i'm broke lmao

October 05, 2022

I know this may sound sleazy, but my future psx games are going to be monetized. To be clear, I will always release the source code, build files, and game ISO for free. However, there are certain things that will be locked behind my (not-yet-opened) patreon, such as game design documents and early builds. I'm not quite sure when I'll start the patreon though. I'm not as confident building games on PC as I am on the PSX, so PSX gamedev is what I've decided to pour all my effort into.

Funnily enough, I once tried making a youtube video about my old melinda tech demo for some youtube monies, but the moment I heard my voice reading the script I had cringed so hard that I scrapped it entirely. However, judging by Bandwidth's video, it seems like it's possible to attract enough people to make this thing financially viable. I just need to market it correctly and hope that Sony doesn't send me a cease-and-desist letter.

In regards to the DegreeX engine, I've removed some bottlenecks, (finally) did some optimizations, and refactored a lot of stuff. It's pretty much been the only thing I've focused on for the past four months, and the biggest change so far is the camera system. In the past if I wanted to change the camera's offset from the player, I'd have to adjust each and every translation vector of every MTD struct like this:

/* bouncy camera */
if(camera.global_pos.vy < p_view->camera_y)
{
	camera.global_pos.vy -= delta_camera;
}
else if( camera.global_pos.vy > p_view->camera_y )
{
	camera.global_pos.vy += delta_camera;
}
delta_camera >>= 1;

if(player.mtd.translation.vx < p_view->world.vx)
{
	player.mtd.translation.vx -= delta_world.vx;
}
else if(player.mtd.translation.vx > p_view->world.vx)
{
	player.mtd.translation.vx += delta_world.vx;
}

if(player.mtd.translation.vz > p_view->world.vz)
{
	player.mtd.translation.vz -= delta_world.vz;
}
else if(player.mtd.translation.vz < p_view->world.vz)
{
	player.mtd.translation.vz += delta_world.vz;
}

/* apply house translation to everything else */
player.atd[PLAYER_JUMP].translation = player.mtd.translation;
melinda_cxc.translation = player.mtd.translation;

for(i = 0; i < MAX_CATS; i++)
{
	cat[i].mtd.translation = cat[i].range.translation = player.mtd.translation;
}
rope.translation = player.mtd.translation;
reticule.translation = player.mtd.translation;

for(i = 0; i < NUM_BALLS; i++)
{
	ingame.ball[i].mtd.translation = player.mtd.translation;
}

for(i = 0; i < ingame.nmtd; i++)
{
	for(j = 0; j < 2; j++)
	{
		ingame.level_mtd[i][j].translation = player.mtd.translation;
	}
}

/*
 *
 * etc...
 *
 */

I've now changed it so that you can just register an "entity" with the camera, and apply all translations of registered entities at once. In short, I can actually add multiple models into my scene without it being a chore anymore! I've also implemented this for rotations. You can also now get the camera's position, which is useful for when the camera collides with level geometry.

I'm almost finished implementing a couple other new features, and once I'm done I'll start posting about the game. This time I will *try* to get the prototype done ASAP so that the gameplay loop solidifies in a matter of days, not 9 months. I completed the design doc in September but there's still quite a bit of technical work that needs to be done before I can continue.

addendum

If you have some money to spare, donate to nocash (he's homeless). His NO$PSX emulator and documentation has been instrumental in helping lots of people learn about the internals of the PSX, myself included :)