Programming: Updated Teenage Mutant Ninja Puppets
Posted by llemarie on November 11, 2007
I’ve received a few requests to post the full version of Teenage Mutant Ninja Puppets as shown in the YouTube video I posted a few months ago.
This version has the high resolution textures and character position editor enabled.
Update: Network support now works and the editor can save the current pose of the ghost (the pale guy) by pressing ‘R’ on the keyboard, then during the game you can use the pose by pressing ‘T’.
Download it free here (5MiB).
Screenshots on flickr.
llemarie's weblog 
Programming: Teenage Mutant Ninja Puppets « llemarie’s weblog said
[…] Updated: I posted the big version here. […]
Sanji said
uhm, about the editor, hmm, how does it works ?
I have Tried and tried to figure it out, but i cant…
can u please help ?
llemarie said
Hi, the editor is not finished. You can set a pose by dragging the limbs around, but you can’t save it.
Regards, Lionel.
Sanji said
uhm, can u mail me in youtube, when the Finished version is out ?
my acc on youtube is callmesensei
shalom said
this game work very slow!!
can u tell me what to do?
llemarie said
Hi Shalom,
The game requires a decent graphics card. You might get away with an on-board Intel card in a laptop (like I do), but it’s preferable to use a normal nVidia or ATI card. Also make sure you have the latest drivers.
Hope it helps,
Lionel.
shalom said
hoo thanks man it’s works good now
Fum said
The game doesn’t work for me 😦
It just pops up a windows error box when I launch it.
I suspect this might have something to do with the menu as the 96k version also crashes but only after I press ESC to enter the menu.
llemarie said
Hi,
I’m sorry to hear that. I have stopped working on this as I’m currently working on the new version and it doesn’t use the same engine at all. It has to be ready for Breakpoint as Easter, so there is no time to lose.
Hopefully that new version will work for you!
There’s a lesson in this for me though and version 2 will include tracing features to help users report on the exact point of the crashes so that I can fix them.
Lionel.
Fum said
I hope it’ll work. I do like this game and played a bit on someone else’s computer. Excuse my being rather sparse on details but I can’t really find any meaningful factor that could decide why the game doesn’t work on my computer.
I’m running an Athlon 1200, GeForce 5700, 512 RAM, and Windows XP SP2 (without autoupdates). I updated my graphics drivers so that’s not the case.
I’ll be looking forward to the next release.
Have a happy new year 😉
zizverg said
My English is not very well….
Hey guys! What is the name of this Font (style of text). I asking that, because I saw it before. Practically I know were I saw it.
Thank you very much… very good game.
Add to the OPTIONS “SOUND” ON/OFF.
llemarie said
Hi Zizverg,
It’s just an “LCD” font, I got it on 1001freefonts.com IIRC.
I’ll try to remember to add a sound option in the next version, thanks for the suggestion!
Lionel.
zizverg said
And also I think you can add to options “Always in Slow Motion”. I’ll be very cool. Like in films )).
Snaideri said
How about editable controls, for multiplayer on a single computer etc.?
llemarie said
Zizverg: The new version has a key to control slow-motion, so you’ll choose when you want to slow the action down.
Snaideri: You can control multiple characters on a single PC using game pads. The new version will support multiple players on the keyboard, that’s a good idea.
Thanks,
Lionel.
FYT said
The game crashes on “Press Escape” and open the visual studio debugger.
llemarie said
Hi,
If you do open the debugger when it crashes, does it give any useful information that I could use to fix the problem? A rough location of the crash would be a good start for me to check the code already.
Thanks,
Lionel.
DVC said
i love it but can you change your color
llemarie said
Hi DVC,
In that version it is not possible to choose your own colours. I will make sure that the new version lets you customize the colour of your ninja.
The development of the new version is well under way, it should come out at Easter as planned.
Thanks,
Lionel.
Snow Dan1 said
Hi, ummm… The menu is blurry, i can’t read it very well. But Great Game! 😛
llemarie said
Hi Snow Dan1,
The game is trying to be clever in that it detects what resolution texture it can render the menu at. In your case, it seems to detect that it can only render the menu at very low resolution to run at full-speed. It might be that your video card is not fast enough, or that you don’t have the latest drivers for it.
Thanks,
Lionel.
