im new too!

I'd like to contribute, so here are some ways I can if you have anything I could do:

Hey Doggit I have a lot of experience composing music (using FL studio 8), though not the 'ambient/spore-ish' kind (well maybe occasionally). I play the piano though and I noticed you were looking for someone with that skill (although im not sure how up to date that is now).

I'm also an experienced photoshop power-user, so if anyone wants any 2-D art, ask away.

I have some programming knowledge but i hardly ever use OOP nowadays so I dont think id be much help there.

Lastly, I'm good with wikis so I could manage the thrive developer wiki and keep it very up to date. I noticed that a lot of the info on the forum isnt on the wiki and it should be, so I could work on that if nothing else.

hypoxanthine wrote:

I'd like to contribute, so here are some ways I can if you have anything I could do:

Hey Doggit I have a lot of experience composing music (using FL studio 8), though not the 'ambient/spore-ish' kind (well maybe occasionally). I play the piano though and I noticed you were looking for someone with that skill (although im not sure how up to date that is now).

I'm also an experienced photoshop power-user, so if anyone wants any 2-D art, ask away.

I have some programming knowledge but i hardly ever use OOP nowadays so I dont think id be much help there.

Lastly, I'm good with wikis so I could manage the thrive developer wiki and keep it very up to date. I noticed that a lot of the info on the forum isnt on the wiki and it should be, so I could work on that if nothing else.

Welcome to team, but you should post this in your welcome thread.
Welcome, i dont want to be hard on you!

FIXED

Welcome to Thrive hypoxanthine!

There are a lot of tasks available for what you offer. Like you already did, contact Doggit for music. You can also create concept art with your Photoshopping skills. Some good things to create is just basic art, or even images of cells, organelles, environments, or the Game Interface for the different stages.

If you can help with the wiki that would be great. Check out this thread. Looks like you already did.

Welcome hypoxanthine!

Doggit and I are in charge of music, and it's great to have another composer on the team. If you've already composed anything that you think may be suitable for Thrive, I would really like to hear it. If not, visit these links for some inspiration:

http://thrivegame.wikidot.com/soundtrack
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1xZFxatUbjMTzgTTI6FRxxhnS4h7hT1x

thanks for the warm welcome! Ive listened to some of the tracks and they are really good, you've all certainly done well. The way I feel though is that they all sound very similar, which is ok, except that I fell each one should have some main theme. I absolutely loved the spore music, it was brilliant, and even though it was procedurally generated (which I have no intention of trying to mimic) it still had distinct themes, and i think thrive music should too. It kind of almost does right now but it all seems...a bit one-dimensional. I was planning a series of animations years and years ago which I never got round to doing because me and the rest of the team couldnt decide on any finalized scripts but I got lots of the music done and most of it is designed to loop which might make it suitable so Ill make a youtube account, upload and you can let me know what you think.

I think Doggit wants to keep most of the music ambient rather than melodic, which I have to agree with as most of the time it'll be in the background. However, I'm not too good at composing purely ambient music myself, so most of my themes have a bigger focus on melody. To be honest I don't notice Spore's music much at all when I play it, which for ambient music is perfect, but most of the Spore themes were a little too . . . how should I put this? . . . bright. What I mean to say is that Spore's music fitted its friendly cartoonish style, but we want Thrive to be far more realistic than Spore, and will therefore need both major and minor pieces throughout the game, not just major ones like Spore.

I would argue that despite a focus on ambient music most of the themes composed for Thrive so far are widely varied, although I suppose everyone has their own opinion. The microbe themes may all sound similar, but since the gameplay of the microbe stage won't change much you don't need much variation in music, only enough to prevent the listener from becoming bored. From the organism stage onwards the player will visit many different environments and will be in many different situations, so the music at that point should get just as varied. Listen, for instance, to these two themes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JriFsd_O2Y0&list=PL1xZFxatUbjMTzgTTI6FRxxhnS4h7hT1x&index=63 and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MP5vQIW6Asc&list=PL1xZFxatUbjMTzgTTI6FRxxhnS4h7hT1x . Both are meant to be played during the organism stage, but they're completely different. I could have picked several different combinations of themes for that comparison. Then of course there's the main theme, which the player is certianly meant to take notice of: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzORDb5U5Bc&list=PL1xZFxatUbjMTzgTTI6FRxxhnS4h7hT1x .

Yes, it would be great if you make a Youtube account to show us your music! I'm looking forward to listening to it, and I'm sure many others are too.

yeah i would agree a lot of the music was a little too upbeat, especially in the GA expansion pack, but some of it was good. yeah, about 3/4 of my music is in a minor key.

ok, i set up a soundcloud and ive uploaded some that I think would suit the game.

