Basically I have about 9-10 weeks to do:
- State Manager
- Main Menu
- In-Game Menu
- Scaly AI Improvement
- In-Game Help Text/Subtitles
- Sound Effects
- Optimisations: Quad-Tree system
- Optimisations: Basic impostor system
- Optimisations: Occlusion culling
Plus I'd like to get ragdoll in for the Scalies when they die.
Compared to the amount I did in the first half of development this is nothing, but my internship leaves me burnt out by the weekend. Still every Monday and Tuesday we have to go in and work on the game from 9-5 and show our progress in a weekly meeting, which is good cause it prevents any major slacking. Ideally I'd like to have everything on that list completed in 3-4 weeks so I can spend the rest of the time polishing and tweaking.
So a little more information on the game: Humans occupy almost all planets in their galaxy and in an effort to expand their empire, they send expeditions to neighbouring galaxies. One of these finds hostile alien life which then traces the expeditions route back to the human galaxy and invades. You play as Outworlder Alpha-87, the 87th inductee into the elite ranks of the Outworlders. These soldiers are sent to remote planets that don't have a strong defensive presence.
The game takes place 10 years after the start of the invasion and Outworlder Alpha-87 is sent on his first mission which is to retrieve new Fuel Cell technology that has been developed on a research planet. Unfortunately the aliens (the Maurosaur) arrive first and shoot down the Outworlder's ship. It crashes into the ocean with your equipment and you're left with only your jetpack to battle the aliens and retrieve the scattered Fuel Cell prototypes.
You jetpack has a main thruster which is mainly used for flight but can also blast all its fuel out at once, damaging nearby enemies and unearthing small rocks from the ground. The jetpack also has side thrusters that can suck or blow. They can assist in flight, blow rocks or suck up rocks and then shoot them out. The more Fuel Cells you collect, the better your abilities will be.
The main enemy the Maurosaur or "Scaly" is a humanoid lizard creature that shoots bolts of energy from their weapon. They will take cover behind nearby rocks and whatnot when being attacked.
The other enemy is the Scuttler. These are small crawling creatures that are about the size of the typical rock that the Outworlder can shoot. They will charge at the player and explode on impact, but the Outworlder can blow them back or suck them up and shoot them like grenades. They will explode after a few seconds once sucked up if not shot.
The game is being made to be short and sweet. It will take place on one level and there will be 8 Fuel Cells to collect. Once the player has collected them then he'll be able to fly high enough to reach the research outpost and fly away.
Very boring but I guess I had to explain all that. To show that I did actually fix the Scaly weapon offset after the last update, here's a screen:
