Buyog's Lair

Getting tired of Parasite posts?

Friday, June 07, 2013

One more post on Parasite, then I think I can move on and start talking about something else again. Promise.

This week I've been looking around the community, downloading a ton of Marvel/DC characters, and trying to figure out which, if any, to support in Parasite's power system. I've got a long text file with all of my notes, but I haven't made any long-term plans yet, because really, there's plenty still do with with the half-finished power sets he's already got. <_<

I am starting to get comfortable with the idea of certain classes of power sets -- for example, right now he has separate power sets for Plastic Man and Mr. Fantastic, who basically have exactly the same powers, and there are places all over the code base that have to change if I ever add a third "stretchy character" power set, since it affects all of his basic attacks. Right now he only has one super-speedster power set, for Flash, and adding support for new speedsters like Quicksilver and Jay Garrick should be as simple as adding their names to the state controller that grants that one.

On the other hand... there may be times when otherwise-similar characters have a signature move (Hulk and Thing are very similar, for example, but Thing doesn't ever do the Thunder Clap that's such a common Hulk visual), or a particular passive (Ice can wall-jump, for example, but Iceman can't), and if we lump all "Hulking characters" and "Ice characters" into single power sets, we lose those distinctions. I don't know, maybe that's okay.

Needless to say, I'm still of two minds about the long-term plan. The short term plan is the same, though -- 30 power sets for DC, 30 for Marvel, all with finished, non-buggy moves. That'll keep me plenty busy for a while.

Of course, I also just added a Cable power set, because I thought it would be pretty easy to code (and it was):

On another topic...

I've been using Github for several years now to host my open-source code (mostly web stuff), and a few years ago, I stuffed a couple of my MUGEN projects in a single Github project (which, in retrospect, was a pretty dumb idea), but never really used it. These days, I'm on different machines all the time -- my Windows7 laptop at home, my MacBook at work, and my Windows PC when I need to use a mouse (it's slower than the laptop, but better for sprite editing and that kind of thing). I've been using Dropbox to keep my MUGEN projects in sync across all those devices, and it works well enough, but is kind of a pain for other reasons: most of the time when I'm working on a character on my laptop, it's code-only, and the code of a character takes up a LOT less space than the entirety of one of my WIP folders (which are full of sprite rips, half-finished edits, sound rips, reference videos, etc), so putting everything in Dropbox is a bit of a waste, and a drain on performance when all that stuff has to get synced across all my devices, even though I never actually need it on most. So, long story short, I've come back around to the idea of hosting my MUGEN work on Github. I put Parasite up there a few days ago, and plan to do the same with my other unfinished characters like Sinestro and Mandarin. So expect more on that soon.

Labels: Parasite

There are HOW many Capcom-original Marvel characters?!?

Friday, May 31, 2013

So last week, in talking about the long-term plan for Parasite's stolen-power moves, I said I was planning to support:

… a plurality of DC and Marvel heavy-hitters, hopefully all Capcom-produced Marvel characters and all the great MUGEN-only ones. Then I'll do like TwinImage suggested, and implement a handful of generic power sets for all other characters he might encounter, including things like strength, speed, super-armor, etc.

Seems reasonable, right?

Earlier this week I actually sat down and compiled the rosters of all the Capcom-produced fighting games with Marvel characters, and guess what I learned?

All Capcom Marvel characters (to eventually support...? Eeek!)

X-Men:Children of the Atom

Cyclops, Psylocke, Wolverine, Storm, Colossus, Iceman, Omega Red, Sentinel, Spiral, Silver Samurai, Juggernaut, Magneto

Marvel Super Heroes

Hulk, Wolverine, Spider-Man, Iron Man, Captain America, Psylocke, Magneto, Shuma-Gorath, Blackheart, Juggernaut, Dr. Doom, Thanos

X-Men vs Street Fighter

Cyclops, Wolverine, Rogue, Gambit, Storm, Sabretooth, Juggernaut, Magneto, Apocalypse

Marvel Superheroes vs Street Fighter

Cyclops, Spider-Man, Captain America, Wolverine, Hulk, Shuma-Gorath, Blackheart, Omega Red, Apocalypse

