The Last Sunshine
The Last Sunshine
Hey Shmup fans,
This seems like a pretty hardcore community. While our game, The Last Sunshine, is not a typical shmup, we've borrowed elements from the shmup genre heavily. It would be great to get feedback on our game which just hit beta.
Store page: http://store.steampowered.com/app/390960/
Passive planner: http://tls.foureyes-productions.com/pas ... ?selected=
Thank you for your time.
This seems like a pretty hardcore community. While our game, The Last Sunshine, is not a typical shmup, we've borrowed elements from the shmup genre heavily. It would be great to get feedback on our game which just hit beta.
Store page: http://store.steampowered.com/app/390960/
Passive planner: http://tls.foureyes-productions.com/pas ... ?selected=
Thank you for your time.
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BulletMagnet
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Re: The Last Sunshine
Just gave the "medium" difficulty a quick try, a few brief thoughts:
- I like the presentation, it seems to lay somewhere between "abstract Geometry Wars-ish" and "organic kill-the-viruses-ish", and the artwork is nice IMO. I would definitely suggest including options to tone down the visuals, though, since the game was playable on my laptop but frequently dropped the framerate when a decent amount of stuff was going on.
- The controls seem pretty simple; playing on a 360 controller it's just the two sticks and two trigger buttons, or am I missing something?
- Weapon balancing is obviously still a work in progress, but in a fair amount of cases I felt like it was best to just hold both triggers down all the time and aim whenever something appeared; I almost feel like the weapons, especially the more abusable ones, should be limited a bit, maybe with a short cooldown timer or the ability to fire only one at a time...then again, maybe giving the player incentive to go Schwarzenegger was the idea, I'd be interested to hear more from you on that...
- ...especially since the enemies here are deceptively mean at times, especially the bum-rushing red things, which were easily my biggest bugbear whenever a bunch of them came at me at once (though I glimpsed a handful of things that flooded the screen with bullets, which were no picnic either). Even the little floaty things can hide in the "grass" along walls, which can sometimes make it hard to tell when you're getting hit.
- On that note, giving the player a bit more info to go on would probably also be a good idea; I can understand trying to keep the HUD clean, but in truth I wasn't sure exactly what the game wanted me to do besides float around and not die until the exit showed up, since there were no indicators of major targets or additional information, nor any description of what items and other things did, or even if certain enemies were taking damage. Again, I'd assume you're working on this stuff, but a hint or two might help the game flow better.
I think that covers the major points...some good things happening, interested to see where this goes. Let me know if i need to explain anything better.
- I like the presentation, it seems to lay somewhere between "abstract Geometry Wars-ish" and "organic kill-the-viruses-ish", and the artwork is nice IMO. I would definitely suggest including options to tone down the visuals, though, since the game was playable on my laptop but frequently dropped the framerate when a decent amount of stuff was going on.
- The controls seem pretty simple; playing on a 360 controller it's just the two sticks and two trigger buttons, or am I missing something?
- Weapon balancing is obviously still a work in progress, but in a fair amount of cases I felt like it was best to just hold both triggers down all the time and aim whenever something appeared; I almost feel like the weapons, especially the more abusable ones, should be limited a bit, maybe with a short cooldown timer or the ability to fire only one at a time...then again, maybe giving the player incentive to go Schwarzenegger was the idea, I'd be interested to hear more from you on that...
- ...especially since the enemies here are deceptively mean at times, especially the bum-rushing red things, which were easily my biggest bugbear whenever a bunch of them came at me at once (though I glimpsed a handful of things that flooded the screen with bullets, which were no picnic either). Even the little floaty things can hide in the "grass" along walls, which can sometimes make it hard to tell when you're getting hit.
- On that note, giving the player a bit more info to go on would probably also be a good idea; I can understand trying to keep the HUD clean, but in truth I wasn't sure exactly what the game wanted me to do besides float around and not die until the exit showed up, since there were no indicators of major targets or additional information, nor any description of what items and other things did, or even if certain enemies were taking damage. Again, I'd assume you're working on this stuff, but a hint or two might help the game flow better.
I think that covers the major points...some good things happening, interested to see where this goes. Let me know if i need to explain anything better.
Re: The Last Sunshine
Most of these critiques seems pretty fair to me. Thanks for taking the time to give feedback. I'll reply to your critiques:
- We're continually working to make optimizations so it will run more efficiently. As we progress, we should be able to keep the community in the loop.
