Long story short: I was working on a redoing my shooter Gore Hounds and realized one of the big problems I had with the Gore Hounds was I wanted to do too many different types of game.
Solution? Make an engine that supports making all of them. Basically I'm making an engine [in GM8] that will allow me to make top down arcade shooter, tower defense, and possibly RPG games. More on how I plan to do this in future updates.
PLANNED FEATURES:
-emphasis on reactive world.
*ex. shooting an electric generator will not only shut down machines in the area but also send sparks that can set other objects on fire.
-destructible environments
-in depth statistics and damage modelling
-ability to change everything from player's running speed to the amount of bullets a gun fires by changing a few numbers
-script based weapon system
*weapon behavior will on a per weapon basis. basically when you fire it will check what the weapon is, then run the appropriate scripts.
-achievements [low priority]
-returning gore/particle effects from Gore Hounds
-Graffiti Story System
*basically imposes text on enviornment. see Splinter Cell Conviction
-in-depth combo/scoring systems
*kill streaks will also return from Gore Hounds, allowing you to say, set your bullets on fire when you kill 50 enemies without dying
-multiple status effects
*statuses will effect things such as if the player is on fire, poisoned or frozen. can also effect enemies.
in addition i'm looking at running the engine at 60 fps for smoother gameplay and better looking time-slowing effects if i choose to implement them. however, it may run too fast and i might need to cut it out.
just for reference, i will be using assets from Gore Hounds. so that's the graphic style i'll be working with. it just makes it easier to focus on programming.
more info to come, as well as prototypes for the different systems.
i'm also looking at licensing it under Creative-Commons Non-Commercial Share-Alike and making the source code widely available so that others can use it.
when i do post some source, some feedback on the complexity and ease of use would also be helpful.