poorlocke
Member
LATEST UPDATE
Windmills is live on Steam!
Grab it now for 30% off!
Windmills is finally complete!
After 14 months of non-stop 12-hour days of development, Windmills is finally released!
It was exclusively launched on Opera GX and it will be free till the end of 2022!
A Steam release will follow up at the start of February 2023.
I am also working on a FREE expansion that will be implemented some time after the Steam release.
You can also join the Discord Server if you want to be informed about updates, tricks, or help with the game.
Thank you everyone in this community, especially: Xor, BasementApe, FoxyOfJungle, Nocturne, Gizmo199, Cristian. Each one of you helped me push on and finish this project.
In Windmills you play as the last Crimson Cape, a witch - hunter, on his quest to find his missing father. In this combat - focused metroidvania you will face dangerous monsters and devious wizards that will put your skills to the test. You will unlock new abilities that will help you traverse the world and you will absorb the powers of your enemies, allowing you to use them instead. The story unfolds in a unique way, based on the way you progress through the game. Depending on your actions, areas and enemies can change because the narrator will remember things differently, making each narrative unique. Because what is more important, if the windmills were giants or if the story was worth telling?
ORIGINAL POST
I'm taking a break from the Infinity Engine Project and the last couple of weeks on my free time I started working on a metroidvania. This is the combat demo, I would like to hear some ideas to juice it up. Screen shake and camera zoom is good and all, but I think during combat it needs that extra "oomf". What do you guys think?
Windmills is live on Steam!
Grab it now for 30% off!
Windmills is finally complete!
After 14 months of non-stop 12-hour days of development, Windmills is finally released!
It was exclusively launched on Opera GX and it will be free till the end of 2022!
A Steam release will follow up at the start of February 2023.
I am also working on a FREE expansion that will be implemented some time after the Steam release.
You can also join the Discord Server if you want to be informed about updates, tricks, or help with the game.
Thank you everyone in this community, especially: Xor, BasementApe, FoxyOfJungle, Nocturne, Gizmo199, Cristian. Each one of you helped me push on and finish this project.
In Windmills you play as the last Crimson Cape, a witch - hunter, on his quest to find his missing father. In this combat - focused metroidvania you will face dangerous monsters and devious wizards that will put your skills to the test. You will unlock new abilities that will help you traverse the world and you will absorb the powers of your enemies, allowing you to use them instead. The story unfolds in a unique way, based on the way you progress through the game. Depending on your actions, areas and enemies can change because the narrator will remember things differently, making each narrative unique. Because what is more important, if the windmills were giants or if the story was worth telling?
Beta 0.2.0.0
Windmills has finally a Beta Release!
After many months of development and a lot of painful polishing and optimization, I have a build that is pretty close to what I aim for the players to experience in the final game.
If you have no idea what the game is about, this is the proper place for you!
Windmills is a combat-focused metroidvania. You will have to fight dangerous monsters and the only thing you can rely on are your abilities!
The combat system is based on suppressing, deflecting, dodging and parrying. As you progress through the story, more mechanics are unlocked, giving you more options for combat and exploration.
A big part of the mechanics are the reversals. Deflecting at the right time or parrying projectile spells, gives the player extraordinary abilities for a small amount of time. For example you can parry a lightning spell and charge your next attack with the element of lightning.
The story unfolds in a unique way, depending on the way you play the game. For example, depending on your actions, areas can change because the narrator will remember things differently.
What is included in this demo:
This has been a long journey, coming after almost 9 months of development. The combat is the main element of the game, with exploration being the second most prominent attribute.
The AI of the enemies has been refined to challenge the player without becoming tedious.
The main aim of the game is to empower the player to push forward and overcome great obstacles.
Alpha 0.1.0.0
The latest update is just one thing, but it affects the game to its core. I added the mechanic of remembering things differently, depending on the player's actions. For example, if you help one NPC instead of another, your playthrough experience will be different. In this example, I show the "mandatory" memory failure, where the narrator remembers that it was raining and that the enemies were different than the ones he had encountered so far. This leads to having the same maps, but with different enemies and different weather.
The mechanics of combat are simple: attack and deflect.
Almost all attacks can be deflected but also everything can be dodged. Now that the fundamentals were established, I needed to spice things up. I am against damage sponges so all the enemies have limited health. In order to avoid making the combat stale and limit it to simple attack-attack-deflect-repeat, the first addition was of course, shields.
Shields are a fine twist in this mechanic, but a bit boring if you overuse them. After I had the two basic categories of enemies, I needed to keep the player interested. My next addition was enemies that can combo their attacks.
This forces the player to actually learn the enemy pattern and makes them aware that there is more to this game than they thought.
Ok enough about defense, what about attacking?
The player can either attack between enemy actions and attempt to interrupt them, or wait for their attack to end and take turn. One major addition to this mechanic was adding a "suppression system".
