Fractal Block World - The Infinite Open-World FPS-RPG about Fractals
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- čas přidán 3. 07. 2024
- Fractal Block World is an incredibly bizarre and unique game, combining Descent-esque gameplay with RPG elements and dungeon crawling in an open world navigated by growing and shrinking in size. This game has close to no online documentation, despite its uniqueness and ambitious design. So in this analysis, I want to deeply dive into it and talk about how it fractal'd my blockworld.
Patreon: / marriedtomychair
Email: mailedtomychair@gmail.com
00:00:00 Intro
00:04:21 Presentation
00:13:23 General Gameplay
00:27:13 Combat
00:45:42 Fractal Roadblock World
01:00:10 Concluding Thoughts + Accolades
Official Fractal Block World Website: danthemanhathaway.com/Computer...
Track List:
Hiding the Secrets (by Bobby Prince, from DOOM)
Guardians (by Alex Seropian, from Marathon)
Lab Rat (by Alexander Brandon, from Jazz Jackrabbit 2)
Suddenly-Opened Cannon Lid ~ Slow Starter (by Jynx, from Brilliant Pagoda or Haze Castle)
Of Chariots and Horsemen (by RENREN, from Binding of Isaac Excelsior)
The Sprouting Stone Wall, The Moving Castle (by Jynx, from Brilliant Pagoda or Haze Castle)
Dark Halls (by Bobby Prince, from DOOM)
Lunate Elf [Midi] (by ZUN, from Touhou 6: Embodiment of Scarlet Devil)
The Desolate Black and White ~ Double Sickle of Death (by Tokini11, from Touhou Abyss Soul Lotus)
The Utopia of Steel and Oil (by Jynx, from Brilliant Pagoda or Haze Castle)
Warp Destination (by 3R2, CreSpirit, and Triodust, from Rabi Ribi)
Stage 7 (from Like Dreamer, artist unknown)
Engineering (by Eric Brosius, from System Shock 2)
Forgone Destruction (by Michiel van den Bos, from Unreal Tournament 99)
Lullaby of a Deserted Hell (by ZUN, from Touhou 11: Subterranean Animism)
Water Level (by Alexander Brandon, from Jazz Jackrabbit 2)
Ai (by Manabu Namiki, from Dodonpachi SaiDaiOuJou)
Nave (by RENREN, from Binding of Isaac Excelsior)
Main Menu Theme (from Like Dreamer, artist unknown)
Praise the Sleep Cube! - Hry
Thank you for making a video about my game! I don't think it is a perfect game, and I am always looking for feedback to make it better. I was the only person to play it before it was released on Steam. I think you are right that less than 10 people have beaten it. When I play, I do not kill all the monsters but instead run past many. I think you made many great suggestions! I think I will make "normal mode" (the one you played) require a password (like the even more difficult modes). I play the game mostly on the "Relaxed Difficulty" (which I hope a newcomer would use). In terms of waypoints, I struggled with their placement because I did not want fast travel to dominate. I was concerned about having waypoints in areas with lots of ammo, but on the other hand it is more important that the game be fun to play. Adding minigun (and rocket) ammo all over should be easy. I can see your points about how perhaps many one-way waypoints could be two-way. It is also an interesting idea to replace white box devices with toll bridges. Music for the game is a great idea, I would just need to figure out how to make that happen. Improving monster AI is a good idea a well: maybe hit scan monsters could make a sound when they first see the player. A lot of weapons are not very good when you first get them. I could make their baseline level better. On the version of the game that was released a couple days ago I turned down the sounds the player makes when he gets hurt (someone else complained about that). I think also music might make sound effects less annoying. What I really want to convey is a massive world that the player can explore. Combat is suppose to complement that, and all ideas for changes are welcome. Thanks for playing! I appreciate you making this video!
Hello! Apologies for taking a while to reply. I had some difficult days, got distracted, and it slipped my mind for a bit. Regardless, it's great to know you've seen my video. It's probably the first time the creator of a game themself has visited my comment section. It seems you've taken my criticisms well. In fact, I'm writing this response shortly after seeing you released an update that made a lot of my proposed changes! I'm really happy to see it. I've never had such a major influence on a game before.
