[GM7] Asteroid Defense (v1.21 is here!)

[Jason]

I'm going to be tweaking the difficulties and seeing if I can add new gametypes (Yeah... to a defense game, lol)

This is taken from what I said in another thread, but yeah, this is what I'm doing to the game, I'm working on progressive difficulty as Tuna suggested, as well as adding other things, I'm thinking of adding a challenge mode, like for example, destroy so many asteroids with a limited amount of ammo, since the bullets bounce I assume there will be some strategy involved, making sure to bounce them off the asteroids at the right angle etc. I'm already working on some new and pointless functions, like being able to change the background colour, adding some other cosmetic changes, like changing the look of asteroids, bullets, and turret, y'know, to give yourself some variety, after playing for 5 minutes you might want a change of scenery so POW you press a button and everything looks different!

If there's anything else I think about adding I'll make note of it here so you know what to expect from the next version, assuming I manage to get it out, lol.

 

[moog]

cool. i played it and its ok, but it just seems too short. why not reduce the amount of asteroids and the speed the go? (this was probably already issued, i just didnt read every post)

it looks well put together, and the graphics are cute man. nice work. my score was 2770 on hard :D

also the music choice was pretty good, if you made that, it fits well. i just assumed you had a track from some other commercial game or something.

 

[Jason]

Nah man I made it myself, I like to make as much of my game(s) as custom as I can lol. Yeah I know it's short since I haven't really done much for it yet, I'm going to release some small updates first, but eventually you'll see more game modes popping up and stuff, and yeah I'm already working on the difficulty issues, I guess each difficulty is pretty much about being able to click faster, lol.

Do you think I should lower the distance between extra lives? I mean, I've got it so every 10,000 points you get, you earn an extra life, but it seems quite a distance, especially since my highest score has been 23480 and that was a pain in the arse to get, lol. I'll probably lower it to 5,000 points, that seems a little more fair lol, since it's still a challenge, but it isn't TOO hard to get to.

 

[moog]

I think 5000 sounds pretty good.

 

[Jason]

Well here's a list of things you should be seeing in v1.2 which I'll try and release tomorrow:

- Change background colours using the 1, 2 and 3 keys (Not on the numpad, this makes it easier for Laptop users since usually they have to hold an extra key down in order to access it, unless they have a super long one, lol)
- All asteroids to be slown down by 25%, hopefully this will make it easier until I get the progressive difficulty working properly
- Extra life requirement halved, only need to get 5,000 score per life
- Main Menu interface will be changed slightly to accomodate extra buttons, I may add dummy icons in just to see how it looks.
- The score limit will stick at 100,000 (Although currently you can actually get OVER 100,000 if your bullets bounce off and hit others before the high score pops up, lol, sort of like QWOP, you need to do 100m but can finish with 101.8m or something, lol), but I'm going to hopefully add some sort of finish screen, not sure what to put on it, but yeah.

 

[bashful crobat]

I got minced in 5 seconds on easy

 

[BlueScope]

Yeah, don't ask why I used gradients, even I don't know, although I do like the colours of the sky... maybe it's because without gradients it'd look odd, I don't know, trying to make a radial sky/space/whatever is kinda weird, lol.

Um... I was gonna comment that I liked the enhancement, but apparently, you didn't even realize it yourself XD
I like the fact that the gradient focusses the field of play - the outer regions are darker, just like the androids, so you have a harder time spotting them. If they're coming closer, they become easier to see, because they form a higher contrast then.

In general, and I gotta add I didn't play it yet as I'm at work, it looks pretty alive from what I see on the screenshot. Obviously, a defense game isn't quite new, but I like the bouncing bullet aspect. If bullets in space make a lot of sense is a different matter, but I'm sure you find some oxygen somewhere to ignite them ^^

