So I started a hack.

You can leave the room during the dragon boss battle - that causes a minor glitch, since the game never exits boss battle mode.

 

@Maelstrom:
I'm not sure if I'm going to do something. The part where you can drown is relatively short and lasts for pretty much just one area (the tunnel.) Afterwards there isn't any water (except on the way back to get the gold bar, which is useless at that point anyhow), then the next level with water is the one where you get a permanent air tank.

It's not something I've discarded, but it's low on my list of priorities. I'd rather get the game done (and bug free ) than going back and tweaking little things. As important as they are to give a game a clean and finished look, I DO want to finish this hack someday. And the game is still a demo, meaning that there's no guarantee that what's already there will remain.

@Slife:
Thanks, I forgot about that one.No internet access at home means I have to rely on a very bad memory. I'll fix that as soon as I get home.

 

So have you added any new bosses from the last release?
Because except for the new explosive charges, I don't see any differences and I'm wondering if I missed something.

 

I'm going to take a wild guess and say you just clicked on the link without reading the post explaining what was different in the latest release.

 

No, but I am wondering what that dragon boss he's talking about is?

Edit: Ahh.. I think he's talking about devon...
Ignore me.

 

Yeah, that would be Devon.

I've started the Core area last night after tweaking the Charges to have a variable range based on their level. Level 1 only covers 1 tile, but level 3 does damage across nearly 3 tiles, which is enough to make it somewhat more useful than it was. The Charges won't truly be useful until their upgrade, which will make them span a larger range, do more damage, and allow the laying down of more than one at a time.

So, the Core. Nothing yet save for an introductory event. There's a powerup for the Charges (more ammo) accessible through careful timing and the jump boots, but nothing else.

Still not sure what I'll add as enemies. I definately want to give the Core a bit of a platformer feel, with tight jumps and such. So most enemies will be geared towards being more of a nuisance than an actual threat.

I found another bug. Using the Charges on the desert wolves makes them stop. Another thing to fix...

 

How do you get out of the room with the charges?
Once I go in, I'm stuck untill I jump into the lava and die.

 

You can't. The hack ends there for now. The statue even tells you that's as far as things go. Hopefulyly you aren't using the debug mode's save anywhere option to save in that room, because your position won't be validanymore.

I should mention that the charges were lowered from 20-some ammo to about 6. This is due to a number of factors, ranging from its increased versatility, a drop in the exp required to level it up, and the fact extra ammo is common enough (in fact there's a pickup not 5 minutes away from where you can get the Charges.) There's no need to start over next time, you'll just have about 20 extra ammo that's all.

 

Another small thing I've noticed:

The headless boss (right before devon, in the room where you get the ion gun) is stupidly easy. On the lowest level of the room there's a small depression almost at the right end of the screen. If you stand in it and fire up, the boss can't hurt you - he jumps before he attacks, so you're out of damage range.

 

Better than my strategy (3 hp), I killed the first one by jumping over the hole and firing down, and the second one by shooting it, jumping down a level and firing up, running back and shooting more until one of us is dead.

 

It can hit you in the hole, but firing away with a Lv3 Handgun is likely to kill it before it can do any serious damage. But there are ways to trap either of them - it's not meant to be a difficult fight. In fact, given that they can't ride the elevator, you can just lead either of them to the bottom section (the first one is already there) and jump back and forth over the hole in the second floor, firing downwards.

 

lol that almost how i killed the 2ed one but it was the one jumping back and forth on the 2ed floor

 

I just got around to trying to download this but it said the file had expired =(

Darnit.

 

add me on AIM : SpaceDlphin
I'll send it to you

 

I found all the bosses to be stupidly easy, but not until the third go-around. This is with the notable exceptions of Devon, who took at least six tries, and the replacement for the jellyfish, who can be killed easily by not moving from the entrace more than a few steps, with no risk to the character.

Edit: That is to say, I very much like how it's put together, with the exception of that one easy boss. The rock cannon makes it more or less a waste of time to even have to fight him.

 

Hrm, I can increase the range of its attack, or reduce the rock cannon's.

I'm glad you enjoyed it. One rather unfortunate thing is that most people complain about the difficulty being too high. The tunnel, for instance, took two revisions before stopped their complaining (the only actual changes were the platforms, which were lenghtened, and the shooting enemies, which were more numerous. And a few other things I forgot. I think some paths were made easier and extra platforms added in the first area. Have a look through some of the older posts in this thread to see what I mean.

I haven't worked on this for a few weeks but I think, when I'll resume, I'll quite watering it down for the sake of less experienced players. I find it relatively easy, and after some of the more recent comments and that rather impressive 3hp run, it's obvious I'm not the only one. >"<

 

Just wanted to mention that gold can't corrode or rust.

 

I think the boss of the submerged tunnel would be at least a bit more difficult if he just didn't start on the opposite side of the room. That way, you'd at least have to dodge him and maneuver him over there before you could relax and snipe him to death.

 

I never thought about sniping it. I just made sure it was always moving vertically. not a hard boss, people.

 

Not sure if this works - can the scripting do this?

This seems like a really backwards way to do it, but if you were able to set up an effect that looks for a projectile from a particular weapon (or maybe keyed off the sound effect of it firing?), you could set it up to teleport a different 'weapon' into the projectile's location that can damage both the player and monsters (after detonating, it teleports back to its home and resets.)

Maybe base the damage effect off a combination of the countdown cloud from egg corridor two and the falling spikes? The weapon would have to have a very long reload time, and only fire one shot at a time, so some sort of giant bomb would be close to ideal.