I need a break from this game for a while (it's nothing bad, it's more that making these videos can be so exhausting that I have to distance myself from the games I cover for a while), but I promise I'll pick it back up again soon. I don't usually make followup videos but I likely will make one in the near future, since the update clearly fixes a lot of the issues I had. I still do wish for more dungeon layout variety and enemies with more advanced behaviors, but as things stand, it sounds like the game is in a significantly more comfortable place. A friend of mine promised he would purchase and play this game soon, so I'm looking forward to see what he has to say about this current version.
I might be slightly late to the punch on this part, but I worry that hitscan enemies having "wake up" sounds could contribute to the odd soundscape I mentioned in the video. I know a lot of classical shooter do that kind of thing though, so I guess it depends on how it's implemented. Also, that tidbit about the cannon's alt-fire is interesting. It's definitely rather exotic and I would have mentioned it if I noticed it. I probably missed a terminal that mentioned it.
Also, funny little side thing - the sleep cube has become an in-joke between me and a handful of my friends. I am curious if the sleep cube has any significant purpose? And what is the significance of the 1939 New York's World Fair? The sleep cube room is such a memorably strange and bizarre sight, and it's perhaps the exact moment that made me fascinated with this game. I'd love to see more odd, inexplicable sights like that in future versions of the game.
And out of curiosity: Was this game influenced by System Shock 1 and Marathon? Assuming you were inspired by other games, I am curious to know what some of your inspirations for Fractal Block World were.
Anyways, my channel is small, but I'm still hoping this video brought a good few eyes on this game. Have a good one, and good luck with future development!
@@marriedtomychair I really appreciate you making your video! It is always good to get feedback. Over the next 6 months I will make changes addressing your ideas.
I will make monsters have a delay before they shoot the player, making some kind of indication. The indication will be a white dot that appears on the attack display. By the way, the attack display on my version (which I will upload soon) now uses a cylindrical model as you suggested instead of a spherical model (the spherical model was because the game originally had 6 degrees of freedom). That is, now it shows "verticality". I also think that some monsters should be part of a hive mind, where once you are seen by them for a few seconds, then they start shooting you. This way you cannot fly through a lot of them quickly without being hit. However you can stand at the edges and chip away at them. This is not as much of a problem for the monsters that are on a larger level of detail than the player (these monsters can simply have a personal delay).
I want to have more monsters move around, which is a technical issue with the engine. The only real problem is I need to write the code in a way so it does not slow down the program.
More varied dungeons is a good idea. Ideally most dungeons would be of the "hub" type of area you described. So the game would be hubs inside hubs insides hubs. I think I2 needs more of these. I2 is supposed to be the canonical place to improve your railgun. When I play that game (on the purple cat difficulty), it usually takes me an hour to get to I2, but then the game becomes more difficult and it would be good for me to put more places to explore there. I try to leave I2 as quickly as I can and go into I3, which paradoxically is easier (if you have a good railgun weapon). There I can farm nuke upgrades.
By the way, have you been to outer space? You can get there from the Tau Caves. You want to go up the Oak Trees using your rockets first to kill the monsters (before you enter the tree).
Having more ammo and waypoints is a good idea. In this next version you will be able to respawn while keeping all your ammo for a fee (8% of your gold). I am on a mission to replace all white box devices with alternative mechanisms (such as toll doors). For example, Montreal cities now have a 300 gold toll door, which once are open are open forever. Some white box devices are used in "arcades" where you are given infinite ammo when you enter, but all your ammo is stolen when you leave. These can be replaced by a system which when you leave, it sets your ammo to what it was when you entered.
When you play it again, I would recommend the "purple cat" difficulty, which is now the normal difficulty. In this mode it is quicker to kill monsters and tanking damage is less of a problem. There is also less upgrade grind. I mostly play on the purple cat mode.
I also added more to the storyline.
The laser secondary is now much better at wiping out a horde of monsters. I am also going to add a weapon mode to the cannon designed to replace the primary mode. This new mode (the tommy gun) will be able to hit monsters larger and farther away.
The 1939 World's Fail room is a reference to my dad, who loves that fair. The sleep box is intended to let you sleep so that you can pick up ammo boxes again (most ammo respawns in an hour). However I don't want people to abuse that mechanic.
