units are flying (except runners), moving CRLPs are vulnerable to the Anti-Spore-Unit (forgot their name).
Beams.
This is all going to be up to the mapper, I think.
Cool idea,
It would be nice to have a tool that will help us visualize range. For example I’m making an if statement
30 35 20 GetUnitCountInRange if…
I think a tool that will show me (visually on Map) what is the actual area this (30 35 20) would be great.
0.0
I was starting to agree with triggers…
But THIS is so much more…
And what’s more? I code stuff in FORTH! 😀
I have a suggestion.
Can you implement a simple anti-mistake stuff while coding the CRPL ?
For example :
if i type “Delai300” instead of “Delay300”,
the function will be highlighted in red, meaning this function is incorrect.
What do you think Virgil ?
Would be nice to see color-coding – that way anything that isn’t the color you expect is obviously wrong.
When Virgil does some script on the video he always clicks compile button. It says succesfull so it propably checks if everything in the script is done properly.
Syntax coloring probably won’t happen since that’s a lot of editor work. But, the compile message tells you what is wrong in many cases.
Awesome, awesome awesome. Though I curious about some more complex scripts impacting performance and if performance could be impacted by multiple CPRL towers. The obvious if someone was releasing spores every second might bring things to a crawl.
I limit the number of executions that a core is allowed to make during a given frame. There are also other limits to prevent infinite loops, etc. But, a bad map maker could always still do things that burden a player’s computer.
Is there going to be an equivilent to an exit command?
Id est,
if condition: terminate script
To expand on that query – will there be an exit for the current execution, and will there be an exit to prevent future execution?
That’s not a half bad idea… Basically a command that aborts the current execution. You could always nest if statements to accomplish something similar, but an abort/exit command could be much friendlier in many cases.
what about making alternative graphics for it, or having something that changes their color a bit? If there were more than one, it would be easier on the player if they looked a little different.
<3 random!!!!!!!! so cool!
I plan to allow a CRPLTower to change its appearance.
just to check, but there will be logic gates, no?
and, or, xor, not
hhhmmmm….some interesting ideas:
1.Will there be custom FRIENDLY unit controls, like set cannons at 500 HP, or make collectors cost 10 packets instead of 5
2. I really like the idea of more units, the stronger the emitters, that’ll sure hit the turtlers! 😉
3. What about emitters that produce more creeper the more damaged it is?
4. A script to set health regen speed?
2-4 all possibilities
1… not sure yet. Maybe cost controls…
looking at this i keep thinking
creeper mortar.
or, god help us all, a creeper BERTHA- launches a spore with a VERY high health, stupidly large payload, and did i mention it does random coords every 30 seconds? yea. if this thing goes active, you DIE. good news is you got 10 min to kill this thing before it activates. bad news. . . theres a lot of creeper in your way. good luck soldier!
on a related note, this would be a good way to impose time limits. place one in a pool of deep creeper with several high-output emmiters, (or make it so it cant be hurt) and tell it to emit (game ending amount) of creeper over the whole map after (X) min.
Wow. Amazing. The CRPL is the answer to all the suggestions involving enemy technology. A graceful creation with an entire new world of opportunities inside, I am very impressed. I look forward to when I get to start using this…this…thing. It will probably get its own section in the kc forum.
Does it by default get affected by the player in any way? Such as nullifiers or pcs? If not, would it be possible to tell pcs or other player weapons to target it?
How much should mapmakers worry about performance issues? I don’t have any experience in stack languages, but flash certainly bogs down cpus with hundreds of ifs per frame. Any guidelines for when we are just going too far?
Could we get a list of possible commands sometime before the game is released? With the things I have in mind, we’re going to need all the help we can get.
Keep plugging away. With this video, your programming ability was illustrated quite clearly. This game is doomed to be amazing.
A CRPLTower will have options as to what affects it (nullifiers, normal weapons ,etc).
Performance issues for many and most things are minimal.
There will be full docs, but I won’t release them till the game is nearly ready for release.
Hurray. So when the documentation is released, we’ll know it’s not long until the game comes!
Though you’ll probably already have a more or less fixed release date set by that time..
what programming languages is this. so i know what to start learning for when this releases
Look up RPL or forth to get a feel for it. You can also look up “stack based language” and read about the general concepts.
First time poster, long time lurker.
Love the flexibility of the towers and the scripting language.
question – can the graphics of the tower be modified? Allowing for graphical modification would allow modders to make truly unique, custom enemies.
