#41. Posted:
nidalnijm
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Now I am working on a new map for my game, based on Camp Filon, an Israeli Military Base located on the Golan Heights on the Syrian Border. This is not a replication of the real place, because I am using many Marketplaces Assets (models and textures purchased from sites like Turbosquid, Unity Assets Store, Unreal Engine Marketplace, and so on) to build this map. However, I am trying my best to make these maps have at least a similarity with the real locations.

This mission will be on the best Metal Gear style, you need to invade the enemy base at night, eliminate them without being spotted. I am also doing uniform (cloth) variations for the game's protagonist, Ahmad al-Ghazzawi, just to fit the mission. For this mission, the player will be wearing a black uniform to be like a shadow on the darkness, to be a trully nightmare for his enemies. It's just a comestic thing, but I think it adds that extra degree of polishment to my game (soon I will showcase).

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/camp_filon_1.png

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/camp_filon_2.png

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/camp_filon_3.png

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/camp_filon_4.png
#42. Posted:
nidalnijm
  • Summer 2021
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Fursan al-Aqsa Dev Blog #11 - Maps Showcase - Camp Filon

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/Fursan_al-Aqsa_-_Like_Stars_on_Night_Final_EN.png

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/Fursan_al-Aqsa_-_Showcase_Camp_Filon_2.png

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/Fursan_al-Aqsa_-_Showcase_Camp_Filon_5.png

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/Fursan_al-Aqsa_-_Showcase_Camp_Filon_8.png

Click here to see more Screenshots:
indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...que/images

Click here to see the Video Showcase of this environment, without gameplay (to avoid spoilers ):
indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...n-showcase

Hello my friends!

Sorry for the looooong delay without posting updates. Even though I did not post here on the forums, however, I am very active on twitter, and most important, I have been working VERY HARD on this game, and will show you now some important updates and informations.

First of all, I want to apologize about the release date for Episode 1 of my game. I was planning to release on may 10th because I want to send my game to Brazil Independent Games Festival (BIG), and it had a deadline for sending the game until may 11th, so I was decided to release the game one day before it, on its current state.

As everyone knows, because Coronavirus, all the major gaming events were cancelled, and the same with BIG Festival. Now the deadline was extended until November.

So I continued to develop my game, and build the maps (the last step on my game dev workflow). I spent the last year of 2019 working on the programming and characters animations, and from since 2018 I did not build a new map for my game (I was only building small testmaps for testing the programming and animations). So I began to build this map, Camp Filon, and I have done an upgrade on my maps building workflow, and I was able to build this map under 10 days. Because this I realized that in one month I can complete, finish designing 3 maps, which means, 3 missions (for the campaign mode), and also some extra missions using these same maps with some time of day variations.

Then I came to the conclusion that would be a lot unfair from my part to release this game with only 1 map when I can add more content to make this game more playable and enjoyable by the community.

For all these reasons, I decided to delay the release of this game a bit more, maybe one month, or two (no more than this), for the sake of polishing this game, adding more content, and raising the overal quality, so Fursan al-Aqsa will live up to all this hype and the community expectations, maybe this can be one of the Best Indie Games of 2020

I think I am not harming anyone with this delay, because I did not make any kind of pre-order (or the like).

I am very happy with the results, and this new map which shows the final game quality, is by far the best map I ever created in Unreal Engine 3, and the next maps will be even better.

Also another update, I did a complete revamp of the game`s website, made it very professional, with complete informations about the game, specs, features, and so on:

fursanaqsa.com/

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/image.2.png

About the release itself, after thinking a lot, searching and re-searching, analysing various factors, I decided to go on my own even on the releasing and distribution of my game.

I will be skipping marketplaces like Steam, Itch.io, and other sites and will release it on my own website, a small ecommerce system I developed with PHP Cake Framework, integrated with Paypal IPN Payments (I am a web developers with +10 years of experience creating sites and e-commerces arround the web).

This is the virtual store for my game (you can`t purchase yet):

store.fursanaqsa.com/

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/image_1.png

The reason is simple: Reduce my costs!

Steam is very expensive, 30% of revenue share, added to this, is the USA Government Withdrawal whenever Steam sends money from USA to my Bank Account in Brazil, that can reach more 30% (there is no Agreement between Brazil and USA regarding this fee). Last, but not least, is the Brazillian government`s fee for receiving money from outside brazil, which can reach from 5% to 10%. And adding to this problem, is the currency conversion, which today, 1 USD is almost 6 BRL!!!

So as you can see, Steam is no way for me. The only difference from Itch.io, is that their revenue share can be as low as 0%. Even then, there is still the 30% of Withdrawal and the Brazillian Fee (also the currency conversion).

