Platform shift

I've been reading up about OpenLaszlo and am thinking of shifting the game to that platform. It would allow me to publish the game online (as X-Assault started) and would get rid of my concerns about people being able to run the latest Visual Basic applications (particularly the Mac people).

The code would need to change, but the fundamental programing steps are pretty much locked in. Over the weekend I was reviewing the characteristics of the base set of characters and it looks like nearly everyone has at least one special ability (either positive or negative).

Progress #7

As I get closer to completeing the game I found another sidetrack!

I've decided to use an ".INI" file so users can track their progress.

A defeat of each enemy, finding all the hidden characters, witnessing or triggering certain special events and completeing each chapter will count towards a percentage amount displayed at the end of each game.

This would also save the chapter progress (so no password system will be needed).

I think it will give people who finish the regular game incentive to keep playing to find all the percentage points.

I may even use this to unlock an inbuilt information gallery/database.

But first back to programming the villain's special abilities (or handicap in the case of Starscream).

Progress #6

I continue to get side-tracked with the fun elements rather than the game play. I've come up with an additional team with it's own hidden villain for example. But I've got to get the basic game done first! I have revised the mechannics of character creation for the Autobots and next I have to do the same for the Decepticons. It has mucked up retreating/benching but in the long run should make that aspect work more correctly. It also frees up some memory that was really being tied up for no good purpose.

Progress #5

I'm working on the Random team button and the option to buy characters on the character selection screen. The space bar thing is still bugging me.

I also have to keep working on the trivia questions. I've still got around 30 to come up with.

That aside, you can now make your team of five and send four of them to the locations the Decepticons are attacking.

The next major step will be to recreate the battle screen from the aborted version.

Progress #4

I've got the character selection working and the following trivia competition. The spacebar seems a bit slow sometimes though when selecting a character so I have to look at how that's working.

One of the secret characters has also been seeded.

Putting together the team also works. However once you've added a character you can't take him back. It's permanent. I don't like that. I want to give players the option to customise further, up until the final selection.

Future characters

There's a lot more characters, both heroes and villains I'd like to put into the game but I realise that I shouldn't go too far in the first version.

I think that when the game finally gets to chapter four there will be at least another 24 playable characters. This has risen from 20 over the past two month as more and more ideas have came into my head.

Progress #3

I overloaed my main form and now I can't load the project file.

So I've gone back to basics and am building the game almost from scratch, but in order of the how the game play will work.

Fortunetly I can still access all the individual forms and the code so it's not all lost.

I'm currently working on the character selection board and the trivia contest.

To be honest, this is not the part of the game I enjoy, but I'm trying to be true to the original format and the trivia does add some extra play value.

I might leave a secret code in to bypass this and select the characters with greater ease.

I did like the memory game approach.