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[Cosmocat Games]

A couple shots from the latest build:





Plus some updates to the Itch page (including revamped logo) as I get ready to email my press list re: early access review keys:



I've also uploaded the revamped logo most everywhere else (Facebook, web, etc.), and I'm planning to post announcements to my Steam developer and game pages as I've not mentioned it there yet.

Oh yeah, it's currently 50% off for the holidays (along with everything else I have on Itch)--probably the cheapest it'll be for the foreseeable future

[Cosmocat Games]

I'll be streaming some dev in about 30 minutes if anyone's interested. Tonight I'll be looking at adding "death markers", a la Mario Maker, Super Meat Boy, etc.

(If it goes well I'll share the clip here along with a summary as well.)

[Cosmocat Games]

As promised:



It actually came together surprisingly quickly. In a nutshell I:

• Register any deaths with a global singleton
• On scene load, spawn death marker prefabs
• Clear the list when returning the level select screen

This will go out in the next early access build, perhaps over the weekend.

[Cosmocat Games]

Here are the results of a recent experiment: creating a procedural background with Shader Forge. Basically, multiple layers of panned clouds, blended, posterized and down-sampled.

It's the deepest I've gone with shader creation and node-based shader editors. I learned a lot, and I'm pretty happy with the initial results. It may also come in handy for some VFX for TOXICANT.





Time-permitting, I may do a rundown of this on today's stream.

In other news, the Steam store page is now live! This means we can finally move to Keymailer for review/streamer key requests. It also means it's time to start adding some achievements!

[Cosmocat Games]

A few more iterations on the procedural background, I think it's starting to take shape:



You can also see a new worm/snake-like enemy that I've been prototyping lately. I'll be doing a rundown of this on today's stream.

[Cosmocat Games]

I'm currently working on a basic waypoint system for the worms (instead of the random behaviour seen above). It's more predictable and should allow for more interesting level designs.



Felix and I also gave the spike ball enemies a bit of a makeover: new sprite, more animation, more detailed transitions, plus some long overdue SFX.

[Cosmocat Games]

Felix made a minor update to the hazard warning UI (the addition of a vignette), I think it really pulls the whole thing together and makes it feel much more... hazardous?

[Cosmocat Games]

Another pass over the worm enemy. To give it more of that classic platformer behaviour, I'm now storing a path history for the head, which each body part samples based on it's initial distance from the head. It still needs a bit of work (smoothing, initializing the path history), but it's getting there!

[Cosmocat Games]

So Felix and are in that proverbial "last 20%" home stretch... We've been trying to nail down what we think is going to be considered "done" as it pertains to a launch version/MVP. Here's what we've come up with (relative to where we are today):

• 32 levels (4 worlds x 8 levels each)--we're currently at around 30, though some need some rework
• some kind of an intro story/cut scene, even if just images and text
• an ending and/or credits
• a boss/final challenge level
• achievements

I did a super quick prototype of a basic cutscene system--basically just an array of scriptable objects, each compromised of an image and text, and some tweening:



For the boss/challenge, we were thinking of having a level with a few different paths, each of which leads to a switch. The goal would be to activate each switch and destroy the planet. (actual story TBD, heh). To that end, I've implemented basic pressure activated switches:



Last but not least, some long overdue updates to the starmap, namely, showing information about the levels (mostly importantly, coin count):



<shameless>And an obligatory reminder to wish list us on Steam and join the Discord if you'd like to check it out--we'll be running another closed alpha soon.</shameless>

[walaber]

this is looking great!

[Cosmocat Games]

this is looking great!

Thanks walaber!

K, new build time! Build 12 goodness:

• Add death markers
• Various level and enemy tweaks
• Various visual improvements
• Add intro cut scene (placeholder)
• Add additional prototype levels to Venom including new enemy type (worm) and new hazard type (noxious cloud)
• Improve star map screen

That's live on Itch now and we'll be doing another round of beta testing shortly for anyone that's interested. Feel free to drop a comment here or in the Discord.

[Micah.WhiteBoxGaming]

Looks like a good mobile app game

[Cosmocat Games]

Looks like a good mobile app game

Thanks! It actually started off as a small mobile game, though we're targeting PC/Steam for this expanded version (and desperately hoping to lose the "mobile game" look somewhere along the way, heh). That said, the controls are still simple enough that it could easily be ported back to mobile at some point down the road.

[Micah.WhiteBoxGaming]

For droid, Id use the tilt for movement on mobile

[Cosmocat Games]

For droid, Id use the tilt for movement on mobile

The original version had touch controls for thrust left/right. It's a very "twitchy" game, so I feel like tilt might be a bit too unforgiving, but could be worth at least trying yeah.

[Cosmocat Games]

Oh yeah, Felix has made some solid progress on the intro cutscene:



As well, we've submitted the game to the Steam Game Festival summer edition, which means we'll be preparing a demo build. I'm thinking I'll also toss that up on Itch for a little while, so stay tuned for that.

[Cosmocat Games]

I just uploaded a new build to Itch which, in addition to the above cutscene progress, also includes the following changes:

• Add names for all levels
• Add Titanis to star map (placeholder level/nothing to see yet)
• Replace exit platforms with switches (will tie into story)
• Add props to remaining Venom levels
• Add wind SFX
• Add missing moving wall SFX

Along with that, I've uploaded a demo build (first 2 worlds) for anyone that wants to check it out.

[Cosmocat Games]

Some more progress on the intro:



The text progresses automatically but I've included an option to speed it up/skip to the next text line. I'm considering adding some old school text effects (wave/shake kinda stuff), and maybe some subtle parallax in some of the frames, though I don't want to get carried away.

I've also started on some early prototyping for the final level. I'm trying to set a slightly more ominous tone than the rest of the game, so I've been experimenting with darker colours and lightning:



(Oh yeah, the level timer is mainly just for me, but I may leave it in and make it toggleable)

[Cosmocat Games]

More prototyping on the final level, including some experimental one-way gates:

[vdapps]

Hi I love rockets, as I'm big fan of astronomy and space exploration! In fact rocket in your game looks a bit like Crew Dragon capsule which will launch soon to ISS.