What I'm not so sure about is your concept of winning the game. 100000 points as the factor means there will likely still be asteroids on the screen, and therefore the player might not even realize he won. Even worse, if he does or not, he might go :| about the fact that what he wanted is to get a highscore, not a victory screen. The highscore audience is what these games are made for - keep that in mind. Maybe decrease the time needed to spawn more asteroids with increasing game time to create a rising difficulty, and actually make the game endless and highscore-based. Or, if winning the game is an important factor, limit the amount of asteroids totally spawning, and show the win screen once they're all destroyed. Then you won't have any rogue asteroids floating around upon winning, but you might still disappoint the highscore hunters... at least you got a few suggestions to work with now though

In general, I'm looking forward to play it when I get home... expect gameplay feedback at that point


EDIT: Gameplay update... I gotta say, the difficulty versions don't really do too much for me, as the all force me to reap the shit out of my mouse button... and considering the price of my mouse, I can't do that for long XD So, to survive, you basically have to mash it - with reaction alone you can't win...
The bare mechanics are quite good... I like how you did the main menu, that's a fun change... and the graphic style is pretty cool overall. One thing I was a bit disappointed of is that the gradient effect in the background I'm describing above doesnt really get in effect, as you're basically focussed on the center all the time... but then again, it might be a subconscious thing... who knows.
Oh, one more thing... I almost all the time lost a life directly upon starting a game. You should make them impact a little less drastic for the first couple of seconds, as the player's thrown right into the game. My suggestion with the gradual decrease of spawning times would automatically solve that, btw :p

Overall, a fun game that I was playing happily, even if it was just for a very short time because I was worried about my overpriced mouse.

 

[Jason]

Okay so I know I didn't keep well on my update promise, HOWEVER, I'm working on it right now, and so far I've got rid of the difficulties and instead you'll progress through levels which will advance in difficulty, I've changed the look of the main menu a little, nothing too drastic, just the look of the buttons to be honest, I've given you the option to toggle through three background colours while ingame, made all asteroids slightly slower, although I'm thinking of making them faster since there's progressive difficulty, I've decided to keep the extra life requirement at 10,000 points too, but asteroids now give 20 points each so it's pretty much the same thing, I just like seeing big numbers, lol.

This time I'll make sure it gets updated TONIGHT, since it's a little overdue lol.

 

[Jason]

Dingaling! Finally!

So I've just updated the game to v1.2 and hopefully all should be running smoothly (I tested it twice to make sure and it seemed fine), you'll notice a few changes which have been briefly summed up in the update log. One thing I ended up not adding, despite me saying I would, is the ability to change the background colour, this is because for each difficulty increase the background changes a different colour, and I thought it'd be better to leave it at that as it's a pretty good makeshift indicator to give the player some sort of idea of what difficulty they're on, it ranges from blue to red, and there's six levels of difficulty, so yeah...

Hope you (Whoever YOU are) enjoy the new and (hopefully) improved version!

 

[Tuna]

So the progressive difficulty is really nice, but I ran into that invincibility glitch again. But this time it actually threw a couple of different error codes. This happened as soon as I shot the play button. You can click to ignore them all and just play the game, but you can't die.


___________________________________________
ERROR in
action number 2
of Create Event
for object controller:

Error in expression:global.extralife
position 8: Unknown variable extralife

___________________________________________
ERROR in
action number 2
of Create Event
for object controller:

Cannot compare arguments.

___________________________________________
ERROR in
action number 7
of Create Event
for object controller:

Error in expression:global.extralife
position 8: Unknown variable extralife

___________________________________________
ERROR in
action number 7
of Create Event
for object controller:

Cannot compare arguments.

 

[Jason]

Ah fuck I must've uploaded the wrong version (I make backups as I go along), it's a quick fix, I'll change that when I'm on my PC later today, lol.

 

[Jason]

Okay so I've fixed it, just renamed the variable and it seems to be working fine, all lives intact etc. I'll start uploading it right now. I should really check these versions more thoroughly lol, I could do with beta testers for my latest versions, lol.

New version has been uploaded!

 

[Tuna]

I could do with beta testers for my latest versions, lol.

That's what we're here for. :biggrin:

 

[Jason]

Yeah lol I think if I make any big updates/changes I'll be needing testers first lol. Speaking of, have you tried it since I've made the quick fix?

 

[Tuna]

Nope, I'm in class right now. I'll try it some time tonight.