Zordak [NEW DEMO - 2022-04-23] [WINDOWS/LINUX]

Apapappa

Member
Even if I don't comment, I'm always happy to see the weekly progress of Zordak. I think a lot of people are.
Oh I get that and definitely appreciate everyone who cares enough about the game to look at/read my devlogs.
It's more of a reminder that I'm open to any kind of feedback or suggestion (good or bad) and as a bonus it might get someone who's new to the game to comment as well.
In any case, I'd like to thank everyone for all the previous feedback/suggestions/likes, you are all a big factor to why I can still keep this game going.
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 40


(WIP visuals for a new upgrade)

Changes:

Removed the "delete save file menu", this is now done by pressing a specific button on the save selection menu instead.

Removed the "fix save file" option for now, it's a bit outdated and I'm not sure if it's worth having this in the game at all so this may or may not return later.

Added another new feature to an upgrade. (not the one shown in the gif)

Added "double tap" support to the input system.

Reworked the entire upgrade system, old save files will unfortunately no longer be compatible.

Updated a couple of old rooms.

Fixed a few misc issues.

------------------------------------------

I got featured on Game Jolt recently, so I posted a mini FAQ there with some answers to questions people might have, so why not post it here as well:

Q: When will the game be released?
A:
I do not know at this moment so the only thing I can say for now is: It's done when it's done.

Q: Will the game be available on any form of console?
A:
I'm open to the opportunity if it comes up but for now this is mainly focused on PC.

Q: Which PC platforms will the game be available on?
A:

Windows:

This is the main platform I'm making the game on so this will always be the focus.

Linux:
I will be trying my best to keep a Linux version available.
This is currently being tested in a virtual machine on Ubuntu 18.04.4 LTS.

I use an older version of Game Maker Studio (v1.4) to create the game, so if an unfixable issue comes up my only choice would be to upgrade to Game Maker Studio 2 (which I will likely do), if this happens, expect the Linux version to be delayed.

Mac:
I currently have no way to test the game on Mac so for now I will have to say that the game will not be available on Mac.
I am, however, open to the concept of a Mac release if the opportunity arises.

Q: How much will the game cost when it is finally released?
A:
This depends on how much of my plans will be realized in the final version of the game and as the game is not really close to being finished yet, I do not have a set price in mind yet.

Q: Where and how often do you update us on how the development of the game is progressing?
A:
I try to post devlogs every saturday.
I also post updates and sometimes short messages on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/ApapappaGames

(removed some info here that was just leading to this topic)
------------------------------------------

The upgrade system rework took a while so that's one reason why the changes list is a bit short this time.
I guess that's it for this devlog, until next time.
 
While I really don't like paying full price or buying games on the first day, I think your demos over the past year have gone a long way to selling me and will help sell others too. Great atmosphere, and gameplay diversity going from without a suit to having a suit, fighting moments of limited oxygen and the boss battle at the end. Keep going with the game!
 

Apapappa

Member
While I really don't like paying full price or buying games on the first day, I think your demos over the past year have gone a long way to selling me and will help sell others too. Great atmosphere, and gameplay diversity going from without a suit to having a suit, fighting moments of limited oxygen and the boss battle at the end. Keep going with the game!
Yeah, I usually only buy games on sale but that's mostly because my money situation is not that great. (especially now with the virus going around)
Still, there's a lot of broken / money grab games being released these days so I understand not paying full price or buying on the first day for those reasons as well.
(pretty sure there are more reasons not to do it too)

In any case, I do try to make the game as appealing as I can so I appreciate the kind words, and I'll do my best to keep working.

Also, on another topic, I can't wait to have some of my planned things implemented into the game, as I think these (secret) things will really improve it in a lot of ways and help distance it more from the metroid series as well.
More on that later. ;)
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 41


(WIP new HUD and ability to disable upgrades)

Changes:

Added a new room.

Updated a bunch of old rooms.

Added ability to disable/enable upgrades. (this menu will be improved later)

Improved player projectile collision checking, should be harder to shoot through walls now, if it's still possible. (I assume it is somehow)

Improved room transition player position precision. (yes, this line is from my new rap song)

Reworked the HUD a bit, still not completely done though.

Added a new upgrade.

Added a new mechanic: Suit Power.

Oxygen and Health now refills over time when standing inside a save station so you're no longer required to save to refill.

Reworked Oxygen, it is now based on ticks and drains "X" amount every second, so the oxygen meter will basically show how many seconds of oxygen you have left instead of a percentage, depending on upgrades.

Moved the "Scale Interpolation" menu button to a more relevant place.

Made a bunch of changes / additions / fixes to an old "secret" upgrade.

Updated the world map.

Fixed some small general issues.

------------------------------------------

I realize the HUD is a bit small in this gif but feel free to tell me if you think this style of HUD is good or bad.
The main reason behind changing the HUD is to make it take up less screen space.

That's all I got this time.
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 42


(WIP beam selection HUD, some left blank to avoid spoilers)

Changes:

Reworked the beam selection HUD, you now hold the beam swap button then press a direction to choose a beam.

Added a time limit when selecting a beam and a 3 second cooldown to prevent constantly holding down the button.

The player kicking hitbox is now a bit bigger to make it easier to hit enemies and such.

Reworked three old upgrades to include the usage of Suit Power.

Added a new upgrade.

Save stations now refill your suit power when saving as well as just standing inside them.

Fixed a pausing issue.

------------------------------------------

So, I'm not sure yet about the time limit + freeze time + cooldown stuff when changing beam, I added it as a kind of penalty for using the quick switch of beams instead of going to the menu.
If you have any thoughts or suggestions about this, feel free to tell me.

In other news, someone asked about a Discord server a while back (sorry for taking so long with this), I'm in the process of setting one of these up for anyone who's interested in that.
The plan is for this server to be like a hub for all my games and things like that in the future, I'm not gonna stop posting everywhere else of course, it will be like a community thing.
So feel free to tell me if you have any thoughts or suggestions about this as well.
 
S

sekafirst

Guest
Hello there,

I just finished the latest demo of Zordak, and I have to say I had a really good time.

The atmosphere is great. Starting almost naked in a wreckage told me right from the start that I was in trouble. There's no talking, just good story telling with the very small intro and the overall feel of the game. I hope it'll stay on this track, with small bit of untold information about what happen and the (maybe ?) ominous menace behind everything.

The gameplay felt good, nothing much to say. Run speed is good, I had a good control on jumps height. Nothing felt wrong to me. Animations that go with the mouvement are also quiet good, minus a lack of one when the character climp up a plateform or jump to another.

The first boss was kind of hard, but it's okay, despite the last save being a long way from it. I felt the small creatures giving some health refill should give just a bit more, nothing much, or it would become to easy. I hope other bosses will be at least one the same level.

