I'm trying to keep Fugl as simple as possible, but hope to add some different game modes eventually. If it was on desktop I could make the world infinite in every direction and there could be different quests/missions and a main story, like a flying rpg. Could be very cool! Mfi-support should be fairly easy to do, just needs to buy one first. Landing gets requested a lot, so I'll try to make that happen!
After I finish most of the biomes, I will start adding the different hazards. An avalanche is a a cool idea!
Hey there, I've been testing Fugl for a few days now and I'm really impressed by the game. It took some time to get used to the controls. I went in with the expectation of controlling both wings individually (and so for instance swiping up on the right side would tilt the right wing up and cause a counter-clockwise roll), but after a while I figured out that where you place your finger, that's basically the center of gravity of the bird, and from there you can control pitch and yaw by sliding vertically and horizontally, and doing rolls sorta by going diagonally. So in that respect it almost makes more sense to have two-finger mode control each wing individually, but I don't know where that would leave flapping... At any rate, in two finger mode I can control the bird pretty much just like I want to, but sometimes he pitches unexpectedly, which I think is also due to it using the finger positions as the center. Maybe locking the center of gravity in the middle of the screen in two-finger mode would improve that. I noticed sometimes after I'd crashed and respawned that I'd start right above a piece of rock, and so would instantly crash again maybe better to start the bird off with some initial momentum in a more horizontal position? Landing would be really cool yeah, and hovering. In that case it would be useful to have flapping seperate from going forward somehow. Now flapping almost always generates momentum, but I guess if you flap while level you should basically be hovering. And then from there you can flap at greater intervals to slowly drop to the ground?
Good to hear and thanks for checking in! Yes, that's how the controls started out actually. They've been through countless iterations with good help of my testers, I'm not going to change them now, but I will add different control schemes and also the option to disable auto-level. I'm curious to know more about this unexpected pitching. It shouldn't do that unless you actually move your finger(s). With the current setup you can switch between one finger and two fingers without ever worrying about any joystick centers, I think it works. But maybe you found some kind of a bug, idk? Yes, I will fix that, haha! Yes hovering would be cool. Earlier I did experiment a lot with thrust vectoring (so you could hover), but the problem is the controls. I try to keep them as simple as possible, but this of course limits the possible manoevers. It's tricky to get the balance right...
Hey Johan, thanks for sending me the beta. I flew around a bit and got the hang of things. Is this a game, or more of a Proteus-like thing that generates an island to explore? If so it might be nice to not die if the bird hits the ground or a tree. Certainly meditative. Certainly gorgeous.
There's something so satisfying about going through a canyon or hole, hitting other birds....how about diving under water, like a 3rd person melodive, swim sim...with a bird
I'm reworking the level structure and adding goals as we speak, but the game will be about exploring and mastery of flight to progress in the levels/biomes. Thank you!
Yes it's a possibility to have different birds with different physics instead of sliders, it's something I want to do, but I'm also reworking the hitboxes of the bird so that only a hit to the body (probably) will result in a crash. In that way you could skim the mountain sides with cool particle effects!
No swimming because of limitations of gpu, but we're thinking of making an underwater inspired biome with jellyfish, etc.
In addition to the planned 10-15 biomes, i also want to implement a level editor so you can make your own procedural levels from the content already there, like your own favorite mix.