Marvel vs Capcom

Captain America, Gambit, Hulk, Spider-Man, Venom, War Machine, Wolverine, Onslaught

Marvel vs Capcom 2

Cyclops, Doctor Doom, Sentinel, Blackheart, Captain America, Gambit, Hulk, Iceman, Iron Man, Juggernaut, Magneto, Silver Samurai, Omega Red, War Machine, Rogue, Sabretooth, Colossus, Shuma-Gorath, Wolverine, Cable, Storm, Thanos, Psylocke, Spider-Man, Marrow, Wolverine (Bone Claws), Spiral, Venom

Marvel vs Capcom 3

Deadpool, Doctor Strange, Dormammu, Galactus, Ghost Rider, Hawkeye, Iron Fist, MODOK, Nova, Phoenix, Rocket Raccoon, She-Hulk, Super-Skrull, Taskmaster, Thor, X-23

WOW.

So then I filtered through all of that and got a single list of all Capcom-created Marvel characters:

1. !Apocalypse
2. *Blackheart
3. *Cable
4. #Captain America
5. *Colossus
6. #Cyclops
7. #Deadpool
8. Doctor Strange
9. Dormammu
10. #Dr. Doom
11. !Galactus
12. *Gambit
13. #Ghost Rider
14. Hawkeye
15. #Hulk
16. #Iceman
17. Iron Fist
18. #Iron Man
19. #Juggernaut
20. MODOK
21. *Magneto
22. #Marrow
23. Nova
24. #Omega Red
25. !Onslaught
26. *Phoenix
27. *Psylocke
28. Rocket Raccoon
29. @Rogue
30. Sabretooth
31. *Sentinel
32. *She-Hulk
33. *Shuma-Gorath
34. *Silver Samurai
35. #Spider-Man
36. #Spiral
37. #Storm
38. $Super-Skrull
39. Taskmaster
40. #Thanos
41. #Thor
42. #Venom
43. %War Machine
44. #Wolverine
45. ^X-23

That's a big list!

Looking over this list, I had several observations:

• # – These are the ones I support already; 18 out of 45... :-P
• * – I've had tentative plans to support these ones in the future, and in many cases have ripped sprites / drawn (or been given) power set icons, etc
• ! – These ones are huge boss characters; maybe I won't support them, since even though they may be playable, they're not going to be common
• $ – Super-Skrull I can kind of punt on, and just cough up a random FF-based power set ;)
• % – War Machine is more or less just a copy of Iron Man, so maybe I can cheat and use the same power set for both...?
• ^ – X-23, I might be able to get away with just treating like Wolverine... #maybenot
• @ – ... and then there's Rogue. I really have no idea how to deal with the Rogues out there, since, as a power-drainer herself, she doesn't have many original attacks. Ranked easiest to hardest, here are my options:
  1. ignore her / treat her like an unpowered opponent (i.e. just get a random health/power boost)
  2. treat her like my MarvelTemplate character, and get a random Marvel power set
  3. create a custom power set based on her few non-stolen moves
  4. try and figure out what power set she's got and copy it (ugh, HARD)

This week, I went ahead and added support for Super Skrull, giving up a random power set from one of the Fantastic Four:

Even with all of these caveats and special-cases, that leaves me with more power sets to add than I a) have room for in my power-stealing code, and b) have time to actually implement! Plus, it completely leaves out any of the other community-created Marvel characters that I'd like to support, like Luke Cage, Scarlet Witch, Wasp, Giant Man, etc.

So I guess I'm going to have to think long & hard about this.

Meanwhile, there's plenty to fix in the power sets he already has! Guess that means it's time to get back to work!

Labels: Parasite

Powerset Drain

Friday, May 24, 2013

Last week, I asked for ideas on new power sets to give to Parasite, and you guys came through, thanks!

Two commenters, one anonymous and one my friend TwinImage, pointed out that I can't keep adding power sets forever, or else Parasite will never be "done". They're both right, but I don't want to pull out all the power sets I've put in, because I've grown quite attached to some of them. I think what I'm going to end up doing is this: I'll provide complete support for a plurality of DC and Marvel heavy-hitters, hopefully all Capcom-produced Marvel characters and all the great MUGEN-only ones. Then I'll do like TwinImage suggested, and implement a handful of generic power sets for all other characters he might encounter, including things like strength, speed, super-armor, etc.