I think that since thrive is basically going to be a darker adult scientific version of spore, the main theme should show this, so ive based my main theme for thrive on what i think is the most iconic little tune in spore but made it more serious and 'space-i-er'. Ive also put on some others so see what you think.

soundcloud.com/hypoxanthine

I actually really enjoyed some of your themes (and I'm not even that big a fan of heavily synthesized music like that). However, they're probably too upbeat or synth-y for actual gameplay sequences. I don't want to be hard on you, but listening to them made me feel as if I was playing something like an arcade game. Your main theme especially, though, I thought was very good, so it'd be a shame to let it go to waste. Maybe if you tone down the percussion sounds and slow it down a tad it would make a good loading screen theme for one of the later eras. Doggit will of course have to be the final judge on anything, though.

Again, don't feel downhearted by what I've said. Whatever I say can be overruled by any of the major members or Doggit anyway, so they may find a way to get them in. You're obviously a talented composer, and I have no doubt you'll be a great asset to the team either way.

Objectively, yours songs is very nice, but the style must remain very "ambient".

hypoxanthine wrote:

yeah i would agree a lot of the music was a little too upbeat, especially in the GA expansion pack, but some of it was good. yeah, about 3/4 of my music is in a minor key.

ok, i set up a soundcloud and ive uploaded some that I think would suit the game.

I think that since thrive is basically going to be a darker adult scientific version of spore, the main theme should show this, so ive based my main theme for thrive on what i think is the most iconic little tune in spore but made it more serious and 'space-i-er'. Ive also put on some others so see what you think.

soundcloud.com/hypoxanthine

Honestly, your second theme could have passed off as a Sim City 4 theme. However, I agree with what Oliver said.

Welcome to the team Hypoxanthine!
Loved your themes altough as Doggit said, they probably should be more "ambient".
And for what 2d art needs to be done, go here https://thrivegame.canadaboard.net/t1131-art-team-we-need-you#22204

when you say 'microbe GUI', what exactly do you want? how is it supposed to look? What elements need designing for it? What size and shape must these elements be? Information please?

Hi there, I see our resident music board has already found you.

hypoxanthine wrote:

when you say 'microbe GUI', what exactly do you want? how is it supposed to look? What elements need designing for it? What size and shape must these elements be? Information please?

We the programmers wonder the exact same thing. A Concept for how the general UI should look like would be greatly apreciated, if you can do something like that.

great! what size window should i design it for (dimensions in px would be nice)? Should I PM you a few basic layout designs or post here? i cant be bothered moving to another thread here is fine.

Screen size ist actually really important, as scaling can be done quite easily. For the proportion, 16:9 or 16:10 is what i believe most people use nowadays. (My screen is 1360x768, that would probably be about the size most people use)

Posting them here is probably the best thing to do, so people can look at them and maybe improve upon your concept, give opinions,...

As far as I can tell, designing a consistent, appealing art concept for the visual side of Thrive is a task that is still up for grabs. If you would like to take this upon yourself, a good start may be the Microbe Stage Specification we are working on right now in the Building Microbe Stage thread (the current discussion is a few pages in).

The specification includes some ideas on the visual style, but nothing of that is set in stone. Also, the microbe editor is a major part that already seems fairly well specified, or at least I like to think so. If you find anything that's unclear or inconsistent, please point it out so it can be corrected.

Screen size depends on the user's preferences, of course. The Wikipedia article on display resolutions lists some statistics for common resolutions. I think the statistics gathered by Steam are most applicable to us. Almost 50% of their users seem to have a 16:9 (or close to it) display, another 25% use 16:10. I'm not sure if we want to support 4:3, as it's a radically different aspect ratio which could require extensive changes to display everything properly.

As a starting point, 1920x1080 or 1920x1200 would serve. But keep in mind that the final game may run in a lower resolution for some users.

We can always stretch things for 4:3. Everything will look taller and thiner, but it would be still playable.

Welcome to the team hypo. Also stretching the screen isn't too difficult. Me and my friend started making a interesting 2d god game and I added a zoom system to it.

screw my exams, im making a gui concept right now. whats the final list of compounds?

hypoxanthine wrote:

screw my exams, im making a gui concept right now. whats the final list of compounds?

It's going to vary from cell to cell, but you'll need
ATP (energy)
Glucose
Carbon Dioxide
Oxygen
Light (treated as a compound by chloroplasts)
RpAse (may or may not be included)
Toxin A, B, C, etc.

If you have any questions on compounds, this thread is the ultimate source.

~sciocont wrote:

Toxin A, B, C, etc.

How about calling them enzymes, so there is no denotation of strictly negative effects?

NickTheNick wrote:

~sciocont wrote:

Toxin A, B, C, etc.

How about calling them enzymes, so there is no denotation of strictly negative effects?

Enzymes are protein (or RNA) catalysts, so it doesn't quite fit agents that the cell is excreting into the environment to affect other cells.