Xeno Fighters R (2019 GM Studio Port)

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Tue Jun 09, 2009 11:16 pm

suggestions for making overpowered ships fair:

-game is locked at max rank and/or enemies have revenge bullets
-separate high score board

BPzeBanshee · Post by **BPzeBanshee** » Wed Jun 10, 2009 9:05 am

It's a shame that Gengar was removed, but at the same time I see your point, Alluro. When I actually first saw the Amada Vipros video showing Gengar in the corner I kinda felt the same way. The change to the point scoring system is interesting too, I know I had trouble getting any massive combo bonus with any of the planes in the current public release in general.
I see the Black Heart also looks easier than in the last video too.

Do you think you'll have a stable release by the end of this month?

Aru-san · Post by **Aru-san** » Wed Jun 10, 2009 2:04 pm

BPzeBanshee wrote:I know I had trouble getting any massive combo bonus with any of the planes in the current public release in general.

Watching Alluro's videos of him playing the game sort of doubles as a superplay for this game. As with superplays, study what he does on the stages so that you can get a high score.

TIP: Wait before killing the large ships on the beginning of Stage 1.

BPzeBanshee wrote:I see the Black Heart also looks easier than in the last video too.

Either that or Alluro's just too damn good at his own game.

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Wed Jun 10, 2009 10:14 pm

quick word on Black Heart - the sweeping star-shaped rolling spread actually tracks the player in the original Battle Garegga, moving with the player -- to the point where if the player doesn't realize it's changing the shot angle in respect to player position and moves with the pattern, the player won't be able to weave through a wall of bullets that was created as a result of the player moving with the spread and not just slowly weaving through the normal sized holes.

BPzeBanshee · Post by **BPzeBanshee** » Wed Jun 10, 2009 10:30 pm

Watching Alluro's videos of him playing the game sort of doubles as a superplay for this game. As with superplays, study what he does on the stages so that you can get a high score.

That's what I've been doing, which proves that I generally suck cause I haven't done much better.

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 7:58 am

Black Heart is now 100% complete. Thanks to feedback by Twiddle and others, Black Heart is now quite faithful to its original Garegga counterpart, with a few minor exceptions (the sweeping vulcan attack is still more forgiving in Xeno Fighters than in Garegga originally).

Black Heart's 8-way rotating spread attack in its second phase is now more faithful to the original.

*Black Heart moves slowly during this attack in a rectangular path.
*The rotating bullet stream now actually tracks the player loosely. You now have to be aware of its rotation change, otherwise you'd have a hard time weaving through the bullet streams.
*It now lasts at least 6 seconds.

Plasmo · Post by **Plasmo** » Fri Jun 12, 2009 11:16 am

Black Heart!!!!!
Now your game can't get bad anymore, no matter what you do.

BPzeBanshee · Post by **BPzeBanshee** » Sat Jun 13, 2009 3:23 am

Wow! Looks excellent!
So just what kind of level do you intend on having the Black Heart in, Alluro? Will it be like one of those EX stages or something?

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Mon Jun 15, 2009 7:04 am

BPzeBanshee: Black Heart will be a boss in a hidden extra level (the EX stages), which is not part of the main stage pool.

Zaiva is now 100% complete. It uses the refined and updated Herr Schatten sprites, which replace the original blurry 3D renders.

Zaiva ship portrait and stats.

Description: The Zaiva has above-average firepower and rapid-fire rate. However, it is somewhat lacking in movement speed and defensive spread. This is a useful ship for those who want to destroy enemies quickly. It has some similarity to the F-22 Raptor from Strikers 1945 III, except with more firepower and less speed. Everything about this ship is purple: the ship itself, the weaponry, the bomber, and even its Slaves.

Name Origin: Named by Isotoxin, who designed the ship originally in 3DS MAX, the word Zaiva is the name of an Italian industrial ink and paint company that was founded in 1986.

WEAPON ARRAY:

MISSILE: Brionac Gunpod
Releases weapon pods that aim at nearby enemies and fire micro-missiles. When their ammo stores are depleted, they disintegrate. This is not a very powerful weapon on its own.

LASER: Fragarach's Trident
Shoots piercing laser beams straight forward, which flank the Zaiva's sides slightly. Although not very powerful on its own, this weapon pierces through multiple enemies.