Ex – queen runner that looks like a big runner (animated or not) and makes runners.
This would greatly increase the tie in to custom stories.
Yep, I’ll allow the graphics to be changed at run time by the script.
I’ve already heard a new idea that I think completely changes creeper world gameplay. Towers that increase/decrease their output based on the number of units present. Or based on the energy output of the players build. It would suddenly become a lot harder to build out to a stalemate with the creeper.
I also really like the tower that changes to anticreeper if you can get units close to it. Especially if you can set a delay for the change long enough to overcome just flying 10 blasters over and poof. A delay long enough that unsupported weapons die before the emitter changes.
Both types of tower look to be game changers. You said you were almost done and ready to take my money, right???
I’m getting much closer… but there are still important things to do.
Hmmm, that would make a nice CTF scenario, Tower that emits creeper but once you battle your way close enough it starts emitting AC and the amount increases with the number of “Defenders” within range.
The question is can a map maker create an intelligent tower that will work at taking back the “Flag” tower if the player controls it (AKA It’s emitting AC).
If the creeper on that emitter’s cell is negative, throw spores around it. The higher the amount of AC, the more spores you throw.
Well, yes, but that’s only the most basic of things. You could start it setting up fields and increase other emitter outputs and release digitalis, and…
Aah! There are so many possibilities!
Exciting! At point one I was thinking to myself “hey, since negative creeper amounts represent anti-creeper, you could make a spore with a negative payload and thus an anti-creeper payload”, and then realized that heck, you could actually simulate a spore with a properly-coded moving CRPL tower . . . which could then be tweaked in all sorts of crazy ways.
There are a few custom maps in CW2 that have anticreeper spores. They really freak you out until you accidentally let one land, and then comes the sigh of relief.
*cough ReversalOfFortune cough*
Hehe.
Wow, thats a great idea for making custom maps more custom. I think there will be many sadistic people who will make extremly diffcult maps. I have some ideas myself^^
I never bought a game online, but i think i will buy this game.
Spores lowering the surounding terrain like a bomb, spores draining energy till they are destroyed, a tower reversing the terrain (level 10 becomes 0, 9 becomes 8 etc.)
It will be great fun and I’m looking forward to the release.
wow…. this will get us some crazy maps!!
normally i download games. but with creeper. nevah! I’d happily pay 10 euro for such a great game! and it keeps getting better and better
Virgilw I’m not old enough to understand it but you made it really clear thanks
I ment the scripts sorry for double comment
is there a command to make the tower invisible when it moves so it could pick a random place spot take a min or two to get there then reappear?
Awesome Stuff!! I am anxiously awaiting the release.
After watching the video I thought a way to eliminate the roaming emitters would be to allow the charged Nullifiers to act in a “tractor beam” fashion to halt movement or at the very minimum not let them escape. But after reading comments I like the idea of them being susceptible to stun by the anti-spore cannons. This feature will make a seemingly simple map Very difficult quick if it roams around setting out digitalis grid, runners and creeper.
Just deactivate the nullifier before the last ammo packet arrives, and activate it to ambush the CRPL tower.
Will multiple towers be able to share data? Though it might be fun to implement messaging over creeper cells…
SlickRick- Maybe. If not, probably a teleport or disappear-reappear type of script.
Virgilw- In the campaign, the new tower should destroy whatever it touches. Remember back to CW2 drones(More specifically, the end of day 18 with that 750 HP drone! Yeah, we all remember..)
Also, colorblind mode? I’m not color blind but i’m sure a bunch of people would get confused.
MIND. FRIGGEN. BLOWN!!! Once again you see your game not just as a from one author but as a story anyone can add to! Wish more developers had this mindset!
Matthew
is there a way that the tower could be invisible/untargetable/not on the map, so that it would control what happens, and execute commands and so such, but wouldn’t be able to be destroyed?
I realize you could just make the map bigger and then section it off with some empty space, but then you have to pay attention to ranges of nulifiers/(snipers?) and power zones, and is sorta a waste of map-space you could use for something else.
Anyway, just a thought
-sevy
If you sectioned off an area the bombers could still drop their load on that spot.
Does anybody know how i can get creeper world one and two on my new pc? i have it on this one but i wanna have it on my new one…
and BTW i dont have the cd key thingy anymore, so please any help?
email support@knucklecracker.com with your order number, (email address, physical address, etc. [edited by V]) that you used, or some other identifying thing.
This comment is once again being made as I watch the clip. It’s basically another one of my see-along commentaries.
Finally, a look into the map-creation software and functions.
