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[Farmergnome]

Great new fun, crazy video and definitely have gotten more of a Metal Slug vibe from the start of your devlog rather then Contra.

Its crazy how much people try to alike games to another, end of the day I couldn't really give a shit so long as its fun, I've played fan games that are more fun than some blockbuster original games, just how it is.  Initially I threw Contra over some of the early videos (which I have also re-ordered in the first post chronologically).

Some updated screenshots since I haven't posted them in awhile, and also thanks to the people who have helped the IndieGoGo fundraiser with $65 so far!  It seems like a long way to go to reach anything close to livable at this stage, so I'm not sure, maybe the interest in this project isn't that high or I'm doing a shitty job at getting the word out, maybe a little to early to tell at this stage.

Help if you can guys: http://www.indiegogo.com/RamBros-Indie-Game

Enough spam, screenshots!

[Udderdude]

I really hope I'm wrong on this, but from the trailer it looks like there's constant screen shaking and explosions, and you have a health bar so getting hit (which will certainly happen because you can't even see what's going on) isn't even a big deal.

I know it's supposed to be tongue-in-cheek and over the top, but you should at least make it so you can see what's going on.

Also, it's a far cry from Metal Slug so I would stop making that comparison.  It's more like super-deformed Contra with worse visibility and a lifebar.

Yea it is tongue and cheek bro, get a sense of humor, the real game is actually pretty slow, I actually camera shaked the shit out of that trailer for the luls, some of the older videos are better rep of how it plays.  I think it has more resemblance to metal slug than contra TBH.

Even in the older videos it's near impossible to tell what's going on when you're shooting at things.  How are you depth sorting your sprites?  You should be putting all the explosions and random bullet casings way at the back, with enemy bullets at the front.  And the enemy bullets should be bright and glowing.  Your explosions are probably too bright as well.

You can see in this footage of my own game that the explosions are always in back and bullets appear on top of them. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzoSDWb9DPs

Also I see you didn't reply to anything about the lifebar .. I hope there's a way to play the game w/o one and hopefully it's not impossible to beat it with one hit deaths.

[Farmergnome]

Yea its quite the clusterfuck at the moment (in the current vids especially) , I usually particle bomb this stuff then tame it back,  that's what I did for Black Market and Goblin War Machine and Zompocalypse, and I dont really have too many visibility problems with those games, just the way I do things. Ive already done the sorting on the bullets but haven't put up any recent footage yet, probably next video.

[Edit] here's a quick recording of it currently, ill probably chop some of the explosions back at some stage, they are emitting way too much smoke still:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gREuEB4Xi3Q

As far as the lifebar, I'm still toying with it, I'm not sure how I'm going to do the HP yet, I've tried lives, 1 hit (in the very beginning) and I'm not really happy with anything yet, I like lifebars but I don't like that there's a massive disconnect (constantly looking up), to be decided later basically, no right option has presented itself to me.

[Udderdude]

here's a quick recording of it currently, ill probably chop some of the explosions back at some stage, they are emitting way too much smoke still:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gREuEB4Xi3Q

Your bullets are the same color as the enemies, and they cross direct paths with eachother.  That is pretty damn hard to see.  The player's bullets should be behind the enemy bullets, and should never be the same color/tone.

[JMickle]

I love how all those kills and effects have got such great punch, that's real nice. My only quarble (i made that word up) is the camera, but i'm sure you're gonna work on that

[Farmergnome]

here's a quick recording of it currently, ill probably chop some of the explosions back at some stage, they are emitting way too much smoke still:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gREuEB4Xi3Q

Your bullets are the same color as the enemies, and they cross direct paths with eachother.  That is pretty damn hard to see.  The player's bullets should be behind the enemy bullets, and should never be the same color/tone.

Okay ill tint the enemy bullets a bit more, see if that helps, there's not much that can be done about bullets crossing paths however, that's just how it is, both the characters are roughly the same height, the enemy bullets do sort in front of the players bullets btw.

[Udderdude]

there's not much that can be done about bullets crossing paths however, that's just how it is, both the characters are roughly the same height

Aside from making the enemies taller, what you could do is make the enemies aim upwards so their projectiles form an arc and fall on to the player's position.

[Farmergnome]

there's not much that can be done about bullets crossing paths however, that's just how it is, both the characters are roughly the same height

Aside from making the enemies taller, what you could do is make the enemies aim upwards so their projectiles form an arc and fall on to the player's position.

I tried that before and it kinda felt a bit too retarded, im trying to size up the bullet sizes at the moment, so if there's overlap they will still be visible.