BOMBER: Caladbolg Wave
Releases a massive surge of concentric plasma energy outward, slowly covering the whole screen. This is one of the weakest Bomber weapons from a damage standpoint, offsetting its full-screen coverage and instant deployment. This is an upgrade of the original Zaiva's wide beam wave Bomber, which failed to cover the sides and rear of the Zaiva originally.

Video will come soon.

emphatic · Post by **emphatic** » Mon Jun 15, 2009 7:57 am

Wow, Zaiva looks really cool. The lasers remind me of one of the Storm Blade fighters.

BPzeBanshee · Post by **BPzeBanshee** » Mon Jun 15, 2009 9:53 am

Purple for everything, eh? Will you have a similar fashion of graphics with the other two starter planes?
It looks excellent! I CAN'T WAIT TO PLAY IT!

:D:D

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Mon Jun 15, 2009 11:42 am

Video of Zaiva in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLFTIm5xM9E

Gespenst · Post by **Gespenst** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 11:03 am

@Alluro (or Herr Schatten?), hope these pics helps for the Souvalou and Galaga sprites...
Souvalou

Galaga

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 11:07 am

Gespenst wrote:@Alluro (or Herr Schatten?), hope these pics helps for the Souvalou and Galaga sprites...

We already have Solvalou and Galaga ship sprites. Thanks though.

Gespenst · Post by **Gespenst** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 11:51 am

Alluro wrote:
Gespenst wrote:@Alluro (or Herr Schatten?), hope these pics helps for the Souvalou and Galaga sprites...
We already have Solvalou and Galaga ship sprites. Thanks though.

I see

BTW, how's with those Ace Combat sprites? Will you put them in the game?

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Tue Jun 16, 2009 12:11 pm

Gespenst wrote: BTW, how's with those Ace Combat sprites? Will you put them in the game?

I'd rather put in Strikers 1945 III planes than those sprites, honestly, unless those sprites receive a serious overhaul to fit in the style of Xeno Fighters. Putting in ships is not just a matter of sticking it in and calling it a day. I have to make weapons for it (Main shot, Laser, Missile, Bomber) and balance it out.

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Fri Jun 19, 2009 8:21 pm

v0.2 Release Candidate 1 has been released.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/7v041t

There are too many fixes done since v0.1a to list, but the major stuff in this new version:

*Simplified and revised scoring system.
*Vertical movement to horizontal ship movement ratio increased.
*Judge Spear and Miyamoto have been balanced out.
*Three new ships: Amada Vipros, Zaiva, Zapdos
*Two new playable (but very incomplete) levels.
*Bonus level versus Garegga cameo boss Black Heart (Press 'T' at the select screen).

Please report any bugs or balance issues.

Note:

Stage EX-1 is very incomplete. It's almost devoid of enemies, and it has no powerups and no boss. When you reach the end, the stage will stop scrolling and nothing happens. Reset the game by pressing F2 to quit that stage.

emphatic · Post by **emphatic** » Fri Jun 19, 2009 8:29 pm

Thanks! Updates list looks promising.

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Fri Jun 19, 2009 9:00 pm

Forgot to mention that the INI-based music system is fully implemented in this new version as well.

emphatic · Post by **emphatic** » Fri Jun 19, 2009 11:36 pm

Gemini Valley seems really cool, looking forward to seeing that developed further. Overall impression is: GREAT!

Post by **nZero** » Sat Jun 20, 2009 2:30 am

Will autofire be included soon? Going to kill my wrists taking on Blackheart over and over

Love the custom music feature, gonna play around with the new levels tomorrow to see how they're shaping up and to see if I have any useful criticism to offer

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Sat Jun 20, 2009 4:02 am

judge spear is still too powerful, half the big enemies can't fire a thing with joy2key playing judge spear at 30hz autofire with joy2key, since there's no limit to how many exploded napalm missiles are on screen (there's a limit to the projectiles themselves, but not the explosions like in VP1/the RF games, which makes point blanking really effective instead of just sort of effective)

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Sat Jun 20, 2009 5:29 am

Twiddle wrote:judge spear is still too powerful, half the big enemies can't fire a thing with joy2key playing judge spear at 30hz autofire with joy2key, since there's no limit to how many exploded napalm missiles are on screen (there's a limit to the projectiles themselves, but not the explosions like in VP1/the RF games, which makes point blanking really effective instead of just sort of effective)

Argh. I kept overlooking that issue. Thanks for reminding me of it. Limiting the number of explosions will give me the opportunity to balance out the missile damage and explosion damage as well. Thanks!