Quite frankly, at the point where it is noted that the keyboard helps you make a line straight down, I almost shead tears of joy and relief. To the best of my knowledge, NO OTHER custom, artictic CPU program allows you to do that, meaning mouse-dragging every single straight line.
Interesting that you can call CN’s BACK into orbit and presumably to the Mothership.
So the AC emitters are officialy called “anti emitters”, eh? Better name anyway. And I see that crystals are characterized by size now. Do colors still come into play, or do they have to be visible sizes?
For an RTS game as simplified-ish as the CW series, I never expected it to have the ability in custom games to talk CPU language when inputting stuff into the CRPL tower function. Impressive artictic outcome on the whole.
Would it seem necessary to provide a translation or dictionary page that helps with all of that specific inputting though?
I was also thinking that it would be helpful if target spots appeared when spores either got launched or got close to their landing sites. They sure do arc widely while they are in the air going long distances.
As the tower could emit creeper when units were in range of its specified function, I have to ask, how does that happen when you get close to some drone gateways in some CW2 custom maps? In some maps, gateways were set so that drones suddenly rushed out depending on close unit proximity.
The moment when the enemy suddenly got activly defensive upon weapons or other units being closer is something I have long been waiting for in the CW series itself. It makes it almost a shame it is only a custom map feature. I would like to see that in story mode as well to be honest.
It also came as a shock to me when the units-to-be-built were not destroyed when creeper got to their places. I have almost always wanted to see that.
I have also noticed that the button that calls the CN back up just has “Ship” on it along with the rest of the words on the button. Have you not given the CN-carrying ship (that I for one think of as the Mothership) its official name yet?
Is it just a custom-map-only feature, or is it standard that runners can now carry creeper payloads like CW2 drones?
Two last things, is it possible to make the CRPL teleport? And for the sake of better plot lore, shouldn’t there be CRPL’s in the CW3 campaign?
Another thing I just thought to add: I have not seen any of the other comments as I wrote the above.
most things you mentioned were already mentioned before
I assumed it was, but I did not have enough time to make a comment and see the others above too at the moment and comments tend to pile up here fast.
teleportation is just moving very fast – movement speed is in pixels per second, so anything above 1000 or so will be instant.
Another way to make the CRPL’s teleport would make their speed redicousely high. Either at a certain part of the map, or if it gets too damaged. There will always be loopholes when it comes to this stuff (;
I wonder what happens if one of these is flying randomly and passes over your shields.
Is it possible to program the tower to avoid passing over/near human defenses?
Great new features 😀
It would deposit creeper, which would damage the shield than be pushed away, and digitalis, which would damage your shield, and damage your shield, and damage your shield. It’s not scripted to do anything special near a shield, so it won’t.
If you script it to evaluate its surroundings for player units and respond accordingly, then it will do so.
totally just realized this:
increasing map size during a game!
when such-and-such is completed set terrainlevel in certain areas to 1 from no terrain…
so cool
I like this idea. Kinda reminds me of Supreme Commander where the map expands as you complete objectives.
changing the absolute map size is a definite no-no, but having void to start with and then forming the map is something that is possible.
If you can’t change the actual size, however, you’ll always have a limit to how much void you can change into terrain…
In light of making terrain on open void, I have to say: What’s next, an terp upgrade that lets it terraform on void? 🙂
Already making custom maps in my head 😉
Will the editer be able to make the spores swirve as in it aims for the top of the map, but slowly aims downward. Also, maybe increase their speed?
Try scripting a CRPL tower to behave like a spore. Start on a spore tower, travel as you indicate, act as a target for, and receive damage from beams, and upon reaching X,Y, dump creeper and detonate.
I think I would like it better if it shrunk, so the longer your playing, the harder it will get.
I think the point is to achieve an objective, then expand the map, introducing new objectives while the creeper continues doing what creeper does.
Will you be able to expand a map during a mission.
Example: by destroying a certain tower, a part of the map where you weren’t able to go will be available.
what i was saying above 🙂
Sorry if this has been mentioned before:
I think it’d be cool if you could have CRPL scripts run on *any* unit, eg you could have scripted civilian transports that you have to escort, or an experimental titan unit which responds to orders. This could be done by allowing the CRPL scripts to run on any unit and exposing their functionality in functions, or by having the CRPL towers be able to respond to player input (create GUI buttons etc) and have their sprite sets swapped with that of another unit.
