Powers Preview

Power-Ups are coming together!  The powers are selected when a player gains a new level, and are split into three "trees" - Attack, Defend, Explore.  Here's the menu to select the powers:

Attack will contain upgrades to the sword and gun, as well as a new attack called "Power Beam".  This shoots out a beam of pure power in a short player-directed burst.

Defend contains upgrades to health (double health, quad health), as well as a spherical Shield that will protect the player from attacks.  At higher levels, the shield will even do damage to enemies in range!

The Explore tree contains all the jump upgrades (double, triple, wall), the grappling hook and a new ability, called "Power Jump".  This is basically a jet pack, that lets the player "fly" anywhere in the map for short bursts.

All powers are limited by a "mana" meter that will slowly refill over time.  Stronger powers (Power Jump, Power Beam), will drain the mana meter faster, so watch out.

I'm thinking the powers will be a lot of fun, an the three different trees will give players different ways to play the game.  Of course, by the end game you'll have all the powers.  One of the keys will be tuning the enemies and maps so the game is still a challenge with the full arsenal!

Still some more backend coding to wrap up, one last boss fight, then putting it all together.  Hoping to have a playtest available for both PC and XBox AppHub first week of September!

Script and Maps and Such

Added two new features.

1. Scripting window.  This is for conveying story to the player.  When the player runs over a trigger, it pops up a "dialog" window that can be read (press A) or bypassed (press B).  Poor man's cut-scene!

2. World Map.  The map will be used to select the level as you progress through the game world.  I found some great brushes on deviantart that were used to make the map: http://calthyechild.deviantart.com/art/Tolkien-style-Map-Brushes-138796530

The game is coming together quickly.  One more boss and the level-up / power system.

Then its on to fleshing out all the levels and polishing till it shines!

Boss Fights Delivered

End result of a day of programming, two new boss fights!

The mummy boss chases after the player and melees them on the ground.  If the player is off the ground, the mummy will cast a spell which will launch the player into the air.

The dragon boss emerges from a random side of the screen and breathes fire.  Afterwards, he's vulnerable for a short time.  In between attacks, fire blocks fall from the ceiling to crush the player.

Lots of fun programming behind these guys, mostly abstracting all the code written for the spider boss, and cleaning up code for "beams" - which are basically a list of vectors that can be used for collision or "drawing" lines with particle effects.



Next steps - a world map, and some scripting for dialog/story!

New Boss Design

The design doc for two new bosses!  Dragon and Mummy!

New Worlds!

Desert:

Mountain:

Wasteland:

New Baddies

Acknowledgements

People:


Ena M - http://behindtheveil.deviantart.com/
Ena is an amazing artist and she dashed off the character sprites in Platform Hack without breaking a sweat.

JoeRoh - http://seedroh.blogspot.com/
Joe came in at the 11th hour and saved my butt - adding polish to a ton of art assets, as well as some great playtest advice.  Joe is an aspiring game designer with his own blog as well.

Anna D - http://www.annadonlan.com/
Anna drew some phenomenal logos for both Daydalus Studio and Platform Hack.  She's also a talented photographer.

Visual:


Spiral Graphics Forest Tileset - http://blog.spiralgraphics.biz/2011/01/mystery-forest-tile-set.html
The tileset used in game was modified from a sample tileset found here.

Spriters Resource - http://www.spriters-resource.com/
Didn't directly use any of these assets, but the various animations in the spritesheets of classic games were big inspiration.

Steampunk Font - http://hannarb.deviantart.com/art/Steampunk-Font-148871949
Font used on the menus and popups.

Sound:

nosoap radio - http://www.nosoapradio.us/
Some great video game music available here, completly free.

bfxr - http://www.bfxr.net/
Generate 8-bit sounds in the browser, then save to WAV.

soundbible - http://soundbible.com/
Lots of public domain and "open source" sound files here to use.  Anything from gun shots to bird calls.


Code:

MRPAS - http://www.umbrarumregnum.net/downloads/mrpas
Algorithm used for the Fog of War in minimaps

Platformer Starter Kit - http://create.msdn.com/en-US/education/catalog/sample/platformer

Game State Management - http://create.msdn.com/en-US/education/catalog/sample/game_state_management

Particle Effects - http://create.msdn.com/en-US/education/catalog/sample/particle

Collision Detection with Rotation - http://create.msdn.com/en-US/education/catalog/tutorial/collision_2d_perpixel_transformed


Tools:

Audacity - http://audacity.sourceforge.net
Audacity is an open source sound editing suite.  It can be used to record and edit sound, and export to WAV or MP3.  I used this to record various sound effects, change the pitch or length of others, and noise.

Gimp - http://www.gimp.org/
Open source Photoshop.  Used to edit pretty much all visual assets in the game, from the sprites, in-game objects, HUD and background art.  The two biggest features are the ability to work with the Alpha (transparent) layer, and split images into Grids (which is essential for lining up textures in spritesheets / animations)

Camstudio - http://camstudio.org/
Similar to FRAPs, used to record video for playtests and trailer.