The level design is good too. Secrets were not to obvious, so when it comes to exploration, it felt just like it should.

Really, I have many more hopes than I had problems during the demo. I saw some people arguing about wheter you should differ more from Metroid games or not. I would argue not. Metroid fans don't have many options. Game developpers always try to differ, and it often end to different, atleast for me. Of course, I'm probably not going to have morphball or speedboost, but as long as there's different mouvement upgrades that work well together, it'll be enough. And to be fair, my greatest hope is that the game offer a lor of flexibility in which upgrade you pick first, and which one you can skip, and the same for bosses encounters, given going for the second to last boss should be way harder, and not necessarily faster, than killing them in the "correct" order. Other Metroid-like games, most of the time, got that wrong, giving the possibility to skip everything, or pretty much nothing. Well, Super Metroid might the only one where we have that much flexibility... But still.

Well, I just had to come and post here, to support you, because I think the game can be potentialy great. So, congratulations on the work already done and keep it up !
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 43


(random gameplay because I did not know what else to show this time)

Changes:

Beam switching is now done by cycling through available beams again but it still displays them above the player (like the previous gif) to minimize screen space usage.

Removed beam switching cooldown, time limit and time freeze.

Added a bunch of new sprites and reworked a few old ones.

Added moving platform support.

Added a new tileset.

Fixed an issue causing the player to shoot twice when shooting for the first time after loading a save.

Fixed a few pausing issues.

Updated a bunch of old rooms.

Added a few new rooms.

Fixed an unavoidable enemy issue.

And started some work on a new area, this involves a bunch of secret stuff so I'll leave that out.

------------------------------------------

So as you might have noticed, I did not post a devlog last week.
I don't really have an excuse other than I just couldn't find the willpower to do it, it's been one of those weeks.

Anyways, in other news, I *think* the discord community server is mostly finished so here's a link for anyone interested:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ

So as mentioned earlier, the plan for this server is to be like a community hub for all my projects and such so I'll be posting devlogs there as well.
Right now it's very simple with just a few text channels but I'm open to expand upon this if anyone has any suggestions, I'm not 100% familiar with how these servers work and all so.. yeah.
This is probably also the most direct way of getting in contact with me should anyone be in need to do so.
So.. yeah we'll just have to wait and see how this server thing will work out.

Anyway, that's it I guess.




Hello there,

I just finished the latest demo of Zordak, and I have to say I had a really good time.

The atmosphere is great. Starting almost naked in a wreckage told me right from the start that I was in trouble. There's no talking, just good story telling with the very small intro and the overall feel of the game. I hope it'll stay on this track, with small bit of untold information about what happen and the (maybe ?) ominous menace behind everything.

The gameplay felt good, nothing much to say. Run speed is good, I had a good control on jumps height. Nothing felt wrong to me. Animations that go with the mouvement are also quiet good, minus a lack of one when the character climp up a plateform or jump to another.

The first boss was kind of hard, but it's okay, despite the last save being a long way from it. I felt the small creatures giving some health refill should give just a bit more, nothing much, or it would become to easy. I hope other bosses will be at least one the same level.

The level design is good too. Secrets were not to obvious, so when it comes to exploration, it felt just like it should.

Really, I have many more hopes than I had problems during the demo. I saw some people arguing about wheter you should differ more from Metroid games or not. I would argue not. Metroid fans don't have many options. Game developpers always try to differ, and it often end to different, atleast for me. Of course, I'm probably not going to have morphball or speedboost, but as long as there's different mouvement upgrades that work well together, it'll be enough. And to be fair, my greatest hope is that the game offer a lor of flexibility in which upgrade you pick first, and which one you can skip, and the same for bosses encounters, given going for the second to last boss should be way harder, and not necessarily faster, than killing them in the "correct" order. Other Metroid-like games, most of the time, got that wrong, giving the possibility to skip everything, or pretty much nothing. Well, Super Metroid might the only one where we have that much flexibility... But still.

Well, I just had to come and post here, to support you, because I think the game can be potentialy great. So, congratulations on the work already done and keep it up !
Hey, very sorry for the late reply.

I'm glad you like the atmosphere and feel of the game!
If I manage to carry out my plans then the story part of the game will continue mostly like this with hopefully some twists and turns. ;)

Good to hear that nothing seemed wrong with the gameplay feel, there will likely be more improvements made to it in the future as well so it can only get better.
(some have already been made in the internal version)

Yeah, I expect the bosses to be kinda hard for most people, balancing these things is one of the hard things when all you do as the developer is play the game over and over.
So the plan is for boss difficulty to only get harder so we'll see what happens, this current boss has had it's difficulty reduced countless times already so.. ;)

Glad to hear the exploration felt good as well, this is one of the main parts of the game so it should be good.
I will say though, I'm looking into hopefully making things a bit more varied later on and not just finding the right block.
(this will still exist later on of course as it's one of the main mechanics)

So about the metroid thing, sure, I want to distance myself some from metroid but it's always going to be very similar to metroid, that's not going to change.
The whole thing with this game is pretty much me making "super metroid but not super metroid" so that's just how it is and I'm clearly not hiding this fact, people can say whatever they want and I'll listen to whatever I feel is worth listening too.

As for movement upgrades, these exist in the game already and I will possibly add more movement related things in the future if I come up with anything good.
(I already know I'll catch some flak for one of the existing ones now but it's whatever)

So yeah, I agree 100% with the flexibility of what one can do and I'll be trying as hard as possible to make this happen, the demo for example is intentionally linear to allow players to experience different things in a shorter amount of time.
Many more paths will be open in the full game if it all goes as planned.

Anyway, thanks for trying the demo and giving some feedback, I'm glad you like the game and I'll be trying to make it as good as possible. :)
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 44



(random screenshots)

Changes:

Slightly reduced "low health" effect intensity.

Updated a bunch of old rooms.

Started work on finalizing the intended player path(s) through the game.

The rest is secret stuff so this is probably the shortest changes list yet.

------------------------------------------

I pretty much only worked on secret stuff this week so can't share much as it could basically spoil the entire game.

So, here's a reminder that there is now a discord community server available for anyone to join:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ

I'll be posting devlogs, answering questions and such in there as well so be sure to join if you're interested in this game or any of my future games.
Anyway, that's it for this week, next week will probably be a short one as well as I plan to continue working on secret stuff.
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 45



Changes:

Pretty much finished mapping out the intended player path, I'm sure there will be misc changes along the way though.

Updated / reworked *A LOT* of old rooms.

Added 4 new mechanics.

Started work on a new area. (as seen in the gif)

Added a bunch of new rooms.