Ah, now, you see, that’s actually not needed because of how this one unit works. A script from 1 tower could run all of these special units inside of itself. The only problem comes when you need to nullify this tower – or maybe script it so you don’t have to/ can’t!
I hope Virgil is fully aware of what he’s released into custom maps… 😀
I think the tower can change its appearance so you could do it that way.
Virgil, this is a bit off topic for this weeks post but I was wondering how you came up with the name digitalis for the new enemy. is it a coincidence that human skeletal muscle has receptors for it?
Thank you, Virgil, for all of your effort. I anticipate the coming game even more fervently than before. Please do not rush.
A merry Christmas to you and your loved ones.
Meeeeeerrry christmas!(Eve)
So virgilw-what are you getting us for christmas 😉
He says he will give us a present when he likes the present also.
I’m kinda late to say this, but will the CRPL come with a few generic premade scripts? ie. a cowardly tower that flees, a aggressive tower that rushes the front lines and a strategic tower that analyses then attacks a weak point.
Also, can you make this tower spawn more CRPL’s?
you can make this tower do anything you want…
as long as you have the know-how and skills to code it.
I expect that the forum mappers will make many scripts available on the forums.
well, yeah, but i mean something original or unique…
the only way you can have that on your map is by doing it yourself (which involves know-how and skills) or asking someone awesome and nice to do it for you, and they do it (which also involves know-how and skills).
Sorry, that reply was intended for Lanklord, who was asking about prefab scripts.
oh, oops 🙂
merry Christmas!
happy Hanukkah!
happy Holidays!
happy/merry/good any other important day in this time of year!
And for those of you who don’t celebrate anything: Have a nice day!
also: Forward Unto Dawn!
Wow… as a software engineer myself, I’m VERY impressed with all the stuff you’re adding lately. Especially this stack based language to script custom towers. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to testing your game.
What I wanted to now is this. Another thing is why your needing some kind of instructions to make it act befoer they get there. Could you make them so it could turn on or move or whatever when it gets discovered, like if they get close in the area then it just does its thing surprising them? I want it to have more surprises since your not expecting have the stuff your finding along the way!
What I mean is do you get to start whatever it does CRPL only letting the player decide not the person making the map???
If you code the unit to respond to something specific that the player does, then you can give the player a degree of control over it.
To put it simply, if you want to, and you know how to, then yes.
1 if runers tuch you network the run on lines and become a parasit (consums packets) that hels it self on packets
2 new unit nest makes runners that travse on lines kills parasits and if conectid to digitalas will jump on and reke havic
3 new unit conects the digitalas (dos no alwow parasits to pass only if digitalas makes the conecton) and uses it to push anti creeper into enamy lines
4 new tighten sends guppey like unit into dence creper
creeper is concumed the unit tins it into anty crper (high energy price) if left the it expods anti creeper or if reterned it sends the anti ceper to command node
the tighten creeats the gupey likes
5 new infustructor convertr at cost of time and resors it convers AC and pacets into echother 1AC=5 pacets
6 if you bete a map you have the optine if using it as a base for a costom map
7 crpl can act as a unit good or bad (like tos a morter bomb into anticreeper)
8 make tera forming more expencive
# love your work wish i had the games (only playd acadomy, user space ect) hope this was help full i will be giving better or revised ideas later
also make a cw2 user space
Wow. Four posts, really? Let me address all four of those together as one.
1: Not sure I’d have fun with that – it can play havoc with the logic that packets use to get from point A to point B, since that logic isn’t really intelligent enough to cope.
Also, remember that if digi touches your network, the unit its touching is already being damaged.
2: On lines? You mean on your network? I DO like the idea of a player-operated unit that can conduct its influence through digi and, as you put it, wreak havoc.
3: I would rather have Digi just naturally help spread AC the same way it seems to help spread creeper.
4: Tighten? Seriously? As with #1, I’m kind of uneasy with creating ‘special’ player units that are just magically immune to creeper damage . . . I would rather just go ahead and use sprayers to collect AC, and use some other unit to convert creeper – that requires more strategic use, anyway.
5: I would rather this not be an even conversion, but rip you off both ways. For instance, 5 AC -> 1 energy and 10 energy -> 1 AC. I like this idea, but I do not think it should be capable of acting as the foundation of a player’s economy. It should be a reason for a player who doesn’t like AC to build mines, and a way for a player who’s crazy about AC to get his fix with reactor farms and AC conversion.
6: I don’t know what you mean. Use a map as a base for a custom map? Do you mean take the units and structures you’ve built into a custom map? That might mess up high score tables . . .
