So we have all been working our socks off this week coding various game aspects and also we met up for a long discussion on combat and time scales. Read on to see what we have individually been up to.
Liam dived into the code and fashioned and fixed up our in game physics. This has unlocked many of the abilities the ants are to have including the jump ability, the fling, the leaping retreat and the charging knock-back. All this whilst finishing his thesis. Now that is dedication!
John has been hard at working implementing these into the game. The Trap Jaw ant featured a couple of weeks ago is not pretty much in (few tweaks and Matt needs to get the model rigged properly). Additionally the AI is having a cleaning to make way for new systems – More on that below.
Matt has been pressing on with his level editor (he thinks there is another week of work in it before he is ready for the internal reveal) and at the same time fixing and improving various other parts of the engine, as well as sorting OpenGL on various PC hardware specs.
Over the weekend the group met together to come up with some new systems that would improve the way combat works. In EotU units think for themselves, and as such must micro themselves. Now there is plenty for the player to be doing to aid and change the outcome of the battle but the units themselves will generally make their own decisions. Because of this we have decided the battles need to be more controlled to feel and look satisfying, as well as be clear about what is happening and who is winning. We have decided to implement an overarching fighting system we call the Battle Manager. This system will have access to information from both fighting sides and will make decisions to better the game. Ants will now ask the battle manager for their best attack target and look to it to position themselves on their way in to the fight. The results will be better looking and feeling fights, and we cannot wait to show you.
Keep an eye out for this weeks “ant of the week”, it should appear tomorrow evening and will have some exciting abilities for you to sink your teeth into.
Keep up to date by checking out our twitter accounts and Facebook page, also check out Stomt, it has some of our development discussions on there and nowhere else.
