BLOG ENTRY 5 - 8.20.20

I’m happy to report this week that I did do a little more progress and more so that I figured it out by my damn self. It’s very difficult to attempt to code when you have no idea what the code is called and what it’s supposed to do, so to kind of have things click in your head and understand how to make them, it feels really satisfying.

I’ve been putting off working on the current iteration of the cover system as I have to import it from an asset, and from what I was told on the dev discord is that I have to make collision channels so that when I migrate the cover system shit doesn’t break. However I barely know where things are and It’s scary to fuck around with that stuff. Eldritch Knowledge only bestowed upon the worthy. So I panicked and started doing something else.

I decided to import a metric fuckton of assets that I feel will be suitable stand ins for testing. As I’d already imported the weapons packs from last week I felt inspired and decided to browse through the free assets on the Unreal Marketplace, and found a lot of good stuff I can use, Animation sets, props, etc.

So I already had these VFX packs but hadn’t done anything with it because I didn’t know how to integrate them, and I got bold and decided to mess with it. The result got me really hyped and I decided to keep working and reworked the previous Teleport Ability, which will be used by another class, and worked this really cool dash based on a function called launch player. I added a particle effect under the character and suddenly… PLASMA ROCKET BOOTS!

Rocket Boot Dash + Plasma gun Particle Effects

Given that I’ve been working on a lot of redesigns for each of the classes to have a different type of ability toolkit and ultimately an altogether different play style, I’m very proud of the fact that I designed this variation of the “dash” skill on paper and it actually worked out once implemented. It feels a whole lot better than the simple teleport I had before, and it definitely feels different from the common top down shooter dash. I’m working on improving on it a little more by adding a collision detection while mid air, so that if you hit an enemy you’ll perform a melee attack. If i’m able to I’d like to maybe even add a sort of vault for low cover, try to really nail down that fantasy of a high mobility damage dealer. I’m already working out the different variations in my head but I still have to fully design the idea of the Ability Variation system I want to implement, But that’s gonna be a little while before I can start fucking around with that.

For now I have a flurry of new assets to start fleshing out the visual art style I want for the game, build some prototype assets, as well as the cover system which is just waiting for me like a goddamn final boss. I’m leveling up by grinding other stuff. But I’ll get to it.

I feel for now I also have to fix some animations to finally give it some form, I think that’s what I’m going to use as a side quest while I wrap my head around the collision parameters, Still, If I was able to figure out the dash by myself (sure some tutorial vids), and that really inspires me that I’ll be able to not only crack the cover system, but maybe even improve on the free asset version I have right now.

Fingers Crossed

Daniel “Freaky” Aguilar

Game Designer
Plasmapunk Studios

A Whole lot of assets