I don't know why I just read the past two replies and can't stop giggling. Is there any older builds with same controls but crappy graphics
I downloaded the game about a day ago. From what i've played so far (about 45min to an hour) I'm really enjoying it. I definitely understand the appeal of soaring really close to the terrain. Currently I have the sensitivity at 75% and the speed at about 90%. Personally I also found the inverted y-axis to work better for me, but obviously that's going to vary on the person as you stated in the invitation e-mail. The biomes look great! The cave one is just a little tough to find an entry point when first starting above it; larger openings would help, or even some kind of visual indicator sticking out of the terrain would be great like a bright colored plant or a little vegetation. Something that catches the eye to where a player knows, "oh there is an opening right there!" I often found myself not seeing the openings until it was too late to make the dive into them. The cave biome is so pretty too, I would hate for people to be turned away from trying it out before having ever really seen the inside. Soaring is the best part to me, but I would like if the soaring lasted a bit longer. I don't know if it varies dynamically compared to how long you've flapped or if it's a set value each time you get up to speed and soar again, but It just seemed like each time I was really enjoying the soar streak I was on, i had to flap again. The soaring sensation reminded me of soaring around in Rocksteady's Batman Arkham games. That being said, I was kind of expecting the soaring to increase in speed/momentum when I dove down and back up, like it does in those games. Please excuse my ignorance as I know that's a bit of crazy comparison considering that's a AAA mega budget game and you're just one person and I have no idea how tough it would be to implement physics like that, BUT I think if you are falling from a good height it would be nice to be able to at least go into a soar and dive to regain speed. The game is very soothing and peaceful. I like the options to regenerate terrain and change the bird color. I didn't even notice the birds that increase your speed until I played for a good 25 minutes, but once I did, and was able to hit one for the speed boost, then I was noticing them all over. It would be cool if there were some that were placed low to the ground as well as close to walls, because it seemed like most were in slightly odd locations that made them tough to get without boosting directly into a wall after. As far as longevity; I know you spoke about other game modes and I think that will be a plus. I'm not sure how grounded you want to keep the game, but other bird models to unlock might be cool or if you're feeling crazy, different flying animals. I'm thinking like how crossy road has different characters, something like that might be fun. A person in a wing suit would be a good one. Two more suggestions then I'm done, I promise. First addition I think would be great would be a timer that tracks your flight time and best record. That way when you're playing it's at least like a race against yourself to constantly want to beat your previous longest flight you know? And that could translate into leaderboards for people who have longest flight etc., depending how crazy you wanted to get with it. The second I thought might be fun is if a double screen tap would do a quick barrel roll which corresponded with which side you tapped on. Some type of little trick like that which would just add another layer of depth and fun to flying. Thanks for letting me test, I appreciate it and I can't wait to see how it progresses.
Playtest Hey. I just had an amazing time testing your game! Once I got the controls figured out, which took me a couple of minutes, it was very intuitive controlling the bird. In general I really loved how great it felt steering the bird around, and I think that is the biggest strength of the game. The previous flying games I've played on iPhone had used the accelerometer for controls, and I think your solution is way better (Also I don't get to look like a dork flaying my phone around in the air like a maniac in your game). The game had a very soothing atmosphere with the colors and the fog, that was really fitting well with the gameplay. One thing that kind of pulled me out of the universe, was the other birds that didn't quite fit in. I guess they are still a work in progress. I assume that you are also getting some amazing atmospheric music to go along with the experience. About the gameplay I think you are right not to get rings, coins or IAP's. You have this cool meditative feeling in the game that you don't want to rip the player out of. In that case I also think that the gameplay should be very subtle. Something that the player can ignore if wanted, but still something to pursue. I was thinking something along the lines of collectibles that you had to gather to proceed to a new biome. Maybe they could be some kind of special plant on the ground that carried a light, or colored feathers carried around by the wind. Either way they would have to be something that would fit into the setting. Let's say the player starts with one biome where he has to gather a small number of collectibles. This will then open a portal that the bird can fly directly through into a new biome (This way the player is not taken out of the flying experience when proceeding in the game). In the new biome there would then be more collectibles that would lead to a new portal and so forth. The biomes would then become increasingly challenging as the player proceeds, and also increasingly beautiful. Hopefully it made sense, otherwise don't hesitate to make me elaborate more on it. I really enjoyed your game, and I think it has great potential. Thanks for letting me try it out
Good to hear, that's the game! I'm reworking all the biomes to be levels, so this will be fixed for sure! This is a hard balance, so i'm still tweeking it. I'm not sure I understand your problem, as it's absolutely possible to go from a fall to a soar, but you might need to reorint yourself towards the air to generate lift. Also, speed will increase by diving down, of course the higher the speed setting, the higher the graviry = more accelleration when going down. The speed boosts are an experiemntal feature, I don't think they will make it into the final game, or at least not in their current form. I want to have this system of different unlockable birds as they will embody different physics settings (gravity/turn speed/sensitivity etc) and will be unlocked to match the player's progression towards a master flyer, but I'm unsure how of different I can make them look, as it's a bit hard in the current setup. Using the voxel animals would of course be much easier, but they are really lo-fi with few animation frames and no rag-doll. I really like to watch the bird fly, so I think I will need to make variations on that. I'm all for suggestions, so no worries! I want to add some kind of leaderboards to it. Flight time could be one of them for sure. Also lowest time on each level or lowest time for total completion. Not sure yet... Also there could be special arcade modes that have a more explicit scoring mechanism. I think I need the double tap for some other action. I want to add perching, balling up and air-brakes to the controls without complicating things too much! Thank you very much for providing feedback!