- The controls are basically as you've mentioned. Easy allows 1 skill, medium allows 2 skills, and hard allows 3 skills. In the beta you can get a maximum of 2 skills for now. More on that later.
- The demo is an older version and you're certainly right that some skills are easy mode. In the beta we have a better idea of how to tune skills and you can see the patch logs we've done over just the past few days to tune skills. I'm always open to feedback here as well. The idea here is customization and to allow players to go nuts. However, if they are able to use two 'cover the screen' skills and beat everything there's a failure from a design standpoint, again, something we've addressed in the beta.
- What do you mean deceptively mean? Because you didn't mention it, is it possible you missed the Passive Tree? While it's true you can take damage from something hiding in the grass, you shouldn't be dying in one hit unless you spec pure speed.
- The HUD is also a good point. Eventually we'll need to add a mini-map to indicate where you've been on levels that become a large maze. I like to try to keep HUD as simple as possible and relay information from actual game elements when possible. For example, as Sol suffers damage he gets smaller (Orgone) or if his shield suffers damage it becomes weaker looking. Additionally, as far as what you're supposed to do, it's essentially one of two things, kill the thing or touch the end. I mean, really it's simply touch the end because after the thing is the end anyway.
Good points.
I have an idea, BulletMagnet. Why don't you send me a private message and I'll give you a beta Steam key for free and you can test the beta and give feedback on the newest version? What do you think?
- We're continually working to make optimizations so it will run more efficiently. As we progress, we should be able to keep the community in the loop.
- The controls are basically as you've mentioned. Easy allows 1 skill, medium allows 2 skills, and hard allows 3 skills. In the beta you can get a maximum of 2 skills for now. More on that later.
- The demo is an older version and you're certainly right that some skills are easy mode. In the beta we have a better idea of how to tune skills and you can see the patch logs we've done over just the past few days to tune skills. I'm always open to feedback here as well. The idea here is customization and to allow players to go nuts. However, if they are able to use two 'cover the screen' skills and beat everything there's a failure from a design standpoint, again, something we've addressed in the beta.
- What do you mean deceptively mean? Because you didn't mention it, is it possible you missed the Passive Tree? While it's true you can take damage from something hiding in the grass, you shouldn't be dying in one hit unless you spec pure speed.
- The HUD is also a good point. Eventually we'll need to add a mini-map to indicate where you've been on levels that become a large maze. I like to try to keep HUD as simple as possible and relay information from actual game elements when possible. For example, as Sol suffers damage he gets smaller (Orgone) or if his shield suffers damage it becomes weaker looking. Additionally, as far as what you're supposed to do, it's essentially one of two things, kill the thing or touch the end. I mean, really it's simply touch the end because after the thing is the end anyway.
Good points.
I have an idea, BulletMagnet. Why don't you send me a private message and I'll give you a beta Steam key for free and you can test the beta and give feedback on the newest version? What do you think?
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BulletMagnet
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Re: The Last Sunshine
I did make use of the passive tree, what I meant there was that it's quite easy to get swamped with enemies and/or bullets at certain junctures; I recall wandering into an area where there was a big bullet-spewer and at least 3 red-thing spawners, I just barely managed to escape intact even without attempting to fight anything, which would have unquestionably killed me in moments (as would accidentally retreating into another unfriendly area). Toss a few of the little guys in there to catch you off guard when you're panicked and it's basically over, heh.Hex wrote:- What do you mean deceptively mean? Because you didn't mention it, is it possible you missed the Passive Tree?
PM coming your way.

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BulletMagnet
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Re: The Last Sunshine
I coulda sworn I did, but I don't see it in my "sent messages" folder; I'll try again. 

Re: The Last Sunshine
I got the PM. Get your key! ; D
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BulletMagnet
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Re: The Last Sunshine
Hey, finally got to spend a bit of time with the Steam beta, here are some thoughts. Forgive me if some of them have been mentioned already:
- The game runs nicely at 60 FPS on my laptop, with two onscreen exceptions: enemy-spawning vortexes, and those locked red gates. Either, let alone both (my run ended at a boss fight where the frame drops made it too erratic to dodge everything) cut it to half or less; I'd guess that there are just too many particle effects happening for my machine to handle (screens full of the little floating enemies didn't seem to faze it), so I'd definitely include an option to turn those down.
- My 360 controller also works fine in-game, but not in the menus, so enabling that would be good to add to the list if it's not there already.
