GunnSwitch Blaster Master Run N Gun Vania (Revived Project)

Hey, its been a long time since we rock and rolled. After 4 years off of developing the game due to personal health problems I am back at it again.

They wont let me continue my original thread as its been years now so here is a new dev log. You can still find the old one on here with the title GunnSwitch.

Returning to a project after such a long time has been a challenge, especially working with a project where I had not put enough comments in the event sheet to explain what everything is doing. But after a little time with it I've gotten a grasp on things and added comments to everything. I've made some strides and have got past some obstacles I was having four years ago.

Since returning I've added a health and weapon upgrade system with matching UI. Created some new mechanics and squashed some old lingering bugs. I finished my first proper boss battle in the game with different phases, Boss Health Bar UI.

Not bad for my first month back but there's still so much to do.

As a two person team my brother does the art and helps with design ideas, I do everything else. My style of development is a bit all over the place. Every time I go in with a plan I'll do some of it but then end up being pulled into working on other things I notice when working on said plan.

As an indie dev wearing so many hats, being all over the place is kind of what we do anyways.

Still though, I'm trying to be more organized in my plans of attack and get those missions done before going at something else.

Anyways, we will be updating this dev blog at least once a week with some of the progress we have made and share our challenges and triumphs.

Good luck to everyone

There's some great stuff being worked on here

Cheers

Part Two:

Here the Red Jet chases you, launching missiles into the foreground leading up to the boss encounter.

Red Jet's green orb turrets firing.

In the background the Red Jets turret orbs are destroyed and now its launching more missiles. The explosion smoke forms into a skull like Dr. Wily in the mega man series.

Looks really good! Can't wait to see it in action! Are you planning on doing a YouTube channel for updates? Could be a good way to promote interest.

Here's a few new screens of a new area in GunnSwitch I've been working on.

The Red Cave is a dangerous place to explore.

Jumping over spikey pikes in the first shot, second, grappling down dark spikey mine shafts and finally flying high off a ramp in the dark are a few things to do here.

Hey everyone. Hope your dev journey is going well and are looking forward to the holiday season and a new year of possibility and hard work. The years are flying by fast.

After putting in some serious work time and learning to make a game of this type for the first time ever,

(I've only made small games on mobile and on New Grounds, and a game jam once too.) I've learned that I had to bring the scope of my game down down a bit. Its only me doing most of the programming, game and level design, my brother does the artwork and helps with design ideas and critiques my work lol but that's good as it challenges me to do better.

I've stopped and started this project a few times now over 6 years from the concept of this game being born.

I stopped enjoying what I was making as I really didn't know how to make what I wanted to make, I had hundreds of ideas and delusional dreams of grandeur and all that crap lol

Game Dev is a process that needs focus, attention, consistency, planning and patience, lots of patience/discipline/planning

After some time away, like a couple years I'm not even sure how long.. I feel I have finally got all my idea and concepts puzzle pieces coming together nicely now... now the game loop is feeling good and the game play is more interesting, and most importantly I have some direction and a plan

I realized I don't need to make a game that's super huge, its just the two of us making it and our lives have enough challenges as it is with health problems.. SO..

We are going to make an open world in the sense there are areas to explore like Wonder Boy Monster Land, Shantae and Blaster Master Style of open game play that are nice short explorable sections with light Metroidvania elements such as returning to an area with the right item or weapon to unlock blocked paths. I'm aiming for at least 5 to 10 hours max game length.

What we have planned to make is still a pretty big job even though the scope has been brought down quite a bit.

Most important thing right now is I'm actually having fun and excited about making this thing. It doesn't seem so daunting anymore.

What makes this game interesting are these key features:

- Like Blaster Master, you have a Tank that you can jump out of at anytime to explore smaller passages that the tank cant access. Using a teleport to Tank to make getting back to your tank as fast as possible and no dead ends for the player.

