Today, on 24.05.2024, I have released the Community Update v1.1. In the course of this, there is also a one-week discount of 30% on the game! So if you haven't grabbed it yet, now would be a great time to do so.

What happened

The Community Update has become a reality thanks to your help and input! From the many ideas you have contributed, I have picked out a handful of interesting things and implemented them as part of the Community Update v1.1. I would like to give you an insight into the suggestions in this article.

Ideas that didn't make it:

• Revise leaderboards
  • Originally it was planned that the leaderboards would get an extra page, as well as "season" mechanics, so that there are various effects per season.
  • In my opinion, the effort was not worth it here, as it would have required a major rebuild of the codebase to accomplish this. Nevertheless, the idea is obvious and cool!
• Steam avatar image as boss graphic
  • Absolutely cool idea, especially if it's your own Steam image, because then no silly content can be displayed to other players. The codebase is also the problem here, the effort would have been too high for the benefit.
• Skin packs for enemies/players/background/upgrade graphics
  • If then I would have implemented the feature as part of a modability, otherwise it would certainly be feasible, whereby it would always be important that the skins are all square so that the CollisionShape still fits.
• Enemy impulses announce movement
  • Also a nice idea, especially for suddenly appearing enemies that could indicate a forewarning. Unfortunately, I use a single enemy class for all enemy types and the lifecycle is pretty hardcoded in, making it difficult to implement an advance cue where the enemy needs to know it will get a pulse in X frames/seconds. This would also require major refactoring. In addition, it is questionable whether this does not immensely impair the "look & feel" if there are many opponents on the screen and then a part is additionally highlighted in color.
• Modability
  • Modability was a big wish of mine that unfortunately didn't make it into the finished game. I only found out about the easy modability with the help of the Godot Engine much too late. The class hierarchy is a drag here, as are the folder structures for dynamically loading content into the game. Steam Workshop support would of course also be desirable here, but it is always important that submissions are also moderated. It is also difficult to ensure that all mods can be deleted again and that the original state can be restored without any problems.
• "Bug Hunter" Incentive
  • The idea here was to give people an individual "title" or "player" skin if they found a bug. The problem here was the moderation effort and also the fact that some people didn't necessarily want this "extra sausage". Again, the effort was not worth it

So there were a few ideas that were thought about but didn't make it into the game in the end. However, if at some point I decide to develop a second part, I would certainly take up a few of these ideas again. I would be particularly interested in mod support for a game of this type!

Ideas that made it

I had already listed the relevant features in the patch notes for v1.1, I would like to list them here again in detail.

• Challenge mode
  • This was an idea that K1ngKapra came up with quite spontaneously. I actually think it's a pretty good idea, which is why it made it into the game. Only one boss was initially planned here, with a special behavior that is very difficult to master and is adapted to the length of the song. The second boss was only created because the good K1ngKapra designed an extra boss song, which I naturally wanted to include in the game. Unfortunately, the second boss didn't turn out the way I wanted it to. I still hope that it will add something to the challenge mode.
• Bereichs-Spawner
  • Actually really the coolest feature for v1.1, but the idea came from another game (Ball-it Hell). The idea is that the player gets a "bonus" when he is inside the areas. There are various effects for this, ranging from "double damage" to "time is frozen".
• Tutorial mode
  • To make it easier for beginners to get started with the game, a tutorial has also been integrated into the game. This shows all the important features of the game and at the same time (hopefully) doesn't anticipate too much of the game's discovery. Here the biggest thanks also go to K1ngKapra, as well as Cille.
• Controller Support
  • Controller support was also implemented on a spontaneous impulse. It was also about creating the basis for moving the player with inputs other than the mouse. Originally, the idea of the game was to focus directly and exclusively on the movement of the mouse. I hadn't thought about controller support at the beginning. However, when I received a picture of someone playing the game on the Steam Deck, I thought to myself "it's a good fit". And poof, I sat down and implemented controller support. This also has an effect on the mouse controls, which I will discuss later.
• Colorblind support
  • Unfortunately, many people suffer from some form of color blindness. And since the enemy concept focuses a lot on the color difference, it is very difficult to enjoy the game in its entirety. Therefore, with the help of McBlubb's assessments, I have implemented a setting that should make it easier to play under such circumstances. An individual letter per enemy type is displayed above the enemy so that the shape is unique.
• Hall of Fame
  • Last but not least, the Hall of Fame has also made it into the game. Due to the numerous entries in the leaderboard (41 in total), I didn't want to "offend" the eager players and simply "nullify" their successes, but rather immortalize the top 5 in the Hall of Fame. I hope the players are happy about it :)!
• Multipliers
  • Multipliers are always cool in arcade games. After the release of version 1.0, I noticed that the "level bar" was really "sinking", because it no longer had a meaningful and/or visible function. It was originally intended to display a level-up screen and to link various enemies and upgrades to the player's level. Over time, I made less and less use of the level up mechanic (although it's still in the game) because I felt it didn't really fit into the pacing of the game. So now I've repurposed the level bar as an indicator for the multiplier and it works surprisingly well, I think!

Incidentally, various balancing changes have of course also been made for v1.1, which is why it was necessary to reset the leaderboards.

Mouse control

At this point, I would like to take a closer look at the implementation of the mouse control. Initially, the controls were based solely on the mouse pointer. The implementation here was very simple, the player was simply set to the position of the mouse pointer. This has the great advantage that there is almost no input lag and that the player has complete freedom in terms of the speed of the mouse pointer etc., because this is "only" limited by the possibilities of the connected mouse. Due to the controller support, however, if you do NOT have the mouse sensitivity at the maximum level in the settings, the relative positioning of the player is also carried out during the mouse movement based on the relative movement of the mouse pointer. In this case, relative positioning "logically" requires 2 frames (position in relation to the previous frame), which automatically means minimal input lag. There is also a sensitivity multiplier that ranges from 0.0 to 1.0. It is also the case that internal rounding errors etc. can lead to inaccuracies. This can lead to inaccuracies, which can make the control feel spongy overall. If you experience this, I recommend that you set the mouse sensitivity to the maximum because I have implemented a fallback for this so that the usual direct control is used again in this case (the controller naturally continues to use the relative positioning)! If anyone here has an idea for a better implementation, please send an email to support@avoidshaper.de

Preview

I had already announced that no further developments are planned for A Void Shaper. There are currently a few minor adjustments to be made to make your gaming experience even smoother. Since it is very difficult to test the balancing "well" in advance, I relied on my "gut feeling" for the release of v1.1 and will make changes spontaneously in the future if there is a need. I will decide spontaneously how to deal with the leaderboard. Basically, however, I would be interested in continuing the "story" of A Void Shaper and doing even more in this area. When the time is right, I would say. As part of this announcement, I can also tease that a separate release of the soundtrack is planned! This will be available for a small fee. I am of course in consultation with K1ngKapra. Where exactly the soundtrack will be released etc. is not yet definite. But it's in the planning stage!

Conclusion

I hope it was worth the effort and that you enjoy the update. I think that the gameplay is now much more varied and that the new features integrate well into the existing game. I'm sure everything can be expanded and made even better. However, if A Void Shaper 2 were to be made, I would rewrite the entire code from scratch. The experience I have now gained with Godot and the release of the game would help me to create a much better code base, with which the game principle can also be better expanded. Thank you very much for your attention! I hope you enjoy the update! You are welcome to submit bugs via Steam or, if necessary, send me a message directly via Twitch!