- The difficulty curve is much improved over the older build I'd tried; things still ramp up fairly quickly, but I felt I had significantly more time to get my feet wet than before. I am tempted to say that players should get at least a little bit of invincibility (or some other recourse) after taking damage; my run was going pretty well until one of those charging bug enemies snuck through a thick bullet pattern as I was targeting something else, he just sat on top of me and I was depleted and dead in less than a second.
- I still feel there at least ought to be an option for a more detailed HUD, or a basic tutorial rundown accessible from the pause menu; I still have no idea what some of the collectables are for. Also, the more I play the more I think I'd like mini-healthbars (or some facsimile thereof...a color change, maybe?) for at least certain enemies, so I wouldn't lose track of who to prioritize in the middle of an onslaught. A way to "test" weapons in real time before unlocking them, or perhaps an option to sell them back if you find it's not your style, might also help mitigate bad-dice-roll frustration.
- That said, is there any rhyme or reason behind how much "currency" (and which type) to unlock new weapons you get after finishing an area? Sometimes it felt like I got a good chunk from a relatively easy segment, while lengthier, trickier areas didn't award as much. Maybe players could choose to increase an area's difficulty in some way when entering, in exchange for greater rewards?
While we're on the topic, have you considered introducing some kind of scoring system, or perhaps a separate "arcade" mode (or daily/weekly challenge, etc.) with more "fixed" parameters focused on high-score chasing? Folks like the ones on the forum would definitely appreciate it.
- To segue back into the "main" game, I've mentioned before that I like the game's look and theme, but I don't think it's "quite there" yet. Playing as a celestial body - or something like it - is neat, but IMO the game doesn't quite nail the "cosmic" feel it needs to really sell the concept. Apart from the starry background layer (some occasional comet streaks or passing planets or the like would liven it up, if that's technically possible), the environment (at least the one I've played) could be from a completely different shooter, and the grand sense of scale doesn't fully come across.
I know it's still a work in progress, but on a related note I found the music somewhat repetitive; it's not terrible, but at least early on it's only broken up in boss levels. If composing new tunes and/or cycling between samples isn't possible, even occasional segments without music, perhaps punctuated by sound effects (radio static or beeping to evoke space travel, the echoing, empty hum of deep space, unsettling synth chords, etc.) might add a bit of variety and atmosphere. Perhaps some of the sound effects could be a bit "grander" as well.
As a final note, while this is more personal opinion than anything objective, as it stands the game feels to me like the sort of experience best taken slowly and absorbed unhurriedly; I feel like I should have more motivation to explore distant corners, learn more of the universe's lore, search out elusive enemies that I'd never encounter otherwise, open alternate paths, stuff like that. As it stands, in most levels you're pretty much encouraged to hoof it to the exit and only bother shooting stuff if there's too much of it to avoid otherwise; as soon as I saw the portal I had no more reason to stick around, which somehow didn't feel quite right. I know that the RNG stuff makes this more difficult to implement effectively, but I'd definitely limit the "just get to the point" spirit (outside of the aforementioned arcade mode, anyway
).
I think that covers the major stuff; let me know if I need to explain anything more clearly or if you want anything specific tested. Best of luck from here on out.
- The game runs nicely at 60 FPS on my laptop, with two onscreen exceptions: enemy-spawning vortexes, and those locked red gates. Either, let alone both (my run ended at a boss fight where the frame drops made it too erratic to dodge everything) cut it to half or less; I'd guess that there are just too many particle effects happening for my machine to handle (screens full of the little floating enemies didn't seem to faze it), so I'd definitely include an option to turn those down.
- My 360 controller also works fine in-game, but not in the menus, so enabling that would be good to add to the list if it's not there already.
- The difficulty curve is much improved over the older build I'd tried; things still ramp up fairly quickly, but I felt I had significantly more time to get my feet wet than before. I am tempted to say that players should get at least a little bit of invincibility (or some other recourse) after taking damage; my run was going pretty well until one of those charging bug enemies snuck through a thick bullet pattern as I was targeting something else, he just sat on top of me and I was depleted and dead in less than a second.
- I still feel there at least ought to be an option for a more detailed HUD, or a basic tutorial rundown accessible from the pause menu; I still have no idea what some of the collectables are for. Also, the more I play the more I think I'd like mini-healthbars (or some facsimile thereof...a color change, maybe?) for at least certain enemies, so I wouldn't lose track of who to prioritize in the middle of an onslaught. A way to "test" weapons in real time before unlocking them, or perhaps an option to sell them back if you find it's not your style, might also help mitigate bad-dice-roll frustration.
