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[Intravenous]

The streaming went well and there are now two long videos available on Twitch.tv

http://www.twitch.tv/paul_intravenous

[Intravenous]

A third video is now up on the Twitch page:

In this one I was testing out the speed at which the player can level up and collect new upgrades, new hulls and new weapons so it's full of gameplay rather than introductory chat.

It was also a test of a replacement to a chunk of the sound system and this causes a few glitches with repeating sounds along the way. This has now been fixed.

At about the 2 hour 35minute mark another Dev has joined the stream and the conversation turns to technical chat about how the game functions. As this is a DevLog maybe some of you would be more interested in that part than the gameplay.

Direct Link:

http://www.twitch.tv/paul_intravenous/b/359924890

[Intravenous]

The original post has been completely rewritten and updated with brand new screenshots showing where Neon currently is in development.

Things look very different now to just two months ago when we first posted here.

[PythonBlue]

Very nice progress! I like the looks of it very much! Especially the lights!

Do you have someone doing the music at this point in time?

[Intravenous]

Very nice progress! I like the looks of it very much! Especially the lights!

Do you have someone doing the music at this point in time?

I don't right now. Unfortunately just as I started Neon I had a small shop. It was struggling but making a living. Two weeks after starting Neon as a hobby the shop was broken into over night and robbed. I had to close it and to try and make the event into a positive I decided to put what money I had left, and all my energy and passion, into Neon.

The result of that is that I can't afford to pay for music or any help on the project. However, if you are willing to take the same chance that I'm doing with the game then I'd be interested.

[Intravenous]

Great news

I worked out a deal with PhythonBlue to help create some great music for Neon (he's already created a wonderful ambient piece for the more sedate moments in freiendly space), and we have a new concept artist SpaceDad working on some new ship designs and hopefully later some environment designs.

[PythonBlue]

Thank you again, Intravenous.

My demo piece for the project, which would be the piece he was talking about in his last post. Expect no more related pieces to become publicly available for listening until the game is finished.

http://soundcloud.com/sgtyayap404/upgrades-demo

[Intravenous]

It's great to have you on board Python.



Today saw the addition of the front end difficulty settings window and functionality. Five difficulty levels are available.

Recruit
Normal
Hardcore
Elite
Custom

The games difficulty is controlled in two ways. First is a very simple multiplier to incoming enemy damage. On recruit it is 50%, normal 100%, Elite 175%.

Then there is the AI level. Neon has 160 levels of artificial intelligence for the enemies. This controls their hostility, missile useage, dodging speed and skill, their desire to run or get closer to their opponent (not always the player), and even attempt to flank. It controls when they choose to swap weapons, whether they call for help, their accuracy, how often they alter their aiming, whether they will follow the enemy, and many other things.

The various difficulty settings have different levels of artificial intelligence. So on Recruit level it is 0 and by Elite difficulty it is at 80.

So on Elite difficulty: Level 1 Enemies will already have level 80 AI, and Level 80 enemies would have reached the maximum level 160 AI.

Then there is the custom difficulty option that allows the player to set enemy damage anywhere from 40% to 200%, and the enemy starting AI anywhere from 0-80. These two values go through an algorithm to effect the ammount of loot dropped in the game.

Fighting more difficult enemies takes longer so the player is rewarded with larger loot drops proportional to the difficulty they set the game to.

[Intravenous]

Just a quick update:

I started implementing the full save game system today. Previous work on this had been deliberately small so as not to waste too much time.

The decision was to leave the save game code until near the release of alpha to prevent constantly changing it as the game constantly evolved.

The result so far is that all the proceedurally generated upgrades are having their data stored to the save file. We only want these to generate once at the start of each game.

That's around 800 upgrades with 6 pieces of data needed for each. The loading system to successfully bring this data back into the game is also done.

I ran into a few headaches that lost time along the way but it generally went smoothly.

This was then tied into the front end menu system.

[Intravenous]

Wednesday Jan 30th 2013: (More boring techy stuff)

The Save Game system continued...

Another 8 hours of work went into the save game system today. Due to the number of upgrades and the complexity of the systems in Neon, the save game procedure is far from trivial.

Today saw all the hull data added to the save game file. This includes the variable statistics about each hull, along with all the information about which of the 700 upgrades has been installed in each of the 33 hulls that the player can own.

