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[io3 creations]

In my case the text thing was just twelve times more boring than making new enemies so been neglecting it until now

Yeah, I also used to leave the boring (i.e. less exciting things to later) ... unless  there was a good reason.  For example, setting up menu UI was helpful for testing and interestingly, even creating at least a first draft of the visuals was helpful for some reason.  Perhaps, in a way, it felt like I was making a "new" game and not still working on the previous one ~ especially when I started a new game by modifying one that I just finished.

Fortunately, once you have most of the boring stuff done, you don't have to be concerned when you make other games.

[chrilley]

Yeah, I also used to leave the boring (i.e. less exciting things to later) ... unless  there was a good reason.  For example, setting up menu UI was helpful for testing and interestingly, even creating at least a first draft of the visuals was helpful for some reason.  Perhaps, in a way, it felt like I was making a "new" game and not still working on the previous one ~ especially when I started a new game by modifying one that I just finished.

Fortunately, once you have most of the boring stuff done, you don't have to be concerned when you make other games.

Yeah or at least once you've done it once the next time it will most likely go faster

Waw the game looks great ! The character's moves are fluid it's nice.

Thanks! Glad you like it!


I implemented some hit effects for every time the blade does damage to the enemy.

You can also see the new tints when striking enemies and also leveling up.

Minor fun-fact: That last archer guy noticeable looks like he's being pushed too much to the left when being struck. That's actually a bug of him trying to run away from Jarvis. It's on my to fix list.

[quantumpotato]

The new hit effects look good. The white + blue sword splash looks good with the gred & green explosion effects from the hits and it's easier to read. Good work.

Yeah the difficulty is something I've been messing with for a while now and still not done with it. I think the enemies needs to be trickier rather than nerfing some moves too much. I also tend to use the weaker baddies as my punching bags. Cheesy

Though the gifs are a tad misleading as I know by heart where every enemy is located and I'm more or less running on auto-pilot as I've been playing the same parts over and over. New players will probably not survive long if they charge right into a room swinging blindly. Or well hopefully... I will be running testing sessions soon since I need feedback.

I do think there's a difference between nerfing the moves (making your attacks do less damage, have less range, be slower) and nerfing the effects of the move -- hit stun.

The last gif shows the player jumping to catch the juggling enemies which looks like fun gameplay - my complaint was more that it looks like anything will work (mash attack). The first enemy being comboed actually escapes from the hit-stun (if that's what the flashing red is and they don't seem to attack at all), but the delay + startup animation until their next attack that a "loose" combo can be performed with the player doing an uppercut.

I don't get the impression that if the player missed the last upper cut, for example, that they would be in danger. Where things could get interesting is if, mid combo of the first enemy, that second enemy was charging up a heavy swing, or jumping into the mid-air melee. So the player would have to react.

Also consider knockback effects eg. after a big hit or enough damage, the enemy gets pushed far away - changing the layout and forcing the player to renegotiate their approach giving the enemies trickiness another chance to shine.

[chrilley]

Those are good points quantumpotato. I especially think a way for enemies to bail out of a combo would be neat to have or like a limit of hits they can take before getting knocked back.

I still think I need to focus on better enemies though. A good example in that gif is the archer to the left. While his buddies are getting slaughtered by Jarvis what is he doing? Shooting randomly at a torch...

There's also too much of waddling towards the player and not enough specific attacks that the enemies do, I'd like to see if I can get more of that varied response, like jumps or whatever special attack they could do to throw the player off his game. I've been thinking of giving the skeleton guys a jumping uppercut of their own that might make the air less safe for Jarvis.

Glad the new tints works better btw, I like them more than the previous white!

[chrilley]

As a proud Clickteam Fusion owner I put together a customized pixelart version of their logo for my game.



(I also hope it can put the "what engine are you using" question to rest )

[io3 creations]

(I also hope it can put the "what engine are you using" question to rest )

Now you made me curious.  So ... what engine are you using?

[chrilley]

[io3 creations]

Lol!

Oh! So, it is one of those smaller and lesser know engines that I haven't heard about!

[chrilley]

It really is unknown!

However it's actually been around as several different versions for over 2 decades(!). The first iteration that I used was called Klik & Play(released in '94). Since then it's been updated and re-branded several times as:
- Click & Create
- The Games Factory
- Multimedia Fusion
- Clickteam Fusion 2.5.

I hear they might be dropping the "Clickteam" part for Fusion 3, but who knows

Fanboy history lesson concludes here: Everybody remember to hand in a 4 page essay for next Friday!

[Shadow64]

It's actually really funny that you use Fusion. Derek Yu talks a lot about Klik & Play being a big influence of his - or at least how he started. Have you used any other engines? Or was Fusion the one you were most familiar with, so you chose it by default?

I'm only curious because I've had a copy of it for a long time, but never tried to make anything with it. It always seemed like it wasn't for me, but every time I see a great game that was made with it, or one of its predecessors, I'm always pleasantly surprised and have this desire to give it a shot.

Anyway, this game looks great. Well done! I'll definitely continue to watch along.

