Box Party [New demo update soon]

[catoidi]

You're invited to the biggest party of the year!

 

But the food has gone bad, and they're threatening to crash the party, forever!
It's up to you to stop them before it's too late!

Box Party is a standalone commercial title made in GZDOOM.

Demo Features:

• Party out in 3 unique locations!
• Defeat and devour a bunch of food-related enemies!
• Take advantage of your 4 party-themed weapons!
• Make small talk with the other party-goers!
• Customize your look with 15+ unlockable hats!
• Choose between 3 different characters!

 

The DEMO Version of Box Party is out now!!!!
Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1727350/Box_Party/

Itch.io: https://catoidi.itch.io/box-party

Github: https://github.com/catoidi/box-party-demo

the full version will release when it's ready.

 

Trailer:

 

 

Screenshots:

 

^{if you wish to support Box Party, please consider donating to me at Patreon.}

https://www.patreon.com/catoidi

 

Will you become the Ultimate Party Star?

 

Edited April 10 by catoidi : 4/10/24: updated description/links/etc

[TheNoob_Gamer]

2021 has been a really good year for GZDoom titles, it seems :)

[catoidi]

On 8/17/2021 at 12:01 PM, TheNoob_Gamer said:

2021 has been a really good year for GZDoom titles, it seems :)

hopefully you'll enjoy the demo when it releases this year :)

I've already posted a lot more info about Box Party over on the ZDoom Forums page, and some other places, and it's too much for me to post in this one message, so go check out that if you want to know more about Box Party.

In the meantime, however, here's the latest addition to Box Party:

I've added reserve ammos to the HUD, so you can see how much ammo you have for all of your gear without swapping weapons.

It's the 4 icons at the top, with the current weapon's ammo bar below that, and your health bar below that. If you don't like seeing your reserve ammo, you can turn it off in the option menu.

[Origamyde]

I already love the visuals, can't wait for the demo to be uploaded :) 

Edited August 24, 2021 by Origamyde

[catoidi]

On 8/24/2021 at 3:59 AM, Origamyde said:

I already love the visuals, can't wait for the demo to be uploaded :) 

Thank you :)

 

Now, I dont have any screenshot that could show this off, but I'm currently working on making Box Party more modder friendly.
Considering that Box Party would not exist were it not for GZDOOM mods, I feel like I'd be doing a disservice if I didn't try to make the game as moddable as humanly possible.

So for context, Box Party currently includes a system where enemies will drop health/item pickups that are specific to certain characters, and enemies can also drop ammo for weapons that you have equipped.
At the moment, however, these pickups are all hard-coded, which would make it rather difficult for a modder to add in their own custom player drops or ammo pickups.

However, thanks to some zscript mumbo-jumbo, Box Party will now instead grab this data via a file called "BOXLOOT", and will also search for files under this name in any mods loaded.
If you're adding a player, you'd type out a line kind of like this in your mod's BOXLOOT file (minus the quotes):
"Player = ModdedPlayer, ModdedLoot"
If you are adding a custom ammo drop, you'd make it look like this:
"Weapon = ModdedWeapon, ModdedAmmo"

There are still a few other places in Box Party that could benefit from being more modder friendly, like specifically the Hats system and some other smaller stuff, but just this alone will help out a lot. :)

[catoidi]

after many hours of troubleshooting, custom player/weapon/loot compatibility is complete.

now all you need to do to add your cool new item to Box Party's loot system is a single line of code.

here's a photo of a melon i took on my phone to celebrate.

[catoidi]

 

Level 3 is in the works, it takes place at a music concert inside of an underwater dome.

(skybox is a placeholder.)

[catoidi]

got more work done on level 3. also made it's skybox.

 

demo should be ready within the next 1 or 2 months. (still need to finish up some bosses, lvl 3, and other stuff.)

 

steam page should be up soon. more info about that later.

