^I drink too much coffee.

AYUSSHMUP Daily Devlog #2 - "Enemies"

As promised, here's a screenshot of the game's new look.

What do y'all think? It may seem a little dark, but that's because I put a semi-transparent grey rectangle over it, as I was overwhelmed by its colour.

Prologue

Okay, so there are going to be enemies in this game, which will justify the MUP part of the title. There are going to be a few different classes, each with their own behaviour, because boring samey ships are boring.

Chapter 1 - "List"

As I said, there are going to be different classes of enemies. Which class an enemy is in will affect its fighting and movement style.

ESA came up with these classes, so everyone give him a round of applause if you like them.

* Scouts - These are the little triangle ships in the screenshot. At the moment, they fire at you, but I'm going to change that. They will be unarmed, and will attempt to dodge your bullets.

* Pawns - The other ships in the screenshot. They are a little bit tougher than the scouts, and have basic weapons.

* Frigates - Enemies that are actually worth your time. Frigates are going to be on more-or-less the same power level as the player, and will actually be a challenge to take on.

Battlecruisers - What's like a boss, but not a boss? That's right, a battlecruiser. These things are going to be quite a task to kill.

Boss Ships - The most powerful adversaries in the game. Each one is different; all are deadly.

Chapter 2 - "Behaviour"

I think I've kept this under wraps for more than long enough. With a demo on the way, you'd find out anyway.

The idea I have had with the enemies in AYUSSHMUP, is to give them a collective consciousness, a hive mind. If I can get this right, all the enemy ships will act as one.

* The unimportant scouts and pawns will act as shields for Frigates and Battlecruisers.

* Ships will move in formations, and try to overwhelm you by putting the most powerful ones far away from each other.

* Scouts and Pawns will launch suicidal attacks on you, in groups. Get out of the way!

* More to come…

However, no hive mind is invincible. Destroy a few key ships, and you'll break the spell, sending all remaining enemies beserk. Just try to stay out of the way when that happens, and leave the enemy destroying to the enemies.

Chapter 3 - "Goals"

I'd say I completed yesterday's goals satisfactorily. I implemented ESA's new graphics, and got a relatively okay background generator, even though I ended up not allowing individual surfaces to make more than one rectangle of each colour.

I'm thinking the background's a little too pink, so I may put a semi-transparent purple rectangle over it, to remedy that. I can't understand why it's so pink, I took all the colours I used straight from ESA's background, and I'm fairly certain I use them in the right order. Ah well.

Goals For Today

* Change Scout's behaviour. He's too powerful for a measly scout.

* Implement Frigate and Battlecruiser. I'll leave bosses for another day.

* Work on hive-mind. Only one of its functions semi-works at the moment.

Epilogue

Okay, so I'm off to work on all this now. Well, actually, I'm off to have breakfast and what not, and THEN I'll work on it.

F1ak3r