[TheJMan]

ThDPRo and I have worked on and played this since 2005. After the sad turnout at DOZ(great work everybody who participated, there were very few of us), we decided it was time to release it to the public. We always played it from the editor, but I made some menus with board previews and a kill counter so it can be played from the title screen. This is a fairly complete version of this idea, but I like to think it will never actually be complete. I invite you to add weapons and boards. I invented this originally so that my girlfriend at the time would be able to play MZX with me, and in that spirit I hope you all can find people to play this with you. The beauty of MZX is when you're playing a game and have the thought "I wish it were more like...," you can make it 'more like...'. Show some friends you can actually get in a room with the infinite possibilities of MZX and help grow the community. MZX isn't about graphics and flash, its about imagination and creativity.
The cooperative mission doesn't reset so it can only be played once without restarting the game. I didn't unify the controls on Player 2 because we started using two keyboards to uncramp the the usual controls. It really needs to be WASD on one keyboard, anyway if WASD isn't working the alternative is RDFG. I'd love to hear what everyone thinks and entertain your suggestions.
 2 Player.rar (185.35K)
Number of downloads: 177

[ThDPro]

This hasn't been submitted to the archive yet, I think Jman and I are gonna add controls selection to it unless people just don't care.

Anyway, if you can actually find someone to play this game with, it's bloody great, and it's not just a MZXer thing. I've played this game with people who couldn't figure out how to put a robot on the board. I'm just begging you, you have to play this game with someone at length.

Now, if only mzx had networking ability...

[T-Bone]

Does it play anything like the engine I had created years ago?

http://vault.digital...how.php?id=1308

[TheJMan]

Not to put you down, but I would say our split screen runs a bit more smoothly. Its worth mentioning the first iteration ran about as smoothly as yours and in the same way (by constantly cutting and pasting mzms). ThdPro made the iteration for this release which uses the vlayer, I think. Honestly we've updated every component of this so many times over the last half-decade its nearly impossible to remember who made which bits and how. We did spend a fair bit of energy making the split screen a smooth as it is which took something like 5 versions, any of which took all of 2 commands to control the viewport. This one tracks motion about as cleanly as the built in viewport.

[ThDPro]

The splitscreen in this iteration works with the vlayer and in all reality, with any reference, if doesn't run smoothly enough. Put the players next to each other and things get kind of wonky, but only to a degree that isn't noticeable if both players happen to be moving. Besides, most of the time you'll be looking at the other player's screen to make sure you're even firing at the right spot.

O right, we both forgot to mention this and since there seems to be a blind stigma against it in most multiplayer games that feature screen-splits it might be worth mentioning: screenwatching is absolutely necessary for this game to work awesomely. That's not the way it was designed, but it seems to be the way it worked out.

EDIT 1: it's worth mentioning that while the splitscreen is pretty cool, it's only PART of the game, probably the best board in the game is the Tesalator. I just wanted to mention that cause the focus on the game here and in IRC has been "SplitscreenSplitscreenSplitscreenSplitscreenSplitscreen."

EDIT 2: Has anyone played the game with someone else yet?

This post has been edited by ThDPro: 11 August 2011 - 02:19 AM

[Old-Sckool]

Based on that one screenshot, wouldn't using sprites for split-screen have been a better idea?

[TheJMan]

The screen shot.... Why don't you give it a try before speculating on how better to have made it.

[ThDPro]

Old-Sckool, on 10 August 2011 - 07:43 PM, said:

Based on that one screenshot, wouldn't using sprites for split-screen have been a better idea?

Based on the screenshot? Does it work? Yes. Does it work well? Yes.
I'm sorry, but this is tedious now.

Sprites take two lines, this takes 1.

This post has been edited by ThDPro: 11 August 2011 - 04:32 AM

[Lachesis]

old-sckool is basically completely terrible, ignore his advice

[TheJMan]

Hehe, Thanks for that.
5 weapons in this game and its MZX so you can make more if you like! Having it done it many times I made it as easy as possible to find the salient components. If any of us have the requisite charisma we really should find some folks to play this with. Some more and some better co-op play would be good. The hard part was getting the enemies to intelligently select a target and we've already done that so the rest is just game making. Please modify improve-upon and add to, but lets restrict the suggestions to after having downloaded the game and not just the screenshot. My thinking here is that if you think it needs an improvement, by all means make it, consider this entirely public domain. This is a community, lets come together.
Lachesis, you're awesome.

[T-Bone]

I have found a way to make MegaZeux playable between more than one person in a single game, over an internet connection, on two different machines. Just the nature of which I have to do this, isn't something to be widely promoted since it could be used with evil intent lol. Considering this method makes it possible for one player to actually control the other players computer entirely... rather than just MegaZeux. But yes it IS possible to have online multiplaying compatibilities its just not as traditional or as safe. I've tested it and it works....

[TheJMan]

Any chance you could point me in the right direction?

[asgromo]

What, remote desktop? It sounds like you're talking about remote desktop.

[TheJMan]

Thanks for the tip, we'll give that a try!

[T-Bone]

asgromo, on 11 August 2011 - 05:06 PM, said:

What, remote desktop? It sounds like you're talking about remote desktop.

Yep. Works with a bit of lag. But does work.