Added a bunch of secret stuff.

Fixed around 10 bugs / issues.

Tweaked misc enemy stats and improved misc enemy AI.

Increased player animation speed while in water / fluids.

------------------------------------------

So.. a lot has happened since the last devlog, mostly secret stuff though but I tried to put as much into the changes list as I could.

Since the intended player path has now been basically finished, it means that I'm now pretty much done planning out the world which is quite a relief to be honest.
There will likely be more changes done to these plans, but at least I now have a completely solid structure up and running, which will hopefully speed up the creation of the rest of the game.

I also managed to add some of the mechanics I've wanted for a long time as well which felt pretty good, and to be honest, this devlog is the first time in a while which I've felt good about the direction this is going.
I don't mean everything else has felt bad or anything though, this has just boosted morale a bit.

And last weeks work consisted of only finishing the intended player path so that's why I skipped posting a devlog that week, just to let you know.

I'm really looking forward to seeing people's playthroughs whenever this is done with all the new things + current and upcoming changes. :)

So.. yeah, I guess that's it this time.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 46


Changes:
Fixed 9 bugs / issues.

Updated / reworked some more old rooms.

Added a couple of new rooms.

Tweaked misc mechanics and added a new one.

Reworked a few more parts of the world.

Started actual in-game testing of the intended player path(s) to find out which areas need more changes.

------------------------------------------

This week kind of just disappeared and I only got a couple of days of work in there.
The plan is to continue testing the player path(s) in game while creating new rooms as I traverse these paths.
Still got massive amounts of work ahead of me so I'll just have to keep chugging along.

Question:
Anyone got ideas for enemy types that could fit this game?

Got some planned but could be nice to include your ideas as well.
Can't promise I'll add them though, just looking for some input here. :)

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

ophelius

Member
Just discovered your game, fantastic work of art! Amazing Metroid feel, played the demo.
I will buy this when it comes out for sure! Good job!
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 47


(the gif might play too fast for whatever reason)

Changes:
Fixed 11 bugs / issues.
Updated / reworked a bunch of old rooms, as usual.
Added a new outline shader which is now used to highlight interactable objects when standing close to them.
Made misc changes to certain AI behaviors.
Added two more new shader effects, unnamed for now to avoid spoilers.
Tweaked a few old mechanics a bit so they work better.
Added 4 new enemies.

------------------------------------------

So, my sleep schedule was a bit upside down last week so I skipped posting a devlog that time.
The reason for this is that I want to try and post them at reasonably "optimal" times in order for as many people to see them as possible, I have to try and do what I can to spread the word about the game you know.

Linux Stuff:

I spent approximately 3 full days trying to install Ubuntu 20.04 LTS on my laptop/tablet combo and it finally worked, this is dual booting with windows 10 as well.
So now I have an actual Ubuntu machine running and no longer need to test in a virtual one, this should be more accurate for testing.

I managed to get the game running there as well as shown in the GIF above.

I also went through the dependency list and installed them one by one as listed by "ldd ./Zordak" and managed to reduce the number of dependencies in the dependency install script.
This also showed me that one of the dependencies is obsolete in Ubuntu 20.04 LTS so that one has to be installed manually.

So here's the new dependency list for Ubuntu 20.04 LTS:

[DEPENDENCY LIST]:
  1. libopenal1:i386
  2. libxxf86vm1:i386
  3. libglu1:i386
  4. libxrandr2:i386
  5. libssl1.0.0 (obsolete, need to install manually using wget and dpkg, instructions will be in the a new readme file at some point)
[CONTROLLER/GAMEPAD]:
  1. joystick
  2. jstest-gtk (only for calibrating gamepad)
This is untested right now and not needed to start the game but supposedly needed for controller support.

[APPARENTLY NOT NEEDED]:
  1. libc6-dev-i386
  2. libstdc++6:i386
  3. libcurl3:i386
  4. libcanberra-gtk-module
These might not have been needed for the previous Ubuntu versions either so sorry to everyone who installed these packages, as I've stated before: I'm not a Linux expert.

I got the dependency list used in the current demo from searching around the internet for how to set up the Game Maker Studio 1.4 Linux runner, so not sure why these were there when they are supposedly not needed.

This was all tested using the current demo version of Zordak so anyone using Ubuntu 20.04 LTS should be able to run it as well, provided you know how to manually install "libssl1.0.0".

Question:
If you use Linux, what distro do you use?
I will likely only test the game on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS for now but this information could help me see which distros are more popular.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 48



Changes:
Continued testing the main player path(s).

Updated / reworked some old rooms.

Added a few new rooms.

Added ability to zoom out the fullscreen map by holding a button. (it's a bit low quality now but it works)

The in game timer is no longer paused on the map or upgrade screen, it's paused on the options menu now.

Fixed 4 bugs / issues.

Added / reworked multiple old upgrade features.

Reworked some parts of the world map.

Created a bunch of new tiles.

Added a new upgrade.

------------------------------------------

I don't really have much to say this time, it's just been another week.

I guess I can plug the discord a bit:
If you're interested in more "insider" information about the game, consider joining my discord community listed below!

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 49



Changes:
Updated a bunch of old rooms.
Tweaked / Improved a few misc upgrades.
Created a new electricity / lightning bolt effect which is / will be used for multiple misc things. (showcased in the gif)
Tweaked misc enemy mechanics a bit.
Added support for some new tile "stuff".

------------------------------------------

A bit of a short one this week but oh well, I'll just have to hope for better next time.
I do have to say though, the electricity / lightning bolt effect turned out much better than expected when used with the appropriate things.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 
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Crimson

Guest
I checked out the Zordak demo, and overall, I definitely enjoyed it.
I jotted down some notes base on my playtime (about an hour.)

Pros:
  • I really like the "wall jump," where you can jump from one ledge to the next.
  • You're training the player to look for cracked blocks early on, and even using it to hide things that the player can't access yet, which I like.
  • The map screen is simple and intuitive.
  • As far as the demo content goes, the player is lead quite nicely while making it not too obvious where to go.
  • I like the 3 shots on screen; it puts the thought of not being shoot-spammy in the back of your mind.
Cons:
  • When you have your back to a ledge, and use the kick, you get pushed off the ledge, and do a weird double-kick, where the second one doesn't always finish.
  • Your head can be halfway inside a health pickup, but you don't get it until there is almost 100% overlap.
  • Sometimes, when I crouch and shoot, the shot appears under my feet, and hits the floor (worse is when it happens with my limited missiles.)
  • It would be nice to be able to aim straight up and down when hanging from a ledge (sometimes there's an enemy below you, but you have to jump off the ledge, shoot down, then grab the ledge again.)
  • I paused after killing an enemy underwater, and the water effect kind of broke; the point the enemy was at got drawn really far down, creating a kind of chasm in the water before it rose back up.
  • It would be nice if the charge beam would fire a weaker charge, or just a normal charge if you released the button before a full charge.
  • I got stuck in the marker placement when trying to place a skull marker - I can unpause, and continue playing, but the pause screen now always shows the marker box (upon further fiddling, it seems to occur if you hold Square on a visited map block, hold a direction, and release Square.
  • The main peashooter feels very weak with how many shots it takes to kill the first enemies in the game (but that might be rectified by getting stronger weapons.)
Overall, I had a great experience with the demo!
I'm looking forward to seeing more to come!
 