Putting this data into a file isn't so tricky, but pulling it back out and reconfiguring all the hulls was much more difficult due to the complex way all the upgrades interact with each other to produce the functionality of the ships.

What made it even more tricky was that Neon is still at the alpha stage and many more upgrades will be added to the game, and the number of upgrade slots inside each ship will also likely change and be tweaked over time. Therefore lots of extra code was required to allow save files to be forward compatible even as we change the number of upgrade slots in a ship or bring in new upgrades later in development.

Missile upgrades were then added to the save file.


By the end of the day the basic save functionality was about 90% complete. Only a few minor single variable pieces of data still need to be tacked onto the end. All the really tricky stuff is now done.

The code to automatically load up previous saves or clear the data for a New Game Start was also sorted out and cleaned up.

Tomorrow should see the completion of this part of the save game system. After that, code will be needed to implement multiple save files (save slots) and the interface to control that.

[Intravenous]

A quick weekend update:

Work continued on the save system over the remainder of the week. More specifically the user interface for the save system along with tieing it into all the existing systems.
A 10 slot save system was implemented.

Additionally, more playtesting helped to tweak the speed that new upgrades, hulls and weapons unlock. Weapon damage was also increased across the board to speed up combat to be more exciting.

A new system was added to all the player's ships so that they now pull loot towards themselves. This was to eleviate the issue of having to spend too much time picking up loot after each fight. The player can now fly into the middle of all the loot and wait for his ship to suck it all up over a few seconds. Miscellaneous upgrades to boost the speed of this effect are planned for a later time.  

In the near future, the plan is to add more incentives for the player to get closer to the enemy during battle. A shockwave weapon that does massive damage in a very limited radius around the ship will encourage getting extremely close. Adding more close range - higher dps - weapons will bridge the gap.

Other likely additions such as miscellaneous upgrades to provide brief immunity, cloaking, and EMP blasts to disable enemy weapons and shields will also play into the design goal to give the player more incentive to get closer to the enemy. These will likely not make it into the first alpha build but will come soon after.  

Finally, a loot multiplier mechanic is being considered that would be charged up by combat and kills. This would simply encourage fast relentless fighting, or at least reward it.

[Intravenous]

Midweek Update:

Nothing to exciting again this time. The current workload is all about preparing everything for the alpha build, tidying things up, and going through a long list of little tweaks.

Monday was taken up with yet more work on the save game systems. Autosaves were added, along with functions to search for the most recent save. Lots of other additions were made to make the save game interface more flexible and user friendly.

Next was to incorporate the load/save window into the Front End Main Menus and getting that all tied in nicely.

On Tuesday, code was added to allow renaming of saved games. Time was then spent testing everything about the save system and ironing out the last few bugs.

Then it was time to start work on the list of tweaks and minor bugs that had accumulated over the last few weeks. Nothing too interesting so I won't list them all.

Today was an audio tweaking day. First, new sound effects were created for the main guns and for picking up loot.

Up until this point the whole interface was silent, so it was time to create a range of button click sound effect. I started out with sounds that were quite mechanical, and added the necessary code to add them to every button in the game. The mechanical sound didn't quite fit the rest of the game so they were later replaced with more electronic beeps like you might hear using an ATM.  

Last week I added a new feature to all player ships that allowed them to suck up loot. Today I created a pulsing sound effect to accompany this effect while it was happening.

Finally another sound effect was produced for whenever a dialog box appears.

So, it's all pretty mundane stuff but it all helps to polish up what is already in the game and get things closer to where they need to be.

[Intravenous]

End of Week Update

Graphical Updates
Thursday and Friday were all about texture work, and colour schemes. Many of the textures in the game were old (very old). Due to the unusual way Neon works, it is quite easy to replace a few textures and see the whole environment change.

Five of the colour schemes had their textures redone. This included reworks of even the newest ones to add a new variety of colour in the details while removing all of those blurry edges. This took the whole day because each colour scheme actually has six very different designs (eight if we include the AntiVirus faction that is still very similar to the OS faction).

On Friday, attention was turned to reworking the textures on the ships. Just like the environment textures they were rebuilt to be crisp and clean, and remove that old blurriness. This made a dramatic difference to the look of the older red on black, and green on black designs especially. The ships look much crisper and cleaner with the new designs now.