For all these reasons, I decided to sell my own game on my own website. This site is 100% safe, as it uses SSL Encryption by Let's Encrypt and the payments are processed by Paypal. The purchase process is very simple, there is no need to even register on this website. Just click on the buy now button and you will be redirected to Paypal Checkout Page. You login to your paypal account and make the payment. After the payment is completed, you will receive on your email (registered at Paypal) a download link for the game you purchased. This link is temporary, and expires after 3 download attempts, or after 24 hours.

I know you can`t avoid piracy, and whoever wants to pirate my game will do it, regardless where I release it. It`s very easy to buy a game on steam, then just change some files and configurations, make this game a non steam game and distribute it free arround the web. I mean, steam does not avoid piracy. I personally don`t worry about piracy, because I know here on this community are awesome people who are going to support me by purchasing my game (it will be VERY CHEAP ).

So, there is no reason for me paying all these fees to steam, whenever I can pay only 5% for paypal for selling my game, and nothing more.

Sorry for this long post, however, I hope you all understand me and stay HYPED with my game

Cheers and until next update (Jenin, the Camp of Resistance).
#43. Posted:
Metaverse
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This is an awesome man! It is really exciting to see people like you follow their dreams and create amazing content. I too have always wanted to be involved with game development. Currently, I am a Network Engineer and still attending university but hearing about your story gave me the inspiration to achieve more of my dreams. Best of luck, and I hope to see more information about the game!
#44. Posted:
nidalnijm
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I_Code_My_Life wrote This is an awesome man! It is really exciting to see people like you follow their dreams and create amazing content. I too have always wanted to be involved with game development. Currently, I am a Network Engineer and still attending university but hearing about your story gave me the inspiration to achieve more of my dreams. Best of luck, and I hope to see more information about the game!


Hello man! Hey, thanks dude! I am happy to serve as an inspiration to people arround the web! I also work with web design, and develop this game on my free time (and many sleepless nights). Very soon I will release episode 1 of this game!

Cheers!
#45. Posted:
Eli
  • Winter 2021
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Looks really good especially for an india game! Hopefully a company will pick you up and help you complete your project and advance you in pursuing your dream! Best of luck in your future man, don't ever give up!
#46. Posted:
nidalnijm
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Eli wrote Looks really good especially for an india game! Hopefully a company will pick you up and help you complete your project and advance you in pursuing your dream! Best of luck in your future man, don't ever give up!


Hello man!!! Thanks for the compliments! No worries brother, giving up is a word that is not on my dictionary

I NEVER GIVE UP

No, I am not waiting for any help, except from the community by purchasing Episode 1 of my game, to help me continue developing Episode 2, and so on.

I like to work alone, do everything on my own, from development, to marketing and releasing my game.

Cheers!
#47. Posted:
nidalnijm
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Fursan al-Aqsa Dev Blog #12 - Performance Optimization for Consoles

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/28-_Fursan_al-Aqsa_-_Performance_Test_PS3.png

In this article I explain the new changes I made to my custom UDK/Unreal Engine 3 to fix textures streaming on consoles and make the game run and render as intended on both PS3 and Xbox360.

Hello guys (and girls)!

After one intense week of work, headaches, distress, and almost throwing everything (my PC and my consoles) out the window , I finnaly got that last map, Camp Filon, running smoothly on consoles, the way it was intended to run, as you can see in this video below:

indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...e-test-ps3

Until now, all the gameplay features I implemented on my game, like Knife Kills, UI, Pause Menu, Game Over Screen, HeadShots Counter, and so on, if you see, I tested them on debug maps, empty maps, merely blocks, without texture, particles, or any effect. I mean, these scenarios did not represent how the final game will run.So, whenever I compiled the last map, Camp Filon, to run on PS3 and Xbox360, I discovered another bug, which I did not observe before. All the textures on the map were terrible blurry, I mean, indeed blurry to such extent that the visuals became horrible!!!

I know that consoles have much limited RAM memory than PC, and specifically PS3 and Xbox360, in rough terms, they have 256MB and 512MB of RAM, respectively.What was driving me nuts is the fact that the game run fine on PC, just on consoles the textures got extremelly blurry. After searching on legacy UDK Engine forums (forums.epicgames.com/udk) and on UDN Network (docs.unrealengine.com/udk/Three/WebHome.html), I began to learn more deep about Unreal Engine 3 on Consoles. The good of developing a game alone, is that it can be a true classroom for anyone. I myself, learned a LOT on this project. Specially, whenever I began developing this game, I did not know too much about Unreal Script Programming. Now, I learned a LOT, and I am able to do many things I could not do before.

