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Holo Tanks - turn the living room into a battle arena

DanglingNeuronDanglingNeuron ✭✭✭
edited June 2016 in Projects

Its been a couple of days since I received my HoloLens. So far just have been going through all HoloAcademy tutorials. Prettttyyyy Sweeet.

So as my first getting-my-hands-wet project, I am going to create a simplified variation of my Windows Store game "Tank Arena".

Watch the video trailer for the original game. The HoloLens version will be simplified and incorporate HoloLens user experience.

I am giving myself till July 1st to release version 0.1 on the store. ( I wont be a true developer if I dont give myself unrealistic deadlines lol )

I am just starting this thread to report my progress, post videos, common road blocks I face and how I solve them, ask some questions, get feedback etc. I will also cross post the progress on my dev-blog.

Here are some fluid objectives:

  1. Incorporate Gaze, Gesture, Voice, Spatial Sound and basic Spatial Mapping features
  2. Create a basic Arena. Initially this will be a 2d plane that the player can place in the real world on a table top / planar surface.
  3. Navigate player Tank in arena with Gaze and voice commands like "Follow" for continous navigation, "Arrive" to set a target destination, "Stop" to stop etc
  4. Switch tank guns using voice commands like "Basic Gun", "Spread Gun" etc
  5. Toggle between Navigation and Aim using voice command at which point Gaze is Aim
  6. Air Tap or voice command "Fire" to fire
  7. Spawn enemy turrets and tanks with basic enemy AI to attack/evade
  8. Keep a local score table
  9. Wave level mode, Timed level mode etc

So guys wish me luck.. and give me suggestions.. all of you who have a head start on me :) anything that can help me towards a realistic, fun HoloLens version. I want to learn as much as possible from this exercise for big things to come in the future.

Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

Comments

  • Jimbohalo10Jimbohalo10 ✭✭✭
    edited June 2016

    You have set a big challenge, the time scale may be too tight, personally just completing the project is the most important thing. This is a massive research and development project. I know this just by the conversion of Unity Asset Store code how much time it takes. I suggest that a slower approach may be needed as you will be learning how to use mathematics, physics and spatial mapping together.
    Good Luck, and we are ALL currently 8 weeks (12-jun) into this journey so no one is really ahead of you!

    PS You might find some good information in this thread if you get "stuck"
    unity-path-finding

  • Good luck, interested to see how this works out

  • DanglingNeuronDanglingNeuron ✭✭✭
    edited June 2016

    So here is the first progress video for holo tank prototype.

    Incorporated gaze and voice commands in a simple flat arena for tank navigation.

    Watch Video

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pi_MLWH5Mqc

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • Wow your moving right along Excited to watch the progress!

  • DanglingNeuronDanglingNeuron ✭✭✭
    edited June 2016

    second progress video - Spatial sound, stereo music, drive, follow, fire commands. It looks a lot better on the HoloLens though :)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_eK2vW0Fsw

    @BlunderCode @filharvey

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • mr0ngmr0ng ✭✭

    Very cool!!

  • Holo Tanks - Progress Part 3

    Added some enemy turrets, firing, explosions etc more enemy units on the way.. will now work on some spatial mapping / plane finding to place the arena on a tabletop or floor. and test out a few navigation schemes to see which will be easier for players so they can enjoy a 3 minute level session.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHAjiu0Vraw

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • Looking good Neuron

  • This is great stuff @DanglingNeuron. Do you plan to publish this to the Windows Store?

  • @neerajwadhwa yes I have about 10 more days to go for releasing release v0.1. Currently stuck with trying to detect planar/horizontal surfaces to let the user anchor the arena on a table top or floor. The issue is that I am not getting very good planar detection right now. It works well for walls and ceilings butnot so much for table tops.. maybe its becasue the tables I have are mostly dark/black :sweat:

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • Jarrod1937Jarrod1937 ✭✭✭

    Yeah, make sure you can see the spatial mesh by clicking around in the shell, this will let you know if it has scanned your table properly or has a hole registered instead. I would also look at the minimum area to form planes, depending on how large your table is.

  • Progress video 4:

    Arena Placement using World anchors
    Enemy Turrets, Tanks
    Shoot to Kill
    Tag Along UI - Voice and Air Tap activated buttons

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0Mxer6OIpM

    @neerajwadhwa @Patrick

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • DanglingNeuronDanglingNeuron ✭✭✭
    edited July 2016

    I am submitting a very raw v0.1 of Holo Tankz for private beta testing today.

    And yes someone had already beaten me to it.. "Holo Tanks" name was taken :sweat:

    It will not be visible/public in the store. Anyone interested in trying it out on HoloLens device and giving feedback, please inbox me and I will provide link and promo code to download. Those who dont want to risk bombing their device.. stay away :lol: (pun intended)

    Expect glitches and un-handled edge cases. Its a prototype/demo at this time I wont call it a game right now :)

    Just learnt a lot during the process and still trying to figure out the optimal way to offer HoloLens suited User Experience.

    and here is the video of some levels

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJCh1KOii8Y

    @Patrick @neerajwadhwa

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • DanglingNeuronDanglingNeuron ✭✭✭
    edited July 2016

    Proud #HoloLens owners; After 5 dev-weeks, Holo Tankz v0.5 has passed certification and will be available for you all to download tomorrow.

    I feel so awesome about it, even though its a simple enough game but it was a great experience developing and playing. HoloLens makes it amazing.

    You guys will enjoy 15 levels of gameplay and trust me, the pics and video doesnt do it justice. You have to experience it, Rock your living room with #HoloTankz

    Thank you @Patrick @ahillier @DocStrange @Duskippy for play testing and awesome feedback. I think I have taken care of all reported value adds.

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • @DanglingNeuron Awesome!
    Looking forward to trying the updated version this weekend. Maybe I can beat one level... maybe :)

  • Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • Download links:

    1. https://www.microsoft.com/store/apps/9nblggh4s60r

    2. ms-windows-store://pdp/?ProductId=9nblggh4s60r

    3. Or just search in store for "holo tank" or "holo tankz"

    Have fun! and Please Rate it / review it / provide feedback :)

    Healthcare IT professional by day - Indie GameDev for UWP and mobile platforms by night

  • Cool, looking forward to trying this out. It has a lot of similarities with the project I'm working on. Unfortunately, the conversion from XNA to unity has been slower than I would have liked for me, so I haven't made a ton of progress in my spare time yet.

  • Looks cool, will try it out!

    Owner of the startup Information Experience Sweden AB, http://informationexperience.se
    Information Management, SharePoint, CAD, Visualization for AEC. Architecting and developing solutions for HoloLens, combined with AR Toolkit, Kinect, RealSense, Leap Motion.

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