This mechanic awards the aggressive player by weakening the enemy's defenses. As long as the player attacks, a suppression meter is being built. When the enemy is fully suppressed they alert the player by flashing white. This means that the next deflect will stun the enemy and the player can deal devastating damage. Example:
These are the basic fundamentals:
- Deflection
- Attacking
- Combos
- Blocking
As the player progresses through the game though, they will become more accustomed to these mechanics and will soon begin to see the patterns more clearly. In order to combat that and surprise the player I added the most evil mechanic I could think of: feinting. More advanced enemies can feint their attacks. This allows them to bait the player to deflect early and attack the player on their recovery frames.
Does this mean that the player will get frustrated and think it is unfair? Only the first time they see it. Each feinting enemy has small tells that inform the player if the attack is a feint. Sound cues, more anticipation frames and slightly different animations. The first couple of times the player will have a hard time against enemies like these, until they learn their patterns and animations. The point of the feint system was to add challenge without resorting to the lazy solution of "just make them more tanky".
To keep things fair, each enemy does only one point of damage and the player can take up to 3 hits. Since there are no resources and because I wanted to make the combat more dynamic, each successful block heals the player for 1 point.
In addition, players that are having trouble with combat, can explore the world and discover new abilities to help them in fights. Example:
Since I'm not a fan of artificial difficulty, I followed this procedure:
- Clear basic mechanics
- Simple additions to familiarize the user
- Add twists to the mechanics as the player progresses through the game
- Surprise the player by showing them that the AI can be smart as well sometimes
It is a gamble and I don't really care if it will pay out since my target group is ... well... me.
New updates have been implemented:
- A new biome with a map that can be explored depending on what abilites the player has
- New enemies specific to that area
- Added a basic radial blur shader that activates on certain moments (blur strength can be adjusted by the player)
- Added a template for fully functining NPCs with dialogue and quest phases. First NPC added!
- Gave the player the ability to cancel a hit taken if they deflect at the exact moment they took the hit (making the combat more forgiving)
If anyone is interested I can make a video explaining how I made the NPC dialgues and phases. It's basically a lot of arrays and grids.
Playable alpha build version 0.0.5.0 has been released, you can play it on itch.io and gamejolt.
Alpha version 0.0.5.0 is live with the following updates:
- a new combat maneuver that allows you to move behind your enemy
- a new boss
- more new enemies
- 2 new areas to explore
- some storytelling
Version 0.0.4.5 has new additions:
- Advanced enemies can combo attacks against the player
- Hard enemies can feint attacks and bait the player to parry early and punish them for it
- You can jump through platforms upwards (no more wall blocking)
- Added moving and falling platforms
- Added controller support and fully customizable buttons
Generally I've been fixing tiny issues that will make the player's life easier, I'm struggling a bit with platform jump boost(the ability to jump through platforms) but I'll get it to work properly eventually.
With version 0.0.4.0 there have been some major updates in the game's mechanics:
- Added a "suppression" mechanic. Now in order to perform a successful parry you need to have landed some hits on your enemy. Guarding still works as usual, but in order to stagger your enemy you need to have them suppressed. (This gives more incentive to the player to actually attack the enemy instead of just waiting for a parry.
- Added a new mechanic that lets you absorb projectile spells and cast them yourself.
- Reworked the boss to make him more manageable.
- Movement is very lighter and more responsive.
- Tutorial has been reworked and explains all the mechanics in detail.
This is not very different from the previous version, mainly some ease of life changes and the new suppression system.
Windmills has finally a Beta Release!
After many months of development and a lot of painful polishing and optimization, I have a build that is pretty close to what I aim for the players to experience in the final game.
If you have no idea what the game is about, this is the proper place for you!
Windmills is a combat-focused metroidvania. You will have to fight dangerous monsters and the only thing you can rely on are your abilities!
The combat system is based on suppressing, deflecting, dodging and parrying. As you progress through the story, more mechanics are unlocked, giving you more options for combat and exploration.
A big part of the mechanics are the reversals. Deflecting at the right time or parrying projectile spells, gives the player extraordinary abilities for a small amount of time. For example you can parry a lightning spell and charge your next attack with the element of lightning.
The story unfolds in a unique way, depending on the way you play the game. For example, depending on your actions, areas can change because the narrator will remember things differently.
What is included in this demo:
- The first Act of the game. (Approximately 4 hours of gameplay)
- 4 Bosses and 1 optional Boss
- Many areas for players to explore
- Many NPCs with quests
- 4 new abilities that the player can unlock
This has been a long journey, coming after almost 9 months of development. The combat is the main element of the game, with exploration being the second most prominent attribute.
The AI of the enemies has been refined to challenge the player without becoming tedious.
The main aim of the game is to empower the player to push forward and overcome great obstacles.
Alpha 0.1.0.0
The latest update is just one thing, but it affects the game to its core. I added the mechanic of remembering things differently, depending on the player's actions. For example, if you help one NPC instead of another, your playthrough experience will be different. In this example, I show the "mandatory" memory failure, where the narrator remembers that it was raining and that the enemies were different than the ones he had encountered so far. This leads to having the same maps, but with different enemies and different weather.
