October DevBlog

The start of November means only one thing… Fireworks!

It also means that it’s time for a DevBlog about everything I’ve been doing in the previous 30 days.

Here is a video.

This was the first month where I really started to add content rather than work on invisible backend stuff like server browsers.

In total I’ve added 3 new weapons, 2 super weapons, 4 new enemies, loot tables and power ups.

The Power Ups are quite basic at the moment, all enemies drop some energy that can be collected to power your big guns and defenses, some might drop a health or damage power-up which will regenerate your shields or multiply your damage output respectively. These are all very short term generally lasting only 5-10 seconds.

In terms of weapons the Machine Gun was added (fairly self-explanatory that one) as well as the Repulsor and the Arc Cannon.

The Repulsor and Arc Cannon are both short range weapons and they don’t require a good aim to use. Be warned both of these weapons can hit friends as well as foes so watch where you point them in multiplayer.

• The Repulsor emits a blast of energy that knocks enemies away and hits everybody in it’s area of effect, it’s mostly a defensive weapon and provides some crowd control.
• The Arc Cannon fires three electrical charges in a narrow arc which will hit the 3 closest enemies (or if there aren’t 3 it will double or triple up). This stuns the target and can also arc over a short distance to other targets stunning them as well.

Two new SuperWeapons were added; the Mega Laser and the Spin Laser.

• The Mega Laser is exactly like the classic Beam Laser just BIGGER. It draws a lot of energy while firing and prevents your other weapons from firing at the same time. It is however the only Super Weapon that can be targeted manually making it ideal for taking out enemies with lots of health.
• The Spin Laser is made up of 3 Mega Lasers that rotate clockwise for a fixed time. Where the Mega Laser is good at killing off big enemies the Spin Laser is ideal for clearing up small low-health targets in large numbers. The range of the Laser is longer than the Bomb but it isn’t guaranteed to hit everything.

Four new enemies is actually one old enemy ported from Waves and 3 new ones.

• The Cluster is back! That drunken looking yellow one from Waves returns and is just as drunk as before. Shooting the Cluster is only the start of your problems as it breaks into two smaller faster enemies.
• Turrets are the first new enemy that can shoot back at you. They have a lot of health but can’t move. They are just as likely to kill enemies as they are you so you can use them to your advantage if you’re good enough.
• Strafers are the second shooting enemy. Equipped with a beam laser they try to orbit their target and destroy them from afar. Like Turrets they can be pretty indiscriminate about friendly fire but if you leave them alone they’ll soon have your shields down.
• Boomers just want to hug you. Unfortunately they are so full of explosives that just getting close to you can set them off and it really hurts when they go pop. Boomers are incredibly tough to kill but when they die all those explosives detonate taking out everybody around them - including you if you’re too close.