I'd hoped to have some screenshots of new stuff to show this week, but I've been working out of town, and MUGEN doesn't work on my Mac. So next week, we'll see what we see.

Labels: Parasite

Parasite says, "What's new on the menu?"

Friday, May 17, 2013

Someone mentioned last week in the comments to my previous post that they're excited to see if I add support for any new DC/Marvel characters to Parasite. At first, I kind of mentally resisted the idea, thinking that I had a huge list of buggy & incomplete moves to finish before I think about anything new.

And that's true. BUT...

This isn't a promise that I'm going to actually implement any new power sets, but I'm asking you all to comment below: what's new and cool in the past few years in the DC/Marvel MUGEN world? Also, what characters have you downloaded that you think Parasite should already support, and doesn't? (for example, I'm pretty sure if I tried to power drain Verz & Loganir's new Astonishing Cyclops that I wouldn't actually get a Cyclops power set in return)

As a reminder, here's his current 60 power sets (30 DC, 30 Marvel):

Parasite's power sets

I've got room for 20 more from each side (not that I'm going to tackle 40 more, sheesh), so let the suggestions fly!

Labels: Parasite

Refocus (Maybe?)

Friday, May 10, 2013

It's no secret to anyone that I'm fighting a bad case of MUGEN burnout. I thought when I quit my job back in February to follow my passion and join an exciting new startup in Silicon Valley, I'd have way more free time for MUGEN and freelance game development than I did before. Turns out I've been so excited about the stuff we're building (hopefully more on that soon), that I haven't done much else, code-wise.

Plus, getting a house ready to sell is a HUGE time-sink.

Anyway, I wanted to say that I'm going to try something that I haven't attempted for a few years: making myself a blogging schedule.

Like here, my writing over on my other blog has crawled to a standstill, but like here, I want to keep blogging, and keep doing interesting work worth blogging about. Here's what I've started trying to do this week, after my sweetheart & kids are in bed (so far so good):

• Monday & Wednesday: MUGEN character work
• Tuesday & Thursday: Web work (mostly JavaScript game development lately)
• Friday: new post here on my MUGEN blog
• Saturday: new post on my Palagpat Coding
• Sunday: rest

So, with that bit of site news out of the way, what did I work on this week? Two words: Parasite bugs. Namely, play testing the most current version of his code, identifying issues, and starting to fix them. He's slowly but surely getting better, which makes me happy.

I've also got an idea for a new Spoiler Alert (if you remember that old feature of the blog, you've been around here a while), inspired by my going to see the awesome Iron Man 3 with my comic-loving kids last weekend. I think it'll be fun. :)

Labels: Meta, news, Parasite

What's Next? (Part 1 of 2)

Friday, October 12, 2012

So this took me a while to get back to. Sorry, I'm kinda preoccupied with things I'm not prepared to talk about here (yet).

Anyway.

As Acey predicted in the comments on my last post, my enthusiasm for MUGEN creation has returned this week, at least in part because I had to go and test all of my unfinished characters so I could write this post about what they still need. So without further ado, here's the first part of the list (more coming soon; I have a few characters still to evaluate):

Stay tuned for part 2; I promise it won't take me 3 months to write it!

Labels: Blackest Night Hal, Elektra, Green Lantern, Ice, Invisible Woman, Lex Luthor, Lobo, Mandarin, Marrow, Parasite, Strong Guy

On the 17th day of Christmas

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Feeding Frenzy special

Quick Snack hyper

Yeah yeah yeah, I'm slow and irresponsible and a promise-breaker for not delivering my "12 Days" gifts during the 12 days. Love it or hate it, it is what it is this year. So everytime I release stuff over the rest of the month of January will make fun of my lack of schedule-timeliness. Thus, today is the 17th Day of Christmas.

