Cavadius now has a home, and has undergone several updates. Not sure if anyone here has been keeping up on the website/forum for it, so I figured it might be worth a mention here.
-What's new?-
-Joystick support! (However, only buttons 1-12 are supported. If you really, REALLY need support for anything more than that, tell me. Also, I dunno if it'll vary from person to person, but I've had some sensitivity issues with my gamepad, sometimes a light tap registers a bit longer than the same light tap on a keyboard. This could just be me, but...).
-Joystick Buttons 1-12 are fully customizable
-Keyboard bindings updated to allow rebinding of the Slow Move (shift) key.
-Difficulty modes added (Easy, Normal, Hard.)
-Modified behavior of certain enemies, they will no longer fire when they're X pixels away from the bottom of the screen. (X varies, depending on enemy)
-Mini Core 1 now fires small pulse laser spreads after its initial bullet spread, this gives it something else to do while waiting to leave.
-Mini Core 2 (The one from Salamander that fired ugly clumps of bullets) now has a much better bullet pattern that makes use of various laser type bullets. Far better looking.
-The Big Core is now affected by difficulty settings. On easy, its bullets are much shorter. On normal, nothing much is changed, although it will occassionally fire four pulse lasers towards you during its Quad Laser Sweep.
-The Big Core is now a BEAST on hard mode, specifically when it fires in random spreads or a sweep.
-Bugs-
-Weapon Array screen still doesn't visibly show weapons in left window (Not supported yet)
-Joystick cannot be used for menu navigation/continuing game yet.
-If a joystick is enabled, the keyboard will be non-functional ingame (This is because some Joystick commands only work if I have them 'emulate' a keyboard press. Essentially, the joystick support is an internal version of Joy2Key, figuratively speaking of course.) The function keys ESC (Pause/Return to title), F4 (Window/Fullscreen Toggle) and F10 (Quit Game) will still work though.
The default controls are...
Start Button-Enter Key
Return to Title-ESC while ingame
F10-Quit game (While ingame. use Exit to quit from main menu)
Arrow Keys-Move
Z Key-Fire
X Key-Power Up
Shift Keys-Slow move (While held, you will move at slow speed, even if you used speed ups. Release shift to return to normal speed)
Joystick X Axis-Move left/right
Joystick Y Axis-Move up/down
Buttons 1-12-Customizable, can be set for Shot, Power Up, and Slow Move.
-Gameplay tips-
Combos can result in some massive scores! Keep combos going by rapidly destroying all enemies in your path! Bigger enemies will give more time for the combo!
Type 2 is probably the most beginner friendly, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try the other Types!
Mega Crushes should be used with caution. They will wipe out all enemy bullets and enemies that die in one hit, BUT you will not recieve any credit combo-wise, only points for their deaths.
Your hitbox is a 2x2 pixel square in the center of Vic Viper. ABUSE THIS.
Cavadius now at Trial Version 0.85.
Cavadius now at Trial Version 0.85.
Last edited by ForteMP3 on Tue Apr 26, 2005 2:28 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Just played a short bit and thought it was cool as hell. Going to put some more time into it in the morning before work.
http://www.roushimsx.com/shmups/games/CavadiusTrial.zip
Mirror'd for you, btw.
http://www.roushimsx.com/shmups/games/CavadiusTrial.zip
Mirror'd for you, btw.
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snap monkey
- Posts: 199
- Joined: Sat Jan 29, 2005 2:19 am
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SheSaidDutch
- Posts: 1092
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5parrowhawk
- Posts: 35
- Joined: Tue Mar 15, 2005 8:47 pm
Good concept, clever visuals, absolutely brutal in practice. It's harder than Life Force OR DoDonPachi, and not always for the right reasons.
1. Enemies can shoot at you even when they are very low on the screen. This is an extreme annoyance. Please put in some kind of check to stop most of them (barring bosses/special enemies) from shooting once they get to the bottom 25% of the screen.
2. Bullets at the bottom of the screen are hard to see because of the meter. Please move the meter off the game screen, or put it somewhere where it's not going to cause accidental collisions.