Fum said
Now that I upgraded (or rather bought a new one) my PC the game runs fine 🙂
One bug that I noticed is that you can win and go to the next round even if you die. Just pressing W to get the whip or C for the chain and trying to hit every opponent.
When they eventually die, the “You lose” changes to “A winner is you” and you go to the next round 🙂
boneyardbrew said
Hi,
It seems that your bandwidth limit has been exceeded, which means I can’t download the full version. I would really like to try it out. I am a fan of the smaller version I really enjoy playing it. I always wished there was a version with multiplayer, and then I just found this! Hopefully you can help. Thanks.
llemarie said
Hi Boneyardbrew,
Indeed it seems that there’s a problem with my site host (google pages). I don’t actually know what the limit is for the bandwidth, it doesn’t look like it’s very much.
I’ll get the file hosted somewhere else tonight and post here when the file is available for download again.
Sorry for the delay.
Regards,
Lionel.
llemarie said
The download link has been updated, the file should now be available again.
Regards,
Lionel.
boneyardbrew said
I have one more question. How do you get multiplayer to work? I have two computers on a LAN and when I click the LAN option in the multiplayer menu we both end up hosts. I made sure both firewalls weren’t blocking the game.
llemarie said
Hi Boneyardbrew,
I don’t know if you got my email, I contacted you with a new version to try to see if that fixes the multiplayer connection problem.
Please let me know when you’ve had a chance to try it.
Regards,
Lionel.
Skillz said
hey Lionel great game man , congratz 😉
however this version , as the previous one just doesnt want to run on my pc … it runs on my mom’s laptop ,but not on my pc…
Sadly i have the same problem like Fum…
looking forward to the next version , this game already kicked Ragoll Masters out of the picture , once again great job 😉
Ian said
Hey, I have downloaded the game but it runns Extremely slow. and it jumps a lags.. like my computer is a Carboard box, But i have 2 Cpu’s 512mb Nvidia Graphics and 2gb of ram. Can someone give me some advice? it seems like a really kool game but i just cant get it to run smooth. Thanks
llemarie said
Hi guys, sorry for the delay, I’m at Breakpoint, submitting the new version as we speak! Fingers crossed it should come out this weekend (if the judges don’t find a showstopper fault in it).
@Skillz: Thanks for that. Sorry for the trouble, hopefully the new one will work better, the rendering is less fiddly.
@Ian: Can you try to install the latest drivers for your graphics card? That’s usually the problem when the game is slow.
Lionel.
Skillz said
Llemarie :
Hey np problem man , i always respected artits that get inspired by something and recreate it 10 times better ;]
About that problem , today i formatted my Hdd , reinstalled windows and installed latest GFX drivers…i could post my pc specifications , but i dont think that the problem is in them since my mom’s laptop is alot weaker ;]
When i start the game it launches the window , and after a sec it gives the dont send…i could still give you the report from windows…its alot and there is alot code and modules included..
If ya want i can send it to ya , just leave ur email and ill send it to ya ;]
best regards
Skillz
Skillz said
Sorry for the double post , but something came to my mind…
I wonder if it has something to do with the Catalyst Control Center since im with a Ati Radeon card….
Its a control center where you set Forced configurations for all programs launched…and since you said that the game now detects the best resolution when launched…i wonder if it has something to do with that…
Ill check and report you back..
;]
llemarie said
A new game is now available! Beanie Fighter, presented as a Breakpoint 08 96KB game.
See https://llemarie.wordpress.com/2008/03/23/programming-beanie-fighter/
@Skillz:
Thanks for reporting the problem, please send the windows report to tmnp@hikey.org
Lionel
Freakmik said
Whoa, i realy want to see the keyframe thing in the editor, hope you publish it in a new release!
(hope my english wasn´t so bad :-D)
Liam said
one thing how do i delete the hing cos i dont see the file for it anywhere?
or do i just sit back and i find that it is just a virus or something?
llemarie said
Hi Liam,
Do you want to delete the game? In that case, simply deleting the file you downloaded is all you need. It’s not installed anywhere, it’s not saving any files anywhere, not saving any values in the registry. The game executable is not hidden, it’s simply where you saved it.
If you ran it straight from your browser, it could be in a temporary directory, in which case you can clear your browser cache to delete it.
Best regards,
Lionel.