Earlier this month, I released an update to Parasite that wasn't quite as done as I'd hoped for. Yes, there are still quite a few unfinished power sets -- that's my next focus with him -- but I had a couple of things I wanted to do for better playability. Today I'm releasing a version that accurately captures that vision:

* 11 Jan 2012: v2.2.1
  - new level-1 hyper: Quick Snack (QCB + PP/KK), steals a random powerset from someone off-screen
  - fixed this readme to include the command for Feeding Frenzy (weak kick + hard punch or weak punch + hard kick)
  - bugfix to Feeding Frenzy: air version didn't have any sound effect
  - bugfix to re-enable palettes 7 through 12 (which got accidentally disabled)
  - changed command for Power Overload: now it's F,D,DF + punch & kick of equal strength

Like I said, there's a lot still to be done with him, but I'm pretty happy with the playstyle changes made possible by the new Feeding Frenzy and Quick Snack attacks.

You can get Parasite v2.2.1 here, on his page.

Labels: 12 Days of Christmas, 12Days2011, Parasite

On the 8th day of Christmas...

Tuesday, January 03, 2012

What's a Buyog event without a Parasite update? :)

Tonight (this morning?) I bring you an updated Parasite. He's mostly bug fixes and added support for our new Flash character, but I also gave him a new special, Feeding Frenzy, designed by Jet the Phoenix. It's got both air and ground versions, and allows Parasite to pounce on his opponent for a quick "snack" to boost his power. Took me a while to balance it, but I think it's in pretty good shape now.

You can download Parasite v2.2 on his character page.

Change list:
* 02 Jan 2012: v2.2
  - new special: Feeding Frenzy
  - bugfix to Superman/Heat Vision special
  - bugfix: Lobo clones / Elektra shadows now behave properly on round end
  - bugfix: Erradicator hyper beam wasn't being removed if you got hit out of it
  
Power set updates:
  - added support:
    - Wally West Flash

  - new moves for existing power sets:
    - Fernus the Burning (Martian Manhunter hyper)

EDIT: Added a link to the release thread for this version over at the ScruffyDragon forums.

Labels: 12 Days of Christmas, 12Days2011, Parasite

For the Unscruffy

Monday, August 08, 2011

I recognize that not everyone that reads my blog also checks ScruffyDragon.com on a regular basis, and not everyone is registered over there, so can't get the downloads section anyway. I get it.

That said, most of you, Scruffy members or not, know that this past month we've been celebrating the annual "Scruffyversary" event, marking the anniversary of our domain and team identity as the Scruffy Dragons. It's usually an excuse to show off new stuff, preview upcoming projects, provide new downloads, and so on. This year has been, I think, even more eclectic than usual (certainly more freeform in its schedule :-p), showing just how wide-ranging our interests as a team truly are. Really, you owe it to yourself to go check it out if you haven't.

With all of that said, my part of the month's festivities involved updates to a couple of my previously-released characters, and a preview alpha of one that's been on my back burner for a very long time: Susan Storm Richards, aka the Invisible Woman. These new downloads were all Scruffy-exclusive for the duration of the Scruffyversary event, but I've now updated them here as well. Check out these links to see the new stuff, and grab the new downloads:

• Sue Storm alpha 1 (release thread)
• Sinestro RC 2 (release thread)
• Parasite RC 2a (release thread)

I also shared a video (taken by Magus; alas, my current MUGEN computer can't record video) of the updates I'm working on for Strong Guy, based on a bunch of new stuff McCready sent me a few months ago. Should be ready for release sometime soon:

Labels: Invisible Woman, Parasite, Scruffyversary, Sinestro, Strong Guy

Parasite Polishing

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

I've been trying to get a release of Parasite out the door. His WIP page now shows one of 4 possible statuses for each of his stolen moves: planned, unfinished, done, and the new one: next. Next means I've got it finished, and it will be in the upcoming Parasite 2.0 release. No idea on the exact release date yet, but I want it to be as soon as possible — no waiting on a ScruffyDragon release party this time around.

Here are a few of the power sets I've been rounding out / finishing up as part of this push:

Ninjitsu hyper (Elektra power set)

Photon Array hyper (Dr. Doom power set)

Look for Parasite 2.0, coming soon(ish?) to a select screen near you. :)

Labels: Parasite

This Tastes Fantastic!

Saturday, September 18, 2010

I've been enjoying the heck out of the videos that Capcom is putting out to promote Marvel vs Capcom 3. The cinematic hyper pauses and the new move effects are very cool, and the new characters look like they're going to be a lot of fun. Case in point: Super-Skrull. He's got all of the Fantastic Four's powers, which is giving me some delicious move ideas for Parasite's support of Marvel's First Family.