Speaking of ammo, one of the big reason for so many one-way doors and one-way waypoints was so players would not keep using waypoints back to certain places over and over again to pick up ammo instead of just picking it up as they played normally. The fix that I made in the last update was to have a new type of ammo which does not respawn. Then having that next to a waypoint is not such a problem.
I have not played System Shock 1 or Marathon, but I will have to check them out! This game was inspired by Infinifrag/Infiniminer, Descent (1994), Diablo 2, and Ken's Labyrinth.
I am not sure if you know this, but I was the codeveloper with Zach Barth on Infinifrag 2.
He went on from there to make Infiniminer (which inspired Minecraft), and I went on to make what I called "Block Arena" which then turned into Fractal Block World. So the common ancestor of Minecraft and Fractal Block World is Infinifrag 2! You can read about Infinifrag 2 in the credits area of Fractal Block World in the game (go behind the pictures in the credit area).
"It's a game about taking an infinite left turns into Albuquerque when you're already 12 Albuquerques deep into Albuquerque" - you had my curiosity but now you have my attention
Hi everyone! After 6 months in (extremely slow) development, hopefully, it's been worth the wait. I've had a lot of trouble with audio balancing this time around, so I hope it doesn't get too quiet or loud. I've also had a ton of technical issues with my editing software. As a result, I've spent most of last week troubleshooting and re-exporting the video. Fun stuff! Anyways, I'm definitely going to make something a bit shorter and more digestible for my next video. I can't consistently put out hour+ content like this. It'll be a rare treat going forward.
Also, yes, I did repeatedly call the minigun hitscan despite my footage obviously showing it's not hitscan. Consider this one of the more obvious cases of the disconnect caused by the time between recording, writing, and editing.
Oh, and don't forget to praise the Sleep Cube for good dreams!
oo, this game looks cool. ken's labyrinth vibes from this, that kind of programmer-tech-demo game where they just tossed everything in
Flashbacks! When I first played Ken's Labyrinth on a shareware compilation, never in my wildest dreams did I expect Silverman's tech to become the most licensed FPS engine of the 1990s.
Funny you say that, as the developer discusses on his website that Ken's Labyrinth was a significant inspiration for the game. One enemy type (that I only saw in the monster manual) even had "Ken's Lab" written right on its texture. I guess he's quite open about his influences.
34:02 "it starts fully automatic and only gets fully automatic" xD
This was really awesome! I honestly wasn't expecting to sit through the entire video, but something about the bizarre nature of the game, combined with the drive by nature of the jokes you wrote in, made the entire video really fun. consider me a fan
Glorb Core cruelty squad but inside fractal cubes, that game should be called Manifold Genocide
Let me mention two things about the weapons I did not see in your video: 1) You can use the secondary cannon to kill multiple enemies, because it has a chaining effect. This is useful in the early game. 2) When you should your nuke, you should be using your brake.
Thanks for reviewing this game I played it a long time ago and it was really fun and it was fun to explore and learn everything
The GOAT returns with another upload, also please do make that Borderlands 2 slag teardown vid
It's something I've thought about covering for a good while. I could probably do it as a quick one-off at some point, sure.
Great analysis of a cool game!
i am very heavily trying to resist the urge to immediately get this (i hate impulse-spending)
This looks like a perfect game for those who really enjoyed Cyberspace in original System Shock
Oh, that's interesting! I could imagine it being a light inspiration. I remember hating the way Cyberspace controlled, but thinking the concept was fun and the tech was ambitious for the time. Also reminds me I'm overdue for a replay of SS1.
Maybe the increasingly smaller CZcams channels were the real fractals we explored along the way :)
I see promise and novelty, yet I feel fear.
is the fucking jerma gas sound bite used in this game?! i swear i heard it during the sound section
this game is so fucked up, im not sure i could finish a full playthrough. so yknow, a+ 10/10
this might be autisms most fractalest cultural output so far
"this might be autisms most fractalest cultural output so far" is a very colorful descriptor. i'll have to borrow that.
I forgot I was subscribed to your channel, good to see your content again.
27:40 its difficult for me to watch, it's the sort of game i'd expect if you asked an Octopus to make a Diablo clone. Interesting none the less. Edit: a game that Vulcan children play