- That said, is there any rhyme or reason behind how much "currency" (and which type) to unlock new weapons you get after finishing an area? Sometimes it felt like I got a good chunk from a relatively easy segment, while lengthier, trickier areas didn't award as much. Maybe players could choose to increase an area's difficulty in some way when entering, in exchange for greater rewards?
While we're on the topic, have you considered introducing some kind of scoring system, or perhaps a separate "arcade" mode (or daily/weekly challenge, etc.) with more "fixed" parameters focused on high-score chasing? Folks like the ones on the forum would definitely appreciate it.
- To segue back into the "main" game, I've mentioned before that I like the game's look and theme, but I don't think it's "quite there" yet. Playing as a celestial body - or something like it - is neat, but IMO the game doesn't quite nail the "cosmic" feel it needs to really sell the concept. Apart from the starry background layer (some occasional comet streaks or passing planets or the like would liven it up, if that's technically possible), the environment (at least the one I've played) could be from a completely different shooter, and the grand sense of scale doesn't fully come across.
I know it's still a work in progress, but on a related note I found the music somewhat repetitive; it's not terrible, but at least early on it's only broken up in boss levels. If composing new tunes and/or cycling between samples isn't possible, even occasional segments without music, perhaps punctuated by sound effects (radio static or beeping to evoke space travel, the echoing, empty hum of deep space, unsettling synth chords, etc.) might add a bit of variety and atmosphere. Perhaps some of the sound effects could be a bit "grander" as well.
As a final note, while this is more personal opinion than anything objective, as it stands the game feels to me like the sort of experience best taken slowly and absorbed unhurriedly; I feel like I should have more motivation to explore distant corners, learn more of the universe's lore, search out elusive enemies that I'd never encounter otherwise, open alternate paths, stuff like that. As it stands, in most levels you're pretty much encouraged to hoof it to the exit and only bother shooting stuff if there's too much of it to avoid otherwise; as soon as I saw the portal I had no more reason to stick around, which somehow didn't feel quite right. I know that the RNG stuff makes this more difficult to implement effectively, but I'd definitely limit the "just get to the point" spirit (outside of the aforementioned arcade mode, anyway

I think that covers the major stuff; let me know if I need to explain anything more clearly or if you want anything specific tested. Best of luck from here on out.
Re: The Last Sunshine
Cool, thanks for the detailed reply, BulletMagnet.
1. Generators (enemy-spawning vortexes) are up to bat for an optimization change. Right now there's no limit on how many enemies they can spawn, which is fun, but bogs things down after too much is on screen. Mostly they throw out Trites (refer to our online manual for names of stuff: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yS2 ... Ids9H2aObU) and Trites bump into each other a lot which drags on your processor. I'm thinking we'll put a limit on enemies Generators can spit out and also make Trites pass through each other. Furthermore, I literally just told our artist last night to look at barrier (locked red gates) effects and make sure there aren't too many particles. We've heard complaints about those in the past.
2. Getting controllers working in menus is a low priority, but it's something we want to do ultimately.
3. The difficulty curve in our alpha build (now removed) was not consistent, but that was intentional. It was easy, medium, hard level, not level 1, 2, 3, because we wanted feedback. Maybe Fiends are too powerful? I don't think so. It also depends on your build and your expectations for the game itself. I recognize your a skill shmup player. I doubt you'd keep dying from that same thing over and over. Having said that, I recognize there could be legitimate balance concerns. We'll see as we progress.
4. Your 4th note hits on a lot of things we're still thinking about ourselves. We're certainly not done on UI yet. We've discussed hp bars vs visual damage states on enemies themselves. Damage states look nice but take time. We've thought about showing an animation to illustrate the skill's behavior before buying, which is another good point. We need to direct people to learn the theme of the essence which will dictate the behavior of the skill. Understand the theme, then you understand generally how every skill on the board works. Anyway, all good points we're considering. I'm not sure I see your point about losing track of who to prioritize during an onslaught. Can you elaborate?
5. Typically you get currency for defeating enemies and finding it as you explore. There really isn't a grand plan set before you yet. We're working on a system which ties into skills and essence (currency) but we don't have public details on it yet. So, more info on that at a later time.
