BLOG ENTRY 42 - 11.3.2022

DEV STATUS

It’s been quite a ride these past couple of months. I’ve gotten a lot done on the game, so much so that I’m sure I’m forgetting some of the stuff that I’ve done. So instead I’m going to talk about how close to completion most of the features are. Something that I’m really proud of is the fact that I’ve been getting better at coding and finding bugs and fixing them right then and there. When I started this I could barely place things in Unreal and now I can get elbow deep in spaguetti code and know exactly which thread I’m supposed to work on in order to fix it. I guess as hard as it is to code some stuff has stuck around.

My unofficial deadline to start re-sending the prototype to publishers in order to attempt to get funding is the end of November, and so My dedication has been to get something fully functional, even if incomplete. It’s a very difficult thing to do when you know that the game is still unfinished and saying “I swear to you this will be awesome if you put some money down” It’s been 3 years when I pitched without a solid prototype and even though it’s currently leagues above, In my head I still think that “it’s not done”. I hope that those I pitch to actually see the potential this game has. Fingers Crossed.

PROTOTYPE TESTING EXTENDED EDITION

While testing the game and it’s current gameplay which is mostly combat, I’ve come to realize that it was time to start opening it up so I could have more space to experiment. Mobility is great in it’s current form for all classes so far, but I have not been able to finish the motion warped vault system in order to be able to well, vault. So a full mobility gameplay test is not done yet, Once I’m doing with cover slide/vaulting I think I can make a section that will allow for us to start figuring out how to design levels that are accessible to all the player classes without becoming “standardized”.

While it may be uncomfortable for some players, the idea that your class can shine in one map while suffer and have to improvise in others makes it feel more interesting than if you always have the upper hand somehow. I’ve been spoiled by the soulborne series, and find it fascinating that places that I breezed through my astrologer were difficult for my confessor, and vice versa, some levels/areas that were impossibly difficult before suddenly were easy peazy.

It’s a hard decision to make when designing the encounters. I don’t want to make it impossible for any class to finish the main campaign, but it shouldn’t be easy all the time. The encounters when you barely make it out are usually the most fun in any game. Close calls stick with you longer than feeling “overpowered”.

We’ll see how much balancing is required once the full mobility is up and running (ha!), but if these small levels are a good indicator then it really will be about mastering each classes mobility skill, and that should be very fun regardless of the class the player picks.

THE LOOT IN LOOTER SHOOTER

I’ve created dedicated loot chests for specific ammo types. Most weapons will be using only one type of ammunition, so the type of resource management will be very much in the style of Doom (2016)/Doom Eternal. Weapons may share the same ammo type but function completely different. The scarcity of ammo is still to be determined as weapons are still far from balanced, they are still in the overpowered level and can instakill most things with a couple of shots at most.

Another thing I’ve created are the Medigel Packs, they will refill your emergency heal, which I think I haven’t mentioned that I’s already in the game, now you can heal up if you get wounded, but rather than have your charges refill every checkpoint, it seems more interesting to make them a limited resource so you can choose wether you want to pick up the Medigel pack on your first pass through or coming back. I always enjoyed that aspect of the original Halo where fights would be more intense if you had full shield but low health and no health pack in sight. I may also do an instant heal rather than one you activate but I’ll have to work that out later.

I think it will really depend on where the game starts taking us once we have full encounters with both pre-placed enemies mixed with procedural encounters. If low ammo means more intense fun encounters then that’s where we’ll set it, if a more action packed approach turns out to be more fun we’ll set ammo to be more abundant. Health and Ammo are very useful sliders that can make the game more interesting, but we can’t mess with them too much right now before we make a full “Encounter” with all the elements in play.

FAILING “HOW TO SWING A SWORD 101”

I’ve already got a quick melee attack that feels rather good, still has some problems with hit detection, I’ve increased the weapons AOE and it did get better but needs more testing. The main problem is that a whole Melee system is a different type of combat system than shooting. that’s why you rarely see games with both a fully functional melee system and ranged combat system. Usually one of them is lacking because having both work together is very difficult. I could simply set the melee system as is and it’s on par with Worderlands in the way that it functions.

I however want the Warframe approach, where switching to your melee weapon allows you to use it in more interesting ways, use combos, special moves etc. The current roadblock I have is the fact that I don’t have “stances” yet, so if you equip any type of weapon the player characters will remain with their hands in the same position as their signature weapon. Causing the melee attack montage to move completely wonky, not allowing you to actually hit anything as the sword and arm are in a very different position than they should for the sword to “swing” properly.

DIALOGUE SYSTEM

We have been researching what the best way to create the dialogue system is, we’ve found a couple of candidates that we can follow in order to create a simple quest system without it becoming too much work just editing. I’ve already created a mockup of what I think we can do in order to present the dialogue properly, I think it’s neat, but it’s definetly a placeholder for now, I need to figure out how to make it look better without losing clarity as to WHAT you’re going to say.

We also need to see how we’re going to be storing the story in an efficient manner, how we’re going to nest the quests and plotlines so the game makes sense regardless of who you play as without it feeling like your class doesn’t matter. It’s a tricky thing but I’m sure we can pull it off, just gotta fortify our minds.

NEXT STEPS

My priority is getting 3 key things done, The Melee system, Vaulting over cover and having the inventory system work completely. I have an Idea of what I need to do in order to get it working properly, but It slips my grasp at the moment, but I don’t want to stay stuck hence why I’ve been working on the rest of the things.

Once all 3 things are fully implemented the prototype will be basically complete, that’s crazy. Ok well I still need to make the AI do interesting things, attack you, fire their weapons, drop weapons, etc. but I’m more over the bridge than before. I’m going to crunch hard this month to attempt to fix these 3 things so I can have a full holiday with my girl and the inlaws without thinking that I should be working.

I’ll post once more before the holiday break with any updates and as they say, “shoot for the moon, even if you miss, you’ll be the guy that shot at the moon, that’s gotta count for something right?”

Aiming as best I can, you celestial bastard…

Daniel “Freaky” Aguilar
Game Designer
Plasmapunk Studios

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