3. It would be nice if you made the "normal" enemies tougher and the "powerup" enemies weaker. Gradius-style games already make it difficult enough to get your ship to a decent power level without having to mess with that kind of bullet-spam.
4. Might want to leave the Options on screen after the player dies, a la Life Force/Gradius V. (edit: I just found out, after about 20 games, that this is in place. The fact that out of 20 games I only ever managed to even GET an Option twice should say something.)
5. IMO the game places too much emphasis on "pre-emptive attacks". This just takes Gradius' main problem (die once and it's basically game over) and multiplies it several times. A rank system would definitely help in controlling this.
6. Edit: Enemy bullets are very hard to see amidst your own. Make the player's shots dimmer, and be sure they're drawn "behind" the enemy bullets.
7. Edit: The shield seems a bit too powerful. You might want to decrease its coverage area a bit, or make it "break" more easily (does it break at all?).
1. Enemies can shoot at you even when they are very low on the screen. This is an extreme annoyance. Please put in some kind of check to stop most of them (barring bosses/special enemies) from shooting once they get to the bottom 25% of the screen.
2. Bullets at the bottom of the screen are hard to see because of the meter. Please move the meter off the game screen, or put it somewhere where it's not going to cause accidental collisions.
3. It would be nice if you made the "normal" enemies tougher and the "powerup" enemies weaker. Gradius-style games already make it difficult enough to get your ship to a decent power level without having to mess with that kind of bullet-spam.
4. Might want to leave the Options on screen after the player dies, a la Life Force/Gradius V. (edit: I just found out, after about 20 games, that this is in place. The fact that out of 20 games I only ever managed to even GET an Option twice should say something.)
5. IMO the game places too much emphasis on "pre-emptive attacks". This just takes Gradius' main problem (die once and it's basically game over) and multiplies it several times. A rank system would definitely help in controlling this.
6. Edit: Enemy bullets are very hard to see amidst your own. Make the player's shots dimmer, and be sure they're drawn "behind" the enemy bullets.
7. Edit: The shield seems a bit too powerful. You might want to decrease its coverage area a bit, or make it "break" more easily (does it break at all?).
The shield has a bug in it I need to address, where it can go into a negative health range..I forgot to do a check for this, so under some conditions, yes, it's indestructable. It's supposed to last for 10 hits.
A rank system may be implemented down the road, depending.
The low screen shots are an issue, definately. They'll be taken care of.
Options will be adjusted so you can get them back on respawn. On that note, I plan to use a much faster, Salamander 2 style respawn (Basically, zip to the respawn point)
Thanks for tips! I'll see what I can do.
A rank system may be implemented down the road, depending.
The low screen shots are an issue, definately. They'll be taken care of.
Options will be adjusted so you can get them back on respawn. On that note, I plan to use a much faster, Salamander 2 style respawn (Basically, zip to the respawn point)
Thanks for tips! I'll see what I can do.
YOU ARE APPROACHING THE TARGET OF ATTACK! THE MISSION STARTS NOW! ARE YOU READY?!
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snap monkey
- Posts: 199
- Joined: Sat Jan 29, 2005 2:19 am
Ok, played it for about an hour and here are some assorted thoughts:
I agree with the respawning issue, being able to move right away is necessary to retrieve your options. I also concur with the low screen shot issue. I would even go so far as to say that normal enemies shouldn't be able to fire backwards.
A number should be displayed next to the speed up description to let you know what level you are upgrading to.
On the whole, the lasers seem to fire too slowly to be effective. I haven't been able to get them to their higher levels so I don't know if this changes, but the initial rate of fire is should be upped.
Also, it'd be nice if you could have more bullets from the default weapon on screen at a time so it's not so much of a burst fire. Would make getting initial powerups easier.
Have you considered implementing a customizable powerup bar as in Gradius Gaiden?
Bugs:
Sometimes the speedups are not reset between games, though this only happened once.
Noticed this the most with Type 2, but sometimes it won't let me get an option even though I have the correct number of powerups.
All in all, I'm having a lot of fun with this and I think most of the issues are little things that can be fixed pretty easily. Great work!