[catoidi]

The steam page is up now! Demo still isn't gonna be out til later this year, but I think you should go and wishlist the game. That would be pretty neat. :)

[catoidi]

 

Here's a showcase video for an area in level 3. :)

[catoidi]

I've been working on quite a few things for Box Party, some I won't spoil yet, but there's a few things that I will show:

 

There's now an animated notification that appears at the bottom left of your screen when a new hat is unlocked. (Before it was just a line of text that popped up in the middle of your screen)
(bonus points if you can guess which library i used for this)

 

Also custom hat system is done. It will make adding new hats for modders (but also for me) much much easier. It also allows for custom notifications like the one above, and custom unlock conditions.

Ok here's one last image for now:

[catoidi]

Been working on behind the scenes stuff for Box Party, so haven't had much new to show off.

But here's a rundown of the bigger stuff I've gotten done recently:
-Finished level 3, for the most part.
-Working on the boss for level 1. All the sprites are drawn, just need to finish ironing out the code.
-Added in a bunch of new sounds for enemies and whatnot.
-Fixed the same really really annoying loot drop bug multiple times related to health drops giving the incorrect name to the loot drop handler.
-Reworked the ZScript HUD to allow for (partial) support for custom characters and full support for custom weapons. (But also more importantly to fix a nasty bug causing some crashing.)
-Added some easter eggs to the 3 levels (good luck finding them).

Right now I am currently working on writing up a tutorial on how to add custom stuff to Box Party, like hats, weapons, enemies, player classes, loot drops, etc.
This should (hopefully) make it easier for anyone to make their own custom stuff for the game, because modding is cool and epic.
When the Box Party Demo is released, I'll make a public Github repo for it, since the demo itself will be completely open source. I'll also be adding a wiki page to it containing all of this tutorial stuff.

Edited October 19, 2021 by idiotbitz : typo

[Philnemba]

Looks like another GZDoom engine game added to my Steam wishlist :)

[Toilet_Wine_Connoisseur]

Ok this sounds just amazingly awesome

[catoidi]

On 10/19/2021 at 11:13 PM, Philnemba said:

Looks like another GZDoom engine game added to my Steam wishlist :)

 

On 10/20/2021 at 7:39 PM, Toilet_Wine_Connoisseur said:

Ok this sounds just amazingly awesome

 

thank you!

 

Haven't posted many images this month, so lemme remedy that real quick:

Here's 3 random screenshots I took:

 

Also the library I was using for fancy hat unlocks got updated to support icons, so now all the hat notifications have icons.

[catoidi]

I've made good progress on the boss for level 1, and by "good progress", I actually mean they're finished. :)

Here is a (spoiler-free!) screenshot of the boss in action:

(here's a hint: the boss is a fruit)

with this boss done, 2/3 of the bosses for the demo are complete. the only boss left is the one for level 2.
once boss 2 is complete, there's just a buncha smaller side stuff to finish, and then the demo is ready. :)

(the demo currently doesn't have any music whatsoever, but i dont think i want to delay the demo because of a lack of music. i might release the demo first and then add music to it as an update later down the line.)

[catoidi]

here is today's newest feature in Box Party: Side Objectives!

These are 3 optional side tasks you can do in each level. They will range from collecting a specific item, to doing something for an NPC, or doing an extra enemy encounter.
Each objective will net you 1500 points, so you're gonna need to complete them if you want a high score. Objectives can also be failed.

Here is the UI for the side objectives. You can toggle it on and off with a keybind.
(I'll probably move it at some point)

[catoidi]

Sorry for the radio silence! I've been caught up on other things recently, so I haven't had as much time to work on Box Party as I would've liked.

Box Party's Demo will be releasing onto Steam and Itch.io this DECEMBER. Don't have an exact date yet. Could be December 1st, or December 31st. Only time will tell.

Unfortunately, in order to reach the 2021 deadline I arbitrarily set upon myself, I'm going to have to cut a couple features for the initial Demo release, namely the "Side Objectives" which I just shown off previously, and some minor quality-of-life stuff. The initial release will also not have any music. Since this is just a demo, I'm okay with delaying these things until a little bit later.

I am currently working on the boss for Level 2 and adding some more NPC interactions. I'll release the demo once these are done.

