Sharkbait, a fangame tribute to Shark! Shark!

[EmOneGarand]

Hey everybody, been working on a fangame based on the classic Intellivision game Shark! Shark! An alpha of it is up here: Sharkbait (ALPHA v1.0) requires the Vitalize plug-in. Thought the retro community might find my work interesting.

 

-Matt Alexander

[EmOneGarand]

Was wondering if anybody has tried it, I've heard from some friends that it can't find and install the plug-in itself.. so heres the link for the Plug-in Vitalize 3

[Flojomojo]

While Vitalize appears to be a legit plug-in (not spyware), as much as I'd like to try your game, having to install a browser plug-in is a major turn-off for me. Sorry.

[jbanes]

I'm forced to agree. Considering that browsers today provide the option of Flash, Java, the HTML Canvas tag, and DHTML, there are plenty of options for webgame development that don't involve mucking with the user's browser. Sorry.

[EmOneGarand]

I'm forced to agree. Considering that browsers today provide the option of Flash, Java, the HTML Canvas tag, and DHTML, there are plenty of options for webgame development that don't involve mucking with the user's browser. Sorry.

Uh.. I do believe Flash and Java are both plug-ins you need to install as well. The media I used for the game doesn't have any other option then Vitalize. And for the record it doesn't muck with your browser, it just allows a webapplet to interpret an ccn file just like any Java app utilizes a jar file or a flash application with flash.

[jbanes]

Uh.. I do believe Flash and Java are both plug-ins you need to install as well.

Nope. They ship standard these days. (They have for a while now.) They are pretty much the only plugins you can count on users to be willing to support. Or to put it from a marketeer's perspective, Flash and Java have over 90% market penetration, meaning that you can count on the user being able to support one of those technologies.

 

I seriously doubt Vitalize has more than a 1% market penetration, meaning that 99% of users will be forced to download and install the plugin.

 

And for the record it doesn't muck with your browser, it just allows a webapplet to interpret an ccn file just like any Java app utilizes a jar file or a flash application with flash.

Installing a plugin is "mucking with the browser". Users don't like it for a variety of reasons. Not the least of which is that they have to stop everything they're doing and make sure the plugin gets installed correctly. Depending on the machine they're using, this could require a restart of the browser. Which is a real pain.

 

I'm not trying to get on your case, just sharing a bit of feedback. Most people won't install the plugin to see your game. (As much as we might like to.) That's a fact. If your tools don't support anything else, then you might want to consider other tools.

[lost child]

... The media I used for the game doesn't have any other option then Vitalize.

 

Which of the Klik products are you using? I have Click & Create, The Games Factory, and Multimedia Fusion. All three will compile for Vitalize, but also allow you to build a standalone executable that can be played as long as a CNC32.dll or CNCS32.dll is in the same directory or is in the Windows/System folder.

[EmOneGarand]

... The media I used for the game doesn't have any other option then Vitalize.

 

Which of the Klik products are you using? I have Click & Create, The Games Factory, and Multimedia Fusion. All three will compile for Vitalize, but also allow you to build a standalone executable that can be played as long as a CNC32.dll or CNCS32.dll is in the same directory or is in the Windows/System folder.

MMF 1.5, I know about Stand Alone Apps, but for the purpose of sharing my work so far I created a Net App for it. If their not willing to download a single plugin I doubt anybody but the Klik community would be interested in downloading a stand alone app of my game :/

[jbanes]

MMF 1.5, I know about Stand Alone Apps, but for the purpose of sharing my work so far I created a Net App for it. If their not willing to download a single plugin I doubt anybody but the Klik community would be interested in downloading a stand alone app of my game :/

I would! I just don't want it messing with my browser.

[TheRedEye]

Man, you guys are a bunch of whiners. You should support game developers, especially ones with good taste.

 

Em: this isn't bad, but it has no gameplay yet, so I wouldn't call it an alpha. The scrolling is nice (though very broken if you move up and down enough, but you probably know that), and I like the graphics, they remind me of the old shareware days. I can't move diagonally, though, and if you can't fix that, I recommend finding another engine, because you can't play Shark! Shark! without darting around diagonally.

 

Not to poop in your cereal, but you might want to check out a shareware game called Feeding Frenzy. It's mega popular, and shares many gameplay elements with Shark! Shark! (in fact, the lead designer told me personally that it was his inspiration). I don't know if you plan to do anything with your project other than just show it off to friends and have fun, but if you do, you should seriously consider whether or not you're able to do more than Feeding Frenzy already has. And being that Feeding Frenzy was done by an actual team of seasoned game developers, and had a real budget, I personally doubt it.

 

Good luck either way, and thanks for sharing!