I agree with the respawning issue, being able to move right away is necessary to retrieve your options. I also concur with the low screen shot issue. I would even go so far as to say that normal enemies shouldn't be able to fire backwards.
A number should be displayed next to the speed up description to let you know what level you are upgrading to.
On the whole, the lasers seem to fire too slowly to be effective. I haven't been able to get them to their higher levels so I don't know if this changes, but the initial rate of fire is should be upped.
Also, it'd be nice if you could have more bullets from the default weapon on screen at a time so it's not so much of a burst fire. Would make getting initial powerups easier.
Have you considered implementing a customizable powerup bar as in Gradius Gaiden?
Bugs:
Sometimes the speedups are not reset between games, though this only happened once.
Noticed this the most with Type 2, but sometimes it won't let me get an option even though I have the correct number of powerups.
All in all, I'm having a lot of fun with this and I think most of the issues are little things that can be fixed pretty easily. Great work!
Option bug has been found and will be dealt with.
Also, due to some comments by others on another forum this was mirrored at, I will be implementing an additional gameplay option come next revision of the Trial Version (I plan to get the Trial Version as good as possible, so I'll have a good system to work on when I do the full game).
The new feature? Something I'm sure a lot of manic people will be happy to see...Colored bullets. You'll be able to choose between Classic and Manic bullet colors in the Game Options in a future release. Currently, small Diamond Bullets are light blue, while Large Diamond Bullets are bright pink.
Implementing a Rank System is an idea, but I'll have to figure out how I'm gonna do it. At worst, I suppose I could re-write my bullet patterns. However, the logic behind a ranking system isn't something I'm all too familiar with. Some help in this area would be appreciated.
Also, while a Rank System may not be for awhile, a difficulty system will be availble later on to make the game easier for a first run. I plan to significantly cut the bullet counts in Easy Mode, I may do it somewhat for Normal as well, and perhaps reserve the current patterns for hard.
Cavadius' current state is by no means final. These Trial releases are purely to get player input, so I can improve on the game and have the engine and system set up for a better final product.
As for everyone's comments so far, thank you for your input and honesty, know your opinions do matter, and they will be taken into account as I work on Cavadius.
Also, due to some comments by others on another forum this was mirrored at, I will be implementing an additional gameplay option come next revision of the Trial Version (I plan to get the Trial Version as good as possible, so I'll have a good system to work on when I do the full game).
The new feature? Something I'm sure a lot of manic people will be happy to see...Colored bullets. You'll be able to choose between Classic and Manic bullet colors in the Game Options in a future release. Currently, small Diamond Bullets are light blue, while Large Diamond Bullets are bright pink.
Implementing a Rank System is an idea, but I'll have to figure out how I'm gonna do it. At worst, I suppose I could re-write my bullet patterns. However, the logic behind a ranking system isn't something I'm all too familiar with. Some help in this area would be appreciated.
Also, while a Rank System may not be for awhile, a difficulty system will be availble later on to make the game easier for a first run. I plan to significantly cut the bullet counts in Easy Mode, I may do it somewhat for Normal as well, and perhaps reserve the current patterns for hard.
Cavadius' current state is by no means final. These Trial releases are purely to get player input, so I can improve on the game and have the engine and system set up for a better final product.
As for everyone's comments so far, thank you for your input and honesty, know your opinions do matter, and they will be taken into account as I work on Cavadius.
YOU ARE APPROACHING THE TARGET OF ATTACK! THE MISSION STARTS NOW! ARE YOU READY?!
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SheSaidDutch
- Posts: 1092
- Joined: Tue Mar 15, 2005 12:46 am
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5parrowhawk
- Posts: 35
- Joined: Tue Mar 15, 2005 8:47 pm
(1) Here's my suggestion for a quick'n'dirty rank system.
Player has used 0-6 powerups: Enemies should be easier than normal. For "Normal Mode", just use the Easy version of the same enemy (I assume you're implementing difficulty levels), for "Hard Mode" use the Normal version, etc. For Easy enemies at this rank, any enemy carrying a powerup will not shoot at the player; other enemies will still shoot.