For Steam specifically, I will be releasing the game as an "Early Access" title instead of a "demo". The demo will be in Early Access until both all the cut features are added back and the full version releases. The "full version" on steam will be featured as a DLC for the demo version.

(in hindsight, this was not the best idea. the demo on Steam will just be a regular demo.)

With that giant wall of text out of the way, here's an image of a character: (Can you guess what they'll be used for?) :)

Edited November 26, 2021 by idiotbitz

[catoidi]

 

 

The Demo Trailer is live now! Go check it out!

[catoidi]

Box Party Demo is very, very close to being ready. I've just a few tiny things to add, and if nothing goes wrong, I'll send the demo to Steam for review and then announce a release date once it's approved.

I recently did more work on the game's built-in Guide Book, so here's one of the pages from that:

 

The Guide Book will take the place of the "Read This!" page from ultimate doom.

[catoidi]

Steam has reviewed and approved the demo build for Box Party!!!

Which means that the Box Party Demo will be released on...

 

DECEMBER 6th!!!!!!!
(or 4 days from now)

[catoidi]

Box Party Demo is available to download NOW on Steam and Itch!!!!!!
Go check it out!!!!! :)

Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1727350/Box_Party/

Itch: https://idiotbitz.itch.io/box-party

[catoidi]

Box Party Demo v1.0.4 has been released.

Any save you have currently in Level 3 will be incompatible.

This is a minor update that fixes a few bugs that a playtester found for me that could cause a softlock.

[catoidi]

oops, I forgot to mention this a few days ago, but Box Party Demo v1.0.5 is out.

This update adds a new speedrun clock you can toggle on in the HUD options.
This clock should be especially helpful if you're trying to unlock the 3 speedrunning hats currently in the game.

Here's what the clock looks like. It shows up above the score bar.


This is the last small update I do before I work on v1.1, which will be focused on adding the side quests.

[catoidi]

Box Party Demo Update v1.1 is out now on Steam and Itch. This update adds Side Quests to Level 1, and some smaller stuff too.

All old saves are incompatible. Your hats and settings will be fine, though.

New Features:
-Added 3 Side Quests to Level 1. Each quest will grant you 1500 points, and getting all 3 will grant you a hat.
(Disclaimer: Quests for Level 2 and 3 will be added in a future update.)
-You can now check your side quests by pressing "C". Only works in levels with side quests available.
-Added 8 new paintings, plus 5 extra paintings made by some cool people.
-Added a couple easter eggs.

Fixes/Changes:
-Speedrun Clock is now more precise.
-Fixed HUD shake being broken if you have more than 200 health. (not possible without cheating)
-You can now change the ":)" in the advanced box settings.

 

Edit: You can now unlock this specific hat in the latest update.

Edited December 17, 2021 by idiotbitz

[catoidi]

update v1.1.1 is out now. this is just a minor update to fix a bug that i accidentally caused in v1.1 that prevented the pepper hat from being unlocked.

also 4 of the new paintings added in v1.1 have been redone. be on the lookout for those :)

[catoidi]

update v1.1.3 is out and stuff.

there's now a new message that appears when you die.
also, i've been told that the game is too dark, so i've bumped the default gamma to 1.15. this will only affect new players, though, so you'll need to manually bump up the gamma yourself if you've played already.

i've also added a new "secret hat" mechanic, where the hat doesn't get shown in the hat menu if you haven't unlocked it yet. i've also added 1 new hat to demonstrate this mechanic. you'll find out more about this one soon enough.

currently working on the v1.2 update. here's a sneak peek of that:

[catoidi]

Happy Holidays, everyone. :) If you check out the hat menu today (or if you just set your system's clock to December 25th), you'll unlock a neat little secret hat.

 

[UnusualBug]

This looks so cute! It reminds me of that Q friend game thing.

[catoidi]

On 1/4/2022 at 6:08 PM, Gothic Croc said:

This looks so cute! It reminds me of that Q friend game thing.

Thanks!
 

Also, I'm almost finished with v1.2. This update is definitely on the larger side, I think you people will enjoy the new stuff in level 2.

Here's a teeny tiny sneak peak: