Making an Advanced Shmup #81 - Gameplay Prototype - Pico-8 Hero

[@patriciadelimadelemos6392]

This is underrated!!!!

[@SoulHero7]

This is gonna be a really good Cute-em-up by the time you're done.

[@Ellohir]

The options rotation looks really cool, only surpassed by the rotations of the hoodies on this video! 🤣

[@13x666]

I absolutely love how the third prototype (with Balatro missiles) looks and works! Everything is starting to come together, this project is such a joy to follow :)

[@interzoa]

He's back!

[@llpBR]

Those missiles looks amazing!! I loved the cow bubbles too. Now the game seems to have cows al around.

[@AlexFalkenberg]

My first thought on cows as powerups was that you might raise them up into your ship UFO-style from the surface. ;) The bubbles work quite nicely, tho! It's been a great series.

[@terry-]

Great! 33:34 the propelers usually go on the upside of the drones, no? I had difficulty understanding that it was one of those quadcopters drones at first.

[@LazyDevs]

Depends on the quad. There are pusher quads too. But in this case having the props on top of the body outline made it especially hard to read and flickery. It's just a tough resolution to work in

[@MrSleightofhand]

Not done the video yet but some thoughts on cave vs. "pseudo"-cave. If it's something you care about this can actually be an accessibility issue. Some people simple can't button mash that fast or for that long. Heck, my hands are perfectly fine-other than not being as young as they used to be-and I have trouble playing button mashers for very long because they make my hands hurt. In that regard, "pseudo" is a clear win. More people will be able to play and enjoy the game. Tying into that, you said you want to find reasons for the player to stop pressing the fire button and you said the missiles feel more like a secondary attack than a bomb. I think you can lean into that and let it be a secondary attack similar to Gun Vein. While you're holding the button the missiles charge up and you fire them by releasing the button. (Edit: ha! this is why I should watch the whole video before commenting!) That opens up some strategic play too. Do you fire as soon as they're charged or wait until there are more enemies on screen to do more damage? I don't play a ton of shooters so maybe that's actually really common but whatever. And a suggestion for the missile animation: Drop all the missiles as a cluster and let them fall behind the ship for a few frames like you're dropping cargo or something. Then have all the missiles simultaneously ignite and shoot forward towards their targets. In my head the "cluster" would actually just be a single missile sprite with all the missiles spreading out from that point. I think the slow backwards movement followed by ignition and rapid acceleration would make them seem even snappier than they really are. Looks good in my head anyway.

[@SquidLight]

Great video

[@wofty9526]

Do you have the project to extend the game or pico 8 is to limited ?

[@LazyDevs]

Depends on what you mean with „extend“

[@wofty9526]

​@@LazyDevs I meant like making other levels

[@LazyDevs]

@@wofty9526 I want to finish this one first because it is going to be some substantial work. Once that is done we'll see where we go from that. Either way, that is not going to be part of this video series

[@wofty9526]

@@LazyDevs ok i see, thanks

[@patriciadelimadelemos6392]

First!