[chrilley]

Thank you!

I used to hang around in the same community as Derek back in the early 2000's. I remember playing his game, Eternal Daughter and being very impressed with it!

For my own projects its solely Fusion that I use since I got so much history with it and that I don't need to learn/spend ton of time coding when using it. I also really like where Fusion is heading for its next installment too, it all sounds very promising.

However for freelance or full-time positions I usually get to work with Unity & Unreal based games and I really like those engines as well

[io3 creations]

It really is unknown!

However it's actually been around as several different versions for over 2 decades(!). The first iteration that I used was called Klik & Play(released in '94). Since then it's been updated and re-branded several times as:
- Click & Create
- The Games Factory
- Multimedia Fusion
- Clickteam Fusion 2.5.

I hear they might be dropping the "Clickteam" part for Fusion 3, but who knows

Fanboy history lesson concludes here: Everybody remember to hand in a 4 page essay for next Friday!

At first, I thought that was one more name change than Flash had, but out of curiosity I looked it up now and there was one more before it became Flash:
-FutureSplash Animator
-Macromedia Flash
-Adobe Flash
-Adobe Animate

So it's a tie!

Actually, there are a number of well known games listed on the Steam Clickteam Fusion page http://store.steampowered.com/app/248170/Clickteam_Fusion_25/  but that probably doesn't include the games made when it had other names.

[chrilley]

Yeah there are some heavy hitters made from Fusion but they tend to not advertise the engine sadly. I think we got a bunch of new users thanks to Five Nights At Freddy's though

[quantumpotato]

Those are good points quantumpotato. I especially think a way for enemies to bail out of a combo would be neat to have or like a limit of hits they can take before getting knocked back.

Drastically increasing enemy aggression could help here. Enemies wouldn't need a way to escape if the player is forced to dodge incoming attacks. Good enemy placement could make each room a combat puzzle - attack with the right sequence and timing to avoid getting hit & continue your combo.

If you want inspiration for the escape route, I suggest looking at Guilty Gear's Burst mechanic. If getting hurt triggers a Burst (that has a knockback effect), the Player has to react to the Burst animation and dodge it, then they can punish for more damage.

See also: Smash Bros. Melee's kinetic knockback and "Teching". Attacks do heavy knockback and stun. The attacker has to chase the Defender (possibly with an attack that moves them, which your game has plenty of). The Defender, on hitting a Wall or Floor, can "Tech" and become invincible for a split second, then rolling to either side. This Tech can be chased for additional combos. This would have a pretty serious change in knockback which impacts the game severely!

I still think I need to focus on better enemies though. A good example in that gif is the archer to the left. While his buddies are getting slaughtered by Jarvis what is he doing? Shooting randomly at a torch...
Again, more aggressive enemies solves the "shooting at the torch" problem.

There's also too much of waddling towards the player and not enough specific attacks that the enemies do, I'd like to see if I can get more of that varied response, like jumps or whatever special attack they could do to throw the player off his game. I've been thinking of giving the skeleton guys a jumping uppercut of their own that might make the air less safe for Jarvis.

Regarding enemies escaping, maybe some enemies have a "rescue" move, pulling a character out of being comboed and hitting you in the process.

Glad the new tints works better btw, I like them more than the previous white!

Game looks great mate, keep it up!

[chrilley]

Thanks man! I'll see what I can to implement, I am actually re-doing a bunch of the enemy code.  Mostly to get rid of stupid stuff that started out as placeholders and then somehow became actual design anyway... In the same go I'm throwing in new stuff and hopefully it'll work out!


Also I did a second iteration on the save area recently. What better place to save your game than inside a large pulsing beam of holy light?

[chrilley]

I've been tackling story and cutscenes lately and due to that I've had to sit down and bump up my level editor up from 2.0 to 2.1:



Some of the improvements include:
- Dark color scheme
- Larger workspace and room area
- Cleaned up the layout and spacing of elements
- Script Triggers now easier to manage and work with
- Added background parallax parameters
- Minor bugs here and there fixed too

[chrilley]

Addressing some old feedback from this thread and finally implemented screen shake since I need that anyway for certain cutscenes and misc. effects.

In the same go I tried it out for combat as well. I am not sure whether I like it or not however. The feedback on it has also been a bit mixed so far. Basically the extra weight to all the hits is nice and all but it can be a bit too much after a while.


I could probably keep it as an optional thing though.

[psyguy]

It looks good but I'll side with the "it's a little too much" crowd on this one.  I might suggest using it just less frequently - if you only used it when enemy was died, for instance then you could say "ooh, the screen just shook, nailed another one!"

[chrilley]

Yes I really do agree with you and feel like it is perhaps a bit much!

On that note I got a handy suggestion to restrict the shake effect to just certain moves. So for now the ground smash and the orange charged up slashes will create a shake effect while other attacks won't.



Trying to figure out some new cool move to implement...

[chrilley]

So here's what I came up with!



During a Dash press Attack for a devastating charge attack. It works great on single targets on ground and also bunched up clusters of enemies.