Hello all. I’m working on a top-down zombie shooter similar to Dead Ops Arcade from Call of Duty: Black Ops. One major difference is that the player has multiple weapons and can swap at any time, instead of most being powerups. (Although there will be plenty of those, too.) In this video, I preview the Assault Rifle, Shotgun, Pistol, and Rocket Launcher.
Another inspiration is the tile-based board game called Zombies!!! My goal is to make the player’s choice of where to go next more meaningful, allowing them to explore a randomized city using an overworld map. The player will be able to find bonus rooms while searching for keys to unlock the final boss.
Moving has kept me preoccupied, but I managed to have some fun with ragdolls. The Electro Shield is a reliable panic button and also doubles as spawn protection.
I may have gotten a bit carried away with the Nuke. If only I had a fast mushroom cloud effect for this powerup.
I added a Speed Boost, but it’s not quite worth showing off since it’s programmer art. Pretty standard as far as pickups go, but this is a fun one - probably going to be my favorite. About a dozen mines drop from the sky, and each one has a proximity trigger. Great for defense and offense, adding some extra maneuvering.
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Normally in these videos I try not to die, but I wanted to show off the way zombies crowd the player’s corpse and start munching. I also like the placeholder art and laughter in the game over scene.
Getting back on track after the holidays.
All weapons have pickups associated with them. The Rocket Launcher’s pickup is just ammo, but the other starters can be replaced temporarily with power weapons. The Sniper Rifle and Flamethrower are functional, but the Sniper isn’t flashy and I don’t have a working particle effect for the Flamethrower. Instead, this clip shows the Minigun, which is the pickup for the Assault Rifle.
I think it’s a nice touch that power weapons expire slowly when not firing, so players aren’t penalized much during lulls in the action. They can even swap to other weapons while a power weapon is active.
I’m going to open this project up to collaboration. There’s plenty more that can be done in terms of programming, but I want to make sure the visuals will match. Mainly, the project needs a VFX artist for particle effects and lighting. I’ll post on the collaborate forum, too.