Beta test my Flash game! FINAL UPDATE

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Beta test my Flash game! FINAL UPDATE

Postby Monster on Thu Nov 13, 2008 4:54 pm

The game is finished! You can play it at http://www.kongregate.com/games/ManOrMo ... nOrMonster.

UPDATE 11-20-08: The game is nearly done. All gameplay elements are in and possibly final. Please check it out, I want to submit it by tomorrow.

UPDATE 11-14-08: I've made the following changes (refresh if it still looks just like the old one, apparently Flash gets cached):
  • Blurred the background.
  • Upped the contrast on the hero ship and the crystals.
  • Added more stats and hit percentage.
  • Reduced the hitbox on the player ship.
  • Added visual feedback in the form of a red flash whenever a ship escapes.
  • Made the "Enemy ships left until doom" display at the top larger.
  • Changed the game over/stats screen (for better or worse). This is not likely going to be the final game over screen.
  • The game now gets gradually harder every 5 seconds (but is easier at first). I'm guessing even Hado won't be able to withstand it for too long. Please, prove me wrong. I haven't had time to add the final weapon upgrade however.
  • Added multiplier bonuses for each blast caught in succession that does not damage you. Right now there is no cap, so if someone played incredibly, they could be getting 200x plus multipliers every blast. Forgot to mention that catching a blast is worth 20 points, 50 points if it heals you. So a 200x would give you 4000 points each. That's the equivalent of shooting 40 ships.

I'm making a flash game for an online contest. The game is not complete, but it has most of the functionality/gameplay in. There is also at least one bug that I know of (can't shoot while moving diagonally up and left). Update: Apparently the bug is in my work keyboard, as I tried this on someone else's machine and it worked fine. I'm glad, because there's nothing in the code that should cause this!

Keep in mind:
  • There is no end to the game. It will last as long as you do. The objective is to get the highest score (these will be posted on the Kongregate site once it's done). Eventually the game will get harder and harder the longer you play.
  • There is no sound, as this will be added last.
  • The game is meant to be skill-based and so is quite difficult at first. You'll get better and better the more you play.
  • I will probably be adding minibosses.
  • If the following play instructions seem daunting to you, just jump in and play and then come back and read them. They'll be easy to follow after you've played once or twice.

How to play:
  • Arrow keys move, space bar shoots.
  • You must kill all incoming ships. If 10 ships get past you, it's Game Over. The ship with a number next to it at the top of the screen is the indicator.
  • Ramming ships kills them but you take some damage. Sometimes you need to ram enemy ships before they go off screen behind you.
  • You only have one life.
  • Red bar is health, blue bar is energy, which regenerates quickly. Shooting uses energy.
  • You have an energy shield which absorbs enemy blasts from the front, preventing damage to you. This drains your energy bar. If you catch a blast while your energy is low you will take some damage. If you catch a blast while you have full energy you will gain back 10% health.
  • Catching blasts and not taking damage (i.e. catching them with adequate energy left) gives you points. To max out points you must catch as many blasts as you can. I may add a large bonus later for players who catch all blasts.
  • Whenever an enemy is killed, red crystals appear.
  • Catching crystals fills your upgrade bar (the funky shaped bar in the middle). There are three tiers, each tier you reach upgrades your weapon, except for the last tier, because I haven't added that upgrade yet (if you have any ideas for a cool upgrade, let me know).
  • Each crystal caught also refills your energy a bit. A good tactic is to grab a bunch of crystals to refill energy then catch an enemy blast to heal.

What I need from testers:
  • I need to know how it runs on your machine. On my machine at work it runs perfectly in Firefox through my home connection and slowly through IE using my work's connection. My home connection is slower than my work connection so I don't know why this is. UPDATE: Upgrade to Flash 10 if it seems slow.
  • Is it fun?
  • Do you like how it looks?
  • Any ideas for improvement?
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby Hado on Thu Nov 13, 2008 6:06 pm

Nice work! I'm digging the bullet catching mechanic.

Few things from my 10 minutes of play:

-The hitbox on the player's ship feels huge. I suggest trimming the hitbox to where it's smaller than the graphic to give the player a bit of leeway.

-I think there should be more visual feedback if a ship gets past you, since 10=death. At first I thought the ships up top were my lives -_-

-The ship feels heavy. I think upping the acceleration will make the game more fun, and you can throw more stuff at the player that way. The best shmups I've played have fast, precise movement to help you deal with the billions of things they throw at you. eg. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meegHdD0dAk

-The space background is sharp, while the stuff going on in front isn't as detailed. I think it'd contrast better if you made that a custom graphic as well.
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby Monster on Thu Nov 13, 2008 6:50 pm

The hitbox on the player's ship feels huge. I suggest trimming the hitbox to where it's smaller than the graphic to give the player a bit of leeway.


Will do.

I think there should be more visual feedback if a ship gets past you, since 10=death. At first I thought the ships up top were my lives -_-


OK. Maybe I'll make an alarm or something whenever they slip past.