Geoff said
uuuh is the new version of this coming out soon…. the customisable ninja thing isn’t working or anything i also have a few ideas
– create your own weapon (cant be too long though so its too easy to win)?
– make your ninja wear hats and stuff?
– im also a good graphic designer so just e-mail me if you want to chat sometime
llemarie said
Hi Geoff,
Thanks for the suggestions.
I’ve released Beanie Fighter: http://beanie.hikey.org , have you tried it? It’s sort of the second version of this game.
I haven’t touched the first version of the game in ages. I doubt I will fix the editor in that version, although I fully intend on having a functional one in the 3rd version, which is in 3d.
I’ll mail you about the graphics comment.
Best regards,
Lionel.
Zarock said
Hey,my computer is loading it really slow,when the curtains come and stuff it is really slow,i saw the ATI card comment thing that other guy asked,but do i look it up on youtube to download it?
Isilion said
Hi Lionel,
The game is great. Network mode works good, too. I have read that I can configure the game to team up with some friends or to play against each other, but I have not been able to figure out which keys should we use. Arrow keys keep working for the player one, but how do I control other players?
Thanks for your help!
llemarie said
Hi Isilion,
Thanks for the nice feedback!
In network mode there is no team play unfortunately. To play in teams, you need to be on the same PC. You create a custom game, choose the number of local players, the number of ‘baddies’, select team mode and start.
Regards,
Lionel.
danyukhin said
Umm… I think he meant how to control the other local players, besides the arrow keys. BTW, I’ve this problem too^^
llemarie said
I see! Thanks for clarifying.
For local multiplayer, you can use USB joypads. Multiple pads will be recognised and mapped to as many players.
Best regards,
Lionel.
danyukhin said
Umm… So I can’t play with somebody else on one keyboard, for example, 1P is on WASD keys and 2P is on the arrow keys? That would be great cause I don’t have any joypads… Forgot to say: the game is really really great!
HlMaster said
my pc says that the tmnp is with a trojan
u can fix that?
llemarie said
Hi,
The warning is due to the executable packer that I used on the game. Essentially what the packer does (amongst many other clever tricks) is decompress the game and then launch it. Because the application contains executable code (the compressed game), it is seen by some virus scanners as a trojan. There is nothing I can do about it.
Thanks,
Lionel.
kyle said
i tried and tried to get this game it saying error it failed to start becuase MSVCR71.dll was not found?? can u help
Conor said
The download link isn’t working for me 😦 Any chance of another mirror?
llemarie said
Hi Conor,
Sorry about that, I’ve updated the link now. Please try again.
Thanks,
Lionel.
Ionut said
Hello there! First of all I want to congrats you for this awesome and very fun game you made. Do you have a version that is playable via LAN? I tried this version, but me and my buddy both end up hosts.
llemarie said
Hi,
Network support is very limited in this game. I haven’t changed the code since that version, so that’s all that’s available I’m afraid. To play a network game, you have to be on the same LAN subnet and your firewall must not block broadcast packets. Start one instance on a PC, then when it’s host, start the other instance on the other PC.
To get a feel of how it should behave, start a host on a PC and start a new instance on the same PC: they should connect fine.
Hope this helps,
Lionel.
Ionut said
I am trying to do something simillar to this as a project. Can you, please, tell me what you used?
llemarie said
Hi,
This game was done in C++ with a simple OpenGL framework. Pure win32 code for keyboard handling and sound. There is nothing fancy in there. There are much better ways to go, but this was quick-and-dirty as the code was not written for Windows originally.
Lionel.
Ionut said
I am trying to do something similar in Flash using the Box2D port. Can you give some pointers about the AI. What is the logic behind the AI?
llemarie said
Hi,
The AI is very simple. Each puppet (human and AI) is controlled by moving the head, the rest of the body follows. The AI simply tries to move the head to satisfy a few conditions, in increasing order of importance:
– Some randomness to make it a bit organic.
– If the head is below a set height, move it up. This allows the AI to stand up.
– Move towards the closest opponent’s head.
– If the head is close to an opponent hand, foot or head. Move directly away from it to protect itself.
Different levels of AI simply have different factors for each condition. In particular, harder AIs move away from hits a lot earlier.
Hope this helps.
Lionel.
Ionut said
The puppet and the controls are already done. Thank for the hints, I really apreciate it.