Coming back to my journey, I discovered about Texture Pool in Unreal Engine 3, which, in rough terms, is kinda fixed memory space used for loading (streaming) textures to the screen. From what I understood (I may be wrong, but what matters here is that now it is working), Unreal Engine 3 throws all the textures currently loaded (which can be seen by the player view camera) inside this texture pool, and then it loads the mipmap of these textures as it is needed. The mipmaps here are kinda different versions of the same texture in different resolutions, to be loaded according the camera view distance, like, the closer the player view camera is to a texture, it will load a higher resolution of the texture, the further, it will load a lower resolution version of the texture. This is essential for performance.

So what was happening? The texture pool was filled up in consoles, so it was only loading the lowest resolution of each texture (16x16). The default Texture Pool Size in UE3 is 140MB, so I increased it to 200MB and voila! Problem solved! Not yet...

Again I compiled the map and did run on PS3 and Xbox360. It run beautifully and smoothly, with the textures on it`s full resolution, and the mipmaps loading correctly. However, another problem happenned, whenever I added the enemies on the map, it simply crashed the game on consoles with the error OUT_OF_MEMORY.

I was already entering into despair because this problem, however, my last try, was to compress all the TGA textures of this map in photoshop using the RLE algorithm. I created a small photoshop action script to batch compress all the 465 TGA textures (diffuse, normal and specular), and was able to reduce by almost half the total size of the textures. Before compression they were 576MB, and after they turned 278MB!!!

So this compression of textures compensated the increased texture pool size, allowing the game run, without crash, and with the mipmaps working flawlessly, as you could see on the above video.

Finnaly, I can use this new map as a template whenever building my other maps, as I know now that I need to optimize the maps as much as I can, and keep the maps size small, just like this, for the sake of performance, and gameplay.

Cheers and until next update.
#48. Posted:
nidalnijm
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Fursan al-Aqsa - Demo Coming Soon...

Finally, after a lot of hard work and polishment, I am finishing, for the next few days, a free demo for "Fursan al-Aqsa", so anyone will be able to test the gameplay, learn the combat mechanics and prepare for the big battle, which comes on Episode 1.

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/Demo_Announcement_1.png

https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/Demo_Announcement_2.png
#49. Posted:
nidalnijm
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https://media.indiedb.com/images/games/1/73/72158/Fursan_al-Aqsa_-_Demo_Release_Banner_final_EN.png


In the name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful

£
May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon our Prophet Muhammad, his family and all friends


Peace be upon you

indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...se-trailer

This is the Free Demo of the game Fursan al-Aqsa - Knights of al-Aqsa Mosque. The main objective of this demo is to let players test the Combat Mechanics, give me a feedback, and enjoy killing some zionist soldiers

Download PC Version:
https://button.indiedb.com/download/medium/196033.png
indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...sa-pc-demo

Download PS3 Version:
https://button.indiedb.com/download/medium/196034.png
indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...a-ps3-demo

Download Xbox360 Version:
https://button.indiedb.com/download/medium/196035.png
indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...ox360-demo

This is just a testmap which does not represent the final game's visuals, it was just projected to focus on gameplay and urban warfare (kinda training scenario), simulating the combat situations players will face on the final game, Insha Allah (God's willing).

The enemies A.I is very smart and dynamic, the enemies can feel your presence, if you get too much close to them, or if you shoot at their direction. They also will hunt you untill death

I tried to make the game very realistic, yet, keeping it a videogame. So, dying is very easy, also killing enemies is not very hard. I placed many healthpacks arround the map to help you recover your health.

You need to plan each shot, you need to be very strategic and try to avoid the enemies bullets as much as you can. You need to jump a lot and use the crouch button, to manually deviate from the bullets, to take cover behind objects and walls. I tried to avoid implementing a cover system like Gears of War, instead, I opted by a manual cover system, because it feels more realistic, organic, and challenging. By pressing the pause button (ESC key on PC), you can see the Controller/Keys Configuration with all gameplay commands.

You can kill any enemy with just one certain headshot, and the more headshots you perform, you get a higher ranking.

Inside the demo's download package I added 3 Readme files (English, Portuguese and Arabic) with complete information on how to install and configure the game, how to use gamepad with PC, the list of some known bugs, and other informations. Please read it before playing.

So I hope everyone likes this demo and enjoy playing it. This is just a glimpse of what awaits you on the final game.

Cheers and until next update!

P.S: I need to take a break some days to recharge my batteries
#50. Posted:
nidalnijm
  • Christmas!
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Hello friends!

The PS3 Demo was buggy, it was not working on PS3 at 1080p, neither 720p, only 480p.

But I already fixed it, as you can see here:
twitter.com/UdkUltimate/status/12...9166821379

So tomorrow I will launch an updated version of the demo, including the working PS3 Demo, and this new freaking awesome feature, Bullet Time with all its glory :
indiedb.com/games/fursan-al-aqsa-...e-showcase
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