Apapappa

Member
I checked out the Zordak demo, and overall, I definitely enjoyed it.
I jotted down some notes base on my playtime (about an hour.)

Pros:
  • I really like the "wall jump," where you can jump from one ledge to the next.
  • You're training the player to look for cracked blocks early on, and even using it to hide things that the player can't access yet, which I like.
  • The map screen is simple and intuitive.
  • As far as the demo content goes, the player is lead quite nicely while making it not too obvious where to go.
  • I like the 3 shots on screen; it puts the thought of not being shoot-spammy in the back of your mind.
Cons:
  • When you have your back to a ledge, and use the kick, you get pushed off the ledge, and do a weird double-kick, where the second one doesn't always finish.
  • Your head can be halfway inside a health pickup, but you don't get it until there is almost 100% overlap.
  • Sometimes, when I crouch and shoot, the shot appears under my feet, and hits the floor (worse is when it happens with my limited missiles.)
  • It would be nice to be able to aim straight up and down when hanging from a ledge (sometimes there's an enemy below you, but you have to jump off the ledge, shoot down, then grab the ledge again.)
  • I paused after killing an enemy underwater, and the water effect kind of broke; the point the enemy was at got drawn really far down, creating a kind of chasm in the water before it rose back up.
  • It would be nice if the charge beam would fire a weaker charge, or just a normal charge if you released the button before a full charge.
  • I got stuck in the marker placement when trying to place a skull marker - I can unpause, and continue playing, but the pause screen now always shows the marker box (upon further fiddling, it seems to occur if you hold Square on a visited map block, hold a direction, and release Square.
  • The main peashooter feels very weak with how many shots it takes to kill the first enemies in the game (but that might be rectified by getting stronger weapons.)
Overall, I had a great experience with the demo!
I'm looking forward to seeing more to come!
Hey, thanks for trying the demo, I'm glad you like it!

The demo is a bit old now so most of these issues I already know of / fixed but some of them are new but I'll comment on some of them either way:

The 3 shot limit was removed a while ago in the internal version for testing and I actually feel the same to be honest, which is why it's back in but at a 5 shot limit now.
I saw too many people just spamming shots and then wondering why sometimes projectiles don't come out, that's why it was removed for a while so I could test it out and see how it felt.

I have now fixed the water and map marker placement issues, thanks for letting me know.

Shots appearing at the players feet will be fixed, I've known about this for some time just haven't got around to it yet.

Aiming straight up / down while ledge grabbing is on the list, not sure when or if this will be added though.

Charge beam will be getting some reworks / improvements but probably not in the way you suggested, I'll add it to the list anyway in case I change my mind.

I'll take a look at the pickup hitboxes and enemy health values.


I assume you mean you did something like this to get the double kick:

If so, this has been fixed some time ago.


Thanks for the feedback. :)
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 50


(interactable object outlines from a previous devlog)

Changes:
Added more lightning / electricity effects to misc relevant things, improved visuals and optimized the effect a bit.
Improved dropped item collision detection.
Display scale method can now be changed in window mode as opposed to only in fullscreen.
The player projectile on screen limit is now back but it has also been increased to 5 from 3.
Fixed a fluid surface pausing issue, fixed a general fluid physics issue and tweaked general fluid physics a bit.
Fixed an issue with map markers causing the map marker selection menu to get stuck on screen.
Tweaked player shooting mechanics in attempt to prevent the projectile from spawning at the players feet. (hasn't happened again yet)
Fixed spamming aiming buttons causing the player projectile to sometimes spawn at the wrong position and / or go in the wrong direction.
Fixed a potential crash when killing an enemy with a projectile.
Reduced misc enemy health values a bit.
Reworked two upgrades a bit.
Added a bunch of new tiles.
Added some new particle effects.
Added 4 new backgrounds, improved an old one a bit and added a new background effect.
Added a new enemy and some missing particle effects to misc enemies.
Added a few new rooms. (one of them took a looong time to finish)
Tweaked crawler enemy hitbox so they are now less likely to hit the player through thin walls.

------------------------------------------

This week was pretty good in terms of progress, the devlog could have shown even more but I had to remove a bunch of secret stuff.
I had to make the gif quickly so it's not really that interesting but at least it shows something new.
I don't really have anything else to say so that's it for this one.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 51


(WIP new sprites)

Changes:
Fixed player standing up when getting hit while crawling.
Fixed player knockback on hit so it now works correctly.
Fixed a crash related to an enemy.
Fixed a crash when trying to bind an action to a number key. (1,2,3,4 etc)
Fixed 9 other minor bugs / issues.
Added particle effect for tiles breaking.
Added gameplay option to disable interactable object outlines. (defaults to on for now)
Wrote and added a completely new sprite system to greatly simplify editing the player sprites. (preparation for player sprite reworks)
Added support for room tags and flagged relevant rooms as hidden.
Hidden rooms now use a different color tint on the map.
Added two features to an old upgrade.
Improved the localization system a bit.
Reworked / updated some old rooms.
Flyer enemies can now drop up to 4 items to reduce farming time.
Interactable object outlines are now disabled when choosing "no" on the "enable tutorials" screen and they are now enabled if selecting "yes".
Increased damaged helmet upgrade hitbox size.
Reworked an aspect of another old upgrade.
Tweaked player movement a bit.
Suit power now always displays as "1" when not having a suit.
And finally, started experimenting with reworking misc player sprites.

------------------------------------------

So, I'd be lying if I said everything has been good lately, in fact, it has not.
The week after my previous devlog was the worst one in a long time, first time I punched a wall in like 12 years.
One good thing came out of this though, it made me realize I had to revise my plan a bit.

I've come to the realization that I will have to start having an actual serious side project.
Not as ambitious as this but something that could possibly make me some money, so that it might help me get out of this place I'm living in.

I will not be able to finish this game within a reasonable time frame before I lose my mind from living here.
(EMPHASIS: the game is not dead, I'm not going to stop working on it, it just might get less attention sometimes)

So I don't have much of a choice but to try this right now.
I'll also have to seriously consider the idea of a Patreon and such things even though I don't really like it, maybe even a Kickstarter.. I don't know yet...

