Abandoned Hocus Pocus fangame engine

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Violet CLM
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Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2007 10:14

Abandoned Hocus Pocus fangame engine

Post by Violet CLM »

Download!
Hanukkah present time. Here's a very old alpha of an engine for a proposed Hocus Pocus remake. It plays very similarly to the original, but with a few added features. The level editor is also included, along with two tilesets, although it's perfectly possible to make more. (You can't change the background, however.) No documentation is included, so here are a few usage warnings:
  • Both levels included are basically engine tests. tt1.fgl is reachable by selecting an invisible fifth episode, and the powerup test map can be reached by selecting the second episode. If you want to make your own, you'll have to do some renaming or take advantage of the levels it tries to find for the main four episodes.
  • Most of the menu options don't work. "Quit" is pretty, though, and the difficulty settings seem to work perfectly.
  • Physics are mostly good, but there's an occasional error, and the pogostick mode goes somewhat faster than the engine can handle.
  • You can't complete a level. You can however die, but the percentage of collected treasures is broken.
  • Warp potions don't do anything, and enemies have no AI.
  • Fun debug keys: S (superjump); P (unimplemented pogostick mode); 7 (+50 fireballs).
  • The text system (used by the rabbit) should be pretty clear, but you have to make it yourself in notepad or whatever. Leave the I setting (image) at 0, as no other speakers were ever programmed in.
  • Try the level editor! No, I don't remember what the candle was going to be for. The interface for the editor is horrible, but I think it can be figured out without difficulty.
I think that's about it. The lack of working triggers, enemies, and win screen kinda sucks, but I think there's still the potential to make some entertaining obstacle courses if you feel like it. I'm not sure, but maybe the conveyor belts can be turned off by switches? Give it a try.
This release doesn't mean that the game will never get made, of course. I rather enjoy it. But it'll be some years if it is remade, and at the very least I'll want to switch to actually using original Hocus files, so this engine is kaput except for the possibility of you having fun with it. :) Happy holidays!


EDIT March 8, 2012: The download link was broken, but it now points to a slightly better version in which triggers work, the test level can be accessed from the main menu, and more of the new features are shown off in the test level.
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