1. Reed Richards:
   
   
   Elastic Slam special
2. Susan Storm
   
   
   Invisibility special
   
   Cosmic Dust hyper
3. Johnny Storm:
   
   
   Fireball special
   
   Supernova hyper
4. Ben Grimm:
   
   
   Yancy Street Special
   
   Clobberin' Time hyper

The only one I haven't really gotten a handle on yet is Mr. Fantastic's hyper; the ideas I've tried don't really seem to fit him, and Super Skrull's hypers are mostly based on Human Torch and Thing. So I'm still thinking about that.

Anyway, MvC3 looks insane. I can't wait to play it, and see what else I can adapt.

Labels: Parasite

Vlog #1: New Stuff is on the Way!

Wednesday, July 07, 2010

I just realized it's been over a year since I've posted any new videos to YouTube, so I just did this one as kind of a status update / signal of things to come. Don't know how regular these will be, but at least it's something. Bottom line: the time-hole that is grad school is done for me now, except the thesis defense in 2 weeks. Woo! So MUGEN stuff is back on my plate, and coming down the pipe soon.

Labels: Blackest Night Hal, DC vs Marvel, Elektra, Mandarin, news, Parasite, Sinestro, video, vlog

Oops, too soon...

Tuesday, July 06, 2010

My last post was a draft that got published too early, so a couple of the linked images aren't uploaded yet. Do not adjust your TV set! I expect those to be done and uploaded tonight, not two days ago.

Sorry about the confusion.

Labels: Parasite

Speed Demons

Monday, July 05, 2010

Here's another in my series of themed "Parasite eats..." posts (see previous entries here and here). Today I'm showcasing the hypers for Superman and Flash, which have both been missing for far too long.

Speed Fury hyper, stolen from Superman

Speed Force hyper, stolen from Flash

In order to really fit the title, this post was going to have Etrigan's hyper in it too, but I haven't decided which of Etty's many hypers to give him yet. Kinda wanted to steer clear of the magic ones, so that narrows it down quite a bit, even though I really wanted to do Dancing Blazes. Wind from Hell, I suppose...?

Labels: Parasite

"Small" Update

Friday, April 16, 2010

Lately I've been working closely with my friend AngelEcks, creator of the great, recently-released Atom character for MUGEN. I did some testing and helped him through a few thorny patches of code, and this week, he paid me back by giving me an even better shrinking technique than he used in his own code, so my Parasite can do it the "cool" way. That's so incredibly generous of him to give it to me, before he's even had a chance to use it himself! Thanks a ton, man.

Anyway, this is the result of me integrating and modifying that code snippet, with the excellent "atom effect" sprites provided by McCready (again, shared by 'Ecks... McCready made them for him):

Subatomic Sidestep special

More, as always, coming soon.

Labels: Parasite

Snow Day #2

Tuesday, February 09, 2010

Well, the snow plow finally came down our street today, and we were able to leave our neighborhood for the first time in several days... but we've under another winter storm warning tomorrow and Wednesday, so I've got another free day off. In commemoration of this unprecedented occasion, tonight I've finished Parasite's Iceman-based power set:

Ice Boulder special

Arctic Attack hyper

I still have a few more things to tweak, fix, and finish before v2.0 Release Candidate 2 is ready for download (yes, it is taking longer than I expected), but this put me one big step closer. Huzzah for snow days!

Labels: Parasite

Yum, yum!

Sunday, January 17, 2010

This is why I love having Jet the Phoenix for a partner! This past week he sent me a concept & sprites for a new intro for Parasite, which is made of 100% WIN, smothered in awesome sauce:

As of the RC2 release, you'll have some feedback of sorts about whether Parasite can gain a power set from an opponent, and if so, what the icon will look like. Plus it gives him a chance to drool a little over his food before he eats! ;) Plus, the code it took me to get him to recognize his opponent at the start of the round is proving to be quite helpful in tuning his AI so he doesn't go overly crazy with Feeding Time attacks. That's my kind of a WIN-WIN. :)

I also started (finally!) stubbing in the hypers for the Superman and Flash power sets; neither is ready to show yet, but they should both be done for the RC2 release (which is still coming sometime soon, but has been delayed a bit by grad school tasks this past week).