So this is why there was no devlog last week, but anyways, enough of this stuff.

------------------------------------------

I'm looking for any kind of feedback on these new sprites, they are not done but they show what direction I'm trying to go.
I'm also not quite happy with how the white one turned out just yet.
This will be the final full player sprite rework so this time we better get it right, or at least good enough.
That's all I got this time and if all goes to plan, expect to see a new game pop up from me some time "soon".

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Sorry to hear that, dude. I hope you figure it out, not juet for the game but for your own sake.
As for the gif, I really like that newer sprite, it looks great.
It is what it is I guess, life is just being life at this point.
We'll see how this side project thing goes, in all likelihood it will crash and burn but I have to try something.

And thanks, I'm really liking how the new sprites are turning out as well, still not satisfied with the white one but the other one is one of my best sprites so far. :)
(assuming you saw the latest version since you liked the status)
 
Yeah I saw the overalls version too which is a nice improvement! Design makes a lot of sense.
Not that I'm much of a fan of Patreon or Kickstarters, but I feel like your game would do well. Though I hope your side project idea works out.
 

Apapappa

Member
Yeah I saw the overalls version too which is a nice improvement! Design makes a lot of sense.
Not that I'm much of a fan of Patreon or Kickstarters, but I feel like your game would do well. Though I hope your side project idea works out.
Nice, so yeah I like the overalls version better than the other one so the final version is likely to stay similar.
I'm not much of a fan of Patreon or Kickstarter etc either but it's getting to the point where I have to look at every option available.
And yeah, we'll see how the side project thing works out.
 

CMAllen

Member
Sorry to hear trouble with the game, because it looks like it has great potential. Sadly, being a creative type is...a bit like being in an abusive relationship. You pour your heart into it, and most of the time, you get nothing but trouble, pain, and disappointment in return, no matter how good you are at your craft.
 

Apapappa

Member
Sorry to hear trouble with the game, because it looks like it has great potential. Sadly, being a creative type is...a bit like being in an abusive relationship. You pour your heart into it, and most of the time, you get nothing but trouble, pain, and disappointment in return, no matter how good you are at your craft.
Oh I know, I feel like my entire life is like that at this point.
But this is one of the few things left that I still enjoy so I have to try.
If I ever manage to get out of here then I'd have at least 3 more things to enjoy but as long as I'm living here, this is all I can do.
So we'll see how this side project thing turns out, I started planning one yesterday and will continue on some time later today.
Oh, and just to clarify, the game isn't the issue here, it's everything else around me.
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 52


Changes:
Fixed 10 bugs / issues.
"Finished" animating the blue jumpsuit player sprites.
Added / created misc new stuff related to the new blue jumpsuit player sprites.
Added a few new rooms and updated / reworked misc old rooms.
Updated a bunch of things to use the newer version of my palette, which is used for the new player sprites. (objects, tiles, backgrounds, etc)
Re-enabled the old "Render Scale" setting which allows you to increase game rendering size to smooth out movements/rotations or just the screen in general.
Scale interpolation is no longer enabled by default. (should remove most of the blurriness)
Adjusted overall game color mood a bit.
Reworked / improved a few old tiles.
Improved important object highlight flashing.

------------------------------------------

Most of this week went into creating and animating the new player jumpsuit sprites and I guess it was a good week overall.
So, I guess I'm looking for some feedback on these new animations, I know it might not be that easy to see considering the gif being so small, but I have to keep the size down and thus it looks like this.
So if you see anything that looks super obviously wrong then please let me know. (there's definitely some wrong stuff going on)
The standing kick animation is not really where I want it to be yet so I know that one definitely has issues.

------------------------------------------

And in other news, I've started slowly working on a side project for reasons mentioned in the previous devlog.
I don't really have anything to show yet but it will be somewhat of a shorter game in the vein of The Legend of Zelda: a Link to the Past, so more on that later when I have something to show.
That's it for this devlog, next time we will hopefully be done with some more player sprite reworks but we'll see.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
the new blue jumpsuit sprite animations look amazing dude! You have really brought it to life!
Thanks. :)
I tried making them a bit more fluid than before and it mostly worked out so far, even though they now use fewer frames as well.
It's mostly the standing kick animation that I'm not really satisfied with yet.
 

Apapappa

Member
Yeah, the blue jump suit looks great so far. Also, I'm not sure anything in the vein of Zelda would qualify as a 'short' game.
Thanks, I've made some more adjustments to some of the animations so they should look even better next time I post them. (mostly the kick and punch)

So, what I mean by "in the vein of Zelda" is mostly the gameplay and top-down (ish) perspective, it will in no way be even close to as big as "A Link to the Past" for example.
I've also got a trick up my sleeve which may or may not make the game better, more on that later though.
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 53



Changes:
Updated misc player HUD sprites to new versions.
Improved damaged helmet collision hitbox.
The save file screenshot is now embedded into the main save file and thus removing 5 extra files in the save folder.
Simplified / reworked parts of the achievement system.
Improved the standing kick and crawl punch player jumpsuit animations a bit.

------------------------------------------

Didn't get much done this week.
But at least I managed to pretty much finish up the jumpsuit animations and start working a bit on the white underwear ones.
So let me know if you see something completely wrong with the animations in the gif.
That's all I got this time.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 54


Changes:
Made numerous misc adjustments to the blue jumpsuit sprites.
"Finished" reworking and adding new animations to the underwear sprites, some showcased in the gif.
Reworked some parts of the in-game intro cutscene.
You can no longer view the upgrade screen without a full suit on. (serves a bit like progression)
The old previously removed green lights during the tutorial sequence are now enabled when choosing "yes" on the tutorial screen.
Tweaked misc player animation speeds.
Updated misc object sprites.
Updated misc HUD icons.
Updated a few rooms.
Fixed 3 bugs / issues.
And finally, started actually reworking the suit sprites.

------------------------------------------

As expected, most of this week went into spriting and animating the underwear sprites.
So if you have any feedback for these new sprites showcased in the gif, feel free to tell me, I'm always looking to improve when I can.

Next week will most likely be the same thing but for the geo suit sprites.
And then when that is done, I can finally get to working on setting up a new demo, but more on that later.

------------------------------------------

In other news, I'll be launching a Patreon some time soon. (probably next week, provided nothing goes wrong)
Now, I understand this might not be that interesting to most of you but this is something I need to do at this point.
The purpose of this Patreon is to set up a way for people who would like to support me and my games, to do just that.
So, more on that later as well.