Also, a number of people found Zaiva's Missile weapon to be quite overpowered. If more people feel this way, I'll nerf it.

And crap, I forgot to include Boss2.mp3 in the music folder. You can either use your own mp3 file and give it the name "Boss2.mp3", or you can edit the music INI file to point to another mp3 file of your choice.

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Sat Jun 20, 2009 10:49 am

Zaiva's missile weapon doesn't seem very overpowered (at least, not as overpowered as current JS Napalm) as it does roughly the same damage as the laser weapon but has far more utility. However, lowering the damage would make it too useless as a weapon, so I'd suggest lowering the gunpod turn speed to make it more of a tactical weapon (like Zapdos' missile weapon.)

For example, make it slowly change direction after what it first "locks" to, like this: if a gunpod locks on to a rear target first and then destroys it, it should not immediately turn towards targets at the front, but instead steadily turn, making it "miss" shots, as to not be an all-reaching tracking gun like it sort of currently is now, encouraging the player to place the gunpods close to what they wanted to destroy, as opposed to parking them anywhere and letting them take down popcorn enemies for them in all directions.

Making the turn speed too slow would defeat the point of the weapon (a wider angle of defense), though.

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Sun Jun 21, 2009 12:38 am

If you need the missing Boss theme MP3 for Jade Hydra, get it here: http://www.sendspace.com/file/5xtloi

Put it in your Xeno Fighters EX music folder.

Alternatively, you can either use your own mp3 file and give it the name "Boss2.mp3", or you can edit the music INI file to point to another mp3 file of your choice.

BPzeBanshee · Post by **BPzeBanshee** » Sun Jun 21, 2009 9:26 am

I dont need to tell you that this is an excellent piece of work you've created, Alluro. Even the unfinished levels (Level 6B) look visually excellent.
I wish I could make something that looked as awesome as that......>_>

Ixmucane2 · Post by **Ixmucane2** » Sun Jun 21, 2009 3:42 pm

Congratulations for the great game. I have only two points of constructive criticism:

1) I miss the spread weapons that I'm used to in Raiden. Weapons are reasonably wide, but none of them can cover a large portion of the screen and all but one are constant width.
Apart from generic tactical and variety considerations, spread patterns would have a good synergy with the early shooting bonuses that sometimes appear: players could opt to close in to fry enemies with all bullets and kill them faster.

2) I don't have the slightest idea of what controls the value of medals: it tends to remain constant whether I catch or miss them, contrary to "industry standards", then increase a bit for no apparent reason. I have no doubt the scoring system makes sense, but some feedback would be helpful.

EddyMRA · Post by **EddyMRA** » Sun Jun 21, 2009 4:45 pm

Ixmucane2 wrote:Congratulations for the great game. I have only two points of constructive criticism:

1) I miss the spread weapons that I'm used to in Raiden. Weapons are reasonably wide, but none of them can cover a large portion of the screen and all but one are constant width.
Apart from generic tactical and variety considerations, spread patterns would have a good synergy with the early shooting bonuses that sometimes appear: players could opt to close in to fry enemies with all bullets and kill them faster.

Use Miyamoto. There will be more ships that will have wide firepower in later versions.

2) I don't have the slightest idea of what controls the value of medals: it tends to remain constant whether I catch or miss them, contrary to "industry standards", then increase a bit for no apparent reason. I have no doubt the scoring system makes sense, but some feedback would be helpful.

Have you played Raiden Fighters? The medal system follows that game. Increase the value of the medals by collecting every last one visible. The next medal that appears will increase in value. Raizing games follow the same principle somewhat.

Aru-san · Post by **Aru-san** » Sun Jun 21, 2009 5:51 pm

Alluro wrote:The medal system follows that game. Increase the value of the medals by collecting every last one visible. The next medal that appears will increase in value. Raizing games follow the same principle somewhat.

The only minute difference being that medals level up the moment you pick up a medal and not after clearing the screen of visible medals.

Post by **nZero** » Sun Jun 21, 2009 7:53 pm

Alluro wrote:Use Miyamoto. There will be more ships that will have wide firepower in later versions.

Raiden mk-IIβ plz

spread vulcan + forward missiles + cluster bomb