Player has used 7-19 powerups: Enemies should be at their usual power level.
Player has used >20 powerups: Enemies should shoot the same patterns, but more frequently - i.e. reduce the cooldown between enemy bursts.
I doubt that this version of a rank system would be abusable, but just in case, you might want to make some enemies not appear at lower ranks so as to mess with the player's chaining - this would discourage rank-manipulation among advanced players.
(2) Colored bullets are a GREAT idea.
(3) Yeah, Normal mode's lasers are kind of gimpy. My suggestion is that you force the Options to fire in a staggered fashion - so that the Option only shoots when the player is done firing. Thus picking up enough Options would ensure a fairly continuous stream of fire.
(4) Type 3's Double ring needs to fire more frequently or be larger; it's useless as is. It should also follow the player's ship around (IIRC it doesn't at present). Please put a longer delay on the Tactical Missiles too, so they explode a bit further from the ship. As it is, there's no reason to choose the Double weapon over the (really uber) Laser of Type 3.
(5) How about having the shield recharge over time? So it could only take (say) 5 hits, but would recharge slowly. Also, reduced shield coverage area would really help when threading a tight pattern.
(6) I think the burst fire is fine. It forces more "tactical" shooting. A sighting system would be interesting though...
(7) Just for fun, here are some wacky ideas.
- Each ship has a unique "power"...
- Normal ship has a wider collision box for the purposes of collecting powerups - i.e. it doesn't have to be so close to a powerup to pick it up.
- Wide ship can "store" one Mega Crush - it will glow when it has picked one up. Holding down the fire button continuously for 2-3 seconds will release the Mega Crush.
- Tactical ship is less likely to collide with enemies; most (small) enemy hitboxes are reduced to the size of a bullet for purposes of computing collisions. It is also mostly immune to side wall collisions; when it hits a vertical side wall, sparks will fly, and it will only explode after 1-2 sec. in contact with the wall.
- Power ship has a "sight system" - just a line painted from the ship through the top of the screen, to aid in aiming.
Player has used 0-6 powerups: Enemies should be easier than normal. For "Normal Mode", just use the Easy version of the same enemy (I assume you're implementing difficulty levels), for "Hard Mode" use the Normal version, etc. For Easy enemies at this rank, any enemy carrying a powerup will not shoot at the player; other enemies will still shoot.
Player has used 7-19 powerups: Enemies should be at their usual power level.
Player has used >20 powerups: Enemies should shoot the same patterns, but more frequently - i.e. reduce the cooldown between enemy bursts.
I doubt that this version of a rank system would be abusable, but just in case, you might want to make some enemies not appear at lower ranks so as to mess with the player's chaining - this would discourage rank-manipulation among advanced players.
(2) Colored bullets are a GREAT idea.
(3) Yeah, Normal mode's lasers are kind of gimpy. My suggestion is that you force the Options to fire in a staggered fashion - so that the Option only shoots when the player is done firing. Thus picking up enough Options would ensure a fairly continuous stream of fire.
(4) Type 3's Double ring needs to fire more frequently or be larger; it's useless as is. It should also follow the player's ship around (IIRC it doesn't at present). Please put a longer delay on the Tactical Missiles too, so they explode a bit further from the ship. As it is, there's no reason to choose the Double weapon over the (really uber) Laser of Type 3.
(5) How about having the shield recharge over time? So it could only take (say) 5 hits, but would recharge slowly. Also, reduced shield coverage area would really help when threading a tight pattern.
(6) I think the burst fire is fine. It forces more "tactical" shooting. A sighting system would be interesting though...
(7) Just for fun, here are some wacky ideas.
- Each ship has a unique "power"...
- Normal ship has a wider collision box for the purposes of collecting powerups - i.e. it doesn't have to be so close to a powerup to pick it up.
- Wide ship can "store" one Mega Crush - it will glow when it has picked one up. Holding down the fire button continuously for 2-3 seconds will release the Mega Crush.