Anyway, feel free to tell me what you think of this as well as ask any questions you might have.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 55


Changes:
Reworked and animated all suit sprites.
Adjusted misc other player sprites.
Slightly reduced player movement speed while not having a suit.
Increased player oxygen drain under water.
Added a new mechanic.
Reworked Slither's patterns a bit, less randomness and fly spawning is no longer random at all.
Added a faded black background to the robot companion messages to help them stand out.
Re-enabled the "Apapappa Games" intro logo with a new reworked one.
Reworked the Zordak game logo.
Improved the in game fonts.
Adjusted misc menu tooltip positions and reworded misc warning messages.
Updated the "player taking off clothes" intro cutscene sprite to match the new player sprites better. (still WIP as all of the cutscenes)
Updated some old rooms.
Fixed 19 bugs / issues.

------------------------------------------

As planned, most of this week went into reworking the suit.
I won't be showing that just yet though. (very slight sneak peek of a part of the suit in the GIF)
I guess that's it for the Zordak devlog portion of this post.

------------------------------------------

In other news, I'll be joining a game jam today so Zordak will loose a bit of attention for about a week or so.
The reason I'll be doing this is to quickly test out an idea and if it works out good then I might consider replacing my current side project with this, so more on that later.

------------------------------------------

As for the previously mentioned Patreon, I got hit by some issues so that will have to wait a bit, not much I can do about it, I'm currently waiting for something.

Discord Community:
https://discord.gg/fTTEUNZ
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 56



Changes:
Reworked grass swaying a bit, it is now less in sync and more erratic.
Added a light for the player when charging a beam.
Slightly increased screen transition speed.
Adjusted misc menu elements.
Fixed 1 bug / issue.

------------------------------------------

So as mentioned before, I recently joined a game jam: https://itch.io/jam/lowrezjam-2020
So not much got done on Zordak since I spent all my time on the jam game.
I'll be returning to Zordak soon.

------------------------------------------

So let's talk a bit about the jam game instead:

Y.A.W - You Are Weaponized.


Here is a link to the final product after ~78 hours of work:
https://apapappa.itch.io/yaw

So the premise of the jam was a limit of 64x64 resolution and I ended up making a sort of old school Doom / Quake hybrid.
Overall, it turned out better than expected, in fact, so well that I'm strongly considering replacing my side project with this.
Download + more info in the link above and feel free to leave any feedback over there if games like these interest you.

------------------------------------------

And in other news, I have now launched a Patreon, so here's some more information for anyone interested in that:

The main purpose of this is so the people who want to support me and my games, can do just that.
All funds will go to improving my life and as such improving the quality of my games.

There will likely be no real benefits for becoming a patron, mostly because I don't really want to gate off any content and as such keep this entirely optional.
I may, however, add some tiny benefits in the future, like for example: "adding a name of your choice to the credits of the game I'm currently working on" which is a benefit right now.

So feel free to take a look at my Patreon page and do with that as you wish, any and all support is greatly appreciated as this is pretty much my only form of income at this moment.

The censored thing on the left in the first image is also a sneak peek of the new Zordak player suit so be sure to head over to Patreon and check that out. ;)
(it's not behind a paywall, it's just the header image)

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 

Roastedzerg

Member
That Y.A.W. game looks friggin sweet! Also i love your sprite work, smooth animations and pleasing aesthetics. Keep it up! đź‘Ť

Side note: I could learn a thing or 2 from the way you set up your blog, very clean and informative.
 

Apapappa

Member
That Y.A.W. game looks friggin sweet! Also i love your sprite work, smooth animations and pleasing aesthetics. Keep it up! đź‘Ť

Side note: I could learn a thing or 2 from the way you set up your blog, very clean and informative.
Thanks, glad you like the game and my art, I try to do my best. :)
As for the devlog, I try to keep it organized for easier reading and to make it easier for myself to post, so go ahead, take all the inspiration you need. ^^
 

Roastedzerg

Member
Do you mind me asking what program you use to record your snippets of gameplay in your dropbox links when you show changes you've made? Like when you showed your old kick animations and the new ones.
 

Apapappa

Member
Do you mind me asking what program you use to record your snippets of gameplay in your dropbox links when you show changes you've made? Like when you showed your old kick animations and the new ones.
I use https://www.screentogif.com/ to record, then open up the resulting GIF in Photoshop, then use the "Save for web" option and tweak these settings to try and reduce the file size. :)
Any editing is mostly done in Photoshop as well, like putting two gifs together into one and adding text / images.
 
C

Crimson

Guest
I tried out Y.A.W., and it's quite fun!
A little difficult for me, but enjoyable.

And I'm looking forward to seeing more on Zordak!

Good work all around!
 

Apapappa

Member
I tried out Y.A.W., and it's quite fun!
A little difficult for me, but enjoyable.

And I'm looking forward to seeing more on Zordak!

Good work all around!
Thanks for playing. ^^
Many things could be better like: balancing, NOT "R" for restart as this has made many people accidentally reset the level, maybe a bit better cave wall texture to make it less confusing and other things.
But overall, it turned out better than expected.

Zordak updates will come "soon", next step is trying to get a new demo up and running. :)
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 57




Changes:

Increased "Sleep Margin" to 25 from 15, the game will now use a bit more CPU power to reduce the chance of it being stuck at a lower framerate than intended, this could happen because of power saving features on some laptops.
Improved the new suit sprites a bit.
Added a new enemy.
Added misc missing sounds.
Added "Effect Render Scale" menu option, controls render scale of bloom, lighting, AO, etc where a higher value means smoother screen but at the cost of performance.
Added a bar to graphics related menu buttons indicating performance impact in attempt to try and help people know what to change.
Rewrote the lighting shader a bit, fixes "oval" looking lights + slightly improved visual quality and performance.
Updated misc demo related rooms.
Fixed 9 bugs / issues.

------------------------------------------

So.. I've been feeling a bit down again and I won't go into detail but that's one reason why there hasn't been a devlog in a while.

I don't really have much to say this time other than I'm trying to get the new demo done and I may have to go back to testing Linux in a virtual machine again.
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS does not want to work properly on my laptop anymore, I don't know what the issue is but the screen just goes black whenever I rotate or change screen resolution.
The weird thing is that it does not happen on the login screen, rotate works just fine there but as soon as I log in and try to rotate or change screen resolution it goes black.
If anyone has any idea what's going on there, feel free to let me know.

------------------------------------------

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 58




Changes:

Rewrote / optimized parts of the lighting shader / system resulting in "semi-big" performance improvements on my laptop.
Improved rendering performance of misc effects like: bloom, glowmap, ambient occlusion, foliage swaying, O.R.B projectiles and backgrounds / foregrounds.
Improved CPU performance of foliage swaying, backgrounds / foregrounds, O.R.B projectiles, lightning bolts / electricity.
Updated a few rooms.
Fixed 5 bugs / issues.