Then unexpectedly I ended up adding a skybox. This wasn't planned but I'm very happy I spent time doing it. The space station now feels like it's somewhere and it adds a nice atmosphere.

I finished off the week adding new icons to the docking port interface so it's easy to see what services are available at all times while docked. I also replaced the old placeholder 'Available Services' splash screen with a row of big icon buttons instead of simple text based buttons.


Alpha Testing just around the corner
Everything is shaping up really nicely now. Neon is looking and feeling significantly more polished already.

There is still a list of jobs that need doing before the alpha testing gets underway but they are all minor jobs now. We are still on target for the alpha build to roll out to the first few testers at the end of this month.

[Intravenous]

Two Week Update
Friday 22nd Feb 2013

It's been two weeks since the last update and so much has happened.

Miscellaneous Upgrades
# Miscellaneous upgrades now suffer from diminishing returns. Use two 'Main Gun Boosters' at the same time and the second will be less powerful than the first.
# The power of Miscellaneous upgrades was increased massively to help create many diverse upgrade setups, hence the reason for adding dimishing returns.
# All ships have had extra Miscellaneous upgrades added. This was to allow the player to create more unique ship designs.
# Added Shield Regeneration Boosters.
# Created models for all existing Miscellaneous upgrades, and icons for each of them for use in the GUI. This included the various available missiles. Every upgrade in the game now has a 3D model and 2D icon.

Interface Upgrades
A range of tweaks and alterations went into the user interface. New icons were created to display on the menu buttons to show what services are available when docked. The docking ports introduction screen was also updated with large icon buttons to access the services.

Missile data including their range, speed, and size was added to the pop out data windows when pointing at missile upgrades. Each ship has a limited missile capacity so the size of missiles plays a factor in that.

Music
Neon now has in game music. A big thanks goes out to Python Blue for his stella work with the music. We went for a brooding ambient sci-fi atmosphere (somewhat reminiscent of Blade Runner). There are currently different tracks for friendly and hostile space. Python then wrote a fantastic faster paced piece for during combat. Code was written to blend between the various music tracks.
A music volume slider was added to the options window, and later a main volume slider.

Playtesting and Tweaking
Countless hours of playtesting and hundreds of tweaks happened over the last two weeks to prepare the game for alpha.

Every ship went through substantial changes, along with weapon damage, missile damage, loot drop sizes, uranium drop sizes, upgrade powers, etc.
The game now plays out at a much higher pace, with unlocks coming thick and fast in the early game, and combat is also much more intense.

The tractor beam for sucking up loot was also tripled in power. Collecting loot is now actually fun as it chases after the ship. There are tricks to collecting it all into a ball for a quick pickup.

Shop prices and stock availability were also tweaked many times over the course of testing.
The level when the various missiles and weapons unlock was reworked for better flow to the game.

Teleporting and Reassembly (after death) costs were increased to make death a more significant event.

Damage reduction against high level enemies was reduced to allow skilled players to hunt stronger enemies.

A new mechanic was introduced that makes upgrades progressively more expensive if they are above the players tech level. This was to add gameplay because the player is also now allowed to install a much higher range of upgrades. The increased pricing was a better solution than limiting the player to upgrades closer to his level. It adds more diversity to the possible ship upgrade choices available to the player.

Graphical changes
There were no huge graphical changes this time. The interface updates were already mentioned, but the loot drops got reworked some more. The brightness of ships was also reduced. It was previously increased to make them more visible at range but they looked horrible close up.

The lightning guns effect was reworked to be more chunky and was swapped to be the second gun that the player will likely unlock - usually within the first hour of play.

Target Nearest - Prioritise Visible - functionality added The previous 'Target Nearest Enemy' command did just that. It would happily target the nearest enemy even if it was in another room, or behind the player. A new hotkey was added that prioritises ships in the field of view. This key makes a big difference to the flow of the game. Rather than pause to select enemies with the mouse, this new code does a great job of selecting that enemy right infront of you, even if there is a closer one behind, or behind a wall. The older 'Target Nearest' hotkey is also still available.

Teleport to AHL - added to Quantum Teleporter services
During testing, it was apparent that the game would benefit from having the ability to teleport directly into enemy space.

