Welcome back Star Knights!
It's been a couple of months since the last major update but I'm happy to say I've made some good progress in the meantime. After the Blackstar Castle update I wanted to work on a smaller update before working on the final major update that will bring this game to its fully released state. The main features I wanted to add in this upcoming update are:
- Scoring System: Add a way for players to earn a score that rewards skillful gameplay, giving players another goal to strive for besides just beating a run.
- Leaderboards: Both a personal leaderboard to keep track of personal bests and good runs, as well as an online leaderboard to compete against other players for the highest score.
- Endless mode: Include an option to keep playing, even after winning a run, and give players a chance to see just how far their build can go against ever increasing difficulty.
The work so far
Scoring System
Currently the scoring system is simple but effective. Players gain points for killing enemies, with a kill streak that increases with every kill and makes each subsequent enemy worth more points. However the killstreak resets if the player takes damage. This makes killing enemies and avoiding damage both important to getting a high score. Furthermore, playing on higher void crystals multiplies the score, meaning the best way to get the highest score is the play at the highest difficulty.
Leaderboards
Currently, the personal leaderboard and online leaderboard each show the top 10 scores. Each run on the leaderboard shows various details such as what ship and crew members were used during the run. In the future, I want to add more options to sort against, such as showing top scores earned in a normal run vs an endless run.
Endless Mode
When a player wins a run, they have the option to finish the run like normal, or continue back from the beginning in a New Game Plus mode. When you begin New Game Plus, you start back from the beginning of the runs with some drastic changes:
- Greatly increased enemy stats - they are tougher to kill, faster, and hit harder
- Increased amount of enemies and less time between waves
- Credits are worth more - allowing for continued upgrade progression
- Only one new attachment slot per new game play
Furthermore, when in endless mode, upgrades don't just stop at max level anymore. When an attachment hits max level, it can be continuously be upgraded forever, though at costs that get higher and higher. However, the pace of upgrades do not match the pace of the difficulty increase, and death is inevitable.
Other improvements
While the features mentioned above have made up the bulk of the progress, there have been many other additions and changes to the game. These include:
- Improved level end UI - shows more information and looks better
- Improved tutorial - Explains the scoring system along with a few other smaller changes
- Improved Challenge Level text effect
- UI addition when getting an attachment synergy
- Level transition animation
- Pause Menu UI Overhaul
- Color-coded and better organized stats
- Reorganized UI elements to fit better and look better
- Increased base speed of all ships
- Decreased speed bonus from speed booster attachment
- Shotgun:
- Doubled firerate and halved damage
- Slightly increased shot speed
- Relics:
- Retaliation now has a 33% chance
- Clean slate now has a 33% chance
- Fixed incorrect text displayed for “Kill x enemies” challenge