It's been quite a while, hasn't it? The last few months have certainly been hectic. That's not to say things have quietened down at all; we're gearing up for our game's publication and launch sometime in early November.
So what has happened on the development front in the meantime?
1. We pitched our game to a group of industry professionals. This was the real capstone of the first semester of development. The best thing is that we received a lot of helpful and constructive criticism, which is helping us to get on track with the work that we have to complete this semester.
2. What this translates to for us right now is lots and lots of polish and functionality. Balancing enemy waves, prettying up the UI, implementing tutorials - things that make the game usable.
3. The next major point: giving the game some oomph. One of the major points of criticism we received at the pitch was that the game does not feel as engaging as it could be, so we're working to rectify that. As a result, we are currently working to implement a number of elements that will change the way the player experiences the game.
4. Ceiling grappling. This allows the player character to hang from the ceiling for a short period of time in order to avoid the aliens on the ground. However, players will still be vulnerable to Flier aliens. We're considering using this mechanic to allow the player to hook onto upper balconies so that they can jump between levels without using stairs.
5. Backdashing. We have decided that the player character should no longer be able to run through aliens as this makes life far too easy. And we're all masochists around here. So for split-second maneuvers, we have backdashing, with the added feature of letting Timmy do minor damage if he swings his weapon on backdash.
6. Multiple levels. The player will now have the opportunity to leave home and explore multiple other areas in the local neighbourhood. Maybe there will even be the chance to take down the big bad... ?
There is one last thing that we haven't been able to decide on: the game name. A lot of us are in disagreement about Awien Ambush. Any bright ideas out there?
Re: the name, unless you want the game to really only appeal to a very young audience, I would consider going against "Awien." It just sounds too childish to me. Looking forward to seeing more of your progress!
ReplyDeleteGood comment! We have had many discussions about this since this blog post and we've actually decided to keep the name. Why? There are several reasons:
ReplyDelete1. We feel that 'Awien Ambush' best represents the fact that you play as a small child.
2. It makes for good marketing because there haven't been any other games titled 'Awien Ambush'. (We did find one called 'Alien Ambush', but that came out ages ago and is apparently terrible. 'Alien Ambush' would still be a fairly common name for other works such as YouTube videos, narrative titles, etc.)
3. We don't want the artists to murder us.