After taking some time off from developing Neon Aileron, I have resumed work on the game at the beginning of 2023. This update directly addresses some items that were brought up in reviews for the game.
Level 8 – Level 8 is a boss rush level and previously level 8 was only available if you played on “hard” difficulty. This level also had a “true last boss.” Because of this, I don’t think many players saw the level or the final boss. I decided to make this level available for all difficulties to make the game more enjoyable for all skill levels.
Widescreen – Neon Aileron was original presented in 4:3 aspect ratio to resemble retro games. I decided to change to 16:9 aspect ratio after playing a couple of modern games with pixel graphs that presented and felt very comfortable in this ratio. The result was that Neon Aileron should feel less crowded when there are many enemies on screen. All levels, enemies, and bosses have been reworked to accommodate the new screen real estate.
Hitbox Update - The player's hitbox in Neon Aileron was previously the entire body of the player's jet. This was also done to mimic the shooting games of the 80s and early 90s. This has been updated to a consistent and significantly smaller hitbox that is represented by the ship’s "power core." When enemy bullets come near the player, the ship sprite fades and the power core becomes visible; letting the player know where their hitbox is. This approach allows the player ship sprites to be larger without sacrificing the ability to dodge bullets with precision. In playtesting, this also made busier enemy sections more recoverable. Specifically level 3 (Area 51), which can have periods where large numbers of enemies and bullets appear on screen, is much more manageable now.
Scaling Boss Attack Difficulty - All of the end-stage bosses in Neon Aileron have been reworked so that the attacks become more challenging when you increase the difficulty. For example, shooting attacks may have more or faster bullets, bosses will move faster for physical attacks, and the time between attacks will vary when playing on harder difficulties. Some boss attacks were also tweaked in the process, so be alert if you are already familiar with the boss attacks in this game!
Additional Updates
- Basic story endings have been added to the game. I still don’t have the required art for a full story arc yet, but I hope to build out the story over subsequent updates. I appreciate everyone’s patience with this.
- Taking damage previously slowed ship speed. This really affected playability and encouraged players to intentionally crash to get back to normal speed. The ship will now show cosmetic damage, but movement speed will remain consistent.
- Weapons have been rebalanced. Some weapons were previously overpowered and made the bosses very easy to defeat. Secondary weapons now have more balance, but still provide a meaningful amount of damage.
- The Mountain Rush level has been updated to minimize some of the quick-scrolling elements. I found some of this to be sickness inducing (sorry!).
- Several elements have been optimized to improve overall performance.
What's Next?
- Small updates and bug fixes.
- Create new level enemies.
- Rework level spawning to make the levels more challenging and interesting.