Greetings! I am pleased to announce that I have updated the demo! (to v0.5.1!) This update brings a lot of QOL features and some new UI improvements that make the game generally more enjoyable to play.
New Start Game Screen
(They say a picture is worth 1000 words which is why I put a screenshot of the aforementioned screen up top.)
- We’ve added a new “Start Game” button in the title screen that takes you to this screen (see image above). Here, we’ve rearranged everything to give it a more coherent look.
- Speaking of which, we’ve also changed the font to “Retro Gaming”. This change has appeared on (almost) all UI objects.
- You may have noticed something called “Fun Options”. These are options that change the game in a small but significant way when enabled. These features actually already existed in the demo, but they were hidden under the Gameplay Settings, which required a few button presses to access. Feedback has shown that that was a few too many!
- Since all of the Gameplay Settings have been moved to this screen, the “System Settings” screen has become just the “Settings” screen.
- And please ignore the score multiplier! It doesn’t do anything!!!
Score Summaries
Have you ever wondered, at the end of a run, where those 94,718 points came from? There are multiple ways those points could have been awarded, but there was no way to see how you got your points. UNTIL TODAY!
(I was gonna say something but I forgot)
- Now, when your run is over, you will get to see exactly where your points came from.
- This screen comes after the “Game Over” screen, and is the last screen before you return to the Title screen.
- Some feedback is shown on top of all of the score types. This feedback is randomized.
- Speaking of which, if you don’t want to enter a high score (for some reason), you can now skip high score entry. I’m not sure how relevant this is to score summaries, but I’d thought I’d include it here anyways.
- You can still see the planets moving around in this screen, by the way. Also, in my opinion, this would be a really cool place to take a screenshot in order to boast how good you are at this game!
Moon Buff
Nothing much to say here, except for the fact that we’ve buffed the Moon (powerup, NOT enemies).
- The Moon now has 100HP (from 30HP)
- Large Moon now has 500HP (from 150HP)
- Both The Moon and Large Moon now have the same recovery rate as that of Earth.
- Hamuena (the white oval “moon” that gets in your way) will now instakill a Small Moon if both are found to be active. However, if the Large Moon is active when Hamuena attempts to spawn, then that spawn attempt results in no damage at all!
- The Thing (the molten planet that barrels toward you at max speed) no longer spawns moons upon successful collision.
- Moons also take less damage from projectile shots.
Accessibility
We’ve added a new setting called “Auto Fire”. This setting, when enabled, causes The Earth to continuously fire as soon as its cooldown has been exhausted (kind of like continuously holding down the mouse.) This setting could prove to be very useful for those who play with a trackpad!
Other Things
Bug Fixes:
- Planets will now properly destroy themselves when their boss version spawns when Disable Health is on.
- Nukes should work properly upon subsequent spawns
- The Moon now plays the correct hit sound when colliding with water
- The screen width has been reduced from 9 units to 8.9 units to better fit with the 16:9 aspect ratio.
- When Wipeout is active, Heat-seeking is temporarily disabled.
Feature Revamps:
- The death note that shows when The Earth is defeated by corruption at the hands of Iapetus has been changed.
- We’ve also done some things to the Secret Boss, as well as what happens after…