Linkie linkie: CA Shooter by EternalAmbiguity
And a couple GIFs:
rewardingdearestfoxhound
ecstaticacrobaticemperorshrimp
Okay, so here’re the changes I’ve made (the asterisks relate to overlong questions/areas of subjectivity at the end):
Added a new enemy faction - robots. Currently a turret and a roaming robot. Like the blob is/are susceptible to atmospheric antiseptic, the robots are susceptible to poison. This should be almost all but one of the enemies in the game.
The turret obviously sits in one place and fires at the player when in view and close enough.
The roaming robot will patrol all accessible areas. If it sees the player it will stop patrolling and attack while approaching. If it loses sight of the player it will go to their last known location, and following that return to its patrol path*.
And of course these are “factions,” so the blob and the robots will fight if they encounter each other. Right now they target each other first*.
I also added a couple rooms to this map to feature these enemies. It’s set up so the last room with the McGuffin is the roaming robot one.
I also added a “weapon type” system, where the player can shoot a “bio” bullet or “energy” bullet. The blob enemy shoots bio bullets and has stronger defense against them, and visa versa for the robots.
Related to the above, I also added player “hazard protection,” where their damage from a given type of damage can be reduced or mitigated completely. Right now it’s randomly chosen when a level starts.
I also made a modification which allows players to fire over cells that are blocked for movement (on this map that means the diagonal objects, which block enemy/player movement for any square they occupy)*.
I also tweaked things to provide more enemies for the player to fight in the room adjoining the starting one, hopefully with the effect that the second, following room will be too full for the player to charge into, thus forcing them to use the “room modification” system.
I’d love any and all feedback - mainly on the combat, the room modification system, the player “upgrade” system, and the room/map setup (in the end I imagine something much more complex, but this simple design should inform that).
To address those asterisks:
The way I create the patrol routes is actually kind of cool, and I feel like it would get a little bit of buzz on “development showcasing” platforms. That along with an article featured on Gamasutra I read recently has me thinking about marketing: should I be starting it? Should I have some type of devlog going? Should I be starting up social media accounts to talk about this game? I would like to have it on Steam by the end of 2021. That’s probably unrealistic, but in any case it’s a goal that suggests I need to start considering everything involved in development and release, and furthermore start these different measures early enough for them to be effective.
The justification for each faction targeting each other before the player is that they see the player as more similar to themselves - the player is an organic meatbag sitting in high-tech armor. I could always have them target the player first (would be faster in code actually) or the closest or something, but this way provides for more non-player interactivity so seemed more interesting.
Related to this ability to shoot “around” occupied cells is the potential for something like “cover” shooting: having objects you can shoot over but can’t cross, and possibly also allowing the player to crouch behind such objects. It seems like a natural progression, but it also seems like scope creep, so I’m not sure if it’s a good idea.
Something else I’ve been thinking about is having the view of the map be limited to what the player can see, Among Us style. The benefit is a more isolating and “scary” experience, but it would obviously prevent the player from seeing into other rooms, which might be a negative - the room modification system in particular would probably suffer with this change. There are things that could be done to work around it, such as allowing a limited view through closed doors or something, but I’m curious if anyone else thinks the “atmospheric” benefit would outweigh the cost.
This time next week I intend to be living in a new place I don’t yet have keys to, so I’ll be pretty busy the next 7 days (or days 3-7) and may have to skip the following FF.
…maybe I’ll do something like a warning sound plus flashing a _/!_ type of icon near it. I’ll try a few things see how it comes together.