7: If you script it to act against the player, it will. If you script it to act in the player’s interests, it will.
8: Terraforming already looks relatively expensive – one shifting one cell one level is cheap, but when you have to do that nine times to raise a platform that one unit can fit on one level up, that’s more expensive. And if you need a bridge wide enough for three units, that’s 81 cells you have to terraform. Multiply that by the number of terrain levels you need to raise the bridge. Multiply that AGAIN by the number of unit lengths you need the bridge to extend. That gets expensive FAST.
Like 4 nooberific programing!
Just kidding around virgil, nice work can’t wait 4 the next update. 😉 😉 🙂
U r amazing, i wish i had ur autograph *sheds tear*…
UR MEH HERO!!!! i couldn’t live without u and all the peoples on kc.kewl 😉
V should sell his autograph on Ebay . . .
Listen im not that thaaaat crazy about u, but could we be buds? 🙂
(by the way, i talking about virgil)
Brian-work on your english, bud 😉
Lurkily- You messed number 8 up 😉
We do not know how many cells we would half to terraform. You COULD have said 3 by 3 to get 81, but then you couldn’t accurately multiply how many across again to get your answer.a bride to fit 3 unit length would be 27 instead of 81 since 81 would fit a 3 by 3 exactly 🙂
I don’t necessarily like the idea of 10 energy>1 AC. A player must spend energy to GET to a mine, 20 energy to build a miner, and more energy to keep the mine online. Not only that, but it takes quite awhile to get the resources, and if your network breaks, whatever resources were there just broke and the player must rebuild their network to get there(which takes energy) also, upgrade points can be spent to increase mining efficiency. Also, in ame 3, 1 AC is not that much. Emmiters emmit about 7-8 Creeper but it spreads quickly. 1 AC would spread just alittle and ultimately perish at ANY sign of creeper.
81 is a 3×3 block of units, not a 3×1 strip of units.
I started with a different terraforming scenario, and then forgot to edit the result of the math when I edited the rest of the scenario.
What I was trying to illustrate wasn’t a bridge 3 units long, but 3 units WIDE, not 3 units long.
Regarding 10 AC -> 1 energy, if you don’t like it, just use ore mines instead. After the initial investment to build the mine, THAT ore is free.
The exact values will have to be juggled – I didn’t really settle on precise numbers – I chose those numbers more to illustrate that both ore-energy and energy-ore would be a ripoff, and you couldn’t freely convert back and forth without loss.
Keep in mind, that the amount of ore on a map is a finite rate that the mapper may use to control a player’s handling of that map. I don’t think any unit that has the potential to sway that (if the mapper permits you to use it) should have a cheap cost of operation.
Are there going to be blog posts once every two weeks now Virgil? It’s seeming that way because of the frequency. I’m not trying to pressure you or anything, just everyone likes blog posts. 🙂
Holidays and what I’ve been working on have conspired to cut the frequency of posts. It takes roughly a day of work to get ready for and to make a video (for instance). And that’s a day later for the release in the long run…
At the risk of sounding impertinent (not my intent)
The extra day of waiting per update is worth more info in my opinion, especially as we don’t have a date.
That being said, take as much personal time as you need for the holidays and anything your family holds important. That’s more important than updates on CW3.
I might be alone on this opinion, but I would prefer less frequent/more content per post rather than more frequent/less content per post.
BTW, is the language case sensitive?
Hi guyz!
Uh . . . hi . . .
Hmm..sorry I wasn’t here sooner to say this, but I really have just one request for the map editor, if it’s not already been added: Copy/paste functions, in every area it could possibly be useful, such as terrain, units, creeper density, digitalis patterns, “wind” or gravity or whatnot. It would have been really helpful to have that for terrain in CW2; as it is now, if I forget to blank out the top 3 rows for GUI purposes I have to manually move everything down 3 rows and that’s pretty tedious to do.
I am ecstatic beyond words that you actually implemented this. I’ve been wishing we could have something like this since early on in the original CW!
Woohoo!
Wow, Creeper World has progressed into a epic game, from a previously awesome state. I applaud the expansion of the map, the increase of units, the return to the original style, and now a programmable A.I. Your sir, truly have game, the only problem I find is I want it. Looking forward toward the release.
New to this site but been a huge creeper fan since i first played it ages ago. This new one looks amazing and the ability to not only create my own maps but towers too is something to look forward to. I agree with the comment about having a place for people to place and ‘borrow’ pre-written tower scripts as i have no idea on code writting but would still love to try.