------------------------------------------

So.. this week I got sick and lost a few days of work but I've almost fully recovered now so shouldn't be much of a problem anymore.
I guess it was like some seasonal flu or something because if it was the "C virus", I suspect things would've been way worse than it was.

But anyway, I've been trying to get the game running smoother on my laptop, with some success regarding rendering but not so much for CPU.
So I guess I will probably try to do some more CPU performance improvements next week.
After that I think it's time to fully test the new demo in preparation for release but I still won't give a time frame on that as things can change at any time.

Still haven't gotten Linux to work properly either so not sure what to do with that at this point, still same issue as mentioned in previous devlog.
But yeah, I guess that's it for this one.

------------------------------------------

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 59


(these were recorded on my laptop so performance would be a bit better without screen recording on, also may be a bit hard to see what I'm trying to show)
Changes:

There will now be another .exe file coming with the demo (whenever it is released) called Zordak_YYC.exe, this is the C++ compiled version of the game which should run with much better performance compared to the normal version, new bugs will likely pop up with this version though.
(everyone here on the GMC probably knows this but I'm putting this info here for other places)

Added "Audio Channel Number" to the audio options menu, lowering this will increase performance but if it's too low, then some sound effects will likely cut out abruptly.
Improved audio playing performance for A LOT of things.
Optimized sound asset files resulting in improved audio performance.
Enabled the built in Game Maker Studio "Use Fast Collision System" option, which increased CPU performance but new bugs may or may not exist now.
Improved CPU performance for A LOT of things, new bugs may or may not exist because of this.
Updated a bunch of rooms.
Fixed 19 bugs / issues.
Rewrote the Profiler to give better performance information among other things. (not really relevant for you guys but still)

------------------------------------------

This week was spent trying to improve CPU performance with some success, the game is still not exactly running smoothly on my laptop but here's the improvements in terms of FPS for a few test:

*** O.R.B Sound + CPU Test :

Old Version: 24 FPS
New Version: 41 FPS
YYC Version: 47 FPS


*** General Room CPU Test:

Old Version: 50 FPS
New Version: 56 FPS
YYC Version: 60 FPS


*** Large Room CPU Test:

Old Version: 30 FPS
New Version: 54 FPS
YYC Version: 60 FPS


Keep in mind that this is running on a laptop with these specs:

1.3 GHz CPU with 4 Cores, up to 1.8 GHz in turbo or whatever it's called but it mostly runs at 1.3-1.5 GHz.
2GB of RAM.
Intel Integrated Graphics running at 600 MHz if I'm lucky, otherwise it can dip down to 300MHz.

This was tested on "High" graphics settings and this computer is what I'm testing on to determine system requirements for the game, so considering this being on "High" settings, performance will likely be better on lower settings, I just use "High" since it's the default setting when starting the game.

And I should probably mention that having more CPU cores doesn't help that much for the game since pretty much everything is single threaded, as in running on one core, playing audio might be multithreaded though so this is where multiple cores will likely help.

So, all in all, the game should be running more smoothly for everyone in the new demo. (again, whenever it is released)
And finally, the release of the new demo is getting closer, still won't say when but unless I find a bunch of issues or decide to add/change more things, it shouldn't be long now.

------------------------------------------

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 60



Changes:
Improved CPU / rendering performance of misc things.
Added player hurt states + sprites.
Improved misc player sprites.
Improved player hitbox + sprite offsets.
Reworked all door sprites, they are now different in other ways than just color.
Added misc effects to certain upgrades.
Added a couple new particle effects.
Added a new room effect.
Added more information to misc upgrade descriptions.
Added misc new effects to certain enemies.
Added misc missing sound effects.
Re-balanced oxygen usage a bit.
Improved the lighting shader performance and quality a bit.
Added a new main menu.
Re-organized misc menu items.
Added a bar to the graphics quality button to indicate minimum and maximum amount.
Added a new credits menu which also displays Patreon supporters, will be shown when finishing the game as well of course.
Enabled the FPS Display for the new upcoming demo version with no option to turn it off, this is done to help me diagnose issues easier from looking at a youtube video for example.
Added a background to the "end of demo" text to make it easier to see. (since some people have missed it before)
Updated pretty much every room in the game to fix misc things, like some door frames being backwards, tile issues, etc.
Fixed 44 bugs / issues.

------------------------------------------

A LOT of stuff got done this week and I'm currently in full testing of the new demo for Windows, Windows YYC and Linux.
So the demo is getting very close to being done, *still* won't say when though but it's close.
I guess that's all I have to say, so, until next time.

------------------------------------------

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 61



Changes:

WINDOWS:
Windows now uses a single lighting shader instead of two depending on settings, will slightly reduce performance of low end devices but increases visual quality.
Added a readme file listing misc useful information.


LINUX:
Disabled the windowed fullscreen option as it doesn't work correctly.
The "install_dep.sh" script has been retired, you now have to install these manually, listed in the readme file.
Updated the readme file.


ANY OS:
Added sprites and support for straight up / down aiming while ledge grabbing.
Added new icons for the executable file.
Updated a few rooms.
Fixed 5 bugs / issues.

------------------------------------------

This weeks changes list may look short, but I've been thoroughly going through the new demo testing stuff and I think it's almost done.
It's at the point where I might be able to release the new demo next week, at least that's what I'm aiming for, but we'll see.
That's it for this time, hopefully there will be some exciting news next week.

------------------------------------------

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 62



Changes:

ANY OS:

- Added a new save file error menu similar to the tutorial menu, asking if you are sure you want to load a save file with errors and lists said errors.
- Added another save error checking method: save format, if these do not match then the save is incompatible and a message will be shown.
- Added a background to the save file error text.
- Added a new room effect.
- Added a tiny bit of the old room color tint back into the lighting system, this was lost due to changes at some point.
- Added missing credits button description.
- Added a HUD icon indicating oxygen is draining faster.

- Added a new rendering option: Effect Frame Skip, off by default because it is a bit experimental.
This will render misc effects at half framerate but can add flickering or maybe even be completely unusable on some computers.
Therefore this will be a separate option alongside global graphics quality preset that is either on or off.
Can effectively double CPU and GPU performance for effects affected by this option.
This option + the lighting version increased FPS from low 40s to 50+ on O.R.B test on laptop, would probably have been higher if audio wasn't so slow.

- Added Lighting Frame Skip option, does the same as above but only for lighting, decided to separate this one since it's the worst offended regarding flickering.

