Windows Pod Guardian - Topdown Dropzone-style shooter

hijong park

Member

Pod Guardian - Galaxy Rebel Force Part 2 is a multi-directional shooter and the sequel of my old game "Galaxy rebel force."

I like multi-directional shooters including Asteroids, Time pilot, Bosconian, and Sinistar. They allows to shoot anywhere I want, and there's no dead end, so They offer the complete freedom of movement.

And recently, I got a new personal favorite game called Archer mclean's Dropzone. It's a defender style shooter for C64 but offers slightly different gameplay to Defender, where you have to transport 8 pods to the base and protect them from planters. Putting pods one by one was surprisingly addictive and the challenge was very well balanced that It simply became one of my favorite horizontal shooter, Althrough I still consider Defender as the best.

So I got the idea of making a game similar to Dropzone, but in an asteroids-style field.

The objective is similar to dropzone. You have to transport 8 pods to the base and defeat all enemies to win.
But Since the playfield is different, I added several new ideas to make the concept suitable for top-down field.

First, Pods can't be destroyed by both the player and enemies, so you can only lose the pods when the enemy have put them into their base.

also, You can only carry 1 pod like dropzone, but shield can magnet the other pods. So you can carry several pods at once with a good use of shield.

Compared to Dropzone you can save the pods much quicker, but you can also lose them quicker.

In Dropzone, only the enemies who decided to go down and drop the android (an enemy that kills the pods) treat the pods, but in Pod Guardian Enemies can catch the pods anytime if they have reached to one of them. Also if you transported all pods, Enemies will approach to your base and take the pods. There will be no time to rest until all of these enemies are killed.

Since the game will be very fast-phased, I have improved the controls as well.

In Galaxy Rebel Force, Arrows rotated the ship and there was a thrust button to move. But I found it very stiff to control in a fast-phased game, So I increased the rotating speed and made the ship to move by simply pressing arrows. (Like Sinistar, or Bosconian.) I thought it would trade the preciser movements, but It works surprisingly well. It would feel much better to control with a controller, but unfortunately I don't have one.

Also, Galaxy rebel force had 3 main weapons to choose, But none of them was quite useful. So I decided to make one perfectly balanced main weapon in Pod Guardian. Instead, I'll add more various sub weapons.

The chargeshot had been removed as well. After making Galaxy Rebel Force I learned that Chargeshot is kinda useless in a fast-phased game where there's no time to stop shooting.

The current mode I'm making is an arcade mode, That plays like dropzone or Datastorm. (Dropzone clone for amiga)
When The arcade mode is done, I'm planning to make an adventure mode where you travel space and planets like Gravitar.
 

hijong park

Member

I added some more stuffs today.

The player's basic weapons are laser and mines. Lasers can be upgraded to level 3 and rapid fire mode by getting the items, and mines can be placed and detonated by pressing the button to destroy the swarm of enemies.

Also, I added dockable armors that offers different weaponary, similar to Sega's Space Fury.

Armors offer more powerful weapons, But your ship gets slower and you can't lift pods while docking on them.

I add some more enemies as well. I'm planning 18 kinds of enemies and some bosses.

I spent most of the time to make the enemy fighter jet's AI. I want to make an intense dogfight where both players and enemies try to catch each tails, but it's still not perfect.
 
J

Jordanb

Guest
Looks fun, I love how fast it is. Does the screen ever feel claustrophobic? The UI takes up a lot of space and it looks kinda tricky to see what's ahead though I guess you do have radar. I'd be keen to try a demo - it has been awhile since I saw a new asteroids-esque game that I really wanted to try so you have succeeded there!
 

hijong park

Member
Looks fun, I love how fast it is. Does the screen ever feel claustrophobic? The UI takes up a lot of space and it looks kinda tricky to see what's ahead though I guess you do have radar. I'd be keen to try a demo - it has been awhile since I saw a new asteroids-esque game that I really wanted to try so you have succeeded there!
Since This game is a multi-directional shooter, both the width and height size of the screen should be same. It doesn't feel narrow to me, It's still wider than other multi directional shooters like time pilot or Sinistar.
 

hijong park

Member

If you thought I cancelled Pod Guardian, Don't worry - I won't.

The development of this game was stopped for several months because I were making a experimental 3D game called dark spasm.

Once Dark Spasm is finished, I'll immediately return to this project.

Currently Dark Spasm is about 95% finished.

originally, Pod guardian's opjective was transporting and protecting Pods from the space piretes who will carry or steal pods to their motherships. However, Transporting 8 pods in every singe wave was a bit tedious and the indestructible enemy mother ships could be confusing to the players, So I decided to make it simpler.

Now, Protecting pods is not a mandatory work but only an extra reward, like saving humans in Robotron 2084. Pirates will steal pods to upgrade themselves to the stronger unit, but there won't be any punishments for losing all pods.

But protecting pods will still be important because You will have to use those pods to upgrade your ship or buy something in the shop. shops will appear after every 5 waves.

I made some new enemies to experiment their patterns as well.

Honestly, This game is 50 times more fun than Dark Spasm even in its early development state. That's why I can't cancel it!
 

hijong park

Member

- Added Title screen.

- Added many new sounds including musics.

- Added new weapon : Homing missiles. Missiles are automically launched when Space pirates are taking pods.

- Added Space Trade after every 5 waves. You can exchange items with pods in this trade.

- Added 3 difficulties : Lame, Novice, and Hot shot.

Now It's time to make the attack waves and test them one by one.
 
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