Labels: Parasite

Finished Tweaking

Sunday, January 10, 2010

Okay, I've fixed the stuff I broke the other day. My web server supports PHP, and I figured that would get me most of the code reuse I wanted, even if it is duplicated on the front page and all the archive pages (there are apparently ways to get Blogger to serve up PHP )or at least PHP-friendly content) instead of HTML, but I haven't figured them out yet, so this'll have to do as a stopgap. Note that Stages and Add-ons are both PHP-ified, but Chars isn't yet, because when I do that page, I'll also need to do all of the character pages at the same time... so that's a task for another night.

Earthquake special from Juggernaut

Rudy Smash! hyper from Hulk

Oh, and Parasite's finally got a cool ground-smash anim for Juggernaut's special and Hulk's hyper, thanks to ScruffyDragon forum member GODzilla and my partner Jet the Phoenix. (thanks to both of you!) I've got almost all of the changes done to him that I wanted to make for the next v2 release candidate, so I think that'll be done and ready for download sometime next week. I also owe a new YouTube video showing off all the cool new stuff he can do; more on that soon.

Labels: news, Parasite

Looking Back at 2009, Looking Forward to 2010

Wednesday, January 06, 2010

This past year has been a notable one for me personally, and for the ScruffyDragon team as a whole. I know you've probably had your fill of "end of the year"/"end of the decade" posts, so I'll try not to bore you with that (much), and instead focus on my plans for the new year.

But first, a brief recap on 2009:

• In January, as part of last year's "12 Days of Christmas", BobStarsky and I released Savage Hulk
• In April, as part of our Scruffyversary event, I released the first public version of Parasite, updated betas of Elektra and Sinestro, and "remixes" of both Green Lantern Hal Jordan and Ice
• In May, I picked up a great new partner for Parasite work, in the form of Jet the Phoenix
• Things got quiet for a little while, until I got an idea for a new "Blackest Night" edition of Hal Jordan. That effort is still ongoing, and should bear fruit soon.

Now, here are my goals for 2010:

• Blackest Night Hal Jordan (here's a list of the planned changes)
• Mandarin needs my attention before the new Iron Man movie comes out in May. At least a beta if not more.
• I'll be assisting the SGM team with the coding on tenchimuyo4ever's Green Skull character (he's an Amalgam of Red Skull and Lex Luthor; how could I say no? ;))
• Get Sinestro to a 1.0-level release before the end of the Blackest Night crossover.
• XFields and I are planning to work together again on Elektra, and bring her up to that 1.0 level as well.
• Finally get to that Marrow remix I had planned two years ago
• Invisible Woman: maybe, maybe not. Honestly I'm not very motivated to work on her right now.
• Bizarro: possibly collaboration with Kal-Elvis will re-ignite my enthusiasm here, but Kal's busy working on his music career, so I have no idea how likely that is.

So, that's the plan. I'll try to keep up the pace I set last year of posting something here at least weekly (usually on the weekend, Friday or Saturday), and we'll see how things go. I'm looking forward to a great 2010, and I wish the same for everyone here.

Labels: Blackest Night Hal, Elektra, Mandarin, Marrow, Parasite, Sinestro

On the 9th Day of Christmas (part 2)...

Sunday, January 03, 2010

Today I'm releasing a "release candidate" version of Parasite 2.0. Thanks go to all the ScruffyDragons that have helped me, but especially to my new teammate and partner, Jet the Phoenix, who was responsible for so much of the graphical update in this version. He now sports a full smart palette (with TONS of alternates available in the folder), lots of custom animations and basic moves for specific power sets, and a metric ton of new power sets and fixed/improved moves for existing power sets. It's way more than I can even put in the readme file, but make sure you read it anyway to see what characters he supports, and the implementation status on their power sets.

Note that not everything is done yet; I'm sure there are still a ton of bug fixes to do, and there are still more missing moves than I would like, but it's certainly a giant leap in the right direction.

You can download Parasite v2 RC1 here, and afterward you can go to ScruffyDragon to discuss this release.

Happy New Year! 3 more days to go!

Labels: 12 Days of Christmas, 12Days2009, Parasite