6. We have talked about a scoring system but we haven't decided on anything yet. We want to do a 'hard mode' to appease the really hardcore players in the future. More info on this later as well.
7. I'm going to show your theme comment to our artist. You're probably on to something.
8. Did you notice the ambient tracks in some levels? 5 levels use this track. This is the full list of tracks featured in the beta (some of these are modified): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-UPPym ... 0mhSS8GfUQ Is your critique on an individual track basic? Or tracks overall?
9. Basically, yes. I think we're aiming for ups and downs: moments of exploration and intrigue then moments of action and intensity. As we get more systems built we can do that but right now it's a little more nuts 'n bolts then people are used to for a game. We're buckling down on gameplay, mainly action and customization features, because if they aren't fun, none of it is.
Thanks again for the feedback!
1. Generators (enemy-spawning vortexes) are up to bat for an optimization change. Right now there's no limit on how many enemies they can spawn, which is fun, but bogs things down after too much is on screen. Mostly they throw out Trites (refer to our online manual for names of stuff: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yS2 ... Ids9H2aObU) and Trites bump into each other a lot which drags on your processor. I'm thinking we'll put a limit on enemies Generators can spit out and also make Trites pass through each other. Furthermore, I literally just told our artist last night to look at barrier (locked red gates) effects and make sure there aren't too many particles. We've heard complaints about those in the past.
2. Getting controllers working in menus is a low priority, but it's something we want to do ultimately.
3. The difficulty curve in our alpha build (now removed) was not consistent, but that was intentional. It was easy, medium, hard level, not level 1, 2, 3, because we wanted feedback. Maybe Fiends are too powerful? I don't think so. It also depends on your build and your expectations for the game itself. I recognize your a skill shmup player. I doubt you'd keep dying from that same thing over and over. Having said that, I recognize there could be legitimate balance concerns. We'll see as we progress.
4. Your 4th note hits on a lot of things we're still thinking about ourselves. We're certainly not done on UI yet. We've discussed hp bars vs visual damage states on enemies themselves. Damage states look nice but take time. We've thought about showing an animation to illustrate the skill's behavior before buying, which is another good point. We need to direct people to learn the theme of the essence which will dictate the behavior of the skill. Understand the theme, then you understand generally how every skill on the board works. Anyway, all good points we're considering. I'm not sure I see your point about losing track of who to prioritize during an onslaught. Can you elaborate?
5. Typically you get currency for defeating enemies and finding it as you explore. There really isn't a grand plan set before you yet. We're working on a system which ties into skills and essence (currency) but we don't have public details on it yet. So, more info on that at a later time.
6. We have talked about a scoring system but we haven't decided on anything yet. We want to do a 'hard mode' to appease the really hardcore players in the future. More info on this later as well.
7. I'm going to show your theme comment to our artist. You're probably on to something.
8. Did you notice the ambient tracks in some levels? 5 levels use this track. This is the full list of tracks featured in the beta (some of these are modified): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-UPPym ... 0mhSS8GfUQ Is your critique on an individual track basic? Or tracks overall?
9. Basically, yes. I think we're aiming for ups and downs: moments of exploration and intrigue then moments of action and intensity. As we get more systems built we can do that but right now it's a little more nuts 'n bolts then people are used to for a game. We're buckling down on gameplay, mainly action and customization features, because if they aren't fun, none of it is.
Thanks again for the feedback!
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BulletMagnet
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Re: The Last Sunshine
I don't think the amount of enemies is the issue, at least on my machine; large crowds of enemies never seemed to slow it down, it only happened when either a locked gate or a "spawn void" was nearby. I strongly suspect it's something about the void itself that makes it chug, and it's probably a similar effect as the gates have.Hex wrote:Right now there's no limit on how many enemies they can spawn, which is fun, but bogs things down after too much is on screen.
Might want to take a second look at my username.I recognize your a skill shmup player.

The best example I can think of is the boss fight I died at due to the frame drops; a boss enemy was offscreen someplace, sending bullet patterns my way every few seconds, and between me and him were two spawn voids plus a bunch of little floaty guys. So I need to slowly and carefully work my way to the other side of the room, advancing and retreating in a war of attrition, or risk being overwhelmed, especially by the charging guys, who are very tough to survive if they catch you, so you need to focus on reducing their numbers efficiently.I'm not sure I see your point about losing track of who to prioritize during an onslaught. Can you elaborate?
