Pod Fighter Screenshots
by Ben "Flash" Amos · in Torque Game Builder · 01/08/2006 (11:07 pm) · 24 replies
Please forgive the goofy name ...
This game was just a little private project to see what I could do with Torque 2D and really hammer my skills into place. I've put lots of man hours in just tinkering with it, seeing what I could add to make it better based on my own thoughts and the suggestions of others who've playtested it and given me some feedback.
Pod Fighter is a top-down spaceship shoot-em-up. That said, it has many of the things you would expect from a traditional 'shmup' plus a few nifty extras. The arrow keys fly the ship, while the mouse aims and operates a multi-directional cannon. There are a diverse number of enemies, each with their own specific behavior and flight patterns. It has more powerups than you can shake a stick at, too, including nanos to repair your ship, overshielding, rapid fire, spread beam, missiles, bombs, and more.
There are two things that really stand out in this game, though. One would be the tractor beams used by certain enemy ships. What's bad is that these ships can latch onto asteroids that drift onto the field periodically. What's worse is that they're smart enough to hide behind said asteroids. And the worst thing? If they can line up a shot, they'll reverse the polarity and fling the oversized space boulder right at your ship. Nasty.
The other unique thing would be the gears, a concept that's evolved time and time again since I started with Pod Fighter. In their current incarnation, your ship starts at gear 1, with basic maneuverability and firepower. Destroyed enemy ships will often leave behind small 'charge' powerups. Collecting these builds your charge meter. When the charge meter is full, you can 'upshift' to the next higher gear as long as you have sufficient charge. With higher gears comes faster movement, better firing rates, and faster shield regeneration. If your charge runs out, you drop to the next lower gear. On the other hand, if you fill up the charge meter again, you can keep shifting up and up to greater levels of power.
Okay, enough blab. On with the screenshots.
A nice shot of the player in combat with one of the boss ships
One of the player's missiles hones in on an enemy stinger. Here you can see the HUD at the bottom is filled out a bit more, now that some additional powerups have been collected. Nice explosive flare in the bottom right.
A nice capture of the ship firing in standard pattern ... 4-way spread shot accompanied by a trio of missiles in formation.
This is the aftermath of a bomb, the most destructive weapon in the player's arsenal. Note that's a boss ship getting cooked in the upper right there.
This game was just a little private project to see what I could do with Torque 2D and really hammer my skills into place. I've put lots of man hours in just tinkering with it, seeing what I could add to make it better based on my own thoughts and the suggestions of others who've playtested it and given me some feedback.
Pod Fighter is a top-down spaceship shoot-em-up. That said, it has many of the things you would expect from a traditional 'shmup' plus a few nifty extras. The arrow keys fly the ship, while the mouse aims and operates a multi-directional cannon. There are a diverse number of enemies, each with their own specific behavior and flight patterns. It has more powerups than you can shake a stick at, too, including nanos to repair your ship, overshielding, rapid fire, spread beam, missiles, bombs, and more.
There are two things that really stand out in this game, though. One would be the tractor beams used by certain enemy ships. What's bad is that these ships can latch onto asteroids that drift onto the field periodically. What's worse is that they're smart enough to hide behind said asteroids. And the worst thing? If they can line up a shot, they'll reverse the polarity and fling the oversized space boulder right at your ship. Nasty.
The other unique thing would be the gears, a concept that's evolved time and time again since I started with Pod Fighter. In their current incarnation, your ship starts at gear 1, with basic maneuverability and firepower. Destroyed enemy ships will often leave behind small 'charge' powerups. Collecting these builds your charge meter. When the charge meter is full, you can 'upshift' to the next higher gear as long as you have sufficient charge. With higher gears comes faster movement, better firing rates, and faster shield regeneration. If your charge runs out, you drop to the next lower gear. On the other hand, if you fill up the charge meter again, you can keep shifting up and up to greater levels of power.
Okay, enough blab. On with the screenshots.
A nice shot of the player in combat with one of the boss shipsOne of the player's missiles hones in on an enemy stinger. Here you can see the HUD at the bottom is filled out a bit more, now that some additional powerups have been collected. Nice explosive flare in the bottom right.A nice capture of the ship firing in standard pattern ... 4-way spread shot accompanied by a trio of missiles in formation.This is the aftermath of a bomb, the most destructive weapon in the player's arsenal. Note that's a boss ship getting cooked in the upper right there.
#22
You know, that's something I really wish I'd been able to add to that game while still working on it - the ability to set up your own keys for the controls. I'm sure there'd be a way to do it using the prefs file somehow. And some alternate keys for the mouse buttons would have been good too ... a key for firing, dropping bombs, and a pair of keys for upshifting/downshifting. So without a 3-button mouse, the game's even more of a challenge. Things to think about for future releases, I suppose.
Dangit, you guys keep giving me more ideas. =P No really, it's a good thing. Can you tell I'm a bit wound down on this project?
I think I will go back and add keyboard support for mouse-operated functions, just for completeness's sake. As for those who don't have a decent mouse ... would an option to disable the mouse-aiming be of any use? That would likely be the easiest solution.
I have found, actually, that playing this game with two people can be enjoyable. One operates the mouse (weapons) while the other mans the keyboard (pilot).
"I am a leaf on the wind .... See how I soar."
01/14/2006 (1:37 pm)
You tried with a laptop mouse!? Wow. I'd have liked to see that.You know, that's something I really wish I'd been able to add to that game while still working on it - the ability to set up your own keys for the controls. I'm sure there'd be a way to do it using the prefs file somehow. And some alternate keys for the mouse buttons would have been good too ... a key for firing, dropping bombs, and a pair of keys for upshifting/downshifting. So without a 3-button mouse, the game's even more of a challenge. Things to think about for future releases, I suppose.
Dangit, you guys keep giving me more ideas. =P No really, it's a good thing. Can you tell I'm a bit wound down on this project?
I think I will go back and add keyboard support for mouse-operated functions, just for completeness's sake. As for those who don't have a decent mouse ... would an option to disable the mouse-aiming be of any use? That would likely be the easiest solution.
I have found, actually, that playing this game with two people can be enjoyable. One operates the mouse (weapons) while the other mans the keyboard (pilot).
"I am a leaf on the wind .... See how I soar."
#23
There might be some minor work to make sure the remaps are processed, but it's part of Torque.
01/16/2006 (12:00 pm)
It's possible that this isn't in T2D, but I think it is: Torque already lets you remap keys on the fly (user preference), just use the Options gui (normally mapped to cntrl-o).There might be some minor work to make sure the remaps are processed, but it's part of Torque.
#24
I've managed to scrape together a patch! This patch addresses many of the issues mentioned above, and a few more that I found on my own. Highly recommended. To download, just visit my website.
01/18/2006 (4:01 am)
It doesn't look like keys can be rebound using the Options gui I see in T2D ... just so much stuff about graphics and audio settings. All of it useful, mind you. Just not what I'm looking for.I've managed to scrape together a patch! This patch addresses many of the issues mentioned above, and a few more that I found on my own. Highly recommended. To download, just visit my website.
Torque Owner Bryan Edds