next »

[Alec S.]

Episode 2:  The Weaponmaster.

Alright, with episode 1 out of the way, time to start on episode 2.

(For those who haven't played it, episode 1 can be found here:  http://www.ultimate-nerds.com/space-captain-mccallery-episode-1-crash-landing)

NEW:  Watch the trailer here:  



This is going to be a much bigger affair than the first episode, and have more of a focus on exploration and puzzles.  There will be a more Legend of Zelda like overworld, and the episode should be multiple times longer than the first.

The Story:
Having escaped the planet he had crash landed on with his new robot companion in tow, Captain McCallery ventured out to fill out his crew.  He would need a weaponmaster.  Fortunately, he knew one of the best weaponmasters in the sector.  He had been a former crew member from years past.  Unfortunately, this weaponmaster had been living on one of the most dangerous planets in the sector honing his skills and waiting for someone to manage to find him.  The planet is filled with dinosaur-like monsters.  Captain McCallery will have to brave it's challenges in order to reach his old weaponmaster and request his aid.

So, stay tuned here to keep track of the development of this new episode.  Here's a screenshot.

EDIT:
The Beta release of the game is now available.  Announcement thread:  http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=15452.0

A demo is now available.
Demo:  http://www.mediafire.com/?i6fmbyoaxtuzz6j

EDIT:  Updated screenshots:

[Landshark RAWR]

i haven't played the first one yet but assuming its real good, i could say i couldn't wait for this.

but im downloading it now

[deathtotheweird]

The first one was pretty good, yeah. But a bit combat focused. It was pretty short, so it didn't get tiring though.

Really excited to hear bout more puzzles and exploration. I like the episodic thing you got going on as well.

[Quicksand-T]

That map is reminiscent of one of the Command Keen games.

[Alec S.]

Thanks, guys.

Work's been progressing nicely on this.  I've been working on area design for the first section of the overworld.

[Alec S.]

Continuing along with working on this game.  So far, development has been going much more smoothly than the first game, as I already have most of the foundation in place.

[Alec S.]

I've been continuing to work on world/level design.  I've also begun figuring out how the dialogue system will work and I've also been designing new food items.  This time around, there will be a larger variety of special properties the food could have, and some of them will allow the player to access new areas of the game world.

[Alec S.]

Work continues on this.  I've been working quite a bit on level design.  The level/world layout design is about 1/3 of the way done, and it's already getting to be larger than pretty much any other game I've made.  It's certainly already overshadowing the first episode in terms of size.

Here's a new screenshot:

[Alec S.]

The artist I'm working with for, among other things, enemy art, has begun sending me enemy art.

And so the game about Captain McCallery going to a planet of dinosaurs now has dinosaurs.

Behold!


Here, we see the sneaky bastards hiding behind trees.

[Alec S.]

Be careful what you eat:


Uploaded with ImageShack.us

[Alec S.]

I've added a new enemy type.  A swarming insect.  Disturb their hiding place, and all of them in the area will swarm you.



I've also tweaked combat controls.  You can now jump/dodge diagonally, and holding down the shoot button will auto-fire as well as auto-strafe.

I'm also dropping the energy mechanic from the first game, as I feel that it let to an unpleasant dynamic of fighting the clock for finding food. Food is of course still in the game, but just to do things like regain health and give various effects, both positive and negative.

The artist who did the dinosaur sprites is also working on some environmental art, so the various crappy looking sprites I've made should over time be replaced with more awesome sprites.

I've also tweaked the hallucination effect to make it more colorful and less washed out looking.  I'm probably going to teak it some more, so I'll show a screenshot of that later on.

[Alec S.]

While the artist has been creating new assets, I've also been working my own art assets to fit with the style.  There's now a much wider variety of environmental objects I can build levels out of.

Here's a couple of screenshots that highlight the new assets, both my own and the artist's.

[Alec S.]

I've made a trailer for the game!

You can watch it here: 

[Alec S.]

Just an update to say that the game is still in progress.  I'm currently working on some polish, cinematics and hidden stuff before working on the final dungeon (just so that I don't have to work on all of those at the very end, when I'm more likely to rush those types of things.)

I also cold probably use some beta testers pretty soon.  If you want to test the game, send me a PM, and I'll send a beta version once it's ready.

[Alec S.]

Haven't posted a screenshot in a while.  Here's the Captain's ship:



Since I haven't gotten a response from anyone about beta testing, I'm just going to put together a demo version which I'll release online.  Hopefully I should that together in the next week or two.

[Alec S.]

Hooray, it's Demo Time!  

I've released a demo of the game in order to get some feedback.  The demo contains the first outdoor area, as well as the first set of caves.  The demo should take about 15 minutes to beat, although that can very quite a bit based on skill.


>Download Here<

I've made a feedback thread here:  http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=14872.0

[Alec S.]

Oh, hey, more dinosaurs!



Also, please try out the demo and give feedback.  Feedback will be helpful in continuing work on the game.

[Alec S.]

Hey, just wanted to say I'm back to work on the game proper as feedback on the demo seems to have died out.  Also, I just want to say that I'm quite a bit ahead of the demo in terms of content.  The demo comprises of maybe 1/3rd of what I've done of the game so far.  The only main level design I have left is the final dungeon, as well as some of the hidden areas, which are quite a bit smaller than the final dungeon. 

I'm hoping to be able to release the game some time on October, but it's a rather soft deadline.  Also, I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to sell it, what the pricepoint will be (I'm currently thinking along the lines of $5), and things like that.  I'm thinking of doing some sort of pre-order with a lowered price and access to beta versions before the full release.  If I were to do that, would anyone be interested?

[Alec S.]

Another update post.  Getting closer and closer to finishing.  I should hopefully be able to stick to releasing it this month.

Anyway, I'd like to talk about one of the things I've been doing in the game.  Hidden stuff.  Part of the point of a game like this is exploring a world, and it wouldn't be right if there wasn't plenty hidden in the world for you to find.  The game could be thought of as having three levels of depth.  The standard fastest path through the game, the stuff off the beaten path, which rewards you with treasure and food, and some extra-hidden secret stuff.  I want to reward the player for exploring and trying things.

And what I really want are some "holy shit, I didn't know I could do that" or "I didn't know that was there" moments.  When I was a kid, my friends would spread rumors about secrets in games that weren't actually there.  Things like ways to unlock Luigi as a playable character in Mario 64 or the many rumors in Pokemon.  Since then, I've wanted to put these types of secrets in my own games, and as I've become more comfortable with game design, I've started to.  Dadaists Gone Wild had a few small ones.  If you're one of the 10 or so people who played Dadaists 2, you might have found some of the secrets in there.  The secrets in this aren't exactly of the same nature as the one's in that, but I'm hoping they'll provide a nice reward for exploring the game world.

I really hope someone actually plays this game so they can find these hidden things...

[Alec S.]

One thing the first episode was missing was treasure.  I mean, as a Space Pirate, you should be after treasure.



In addition to your main mission, you can also find bonus treasure.  You get treasure by traveling off the beaten bath, finding hidden and out of the way places, and fighting difficult challenges.  It gives a incentive to explore further.  Also, I have a cool bonus planned for if you find all the treasure...