ShockBots Dev Blog

Well, I think I am done with the game.  Here is what I did today:

+ 2013-02-18 ART: Textured Player
+ 2013-02-18 ART: Player Animations: Idle, RunF, RunB, RunL, RunR, Death
+ 2013-02-18 ART: Intro Screen
+ 2013-02-18 TECH: Player animation blending and facing anim system
+ 2013-02-18 TECH: Death resets game
+ 2013-02-18 TECH: Death Screen
+ 2013-02-18 TECH: Win Screen

The game is playable from start to end and is pretty fun.  It might be balanced a bit too difficult – especially the final boss, but I figure it can be tweaked.  So, today after I get some sleep I’ll play it a few more times and then submit it to Flash Game License and see if I get any bids… Here’s hoping for the best!

I textured the t-rex.  The t-rex now bites if the player is near, otherwise it fires homing shots.  I unwrapped the player and have nearly finished texturing him.  All I need to do is finish the hands and animate the run and idle and die for the player and then do an intro / ending screen and I should be done.  Whew!

I finished the t-rex anims and unwrapped the t-rex model.  Tomorrow I’ll finish texturing it and start on the player.  Man I want to be done.

I changed the map to be a 5×5 grid, with 3 random boss rooms.  The first boss is a giant Chomper, the second the spider and the third is a giant t-rex.  I got the T-rex model in and a walk cycle done.  I still need to texture it.  I normalized the player speed so 45 degree angles aren’t faster than horizontal or vertical movement.  I also created a minimap showing rooms the player has been in as dark green, unexplored rooms as black, and current room as either red or bright green depending on if there are enemies present in it.

I am really close to finished – just need to finish up the t-rex, texture and animate the player, and create an ending screen.

I am not a fan of texturing.  I finished the spidroid and power up textures.  I created different projectiles for each round type.  I animated a chomper sleep and wake.  I removed unused textures and consolidated onto fewer texture sheets for a one meg savings putting me back at around 2.5 megs including audio and music.  I animated the Spidroid boss walk and die.

Nearly at the finish line.  I need to animate and texture the player and add a death screen.  I need to make the map a square array of 30 rooms and make a minimap.  I also need to add 2 bosses – one will be a chomper redeco and the other hopefully a T-rex.

I created the 2 music tracks for the game – an action theme that plays when there are enemies and a calm theme when the room is clear.

I also created the last batch of sound effects for the game:

• mob bite / melee
• player hurt
• weapon over heat
• explosive impact
• mob bullet
• power up
• loot drop

I added a weapon overheated and power up text displays and randomized the spawn positions used by mobs.  There was a bug where mobs were spawning at incorrect locations instead of at their spawn points, and I think it was because the mob array wasn’t being cleared properly.  I think I fixed it and I haven’t seen the issue but I’m not sure.  Its a game breaking bug so I’ve been playing the game a lot to test it.  I sped up the boomer and added sleep and wake animations for the Boomer and Chomper.  I finally textured the doors and the boss room arrow.  Getting close to done.   Still need to texture and animate the player, texture the shooter and shooter boss.  Also I want to add 2 more bosses, if possible.

Today I added an audio class and Sound effects for:

• Player Weapon Fire
• Ricochet
• Wall Impact
• Round Impact Mob
• Mob Death

I think the sound adds a lot.  I textured the Boomer and UVed and started texturing the Shooter.

I added a mob counter that makes each room have more mobs than the last.   There is a random component, so the number isn’t fixed, but in general each room should be harder than the last.  I created a logo screen and a preloader for the game with a progress bar to indicate amount loaded.  The file is only about 2.5 megs so its pretty quick.  My last game was around 16 megs – I guess it was all the dialog and sprite sheets.

I’ve been going crazy making the final environments for the game.  I have a nice pipeline to get them built, textured and light mapped.  I have 5 rooms done so far and I am kit-bashing a lot to get a few more.  Right now I am spawning way too many mobs, but that’s going to change.

Take a look at the final environments in action:

Shockbots_2013.02.10

Today I got random loot drops, random map generation, and random player start position working.  I added a circle – line segment collision test to prevent the player and mobs from getting right next to walls and penetrating geometry.    This introduced a problem where a mob might see the player but get caught on a wall corner.  I added an unstuck flag so that if a mob sees the player but has been colliding for more than 1/3 of a second the mob will try to move a random direction to “unstuck” himself.  I added in 2 different radii – one for moving collision tests and one for weapon hit tests.  That way mobs can collide with walls and each other realistically, while giving the player a larger target to hit.

I added an arrow to doorways that lead to the boss fight – that way the player knows before going in that they better have geared up.  Overall the game feels pretty fun, but just too easy.  I need to add more mobs and the boss fight is easy to cheese past if the player hangs out behind a barrier – so I need to address that.  Overall pretty decent progress.  I need to add more room types – just having 3 that the player sees over and over is boring.