Magnetar - Global Game Jam 2022 - Day 2
Published
A lot has happened today, and at the ripe ol' time of 4am, that concludes day 2. Tomorrow (But really later today) is the final sprint towards the finish time of 3pm, so after writing this I'm going to have a short rest before I continue. I need it after redesigning the entire game concept a good three times...
Eventually I settled on having only the enemies shoot magnetic bullets, and the player's ship is of a certain polarity. By holding a button, you can flip the polarity, allowing you to selectively attract and repel the enemy bullets to - hopefully - clear your way. This also immediately gave way to a surprisingly easy to implement two player mode, whereby each ship has the opposite polarity and they can't be flipped. Combining this with giving the players different weapons - shooting directly ahead for player one and at angles for player 2, and you've got the recipe for a good co-operative dependence system (so long as you don't accidentally fling a bullet at your buddy.
The enemies are extremely simple, and there are currently three implemented types (with ideas for six). The most basic enemy just sits in one place and fires in one direction, making it very easy to defeat so long as your magnetic field doesn't put you in a negative state. The next type is the first enemy, except it now looks at you. Finally, there's one that tracks you and fires two shots at once, although since both bullets are of the same polarity they quickly separate, adding an aspect of chaos. The fourth enemy I was in the process of implementing is essentially a 'mine' or 'blast' enemy that just spews a bunch of bullets in all directions.
In addition to this, I've also finally managed to set up a main menu scene, allowing you to choose between either mode as well as giving a small tutorial. The logo has a short animation I spent way too long on, but that's something you'll have to see next post (or when you can play the game). Now while the game does feature a fancy spline you can loop around on and a number of battles to take part in, there's not exactly a ‘win’ state. Or, actually, a ‘lose’ state. If you die, the ship just keeps exploding. That's a tomorrow problem I think. Honestly, I'm sure I've done more stuff, but looking back, it was mainly just gameplay experimentation and fighting with the magnetism system. Hopefully more content gets done tomorrow.