The 'Teleport to AHL' (Appropriate Hostile Location) tech adds this. The Teleporter scans the station for the best location to teleport the player to taking into account the level range of nearby enemies. This addition makes it possible to load up the game and get immediately into a full on battle against many appropriately levelled ships.

The player could then teleport back home again after the battle if they wanted to.


Random Other Additions
Save game files are now encrypted.
A toggle button for 'Autosave on dock' was added to options. Previously saving was almost instantaneous but the encryption causes the game to pause for around one second. This can be annoying every time the player docks so the option to turn it off and rely on manual saving was added. The game already has a 'Quick Save' hotkey that can be used at any time.

Added a EULA to the start of the game ready for the alpha release.

Added 'Show Frames Per Second' toggle to the options screen.

All the messages about loot pickups were reworked and redesigned to be much clearer and easier to see the most important information.

Kill based loot multiplier
The game now has a loot multiplier that is increased by killing enemies. It quickly degrades. This system rewards the player for killing fast and efficiently, and for getting involved in large battles rather than trying to sit back and pick enemies off slowly. The faster the player kills the larger each loot fragment will be.

Round up
Countless other changes and tweaks were made, along with catching numerous new bugs that crept up along the way.

The result is that the alpha release is just about ready. As of this moment it could already be ready, but some further playtesting of this final alpha build will occur over the weekend to ensure there are no final issues that need a quick fix/tweak. All being well closed alpha testing should start next week.

The game is also great fun and nicely balanced already. The alpha should offer around 10-30+ hours of gameplay, yet it only allows play up to level 15 (out of 80). The final game is expected to offer hundreds of hours of gameplay.

I look forward to getting some genuine feedback over the coming weeks as Neon is finally ready to be put into gamers hands (if only a select few initially).

Paul

[Intravenous]

Showing the effect Unity Pro, along with a month spent working on graphics and the UI, has had on my game.

Click to see full size
     

30+ Brand New Images

This link may be of specific interest to developers. It shows chronological pics of my game going back over a year to an early prototype.
A History of NeonXSZ in Images

It's now time to make a new video. The one in the OP is over 4 months old and horribly out of date. Hopefully I'll have this done by next weekend and I'll post up the results.

[Intravenous]

Wow, I'm exhausted. It's been a crazy month with some ridiculously long hours spent on the game.

The push was to not only improve the graphics once I'd aquired Unity Pro but to update all the media for the game. Obviously I've already posted some links to the new pics and the last week was spent working on creating a new trailer.

During the process of creating clips to edit together for the video, I captured a seven minute dogfight that was so hectic and so much fun that I went to the trouble of encoding and uploading it in 1080p.

Here's links to both of the new videos:







 I continue to update this log in the hopes of getting some feedback but I'm not having much success it seems  

[Intravenous]

Alright guys, tons has happened since I last updated here. Unfortunately as a solo dev there isn't much time left over for doing a regular Dev Log here 
However I do write up an in depth Dev Report on a daily basis on our forums now. You can find it here:
http://www.neonxsz.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=11

Tons of stuff has changed recently. The game now offers 50+ hours of gameplay and is far more polished offering tons of new ships, upgrades, gadgets, weapons and features.
For a latest look at the game, along with some casual developer commentary from this weekend, you can check out the following vid.

[Intravenous]

Back with a little big update. A bunch of new media happened this week after the latest version of our alpha went live.

Over two an a half hours of gameplay videos from the new alpha build went up on our YouTube Channel.
This included two 50 minute gameplay videos with commentary, and two video developer diaries.

If you like fast action gameplay don't miss this

which contains some of the best combat yet caught on video for the game.

We also added a page for NeonXSZ on IndieDB last weekend and at the time of writing this we are currently ranked 36th of 10241! OMG.

Not only that but our temporary splash screen webpage was totally redesigned and replaced this week with a much more polished design and can be seen here. It contains 20+ brand new pics, new videos, and a detailed visual look at Neon's upgrade system.

Here are a few new pics:



Thanks as always for taking the time to check out our updates. 

[Connor]

will this game be available to buy?

[Intravenous]

Hi Connor, the next stage of development includes setting up the necessary systems to allow you to buy the game.

Hopefully this will be happen within the next 1-2 months.