Mega Tact relaunch

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Mogri
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Mega Tact relaunch

Post by Mogri »

Nearly ten years ago, I got this idea in my head: "What if I made a version of FFT that you could play online?"

And because I was a little bit crazy about the game and didn't know enough about what I was doing to know that I was going to do it poorly, I went ahead and did it. After pouring 100+ hours into the project, I then deleted all of my files accidentally. (Like I said, I didn't know what I was doing.) In all likelihood, the story should have ended there.

But it didn't.

I poured three years of on-and-off work into the project, getting it mostly runnable, and then I dropped it. Two years later, I picked it back up and spent half a year getting it in shape, and then I dropped it again.

Somehow, somewhere along the line, I made a version of FFT that you can play online. I made it support everything in the original game, then I made it support multiple teams, AI, and modding, and then I let it languish for five years.

It's time to bring it back.

Here's the plan:
  • Move it to its own site. Currently, you need to be registered on Slime Salad to play the game, and it's tucked away in a portion of the site that is linked to from, like, my signature. Moving it to its own site will allow it to get more exposure and cut it free from the existing site.
  • Fix it up. I did not know the first thing about web development when I started Mega Tact. The code is a mess, and it's a wonder that it works at all.
  • Give it a fresh coat of paint. Oh yeah, and the front end needs work, too.
  • Set up reminder emails. One major issue with Mega Tact as it exists now is that people weren't taking their turns. While that's not a terminal issue -- you can have the AI take turns for an inactive opponent -- it means people aren't coming back to the game. It needs to generate reminders in order to keep its userbase.
  • Advertise the game. It needs a userbase to begin with.
  • Open a Patreon. While I'm not quitting my day job to work on this, I've found that Patreon is a useful way of gauging actual interest in a project (not to mention paying hosting costs). In the (unlikely?) event that Mega Tact gains a large following, this would also fund a move to a dedicated server.
Notably, for the moment, I am not concerned with adding new features to the game itself, although I'm tossing around some ideas for meta-features (e.g. ranked play) in the near future.

If you have any suggestions, questions, ideas, or comments, this is the thread for you. Please get excited for New Mega Tact!
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Post by Spoonweaver »

I remember really liking this, but it stopped working one day and never got fixed. :(

Glad to hear it's coming back.
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Post by Mogri »

Spoonweaver wrote:I remember really liking this, but it stopped working one day and never got fixed. :(

Glad to hear it's coming back.
Wait what

Does it not work right now? Why did no one mention this?
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Post by Spoonweaver »

Hmm, it was my understanding that there were a large number of bugs that popped up, breaking all my current matches in some way.

It's possible it's working fine now. I'll give it a go.
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Post by Bob the Hamster »

I am excited about this! :D
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Post by Gaplan »

"FFT" stands for "Final Fantasy Tactics"? If so, then i'm very excited! :D
sorry for bad english :v:
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Re: Mega Tact relaunch

Post by SwordPlay »

Mogri wrote: Somehow, somewhere along the line, I made a version of FFT that you can play online. I made it support everything in the original game, then I made it support multiple teams, AI, and modding...
:O
That's amazing¬!
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Post by Mogri »

Sneak peek of the new look and feel

(It looks bad if you can't load the font. Let me know if you see enormous text.)
Last edited by Mogri on Fri Aug 03, 2018 6:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Mogri »

This is something on which I am still working!

Image

The unit editing interface is almost finished, and the unit info box is basically done. Unlike the old unit editor, everything is client-side, so you don't have to hit the "update" button -- everything updates instantly as soon as you make a selection. Also I guess it looks a lot nicer??? And it has helpful tooltips on everything, which is good.

The reference pages are also working, although they're much less of an improvement over the existing reference than the new unit editor is over the old.

Google authentication is working. I'll probably add Twitter authentication at some point...

And that's pretty much it so far. A bunch of the work has been on the back end. I told myself I was just going to slap a new coat of paint over the existing application, but I did not actually do that.
Last edited by Mogri on Thu Nov 29, 2018 11:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Bob the Hamster »

That looks cool! Excited :)
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Post by TMC »

Happy to hear it's not dead, and that there's a lot of invisible progress!
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Post by Mogri »

Well, unit editing is done, and it's time to pick something to work on next...

