Advanced Sidescrolling Shooter (includes GIFs) [Template? C3 project.]

I'm currently in the process of making a fully customisable Stealth/NoStealth platform shooter - without using any external effects/plugins. making it fully commented and Documented.

it is built on top of this Platformer Template I previously made for C2 & C3, that template had the following that work;

• Gamepad/Keyboard Controls
• Function based input system
• Juicy (Squash & Stretch | Angle Wiggle)
• Toggle-able Abilities -Wall Sliding and Wall Jumping)
• Organised and reuseable
• Standard Smooth Camera
• Easily adjustable variables & self-contained
• USES NO 3rd PARTY PLUGINS/ADDONS

with this project I intend include to the following types of features;

(This will be updated as the project gets bigger.)

Player Abilities

• Wall Climbing
• Ledge Grabs
• Dashing
• Grabbing & Throwing Items
• Ladder Climbing

Camera System

• Camera Modes - Default Mode, Director Mode, Free Camera Mode
• Director Object - Update the camera settings when player is overlapping
• Camera Director Settings - Follows Player?, Lock X/Y, X & Y Speed, Camera Angle (+ speed), Zoom Scale (+ Speed),
• Default Mode - Follows the player normally using default settings.
• Free Camera Mode - This would be used to do extra things with the camera e.g cutscenes

Gun System - Configuration

• Weapon Name -able to give a weapon a unique name to use for other things.
• is Automatic - if it is single shots or shoots repeatedly
• Per Shot Interval -time between each shot allowed by the weapon.
• Bullets per Shot - number of bullets spawned when player shoots e.g shotgun releasing 3 bullets
• Bullet Spread - random angle amount added to the bullets. this will be used for scaling inaccuracy.
• Bullet Type - what kind of predesigned bullet it spawns.
• Ammo Capacity - How much ammo the weapon is holding.
• Push Strength - Vector speed applied to AI/Player in the opposite direction of the gun, after shooting a bullet.

Artificial Intelligence System

• Friendly / Aggressive mode -
• Pathfinding
• Target chasing
• Pick up and throw weapons/items
• Adjustable Line of sight settings - these will be used to trigger AI actions.

Debug System

• Show Hitboxes
• System Text Info
• Player Text Info
• Drag objects in debug view
• Minimise and maximise debug windows
• Drag Debug Text windows
• AI State Indicators
• AI visible view cones

(will be updating the topic as with gifs)

I'm interested in the uses other contruct users would have for it & what things that they'd like implemented that I could add into the project but this will depend on the support I receive.

If you want to support the project, support me on patreon for as low as $1 & get access to other projects and get access to more projects

https://www.patreon.com/SalmanShh

You can also follow the project by following the post to get notified of updates.

Day 1

I've finished implementing most of the important features for the guns system as well as updated code for the controls so that aiming can be done via controllers & mouse as well as potentially any other input device if anyone ever needs to.

also started on the early version of the debug mode, displaying system info.

Day 2

I finished up the initial aspect of the AI system, making sure that the correct animation sprite is pinned correctly their parent "Mask" object that handles everything except animations. all the AI characters inherit their animations based on an event sheets that handle all the stuff all AI objects would need.

the gif shows how it works correctly even with different AI objects. using families in C3 is hell of a lot better performance-wise so far compared to C2 especially with using "includes".

Day 4

• Scalable Crosshairs - resizes based on the Bullet spread of gun held by the player.
• Text Windows - Now its easy to add a text object that be dragged/minimised and maximised
• AI Path-finding - initial work has started on the pathfinding
• AI Health - AI character can lose health when shot down.
• AI Movement - AI character's movement can know by controlled via virtual inputs.
• AI Line of Sight - the line of sight is a separate object so that it can be influenced later.
• And more that I can't think of right now

Whats going on?

I'm in the process of figuring out an advanced AI system, this is one of the reasons the updates was a bit slow lately BUT! that will be resolved soon.

was able to get...

platformer pathfinding working using the no 3rd party addon!

What are you using to make this all possible?

mostly the pathfinding behaviour and the platform behaviour to make it possible. also a lot of using tokenat() to make it possible. had to redo things 3 times to come to my current solution.

what was the most time spent on?

mostly edge-cases related to traversing through terrain. fixed some issues I had with the platformer pathfinding that were related to moving through vertical and horizontal tile gaps

and random jumping on slopes

as well as got it to stop so it doesn't move towards a non-existent pathfinding nodes, did that by just clamping my little counter/index thingy since I noticed it could go above the max node count.

is it performant enough to use?

what are the little white sprites? do they have any effect on the pathfinding?

the little node sprites don't do anything, they are there for debug purposes and know what position + angle the node was pointing towards

Changes since I last posted

• Refactored Gun System - now it is a sub-system to the main "Weapon System", this will prove useful later in development for other weapon types. now its possible adjust aiming speed
• AI Grab, Aim & Shoot weapons - an AI character can now spawn and correctly grab an assigned weapon to it or even a random weapon.
• AI Shoot within Angle range - now its possible to make an AI character as accurate or as inaccurate as possible (hint) maybe useful for some melee combat (hint)
• Turn off character abilities - these following things can be toggled; Vision, Can Chase, Can Attack, Move While Attacking, Can Move etc
• Adjustable Attack Rates - how many times a virtual attack key is pressed for the AI character that are within Attacking range
• Target Switching - now AI characters attack/aim towards their nearest target
• Curious & Alert States - now enemies don't immediately attack a player on sight, but based on a delay if they ever see the player in sight for too long.
• Extra Debug stuff - now there is a state indicator above AI characters, double clicking with make a character mirrored and some other extra stuff

Don't forget to support me via patreon to get early access to the project & other useful stuff

https://patreon.com/SalmanShh