The mechanics of combat are simple: attack and deflect.
Almost all attacks can be deflected but also everything can be dodged. Now that the fundamentals were established, I needed to spice things up. I am against damage sponges so all the enemies have limited health. In order to avoid making the combat stale and limit it to simple attack-attack-deflect-repeat, the first addition was of course, shields.
Shields are a fine twist in this mechanic, but a bit boring if you overuse them. After I had the two basic categories of enemies, I needed to keep the player interested. My next addition was enemies that can combo their attacks.
This forces the player to actually learn the enemy pattern and makes them aware that there is more to this game than they thought.
Ok enough about defense, what about attacking?
The player can either attack between enemy actions and attempt to interrupt them, or wait for their attack to end and take turn. One major addition to this mechanic was adding a "suppression system".
This mechanic awards the aggressive player by weakening the enemy's defenses. As long as the player attacks, a suppression meter is being built. When the enemy is fully suppressed they alert the player by flashing white. This means that the next deflect will stun the enemy and the player can deal devastating damage. Example:
These are the basic fundamentals:
- Deflection
- Attacking
- Combos
- Blocking
As the player progresses through the game though, they will become more accustomed to these mechanics and will soon begin to see the patterns more clearly. In order to combat that and surprise the player I added the most evil mechanic I could think of: feinting. More advanced enemies can feint their attacks. This allows them to bait the player to deflect early and attack the player on their recovery frames.
Does this mean that the player will get frustrated and think it is unfair? Only the first time they see it. Each feinting enemy has small tells that inform the player if the attack is a feint. Sound cues, more anticipation frames and slightly different animations. The first couple of times the player will have a hard time against enemies like these, until they learn their patterns and animations. The point of the feint system was to add challenge without resorting to the lazy solution of "just make them more tanky".
To keep things fair, each enemy does only one point of damage and the player can take up to 3 hits. Since there are no resources and because I wanted to make the combat more dynamic, each successful block heals the player for 1 point.
In addition, players that are having trouble with combat, can explore the world and discover new abilities to help them in fights. Example:
Since I'm not a fan of artificial difficulty, I followed this procedure:
- Clear basic mechanics
- Simple additions to familiarize the user
- Add twists to the mechanics as the player progresses through the game
- Surprise the player by showing them that the AI can be smart as well sometimes
It is a gamble and I don't really care if it will pay out since my target group is ... well... me.
New updates have been implemented:
- A new biome with a map that can be explored depending on what abilites the player has
- New enemies specific to that area
- Added a basic radial blur shader that activates on certain moments (blur strength can be adjusted by the player)
- Added a template for fully functining NPCs with dialogue and quest phases. First NPC added!
- Gave the player the ability to cancel a hit taken if they deflect at the exact moment they took the hit (making the combat more forgiving)
If anyone is interested I can make a video explaining how I made the NPC dialgues and phases. It's basically a lot of arrays and grids.
Playable alpha build version 0.0.5.0 has been released, you can play it on itch.io and gamejolt.
Alpha version 0.0.5.0 is live with the following updates:
- a new combat maneuver that allows you to move behind your enemy
- a new boss
- more new enemies
- 2 new areas to explore
- some storytelling
Version 0.0.4.5 has new additions:
- Advanced enemies can combo attacks against the player
- Hard enemies can feint attacks and bait the player to parry early and punish them for it
- You can jump through platforms upwards (no more wall blocking)
- Added moving and falling platforms
- Added controller support and fully customizable buttons
Generally I've been fixing tiny issues that will make the player's life easier, I'm struggling a bit with platform jump boost(the ability to jump through platforms) but I'll get it to work properly eventually.
With version 0.0.4.0 there have been some major updates in the game's mechanics:
- Added a "suppression" mechanic. Now in order to perform a successful parry you need to have landed some hits on your enemy. Guarding still works as usual, but in order to stagger your enemy you need to have them suppressed. (This gives more incentive to the player to actually attack the enemy instead of just waiting for a parry.
- Added a new mechanic that lets you absorb projectile spells and cast them yourself.
- Reworked the boss to make him more manageable.
- Movement is very lighter and more responsive.
- Tutorial has been reworked and explains all the mechanics in detail.
This is not very different from the previous version, mainly some ease of life changes and the new suppression system.
ORIGINAL POST
I'm taking a break from the Infinity Engine Project and the last couple of weeks on my free time I started working on a metroidvania. This is the combat demo, I would like to hear some ideas to juice it up. Screen shake and camera zoom is good and all, but I think during combat it needs that extra "oomf". What do you guys think?
Windmills game alpha gameplay trailer
You can play the alpha here:https://poorlocke.itch.io/windmillshttps://gamejolt.com/games/windmills/636141Music by INTRNLCMD – Sunset City: https://youtu.be/...
www.youtube.com
Last edited: