>
>
> Make sure to watch it in HD. Same game I was working on a month ago or so, just more stuff now. Things have really progressed.
>
> Upgraded weapons system with ammo, cooler background now, sfx, music, charged missile system, and some VERY rudimentary enemy AI (right now) that flies at you, shoots, and flies away (either to the background or foreground) after a given amount of time passes. Also the HUD is a little better, and it has some cool SpriteFont effects, for instance typed out gun information whenever you switch weapons,next to the ammo numbers. I don't think anyone will actually read that stuff, but it looks cool on the HUD.
>
> One thing that isn't in the video is the cool zooming effects. They're still there I just turned them off for the stuff in the middle of the game for some reason while I was recording the video. >_< lol.
>
That is looking really, really nice. I agree with the comment on the video about some minor alteration to show which enemies are actually attackable, though. And what will be in place of the ? blocks?
Thanks a lot.
Yeah, I'm planning on having the enemies that are on the same plane as the player being a little brighter so they'll stick out a little more.
The "?" 3D boxes are placeholders for battleships that will be cruising around the background. Not sure if I'm up to snuff for 3D, but they'll more likely be 2D like everything else.
I actually had experimented with a few battleships exploding and breaking in half in the background. So, it's looking okay. I've been saving this one particular particle object with a custom texture for large objects exploding in the background. Since I've got the layers set up just right, I can toss some floating object into the background that is much closer to the player, and it really adds a nice sense of depth... so something will be floating in the middle of everything... maybe two massive ships battling it out, closer to the player's action...
The purpose for having such a busy background isn't only to just be there though, I want it to be a visual indicator of the player's success. I plan on having a handful of simple mission goals per level that pop up sporadically throughout the level. The important thing is that you don't necessarily have to succeed in these missions, you can fail and keep playing, but the overall picture of the conflict will change based on your successes.
So like one simple mission right at the start will be "Defend the Fleet" ... and you accomplish this by not allowing X number of enemies to escape your bullets. If enough happen to get away, then the enemy will accomplish something... like ... say, a battleship blows up in the background. You have failed in one of your objectives, but that's okay, the war isn't lost, you can try to make it up in some other missions... in fact, you shouldn't expect to succeed in all of your missions. The awesome thing is that some upgraded weapons will be more ideal to accomplish particular missions. Like that sniper rifle is terrible to use in defense objective, its slow and clunky, but holding on to one might be a good idea if you want to take out a special or strong enemy, whose defeat could be a mission in itself. Just because you lose a battle doesn't mean the war is lost (or in this case the level).
At the end of each stage, you'll be able to tell whether this conflict was a victory or defeat based on how many missions you succeeded in, again, it's not like you'll get a game over if you're defeated in all of your missions, but the player's story will change. And its just simple events controlling it all. If mission 1 = successful then destroy battleship1 in the background... things like that. It's actually really simple and effective at making it appear like what you're doing is affecting the world outside, when really the sidescrolling shooter genre is typically a very controlled environment. I'm even thinking about assigning a numerical value to each mission to give value to its importance. Killing a powerful enemy might go further than accomplishing some simple objective. Anyway, I'm very excited about the possibilities for the player to create their own conflict... and though its not really custom tailored war going on, it should at least kind of feel like the player has some power in the game.
And then combine that with a few different background changes (or perspective shifts) per level, a few more different enemies, and a boss at the end of each level and it'll be great. Let's see if I'll even be able to 'event' all that up though, lol.
I'm getting all excited just talking about it.
Completely nerding out. My apologies. lol.