- Tactical ship is less likely to collide with enemies; most (small) enemy hitboxes are reduced to the size of a bullet for purposes of computing collisions. It is also mostly immune to side wall collisions; when it hits a vertical side wall, sparks will fly, and it will only explode after 1-2 sec. in contact with the wall.
- Power ship has a "sight system" - just a line painted from the ship through the top of the screen, to aid in aiming.
One heck of a time getting it to close. Alt-F4 doesn't work, click the X in the window doesn't work. Ultimately, have to CTRL-ALT-DEL and kill the process form there, and even then it still takes a few seconds before the command to kill the process is noticed.
I should run it again, and check the CPU usage. I did note a bit of slowdown at one point in, and I would like to think my computer could handle this without much a flaw. Then again, it is still beta. Perhaps a lot of room for optimization is there.
As for my computer:
Computer (Main)
- CPU: AMD Athlon 2600+ Mobile
- Motherboard: A7N8X-E Deluxe
- RAM: 1024MB DDR333 (Two 512s)
- HDD(s): C: 80GB HDD / E: 200GB HDD (I forget their RPM ratings)
- Video: nVidia GeForce FX 5600 - 1024x768 32bit 75Hz
- Sound: NVIDIA(R) nForce(TM) Audio (onboard) & Sound Blaster Audigy (PCI)
- Monitor: 15" KDS LCD
- Speakers: 5.1
- OS: WinXP Professional 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build #2600)
I should run it again, and check the CPU usage. I did note a bit of slowdown at one point in, and I would like to think my computer could handle this without much a flaw. Then again, it is still beta. Perhaps a lot of room for optimization is there.
As for my computer:
Computer (Main)
- CPU: AMD Athlon 2600+ Mobile
- Motherboard: A7N8X-E Deluxe
- RAM: 1024MB DDR333 (Two 512s)
- HDD(s): C: 80GB HDD / E: 200GB HDD (I forget their RPM ratings)
- Video: nVidia GeForce FX 5600 - 1024x768 32bit 75Hz
- Sound: NVIDIA(R) nForce(TM) Audio (onboard) & Sound Blaster Audigy (PCI)
- Monitor: 15" KDS LCD
- Speakers: 5.1
- OS: WinXP Professional 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build #2600)
great concept, very nice realization for a first effort. A few minor bugs:
- couldn´t change any options except the first one
- dying enemies in stage 2 left strange signs behind
- collision detection is extremely generous. I went right through a few really tight bullet patterns without dying, seemed easier than DDP
- have to agree: the laser is too weak
to quit the game, you are supposed to hit "escape" which brings you back to the main menu where you can select "exit". Still, having an "X" icon to close the window which doesn´t work is not very professional, and I´d prefer a real fullscreen mode without any desktop in view.
what do you think about a tate mode? I´m always hoping people build that into vertical PC shmups like it´s common for arcade games.
A few suggestions for difficulty settings:
- easy keeps enemies from firing within a certain range, like 150 pixels from the player´s craft
- normal is just normal
- hard means every destroyed enemy shoots a suicide bullet aimed at the player craft when he dies
- couldn´t change any options except the first one
- dying enemies in stage 2 left strange signs behind
- collision detection is extremely generous. I went right through a few really tight bullet patterns without dying, seemed easier than DDP
- have to agree: the laser is too weak
to quit the game, you are supposed to hit "escape" which brings you back to the main menu where you can select "exit". Still, having an "X" icon to close the window which doesn´t work is not very professional, and I´d prefer a real fullscreen mode without any desktop in view.
what do you think about a tate mode? I´m always hoping people build that into vertical PC shmups like it´s common for arcade games.
A few suggestions for difficulty settings:
- easy keeps enemies from firing within a certain range, like 150 pixels from the player´s craft
- normal is just normal
- hard means every destroyed enemy shoots a suicide bullet aimed at the player craft when he dies
Interesting demo.
Might want to get rid of the safe spot behind the boss. There's no reason to dodge his spreads then.
I'm guessing if you have enough options you can just trail them behind you and fly to the top of the screen and it'll eventually die. No need to dodge.