- You will use the main character Gunn to open paths for the Tank and the Tank will open paths for Gunn to explore.

A couple examples:

- Use a terminal with Gunn to lift your tank up to an area out of reach using an elevator lift.

- Using your Tank as a platform to reach areas with Gunn. (Tank can grapple and hang to surfaces and be used as a platform.)

- Three explorable Islands with different biomes and characters.

- Its not just exploring the island but there are run and gun style action stages/missions that connect the story

(Around 6 in total)

- Weapon and Health Upgrading system that uses gems you find from exploring the island and completing action stages.

Challenges of making this game are:

- Having to do controls, mechanics, enemy AI and collisions for two controlled characters, your tank and your pilot Gunn.

- Figuring out how to balance the games difficulty and upgrade system

- Making it all come together

Anyways, until next time.

Cheers

Here's a couple new screenshots for screenshot Saturday.

New Cave and new enemy.

For inspiration I like to watch some videos of similar style games while I do dev stuff. I was watching some stuff on the old Blaster Master games today and also the new ones which look great, I've realized our game is going to be a lot different feeling.

Though I got my inspiration from the Blaster Master series for GunnSwitch, I first thought of making GunnSwitch after seeing the bad egg in the series, Blaster Master 2 for the Sega Genesis. Its a bad game overall but a couple aspects of it stood out to me.

Blaster Master 2 has pilot sections that were not over head dungeons but zoomed in side scrolling gameplay with more of a run and gun look and feel to it. I also liked the look of the tank rotating on ramps and slopes and rotating as you jumped in the air to even out your shot projection. So thats where I started from, having a zoomed in character when out of the tank and a tank that rides over ramps and slopes smoothly, I one upped that one by having three separate wheel sections that rotate and move independently which gives a cool feel and look I think.

Thats all I really got from Blaster Master 2, the cool parts lol

As for being like classic Blaster Master style gameplay it will be lighter on the metroidvania style mazes gameplay and more like a Wonderboy MonsterLand/Shantae style open world that is explorable but mixed with run and gun action stages.

Hey, long time no post.

Finally got to a point where I can connect all the levels in one world map area together so its starting to feel more like an actual game with some fun mechanics. Fine tuning the weapons now, fixing old stuff and polishing things up as I go.

Playing with parallax scrolling backgrounds and foregrounds and having fun tinkering with that stuff..

My favorite thing about indie dev is being able to work on a variety of things if I get stuck on something or get bored with another thing theres so many other things I can work on that progresses the development either way..

I think thats why its hard for indie devs to "finish" a game as the final push is forcing yourself to work on stuff that may feel more laborious or like work. By that time though you just gotta push through..

Heres a new screen of the Crystal Caves

Gunn Switch will feature some fun physics objects and interactions (Not pictured here lol) but related to it. These rock blasts can be very dangerous for enemies and creatures and who knows what else. I want to add more interactions between the player, the environment the NPCSs and enemies to make this world feel alive and the action more emergent.

Had an epiphany today about how I want to market GunnSwitch when that time comes, probably in a couple years I hope. Good to start thinking about it early I think.

I cant sell my game on just, its "like Blaster Master" or its "Metroidvania" or whatever or just on its features alone. Or that its indie, they are good things to know about my game but to really give my game a chance to stand out in the sea of games out there I need to communicate it in a more interesting way.

I have to convey what makes it special and im still figuring out what that is and how to express it. The more my ideas get refined and I get further in the process Ill be able to better understand what Im creating here and why.

Heres a look at some clouds that parallax, and some reflections to match. How do you think it turned out?

Here is a look at one of our stage lay outs at 5 % scale zoomed out. Looks like an ant farm. Lots of nooks and crannies for Gunn to jump out of the tank and explore, to find secrets, there's hostages to be saved and lots of butts to be kicked.

A zoomed in look at some explosions, they are dynamic, if the explosion impact zone is moving (ie. the red barrels) so will the explosion spread.