Psychon 2 has been released in a reasonably complete form. Honestly, I got fed up with it toward the end - the levels were taking many hours to complete so there are now 5 full levels instead of the planned 8. Nonetheless, there's plenty for the player to explore and shoot at.
I've also released a single level demo of Rocket Run. This may be picked up again in the future if inspiration strikes. I like the game but need some ideas on how to deepen the playing experience and add real variety to the levels.
Both releases are available on my main website : OneSevenOne Games
Thursday, 22 September 2016
Sunday, 18 September 2016
Rocket Run
Some of us older guys remember Thrust and Thrust II from the 8-bit era. The player's aim was to manoeuvre a spaceship by rotating and thrusting, as it flies over a two-dimensional landscape and through caverns. It's roots can be traced back to Atari's Gravitar and Asteroids.
Rocket Run is a new take on the concept of piloting a little ship around an environment shooting enemies and collecting items. The core of the game is learning to control the ship accurately through increasingly narrow tunnels.
Having tried various graphical styles, I've opted for limited palette pixel art graphics. 8-bit games Starquake,Underwurlde and the more recent Axiom Verge have been my main influence. I'm not really an artist so need plenty of good source material to draw inspiration from.
For the first time in a Defold game I'm implementing parallax scrolling. There's a simple repeating background that scrolls more slowly than the foreground to create the illusion of depth. Right now, it's not possible to place game objects between tilemap layers so the background is just a repeating sprite. Hopefully in future releases of Defold, it will be possible to have a foreground and background implemented within a tilemap. As of this evening, the game has a single map and the player can fly around, bump into the scenery and shoot.
On the to-do next list is:
Rocket Run is a new take on the concept of piloting a little ship around an environment shooting enemies and collecting items. The core of the game is learning to control the ship accurately through increasingly narrow tunnels.
 |
| Rocket Run : pixel art and particles |
Having tried various graphical styles, I've opted for limited palette pixel art graphics. 8-bit games Starquake,Underwurlde and the more recent Axiom Verge have been my main influence. I'm not really an artist so need plenty of good source material to draw inspiration from.
For the first time in a Defold game I'm implementing parallax scrolling. There's a simple repeating background that scrolls more slowly than the foreground to create the illusion of depth. Right now, it's not possible to place game objects between tilemap layers so the background is just a repeating sprite. Hopefully in future releases of Defold, it will be possible to have a foreground and background implemented within a tilemap. As of this evening, the game has a single map and the player can fly around, bump into the scenery and shoot.
On the to-do next list is:
- Static enemies that shoot
- Fuel cans and other items to collect
- Add tractor beam to ship
Tuesday, 13 September 2016
Victory Lane
Not much of a development log this one as the game is already complete! Well, in a fashion - there's always room for improvement.
Only a week of toiling away to make this one - I'm super impressed at the speed someone can make games using Defold. This is my third game in as many months using the platform and I feel set to continue creating games with it for the foreseeable future. It does most of what I need and now I have something of a handle on it, development moves forward at a ferocious rate.
Onto Victory Lane.. the game is inspired by a couple of old games: Chequered Flag by Konami, an arcade game from 1988 and Overdrive by Team 17 - another overhead racer from the Amiga days.
Within 3-4 hours of development I had a car whizzing around a track controlled by the player. Another few hours later, computer-controlled cars joined in the melee. Happily, my idea for how the AI functions worked better than expected - I was expecting hours of tinkering but the cars made it round the track first time.
For now, the game has 4 tracks and the player takes part in a single 8-lap race. There's room for various game modes but I didn't want to invest too much time in a game that no one will see. I intend to pursue this model from now on - this is supposed to be fun and that will mean creating 'bare bones' games, at least to begin with. Enough to show fully what the game is like but without all the bells and whistles.
Victory Lane is the first game I've released on itch.io, so it's unknown how that will turn out. Itch seems like a really well made site made by people who understand indie game development.
Links are available on my main site.
 | |
| The crossroads of life |
Onto Victory Lane.. the game is inspired by a couple of old games: Chequered Flag by Konami, an arcade game from 1988 and Overdrive by Team 17 - another overhead racer from the Amiga days.
Within 3-4 hours of development I had a car whizzing around a track controlled by the player. Another few hours later, computer-controlled cars joined in the melee. Happily, my idea for how the AI functions worked better than expected - I was expecting hours of tinkering but the cars made it round the track first time.
 | |
| A car sandwich |
Victory Lane is the first game I've released on itch.io, so it's unknown how that will turn out. Itch seems like a really well made site made by people who understand indie game development.
Links are available on my main site.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)