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I have started work on a horizontal shoot 'em up called Mercurian. So far I have a player ship and a cave-like tunnel as seen in the following picture.
http://www.foppygames.nl/screens/mercurian20140814.png
Here's a video similar to the above picture. There will be a simple system of power ups that increase the level of your weapons. I'm thinking when the player gets hit, a life is lost and one level of power is removed again. For enemies I have in mind, typical things like walkers, crawlers, gun turrets, hyves with enemies inside, flyers, etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCKf2360su0
pretty promising :)
I'd like to see a good horizontal shmup, Do you have in mind the style of the visuals?
The visuals will be like in the video. Simple tiles with some extra shapes added to them. I will experiment with different colors. The player and enemies will be small colorful sprites, without much shading. So I guess I do not (yet) have a particular stye in mind in terms of "an alien world" or "dark and moody", except for "blocky, simple and colorful". One reason for the surroundings being rather blocky and simple is that it is auto-generated and based on square tiles.
Some more work has been done on this game. (I stopped playing World of Warcraft for the moment, so that helps.) I have added volcanos, bunkers (out of which robots will come), and gun turrets that aim and shoot at the player. There are also explosions and particles and I have begun writing the online high score table. Besides that, what is planned for the future includes: a seconday weapon system that lets the player use three weapons (probably mortar, rocket, and lasers) in addition to the standard gun (so each of the OUYA buttons fires a different weapon); a power-up system that increases the power of all weapons step by step; flying enemies; walking ground enemies such as robots from bunkers; destructible walls; flying enemies that create walls; jumping enemies; a system that steadily increases the number of enemies on screen.
I also received kind permission from a musician to use his music in my game. I don't want to say what music it is yet (because I don't want to give everything away before the game is finished) but I found it on this great website: http://indiegamemusic.com/
http://www.foppygames.nl/screens/mercurian20141126.png
I have added robots that come out of bunkers, that will eventually lob grenades at the player. There will be a second type of robot with laser guns, the shots reflecting off walls. Next will be a level system. I think there will be sectors of a certain length, with destructible walls in between. Each sector will be more difficult than the last one. Here is a short video without player input and collision detection, the music is from Youtube and will not be in the game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQxH8XCOOLo
Like it!!!!! :glee:
The single color tiles have now been replaced with a repeating rock texture. The background shows the same, only larger. Here's a current video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jT6_5O1ShE0
P.S. This game is being written in Actionscript 3 (Adobe Air) and uses the Starling framework. For my graphics I use Paint.net, and sound effects are created with SFXR.
Did you intend for the ship to look like Opa-Opa, or is that a coincidence?
Funny that you mention that, someone else also told me, but it is a coincedence. I had not seen Opa Opa before! Or maybe I have forgotten and subconsciously used the same colors. :)
I dig the look of it. I especially like the little block guys hopping around. :)
Is the background procedurally generated? This is looking like something I would play for sure!
Yes, each time a new column of tiles is to appear the roof and floor are more or less randomly moved up or down. (The darker tiles you see in the background are just a set of fixed columns that keep scrolling without changing, except for their color which is a darker shade of the current sector color.)
Things I like:Quote:
Originally Posted by Foppy
It seems playable and smooth :)
Things I DON'T like:
The terrain is too simple.
I'd like to see soft hills, curves, not only a "boring" sequence of 90 degrees blocks.
(is that a limit of Actionscript? If not, you MUST improve the game!)
p.s.
I'm waiting to hear the musics, I love chip tunes, hope for something "retro-oriented" ;)
Yes the blocks are a bit simple. It's not a limitation of actionscript, just a limitation of my current engine. I wanted to keep it relatively simple to program. Maybe hills and other things to make the landscape more exciting can be in Mercurian 2! :)
Some progress was made on this game over the last couple of weeks. The online high score table is working. It uses names of just three characters as seen in old arcade games. Mainly because I do not want to worry too much about swear words. I talked about this in the chat with Eldon and he suggested using regular expressions to filter out bad words in longer names, good advice indeed but in the end I decided to take the easier route. I still added a small list of funny words one could construct or hint at using three characters, including a few Dutch ones of course (just in case I'd drink a few beers and decide to vandalize my own game).
The high score table shows a maximum of the 100 best scores of the current month. (First I thought about also showing today's best scores but different timezones would make this confusing and not work.)
While playing the high score ranking based on the current score (and on the most recently downloaded high score data) is displayed next to the score. This idea I borrowed from Sine Mora (edit: and/or Kosmik Revenge!), I think.
I added enemies that crawl on the ceiling and drop down when the player shoots them or gets too close. Then they fall on the ground and continue walking, and sometimes pause to shoot some fireballs at the player. Another addition is blue guys, which are alternatives to the green guys. The blue guys fire bouncing lasers. These and the other enemy types make first appearances at different moments, and after that at increasing rates, so as the player flies from one level to the next the screen becomes increasingly crowded. I am smearing out the enemies a bit more than before to make sure most people will be able to play for at least a few minutes before losing all three lives. Maybe some flying enemies will still be added.
Sounds like Kosmik Revenge ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Foppy
Yes you are probably right! I thought I remembered seeing it during gameplay (in a video) but it shows the next score to beat between levels.Quote:
Sounds like Kosmik Revenge
The game has been published on OUYA Discover. Thread in Current Games:
Mercurian - Foppygames