Project MOAM - Moon over Arba Minch

Hehehehe.
I can resist to smile.... I can already see the reactions to our game.... 'great game.... too bad it uses capital'

Anyway. Capitals it will be. Why? Well the main thing is that I want to use text in-game. No reserved tilesetbank no switching the screens. I just want to be able to display text wherever I want in the levels/screen. Good gfx with enough variation AND a full (capital) characterset. That was the main goal for me (Yes, you can call me stupid now).

The title screen of the game is a real piece of art... The title is pixlated in Amharic, the alphabet used in Ethiopia, though it reads in English, very nicely done. It reminds me with English alphabet drawn as Japanese letters.
I've asked a native speaker of Amharic to read the title screen, he immediately recognized the letters but couldn't really come out with a usful interpretation of what was written. He told me it looked like an ancient dead language that nobody speaks nowadays

Thanks. Indeed I used the Amharic font for the title. I enlarged and changed some characters to make it more readable.
If I'm correct John did some fine research and has included Ethiopian phrases/names in the script! (but not using Amharic font )

TADIYASS, GWADANA!

How long have you been working on this project ?
Since Huey is going on vacation as we speak, I'll try to answer that question.
I may be mistaken though.

I think Huey started it in 2006, after which ARTRAG came along which his mad coding skills.
I joined the team in 2007.

have you some idea already as to when it will be finished ?

have you some idea already as to when it will be finished ?

Well, I think of the project more as a therapy I have no idea how to waste my precious free time if we finish this project. So I try to slow down progress as much as possible

We try to finish it late 2009 early 2010. There are some things in the main engine that still need to be implemented:
- Enemy management (to track their status outside the rooms on re-entering)
- Object interaction with subweapons
(not sure if I'm forgetting something important)

The design tools need some work too. The level editor needs some dynamic flag allocation functionalitiy.
Flags can be global (whole game) or local (level). These flag can be used to track if items are already dropped. To track if some conversation/quest is already done. Or it can be used to let objects/enemies communicate with each other.

Once the main engine is done the hardest part (design) has yet to start. Luckily the script John made is very detailed and already helped a lot on the gfx design. But new things are added all the time.

At this moment progress is slow as vacation, work and kids are interfering a lot.

The do list IMHO
- status management for enemies (when leaving rooms)
- subweapon interactions with objects
- MC "vine mode" (to be able to act Tarzan like)
- MC tuning in swimming mode and other states (for HP and AIR)
- Tuning FSMs of existing NPCs
- New FSMs for other NPCs
- FSM specific code for Bosses
- Tons and tons of scripts and script code
- Level design

and naturally, on the tool side

- Tuning of Meteor to support some of the new datastructures
- Implementation in Enemator of the new FSMs

PS
Meteor and Enamators are our tools for level design and NPC design
The most impressive thing we did (as author I could be biased) is that the AI of NPCs is coded into the data and not in the code.
This means that the very same loop runs for all the NPC's, form bats to moles, passing trough bullets.

Looking at our code, none can infer a single thing of what a given NPC does
as all the FSM is coded in tables that encode state transitions, events and actions.

I'm very impressed on your implementation of your AI in data method...especially on a MSX.
It has been done before but on powerfull machines !!
Also interaction with main player is something which is usually sacrificed with this kind of AI. So beware of this.

I'm eagerly looking forward to the release of your game.