I should work on another piece of core functionality, but this is a good time to mention all the stuff that will be new to this incarnation of Mega Tact.

Maps

I want to support map layers. In FFT, many maps (a surprising number, when you look into it) have features like bridges or archways where you can walk below or on top. Mega Tact never supported map layers, so none of those maps was possible, which is why there were only a dozen maps instead of Every Map. Once layers are working, Every Map will be not only possible but probable.

Additionally, I'd like to have a map editor eventually, so users can create custom maps. That's a long way off, though...


Battle formats

Old MT had some rudimentary options for battle formats. New MT will keep those and add more, such as:
  • Zodiac shuffle: Rather than gaming the system and basing your Zodiac on what your opponent is using, the game will randomly rotate all teams' Zodiac independently of each other.
  • Zodiac random: Or you can just randomize each unit's sign.
  • Zodiac fixed: Or you can assign everyone the same sign and not have to worry about compatibility.
  • And things that are not related to Zodiac. More granular controls over what's allowed and what's not.
Additionally, units that don't meet a format's requirements will be automatically adjusted; for example, if a unit wearing the Robe of Lords is assigned to a battle that only allows chapter 3 items, she'll be automatically downgraded to the Wizard Robe (and you'll be warned that this will happen). Old MT already does this for Brave/Faith/Level, but of course there's much less risk of that screwing up your unit.


I wish I had a third item here

But I don't think I actually do. Have I mentioned that Old MT is fully moddable? That's still going to be true in New MT.

What does "fully moddable" mean? It means that you can redo every job, item, ability, and status effect in the game, with very few exceptions. (Certain abilities like Two Swords have their effects hardcoded, though you can still edit those abilities to give them other effects.)
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Post by Mogri »

I know what you're thinking. "I'd like to see some new map tech." Well, good news!

Image

This is Zirekile Falls, home to one of the more iconic battles in the game:

Image

So what's new? Well, besides the fact that maps are working at all, two things:

First, map layers. See how the bridge floats over the river, connecting the two taller side areas? The presentation is very assuredly the easier half of the work here -- I'll need to make it work somewhere down the line -- but until then, it at least looks nice.

And, speaking of looking nice, there's support for multiple tiles that represent the same terrain. The waterfall tiles and the water tiles are the same terrain (as far as the Geomancer is concerned), but they're represented in-game by different graphics. That's especially an improvement for Kamaitachi terrains. Old MT had them all show up as brick, but they can also be trees, moss, books, and notably bridges. It wouldn't be nearly the same having a section of brick floating over the river.

Not yet implemented: the depth indicator (for deep water) and the height-based shading.
Last edited by Mogri on Wed Dec 19, 2018 12:30 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by guo »

It looks gorgeous. As someone who only ever watched FFT played, I'm excited to get stuck in in the near future, especially as I've been playing through XII recently.
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Post by Mogri »

FFXII is packed with little references to FFT and the original version in particular. A certain cutscene has Vaan claiming, "I got a good feeling!" I love me some FFXII.


Image

Here's the slightly-improved map. The water depth indicators are present now, the height-based shading is in effect, and the tiles pop out a bit more than before. The guides are now present on all sides, which is especially helpful when the entire top guide is hidden. (There are tooltips on all tiles, so you could get by without the guides even if you needed to know the coordinates, provided you're using a mouse.)

I've updated the shading effect in New MT. Before, it was strictly a brightness progression, with a darkening filter below 5h and a stronger brightening filter above. Now, tiles are darker below 8h (with brightness = (76 + 3*H)%), and above 8h, the contrast increases (with contrast = (68 + 4*H)%). This is especially apparent if you compare the water tiles at the top of the waterfall to those below. I may end up tweaking that a bit, but I'm happy with the overall effect.

For the web nerds in the audience, this is all managed through CSS magic. Old MT was rendering each tile server-side, so even two tiles with the same terrain type were different images if they had a different height or depth (because it was also writing the numbers on the server end). New MT uses a single, combined image for all of the terrain tiles and applies all of the filters and text in the stylesheets. Not only is that an enormous reduction in the number of HTTP requests required for a given page, but it also means I can easily disable any of the effects by adding the right CSS class to the map container.

I have a pretty decent excuse for Old MT, though: CSS filters didn't exist ten years ago. (Not that I would've known about them back then anyway...)
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