Usually, when a group of them bum-rushes me, I have enough room to maneuver that I can lead them along and simply pick off whoever's closest first; in the confined space of the boss room, however, coupled with the pattern that fills nearly the entire space (and the floaty buggers too), that plan would frequently need to be hastily abandoned halfway through, the chargers would scramble their formation while I was busy dodging the other stuff, and there'd be no way for me to tell which ones were nearly dead by the time they were nearly on top of me again. I could only pick one at random and start shooting; if he didn't die quickly enough, I was probably already squashed by another one.
Hopefully that clarifies things; let me know if it's still murky.
Maybe I wasn't listening carefully enough, but at least outside of menus and such I could almost swear that the only tune I ever heard outside of "Confrontation" during the two boss fights was "Beginnings of Futility", repeated for stages on end. I don't hate the tune, but I did start to wish for a bit more variety as time went on, which could be an especial problem if you do end up taking the "this game is meant to be savored, not rushed" approach. Let me know if I missed something in there...Is your critique on an individual track basic? Or tracks overall?
Re: The Last Sunshine
It's interesting your note is about lag with Generators simply on screen, first time hearing that. Is it possible other generators were off screen pumping out enemies and bogged you down? Or was this a case of, the moment one was on screen there was a drop in frame rate?
Here's the breakdown of music tracks as of now during gameplay:
Tutorial: Ambiance
Levels 00-05: Beginnings of Futility
Levels 06-07: Beginnings of Futility (Dark)
Levels 08-09: Ambiance
Levels 10-11: Beginnings of Futility (Dark)
Levels 12-16: Beginnings of Futility 2 (This is sort of an upbeat version)
Levels 17-19: Ambiance
Levels 21-23: Beginnings of Futility (Dark 2, an upbeat version of the dark version)
Level 24: Impending
Boss: Phase 0 track, transition track, phase 2 track, victory music
What are your thoughts on the variety? A while back I talked to our audio guy and he's interested in spicing things up a little more in the future, so hopefully this concern will be addressed.
Out of curiosity, can you show me the build you used? http://tls.foureyes-productions.com/passive-tree/
Here's the breakdown of music tracks as of now during gameplay:
Tutorial: Ambiance
Levels 00-05: Beginnings of Futility
Levels 06-07: Beginnings of Futility (Dark)
Levels 08-09: Ambiance
Levels 10-11: Beginnings of Futility (Dark)
Levels 12-16: Beginnings of Futility 2 (This is sort of an upbeat version)
Levels 17-19: Ambiance
Levels 21-23: Beginnings of Futility (Dark 2, an upbeat version of the dark version)
Level 24: Impending
Boss: Phase 0 track, transition track, phase 2 track, victory music
What are your thoughts on the variety? A while back I talked to our audio guy and he's interested in spicing things up a little more in the future, so hopefully this concern will be addressed.
Out of curiosity, can you show me the build you used? http://tls.foureyes-productions.com/passive-tree/
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BulletMagnet
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Re: The Last Sunshine
I can't speak with absolute certainty, but it definitely seemed that whenever things started to slow down and I couldn't tell why, once I moved a little bit more forward there was always either a gate or a vortex there (and once it was gone, things would speed back up); as such, it seemed to start taking effect even when it was slightly offscreen, but the unmistakable impression I got was that it was something to do with the vortex itself, not the enemies it spawned. Again, let me know if there's anything specific you'd like me to look for/test out.Hex wrote:Or was this a case of, the moment one was on screen there was a drop in frame rate?
In truth, especially since even the early levels take a bit of time to work through (and may take even more if additional stuff to explore is added), I think a single track for that many levels in a row is pushing it a bit; I don't know how much you have to work with in terms of time/resources, but if adding more music isn't an option then you might want to consider speeding progress up a bit. Off the top of my head you could probably stand to reduce the number of the little floaty guys, who only really pose a threat when you're distracted by nastier enemies and otherwise are just there as a reason to hold the shot button down and slow your advance.What are your thoughts on the variety?
By the time I bit the dust I think I'd upgraded everything except the "regeneration" section once. Definitely health/shield/speed, not 100% sure about shield strength.Out of curiosity, can you show me the build you used?
Re: The Last Sunshine
One of the things we're going to do in the future is remove repetition with things like those early levels you mentioned, shorten some of the easier levels, and lower the total count of levels in a given Zone (this is zone 1, mind you). This should help with track variety and overall flow of the game.