The ship feels heavy. I think upping the acceleration will make the game more fun, and you can throw more stuff at the player that way.


The game is actually pretty fast, so I'm guessing you are using Flash Player 9 or older. I was having the same issue until I upgraded to Flash Player 10. Upgrade your Flash Player then try again, I bet you'll find the speed to be much better. If you still think the controls need to be tightened up, I'll see what I can do.

The space background is sharp, while the stuff going on in front isn't as detailed. I think it'd contrast better if you made that a custom graphic as well.


I thought about that too... the ship graphics are resized from large ones whereas the background was done at the proper size to begin with, which is why it's sharper. I'm not sure what you mean by "custom graphic as well", as all the graphics were custom made by me for this game. I guess I'll try to sharpen up the sprites and give them more contrast... unless you think I should blur the background more. I can try it both ways.
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby Hado on Thu Nov 13, 2008 6:52 pm

Ok, the game definitely gets easier as it goes on. Was expecting a 10 beam spread shot at max weapon upgrades or something, but so far there's only 3 weapon levels :) I stopped at 40k because I had max health and it would've went on forever.

At first my goals weren't really clear. I thought it'd be like a standard level based shooter where this is more like a game of tetris. IMO emphasize not letting ships get the past the player more.. maybe have something at the left side of the screen that the player has to protect that helps the player in some way?
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby Hado on Thu Nov 13, 2008 7:06 pm


I thought about that too... the ship graphics are resized from large ones whereas the background was done at the proper size to begin with, which is why it's sharper. I'm not sure what you mean by "custom graphic as well", as all the graphics were custom made by me for this game. I guess I'll try to sharpen up the sprites and give them more contrast... unless you think I should blur the background more. I can try it both ways.


I was wondering how it'd look with a 3d modelled planet/painted background, something that fits the ships' resolution and style. I think it's the stars that are giving the background so much detail.
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby Monster on Thu Nov 13, 2008 7:15 pm

Ok, the game definitely gets easier as it goes on. Was expecting a 10 beam spread shot at max weapon upgrades or something, but so far there's only 3 weapon levels :) I stopped at 40k because I had max health and it would've went on forever.


Well, in my post I said that I haven't added the last upgrade yet. I'm thinking maybe something that shoots vertically and backward as well. Also, I haven't added the gradual difficulty yet. Right now more enemies spawn when you get an upgrade, and that's it. I'm going to make it so the spawn rate AND enemy fire rate will gradually rise regardless of upgrades. I also plan on making it so you can sacrifice an upgrade tier (or maybe your entire upgrade bar) as a smart bomb that kills all enemies on screen. I plan on making it impossible to survive forever, but the best players will be able to survive much longer than others.

At first my goals weren't really clear. I thought it'd be like a standard level based shooter where this is more like a game of tetris. IMO emphasize not letting ships get the past the player more.. maybe have something at the left side of the screen that the player has to protect that helps the player in some way?


It will be more clear in the final version. Basically the story is that each of these ships are so deadly that only 10 are needed to kill everyone on Earth, and you're the only one standing in the way. Each ship is filled with these energy crystals that explode like a nuclear bomb when exposed to Earth's atmosphere. When collected by your ship, they give it massive energy which allows your ship to reconfigure its weapons or some BS like that.

Some more background on this game... I originally planned it to be a full shooter with multiple levels, bosses, etc. Just today I decided to go in a different direction. Why? For one, when I hand this game over, they own it. I decided I'd rather make a lite version of the game I had in mind to give to them then expand on it (and use a different name) later, even though I think a survival shooter is a pretty cool idea. Also, the time to submit the entry is running out and I want to submit this next week.
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby Monster on Thu Nov 13, 2008 7:18 pm

I was wondering how it'd look with a 3d modelled planet/painted background, something that fits the ships' resolution and style. I think it's the stars that are giving the background so much detail.


I plan on throwing some planets back there and removing that big ship in the background, since that was something that was in my original plan but now no longer is. I can make some nice looking planets pretty easy. I'll try blurring the star field a bit and also maybe changing the contrast on the ships.
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby DarkViruz on Fri Nov 14, 2008 9:24 am

I haven't had a chance to read any posts yet, but my initial thoughts are this:

Novelty ran out for me after about the 4th game. With only having my top score to beat it just didn't feel like it mattered for a task so simple. But I'm a multiplayer fiend, where I have to be better than someone not myself.

Also the counters go up when the splash page appears. At least the crystals captures coutner went up one after I died. Nothing major but thought I'd mention it in case you want to look into that at all.
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Re: Beta test my Flash game!

Postby Monster on Fri Nov 14, 2008 1:33 pm

Novelty ran out for me after about the 4th game. With only having my top score to beat it just didn't feel like it mattered for a task so simple. But I'm a multiplayer fiend, where I have to be better than someone not myself.


You will be competing against other people's high scores when it goes live on Kongregate. I don't think competing against your own high score is very fun either.

Also the counters go up when the splash page appears. At least the crystals captures counter went up one after I died.


Yeah, I'm aware of that, I'll fix that soon. Thanks.
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