[EDIT] I think this is good enough, youtube compression is still making it a little harder to see, but I upped the size, changed the colour, im playing a bit shit today in the recording. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fleXOJQKAME&feature=youtu.be

[Udderdude]

there's not much that can be done about bullets crossing paths however, that's just how it is, both the characters are roughly the same height

Aside from making the enemies taller, what you could do is make the enemies aim upwards so their projectiles form an arc and fall on to the player's position.

I tried that before and it kinda felt a bit too retarded, im trying to size up the bullet sizes at the moment, so if there's overlap they will still be visible.

[EDIT] I think this is good enough, youtube compression is still making it a little harder to see, but I upped the size, changed the colour, im playing a bit shit today in the recording. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fleXOJQKAME&feature=youtu.be

That looks better.  One more thing I noticed is the grenade explosions look very similar to regular explosions, except these ones damage you I'd guess.  Suggest changing the grenade explosion color and shape to something more unique.

[Farmergnome]

Just made the grenades a little bigger and more red then, Id say they are pretty good now, good call though.

[baconman]

My first impression was a lot more MegaMan than Contra/Metal Slug, but paced way up so that it's fun and exciting rather than patience-and-precision oriented; but going more Metal Sluggy in it's personality with a bit of Super Metroidlike "ESCAPE RUSH!" presumably going on at the end of every mission, challenging you to find ways back out of the level different than the ones you originally took going in.

(Or you know, intentional breaking points which -could- be exploited both ways, but only with the key precision or maybe knowing in advance about undocumented abilities your characters have and don't "need" until way further in the game. If at all!)

Either way, it does look very exciting, even considering the decisively limited palette - which I think adds more in character (exciting urgency and recklessness!!) than it removes in function. You could always make the shots light blue, unless you're gonna have a really open/outdoorsy field area... which while possible, seems kind of unlikely given the game's context and level design.

[Farmergnome]

I think everyone is going to see different influences from the game, im not really trying to hide anything with it, just going with whatever works good, actually one of the first influences was Megaman (post one I think) but yea, end of the day so long as its fun.  

The escape sequences are only about 1/3 of the planned levels, the rest are infiltration missions and destroy everything type deals, lots of one off scripted levels too are on the cards, so if you want to see all this stuff help back the project, we just cracked $200 thanks to Alex May!  Legend  

http://www.indiegogo.com/RamBros-Indie-Game

[Greg Sergeant]

This looks great, i love your artwork and you progress so quickly! RamBros is more interesting to me than under the ocean, so i hope you do work on it more

Personally, i'm hoping you take the game in a more skill based direction than just pure chaos, with maybe one or two hits to kill you- less sfx, more visibility. This could result in moments of great excitement and tension where one of you has died, you're counting on your buddy to finish it, with a great sense of joint accomplishment when you finally beat the stage (maybe minigames every now and again where you play against each other, like in castle crashers?). I think the combat is a bit too side-on; air based enemies might be cool. Those enemy walls/ladders seem like a strange choice because they break up the action and slow things down, but i don't know the direction you're taking the game yet - im looking forward to a playable demo

(is visual flair more important than having more people play the game? If you scale it down and release on flash about 100x more people will play it, and the sponsorship money could cover your $8000 plea)

[Farmergnome]

This looks great, i love your artwork and you progress so quickly! RamBros is more interesting to me than under the ocean, so i hope you do work on it more

Personally, i'm hoping you take the game in a more skill based direction than just pure chaos, with maybe one or two hits to kill you- less sfx, more visibility. This could result in moments of great excitement and tension where one of you has died, you're counting on your buddy to finish it, with a great sense of joint accomplishment when you finally beat the stage (maybe minigames every now and again where you play against each other, like in castle crashers?). I think the combat is a bit too side-on; air based enemies might be cool. Those enemy walls/ladders seem like a strange choice because they break up the action and slow things down, but i don't know the direction you're taking the game yet - im looking forward to a playable demo

(is visual flair more important than having more people play the game? If you scale it down and release on flash about 100x more people will play it, and the sponsorship money could cover your $8000 plea)

There's actually a few flyers in-game currently, bomb drop drones, parachuting soldiers and drones that fire left and right, I just haven't really video-ed them much since they are in levels that have just been boxed out.  

I'm not sure visual flare is more important than people playing it, but Id rather make something that's downloadable, I can make better games in it, games Ive done in flash in the past have always suffered on some technical level because I'm not a programmer, I usually have to rely on a programmer helping me to make it happen.

Actually I was playing with the Health system today and one thing I thought could work is something I was thinking about quite a few pages back, implementing a system similar to Ghosts and Goblins, a 2 hit approach that changes your characters sprite, maybe looses the head band?

[baconman]

Lose the headband? Are you crazy?!

The answer you're looking for is "shades."