WELCOME BACK!!!
So, before I start, I have some apologies to rattle off. First off, yeah I know, I suck at keeping this place up to date on the game. In my mind, I've always kind of considered the GTTOD community just one big clump of people, so when I'd post something on the GTTOD Discord Server (which I have done nearly every day for the last 6 years, shameless plug here) I figured that was just going out to "The GTTOD Community" and everyone would get the memo. I see now that there are other microcosms all over the place, each with their own opinions and thoughts on the game. I'm sure going from Sticks and Stones P2 to The Super Secret Branch was crazy whiplash for a lot of people, when really I was expecting everyone to be up to date on what I was doing.
Totally my bad, I'll try and do better posting here from here on out (even if it is a little annoying to fumble with Steam's announcement system).
SECOND apology (yep, I know, another one), to those of you in the last announcement that I got snarky with. Totally wasn't my intention to come off that way, especially not to MachineGod who genuinely did have some good criticisms and was otherwise very kind and concise with his report. I think I often write way too casually, don't really consider what I say, and absolutely come off as a total jerk more times than I'd like. I wanted to just shoot out a quick apology for that, since it really did start kind of a spiral in there. Good God, that was a nightmare. Avoid that place lmao ALTHOUGH I WILL SAY, even though I'm 100% planning on being more careful with that sort of thing, I'm still just...me. I hope no one gets the impression that I'm some corporate entity or anything like that. I'm just a guy at his PC, and sometimes I do the right thing, and sometimes I do the wrong thing, and it's my job to listen to you guys to make sure that everything is running smoothly.
It's kind of like talking a blindfolded man through a maze. Except, in this particular case, that blindfolded man is me, who is also terrible at listening to directions.
GOOD LUCK, HA
Aaaaaanyway, without further ado, here's the last 9 months worth of pain and suffering.
Holy crap, I did not realize it has been this long since I've done one of these. Last we spoke, I hadn't even started the redo we discussed a few months ago. I think at that point I was just poking at a new character controller, but hadn't really decided to do anything with it yet.
Well, the first thing I did after the last post was start working on implementing a whole new weapon system onto the new controller. This one had tactical reloads, inspect animations, and all sorts of cool new features that made pretty much any gun I wanted to make way easier and quicker to whip out. With Krev's help on the models, before long, I had a pretty meaty weapon lineup with flashy new animations to boot.
Afterwards I decided to really get cranking on some enemies. I pretty much started with an enemy template that I could hook all their basic behaviors into - so things like jumping and moving and aiming and staggering and what-not all got slapped onto one brainless husk. So, don't feel bad that I'm shoving him into a wall and killing him. He doesn't feel a thing.
Soon I had them moving and fighting the way I liked. I really started to separate their mechanics once I implemented the shield. I felt that I could expand on that a bit to really define enemy types.
A month or so later, and I had a pretty decent basic starter lineup consisting of a bunch of guns, Razors, Grunts, Raptors, and Infantry (now known as "Drakes"), and even a new melee system that worked fairly similarly to the old one, but with more control.
And it was right here, about a month into the remake, that I felt things were really shaping up far better than previous attempts had gone. The new controller felt great, the game was looking far better, the weapons and animations far higher quality, and more time and care was being put into the actual design of the game too (now that I had had the chance to screw it up a few times, at least).
Krev and I (mostly Krev) got to work on creating a few new enemy types, including a new mid-round boss enemy that hunts the player down throughout the game, "The Legion Sentinel". This guy won't be out until the NEXT update, but he actually is in the Super Secret Branch to fight at the end for funsies.
Around this time, with the help of Jesus (who came IN PERSON to guide the operation), I also somehow managed to build a new PC. Thanks, God.
Once I got things together, I decided to take some time to poke at a new level editor, but this has been held off for a bit while I finish up the rest of the game.
I started working on levels, new visuals, and a template for a new Card System (which you can see finished in the Super Secret Branch). This new system was meant to be around finding and opening card packs that you'd collect while playing. Those packs would then turn into three new gear cards you could use in the HUB (now called "Harbor Deep").
Papa, everyone's favorite admin in the Discord server, was given a choice: Kill the "Gup Chat" (which had garnered a cult in the Discord server), kill the "Gup Cult" (the aforementioned cult), OR sacrifice himself, and guarantee the cult's survival. Of course, Papa decided to sacrifice himself, and was therefore banished from the GTTOD server.
So then I rebranded the GTTOD server into my own personal server, and Papa was immediately brought back. That was a pretty crazy day, though, ngl.
I began working on some new areas and visuals, tweaking and optimizing things to better fit in the new artstyle.
Come on, man. Game looks pretty good, you have to admit.
Around this time, Ford's son, the Golem was born. He was here to take the place of the original Bruiser, and do that he did. The dude hurts.
I also decided to play through the game and talk about how I felt a bit regarding the changes.
After that, I went about reworking how keys and bunkers functioned. It wasn't a HUGE change, but enough of one to, I think, make a big difference in how the game is played. Basically, keys are most commonly found from looting now. In recent versions, you can shoot the doors open on vehicles and crates to quickly search an area. Keys can also be bought from shops, found from killing enemies, and found by breaking the key jar that is a guaranteed spawn in every level. On top of that, Bunkers locations were randomized each stage, and for the most part are the only places to find weapons and equipments (other than the Grab A Gun). This made the gameplay loop more about exploring and navigating around the level to power up than it did about just being a Point A to Point B shooter.