I only had 1 so I had to fly down when it stopped spreading and went back to straight-shot.
I look forward to the full game (and joystick support ... hate ... keyboard).
Might want to get rid of the safe spot behind the boss. There's no reason to dodge his spreads then.
I'm guessing if you have enough options you can just trail them behind you and fly to the top of the screen and it'll eventually die. No need to dodge.
I only had 1 so I had to fly down when it stopped spreading and went back to straight-shot.
I look forward to the full game (and joystick support ... hate ... keyboard).
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5parrowhawk
- Posts: 35
- Joined: Tue Mar 15, 2005 8:47 pm
Safe spot? Might want to move the boss up the screen then. Or have it release rings of bullets if you close in.
Although it's already pretty hard w/o removing the safe spot... I still can't beat it on Normal using the Tactical fighter. Which level of the final game is this going to be?
And once again... player bullets are obstructing visibility. Please fix.
Other notes:
- The hopper dudes can point-blank you: very unpleasant when it happens, and it's difficult to kill them when they wander to the bottom of the screen. Could you set a minimum firing radius for those particular enemies, or something similar?
- I keep feeling that I can fly closer to the sides of the screen than I actually can, and die a lot as a result. Could you either (1) narrow the screen, or (2) allow the player to move closer to the sides?
- There are some enemies (I believe the small blue ones) which fire in this pattern:
/|\
/ | \
I've noticed that when the player moves during their firing cycle, the bullets tend to spread out into a wall, since they're tracking the player. Is this an intentional behaviour? You could consider having them "lock" onto the player at the beginning of the firing cycle and then firing a spread centered on that spot, rather than tracking the player throughout the cycle.
- Each of Big Core's gates should only become vulnerable when the previous one is destroyed. This is a big issue. The Power fighter, with full Options and L2 lasers, can kill it in 9 seconds flat - probably less, but I'm not a very good player. I literally saw all of the gates vanish at once under the area laser attack.
Apart from those issues, it's looking very good (although still kind of hard). I used to like the Tactical fighter, but now the Power loadout is looking very attractive - even if you fixed the Core bug, it'd still be really good for the tight sections, either using lasers to destroy the launch bays or using Double and going in up close and personal with the autoguns.
Although it's already pretty hard w/o removing the safe spot... I still can't beat it on Normal using the Tactical fighter. Which level of the final game is this going to be?
And once again... player bullets are obstructing visibility. Please fix.
Other notes:
- The hopper dudes can point-blank you: very unpleasant when it happens, and it's difficult to kill them when they wander to the bottom of the screen. Could you set a minimum firing radius for those particular enemies, or something similar?
- I keep feeling that I can fly closer to the sides of the screen than I actually can, and die a lot as a result. Could you either (1) narrow the screen, or (2) allow the player to move closer to the sides?
- There are some enemies (I believe the small blue ones) which fire in this pattern:
/|\
/ | \
I've noticed that when the player moves during their firing cycle, the bullets tend to spread out into a wall, since they're tracking the player. Is this an intentional behaviour? You could consider having them "lock" onto the player at the beginning of the firing cycle and then firing a spread centered on that spot, rather than tracking the player throughout the cycle.
- Each of Big Core's gates should only become vulnerable when the previous one is destroyed. This is a big issue. The Power fighter, with full Options and L2 lasers, can kill it in 9 seconds flat - probably less, but I'm not a very good player. I literally saw all of the gates vanish at once under the area laser attack.
Apart from those issues, it's looking very good (although still kind of hard). I used to like the Tactical fighter, but now the Power loadout is looking very attractive - even if you fixed the Core bug, it'd still be really good for the tight sections, either using lasers to destroy the launch bays or using Double and going in up close and personal with the autoguns.
You could destroy the gates out of order in Gradius as well.5parrowhawk wrote: - Each of Big Core's gates should only become vulnerable when the previous one is destroyed. This is a big issue. The Power fighter, with full Options and L2 lasers, can kill it in 9 seconds flat - probably less, but I'm not a very good player. I literally saw all of the gates vanish at once under the area laser attack.