- Improved HUD rendering performance, up to twice as fast. (can be improved more later but will take more time to sort through everything)
The hud now uses a new system for rendering, the old one is still there in case there are a lot of issues with this new one.
If you see anything wrong with the HUD like for example health or oxygen values not updating, please let me know.
(whenever the demo is out of course)

- Added the same performance improvements to the fullscreen map.
(this wasn't necessarily needed but with the new system I can do it so why not)

- Max preset graphics quality now includes setting Render Scale and Effect Render Scale to the highest setting.
This increases smoothness of screen movement / rotations but you will see a huge performance loss on slower computers / laptops. (ONLY on Max Graphics quality)
But since this setting is considered "Max Graphics" it only makes sense to actually put everything on the highest setting.

- Re-organized menu items, adding categories in attempt to make it easier to understand and reduce going back and forth between sub menus.
- Default Sleep Margin is now 30 (maximum according to GMS IDE) to avoid people having to set this themselves when having performance issues, the game will now use more CPU power to try and keep the framerate up.

- Improved Ambient Occlusion quality on all settings, reduces flickering (especially on lower settings) and gives a smoother more natural looking effect.
This will slightly reduce performance for low end devices, up to 5 fps loss with unlocked framerate on my laptop, none or barely any difference in normal play.

- Significantly improved Foliage Swaying/Interacting CPU performance, up to twice as fast, shouldn't cause any new issues but you never know.
Also technically increases performance for every active enemy, although not even close to as much.

- Significantly improved Electricity/Lightning CPU and Rendering performance by reducing arc segments, should barely be any difference in visual quality.
- Significantly improved Light instance CPU performance when outside the screen, hopefully no weird errors start coming up, easily reverted if they do though.
- Improved the damaged helmet player sprites.
- Improved the letters "N,W,V,T" in the game font to be more readable.
- Improved CPU and Rendering performance for general other things.
- Re-worded a bunch of menu button descriptions and added misc new information to some of them.
- Removed the spike "tick" sound, it felt a bit unnecessary.
- Updated some old rooms.
- Fixed 18 bugs/issues.

------------------------------------------

So.. I spent this week fixing bugs/issues, adding/changing things, balancing, etc, based on my early testers feedback and unfortunately some issues were found and I couldn't quite finish everything for the demo release this week.

I'm almost 100% certain that I'll be able to get it done by next week though, I won't promise anything but it's very likely it will be released by then.

------------------------------------------

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 63



The new Zordak demo is out!
There's been too many changes since the previous demo so I'll just be listing the changes since the previous devlog.

DEMO DOWNLOAD (Itch.io)
DEMO DOWNLOAD (Game Jolt)


Changes:

ANY OS:

- Added "gml_pragma("forceinline")" to a bunch of scripts, this should increase general performance when using the YYC version according to GMS.
Didn't really notice much when testing on laptop though.. maybe 1-2 fps increase on O.R.B test.

- Save file format has changed, old save files will not be compatible and loading one will likely cause crashes and/or loss of progress.
This is a necessary change I forgot to do earlier.

- Improved HUD rendering performance.
- Improved Fluid interaction CPU performance, similar to Foliage system, should not cause any new issues but you never know.
- The menu now remembers which button you were on in the previous menu instead of always putting you at the top of the menu.
- Items funneled by charge beam will now move towards the player until the item is collected.
- Fixed 4 bugs/issues.

------------------------------------------

Here it is!
So many things have changed since the last demo so you'll just have to try it out and see for yourself.
Looking forward to hearing your feedback and/or watching playthroughs of this new demo!

If you like the game and/or want to help/support me:
Feel free to spread the word about the game and/or take a look at my Patreon, any help is appreciated!

If you use Discord and want to be more involved with the game or just be notified about updates, feel free to join my discord server listed below.

------------------------------------------

Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 
Last edited:

Apapappa

Member
Devlog - 64

Didn't really find the time to make a new gif so there's only text this time.

Changes:

ANY OS:
- Removed the Metroid easter egg / homage.

- Added multiple controller support, there are some issue though:
This addition may or may not have an impact on performance for low end devices.

For "DirectInput" controllers:
If you're going to use multiple controllers to play the game you have to have them all plugged in when starting the game.
This is because of what seems like a bug with Game Maker Studio 1.4 (GMS) but I'm not completely sure.
When removing or connecting a controller while the game is running always overrides "slot 5" and therefore removing any other controller connected to "slot 5".
This does not happen if you have all controllers connected on game startup.
I only have two controllers to test with so this issue likely exists when using more controllers as well.

For "XInput" controllers:
Both of my controllers are unfortunately "DirectInput" so I have no idea if these issues exist for "XInput" controllers.
They use "slot 0-3" so the slot issue might not be present.

- Pressing "Backspace" to clear a button binding now unbinds both the keyboard and controller button.
- "Backspace" should no longer be bindable to an action.
- "Select" and "Left Stick" should no longer be bindable to an action.

- Pressing "Select" or "Left Stick" on controller in the controls menu now clears both the keyboard and controller button binding.
"Left Stick" was added here to try and cover controllers without a "Select" button.
Controllers with no "Select" or "Left Stick" button will have to unbind keys using the keyboard.
"Left Stick" was chosen instead of "Right Stick" as it makes more sense to me to use the "Right Stick" button for an action while moving.

- Map Exploration and Item Collection percentage has been updated to now show demo progress instead of the full game.
These values have not been correct in a long time for the full game so I decided to just show the demo % instead.

- Added the ability to backtrack through the Preservatory instead of only allowing going around in one direction.
- Added a new secret item.
- Added/Moved misc HUD elements.

- Doubled the amount of time dropped items stay before disappearing.
- Dropped items very close to the player now move towards the player.
- Improved the effectiveness of a two upgrades.
- Re-worder the demo ending message to make it clearer which doors are unlocked.
- Reduced the range of electrical hazards.
- Increased Slither fly attack item drop chance.
- Reduced Slither health a bit.
- Reduced Slither tentacle health a little bit.
- Significantly reduced purple goop particle spawning, this will reduce screen clutter and possibly improve performance a little bit.
- The tutorial robot companion is now disabled in a less graceful way.
- Updated misc old rooms.

- Fixed time played background being displayed on top of the full screen map border.
- Fixed "Escape Artist" achievement not working.
- Fixed misc enemy animation issues.
- Supposedly fixed two issues with light deactivation. (random lights floating in the air)
- Fixed a camera panning vs tile fader issue.
- Fixed HUD not updating on Slither death causing it to display 1% when it's actually 0%.

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I'm currently working on a demo update to fix the issues listed here among others, not sure when this will be out but hopefully soon.
That's it for this one, until next time.

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Links:
Patreon
Discord Community
 
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