This point honestly needs more discussion, because I believe we have a rift in people's expectations with this game, and that is very much one of the symptoms of my lack of super clear communication over here. I think a lot of people come into it with "DOOM, ULTRAKILL, FAST GO GO SHOOT GAME" speed mentality, when really I was hoping to capture that "Risk Of Rain, Hades" pacing (but with a bit more pep in its step). The difficult part for me is now trying to bridge these two communities together, which is far harder than you'd think. I believe that the people on the DOOM side of the fence are wanting to have kind of a power fantasy game where they don't really feel SUPER challenged outside of boss fights. Meanwhile, the people on the ROR side of the fence are more masochistic, and want a challenge through and through.
You can probably see where I'm heading with this.
How do I make a power fantasy rogue-like game that *also* likes to beat you up a bit?
Food for thought. ANYWAY, moving on.
Next I wanted to fill the world with more things to spend your hard earned Shards on, so I started with a pretty simple health upgrade item called Endurance Crystals. Grab one from their chest, choose what you want, and crack it open. Simple. Next I moved onto something more weapon-oriented, which I wanted to kinda be like a low-level Build-A-Bang upgrade. What I landed on was a workbench that I plan to eventually tie into a very simple, streamlined crafting system for equipment (and maybe more).
See? There's another one of those "clearly not a DOOM game" moments that I think would have gone FAR better had I actually communicated that I wasn't making a DOOM-type game.
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After that, I had a really REALLY solid thing going for the core gameplay loop of GTTOD. This was the first moment I was like "Oh yeah, this kinda rocks", and luckily I was recording at the time.
But boy God, soon I'd land on somethings that I think we can ALL AGREE are net positives for the game, which included...
The first of the cool new things in this update were the new curses and blessings system I called "Karma". Basically you have good karma (Blessings, always positive) and bad karma (Curses, a mixed bag). You can find their respective tones in their own bunkers - the first being the revamped Shrine Of The Summit, and the second being the new Altar Of The Abyss. You will be presented with three karma options and must choose one of them to proceed.
After that I finally decided to tackle Dungeons! These are pretty much your high-risk-high-reward areas where enemies scale faster, are more frequently buffed, and are confined in an enclosed space. The payoff is that Dungeons offer the player a really quick and fun way to farm for Jade Vines...which brings us to the next big thing, which might be the most contentious one yet.
Meta Progression. Now, if you were to ask me PERSONALLY, I'd say this is probably the greatest thing I have ever added to GTTOD. I think it is pretty much a great foundational pillar to give players something to aim at, to play for. You basically start with a handful of options to upgrade, and by completing more levels, getting more Jade Vines, and applying them to your character, you can become extremely EXTREMELTY powerful.
Unfortunately, it's not a perfect addition. There are downsides, one of which was felt early on in testing. In order to make a progression system, I couldn't grant the player every ability to start off with like what a lot of people are used to. I can definitely see why a lot of people were upset about that, too. Like I said, with the lack of communication on Steam, a lot of people are in-it-to-win-it on that kind of fast paced arena shooter mentality, which a progression system doesn't really slot as nicely into the frame of. Yet another one of those moments that better communication could have hopefully mitigated.
I still want to work on this system, as, like I said, it's not perfect. I think there are some really cool places I could take this, like almost a psuedo-battle-pass layout in the same way that Gear Cards are a psuedo-loot-crate system (for reference, I do hate those systems when done in toxic, money-hungry ways, but when done right and not involving irl money, I think there are a few things that can be learned from them when discussing properly rewarding the player for their actions).
Anyway, moving on...
Finally, I started working on a tutorial / training area I could use until the prologue is finished. I decided to slap it in this simulated world called "The Reflection", and use that area as a basic gameplay, movement, and combat tutorial. There's even an arena and timed gauntlet to play around with.
Finally, I wrapped up the closed testing with The Legion Sentinel, that dude from earlier I talked about. Finally got him animated and working correctly, and TRUTHFULLY he is pretty fun to fight. Not hard, but fun.
I also had a lot of fun making some of the more hand crafted Babe weapons alongside Ford, the best of which turned out to be this thicc dumpy, the Inheritor.
While initially I was hesitant, eventually I did cave in an add a progression difficulty system, which turned out to be really really great for everyone. There's even a secret difficulty hidden on the totem if you wanna try and trigger it. Otherwise, still pretty happy with this addition.
Finally, after loads of tweaks and testing, I wrapped things up with a pretty cool new loading mechanism I call "The Tower". This is a massive structure that cuts clear into the sky ferries leads you to the next level. It's just a cool way to wrap up the end of the level, and gives you a second to breathe. Eventually I'm also going to display level stats in here, too.
WHEW, so that wraps up the last 9 months, pretty much. Obviously I skipped over a ton of the smaller things since otherwise this would take far FAR longer, but if you'd like to see those smaller things, I invite you to join the Discord! I think after the discussions from last week, we all kinda realized it was a bit of an echochamber in there, and are making an effort to be less...echoy...
Could really use your help with that, for that matter. Please, join in, talk about your thoughts on the progress, and let me know what you think!
LINK TO DISCORD SERVER, AGAIN...
Again, thanks to everyone who has stuck with me thus far. I do hope the project is going in the direction that you had hoped it would, and, if it's not, I'd like to talk with you about it and see if we can't come to a conclusion that is right for everyone (or as much of "everyone" as we can). Feel free to chat about it down below, and let me know what you think!
On top of that, I'm gonna be getting some help in here from time to time from Hitcents' very own Junie (Dasher)! She will be keeping an eye on this place more frequently than I have; and when I decide to become snarky again, she will also be forcefully administering 30 grams of Carbamazepine into my bloodstream to either kill me or knock me out, where-then a fully automated and robotic AI controlled version of me will take my place and proceed to engage with the community in a more respectable fashion.
But I want you to know.
That ain't me.
I'm dead.
...
ANWAY, thanks again for reading! Hope to see you again, but this time sooner than 9 months.
-Andrew, Dev Robot