OpenFire game: top-down shooter, bullet hell

[eugeneloza]

New betta-release: a few improvements: better interface, better music handilng, "crossfire" map, better co-op mode, and others.
A few more interface improvements to be able to port it to Android...

Added new screenshots.

P.S. I'd be very grateful if anybody could look through the game texts (spoilers! ) for errors and suggestions: http://forum.freegamedev.net/download/file.php?id=9712 . English is not my native language
Also I use x1.5 difficulty multiplier for co-op mode. Could anybody test if it's not too difficult/too easy?

[eugeneloza]

Release candidate
Everything is up and working as expected.

I'd be very thankful if anybody could test the game against story and other maps being too hard. Especially multiplayer, as far as I have no-one to play with

[Ñuño Martínez]

Unfortunately I have almost no free time lately. I would like to test it...

[eugeneloza]

I've made a complete walkthrough on hard. Video is in the first post of the topic.

Still struggling with Android cross-compillation setup

[eugeneloza]

Today Android - tomorrow the World!

Finally I've made an Android release. Still very buggy and huge in size (some problems with audiolibrary require uncompressed music storage... I hope it'll be fixed soon )

Practically after successfully setting up FPC cross-compillation to Android (that was the hardest part), Castle Game Engine compiles Android apps like a charm without any need to make some platform-specific code!

Android overhaul.
Joystick / gamepad support thanks to Tomasz Wojtyś
Interface improvements
Speed improvements
And more!

[SilverWarior]

Nice!
Keep up with the good work

[Rodrigo Robles]

Hei Eunege, I tested the game right now, It is very good!

I liked the fun story, the graphics are good, music and sound effects nice, playability is fun too.

The performance is good, It runs ok in an old 9 year desktop.

I missed a score counter (Am I too old school?)

I played it at medium dificulty, and even for my standards (I finished a dozen megamans decades ago) is hard.

For the nowadays game design patterns, it would be good to have finishable stages with a limited number of enemies, that would slowly becoming harder in the next stages. Finishable stages provide a reward for the player.

Excellent work, keep it up.

[eugeneloza]

Hei Eunege, I tested the game right now, It is very good!

Thanks a lot for your feedback, Rodrigo!

When I've started this project I was just thinking of "endless" gameplay with score and ever-increasing difficulty each stage like the 1981 prototype. But finally I ended up with just surviving overwhelming enemy fire is much more fun But, maybe I'm wrong?

You think it'd be a good idea to implement "endless" mode with hig scores? It's not too difficult to do. I'll just have to make room not only for 'constant' maps but for dynamic-generated and check that there is no conflict with custom maps start/end.

I played it at medium dificulty, and even for my standards (I finished a dozen megamans decades ago) is hard.

Yeah... the controls are relatively complex (many new-school players couldn't get hang of that at all) and it takes some time to get used to.
I've found that different controls styles provide significantly different difficulty level. E.g. Android controls are much more difficult (I can hardly beat all maps on 'easy', while even 'hard' level is easier on PC).
Should the difficulty of Normal be lowered a bit?

I've been designing difficulties from the following ideas:
Insane - I can hardly beat that one myself.
Difficult - challenging for me, but usually I eliminate every map in one try.
Normal - I end the map with over 30% hitpoints left.
Easy - easier than Normal.

Finishable stages provide a reward for the player.

Well... practically story maps are progressively becoming ever difficult.
E.g. beating bedroom is no problem as soon as player gets used to controls and understands strategy for killing disablers.
Livingroom is relatively harder and more concentration is needed, but it's still easy to beat it.
Cellar is hard due to shielders working very efficiently in narrow passages and heavy bots. I had to reduce amount of enemy bots a few times to be able to beat it. Most problematic is the boss - Miner avoids fire and spawns bombs that can be taken out easily but do a lot of damage and distract from attacking the boss. And if there is heavy support it's a disaster.
Kitchen is nearly the same difficulty as Cellar, but the fact that healer bots are less effective but more annoying than shielders. And Carrier boss is a hard nut, because there is no way to resist the damage of the fighters like player could with mines.
And attic is the most problematic map because it is highly influenced by random. Sometimes it's impossible to beat, and sometimes it's relatively easy. I couldn't balance it right even by bringing in pre-defined spawn patters for Fi-Wi... And practically it became more an epilogue than a really hard map. It tests more reaction than manuvering and tolerates max 1-2 mistakes at Hard. So... the battle became epic, but not very interesting from gameplay point of view.

Any suggestions are highly welcome