Moon level rundown, and character announcements. (Patreon)

Here we are! The first week of the moon base. For now I will call it Raptura. This level will present our first ally. For the time being we will be calling her Lana Kova. (names are subject to change). This week I set up the structure for the level, along with obstacles and buildings, and I reworked some things involving aiming. As you can see above, there are 2 more characters showing their faces. Both are currently unnamed, so I'll simply be calling them "Sharkgirl" and "Goblin" for now. I will go a bit more in detail on them and the upcoming poll at the end of the post!

Due to feedback, early on I looked a little more in to aiming. I tried a few solutions, but ultimately settled on a final one. I made some algorithm adjustments to compensate for the FOV/perspective. The lasers will now shoot where the last green reticle is regardless of distance, even on the edges of the screen. This also allows me to let the lasers shoot muuchhhh farther. You can shoot things from very far away now, and with much better accuracy.

Another adjustment I made to the aiming was an "assist" of sorts. If an enemy or missile is very close to the player, if the green reticle is over them, your aim will snap to them regardless of your ship's angle. This should help with aiming at awkward distances.

I'm hoping these changes will remedy any issues with aiming people had in the last build. On top of this I made some small adjustments: the FOV has been reduced slightly, and laser speed has been increase by quite a lot.

Now on to the moonbase, Raptura. These next 2 gifs are fairly large, so they might take a bit to load, but they are essentially the intro sequence.

(The pigman is a placeholder for the time being. This level's boss will be speaking there.)

The level will be broken up into a few "segments". The first part of the level will be fairly open.

The first area will be the outskirts. Not too many structures, but it will feature our "Large" enemy, and some cargo ships.

I am going to look to have these guys burrowing and popping up to shoot at the player.

The rail will approach the transition area here. You will enter the tunnel shown.

Upon exiting the tunnel you will be face with the main construction area.

After this section you will be faced with some more industrial obstacles.

There are a few more things that I am planning on adding once enemies make an entrance, but the part after this is what will make this level stand out from the last. There is a branching route. Lana Kova will advise you to boost and slip in to a swinging tube.

Following her instruction will send you through a more secret route, where as missing the pipe will send you over the mountain.

Both routes will have their perks and their drawbacks.

Going over the mountains leaves you open to a lot more combat, and potentially less of an affinity growth with Lana.

Going through the pipe will bring you through the valleys of the mountain. I am hoping to have this route lead you to rendezvousing with Lana, and having her fight alongside you for a bit, but we'll see how that goes.

After these sections you will be brought to the boss which has not been put together yet, so it will need to wait for another week.

That pretty much covers the mapping progress of this week. There is still plenty to be done, but before I give a rundown on next week's plans.

I will touch upon the new characters and the poll. Alongside this post, I will be creating a poll for all VIP Crewmates ($10+) tier. The poll will likely last for 4 weeks, and the winner will be the featured character after the moon base, along with their corresponding planet.

Let the battle begin! I'm excited to see the results.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/v0-3-character-81183151

Now... What's planned for the upcoming week is pretty straight forward. Implementing all of the enemies and bringing loose ends together to be a cohesive level. I'll hopefully have a nice breakdown of more neat things the level has to offer next Friday! Thank you all so much for the support early on in development, and your feedback in the first build!

-Regulus