Something you never hear about in game development is the challenge of capturing footage for a trailer or some amount of publicity. Few games, particularly those with any kind of randomness or procedural generation, look 100% perfect at every moment during development. Even if there aren't bugs, you're trying to take a slice of time, a single image, where the game shines as what you envision it to be. It can take weeks and weeks and at the end of the process you feel a strange mixture of pride in what you have created and despair over all the things you have left to do.
So over August and September as I've been catching snippets for use in the Seattle Indies Expo, I got a face full of the driving experience at times when I wanted to feel the Drive Magic. However, as you drive and shoot there are stalls (put in there intentionally) as the game resolves projectiles and impacts. That sort of turn resolution is pretty common in tactics games, it lets you see the results of your attack (or attacks against you) and process the result before moving on. I originally set the system up that way because "that's what Roguelikes usually do"
However, the frequent halts during my drivin' and skiddin' started to bug the crap out of me, especially when there were a lot of enemies nearby. Of course I don't pause the game when something happens offscreen, but when there are a lot of enemies it can happen often, especially in the arena where enemies were attacking each other.
So, to the experiments! I decided to try a couple things:
I removed the projectile pause entirely and let attacks just resolve while the various vehicles moved to new positions.
I adjusted the speed at which the turn played out based on the player speed, so turns (including those of opponents) just play out faster when the player vehicle is moving at higher speed. Turns at 25 MPH play out faster than turns at 100 MPH.
The results were interesting. Keep in mind that this is still 100% turn-based. The only thing that has changed is how turn results are represented.
You can specifically see the lack of a delay when the player fires machineguns and rockets.
Yes, the result needs a bit of work, specifically:
Bullets don't yet "lead" their targets so they are striking behind the vehicle.
Some slow weapons like rockets that take longer than a typical move duration (generally between a quarter and a half second) need to be converted to take multiple turns to reach their destination.
(...but hey that's gameplay, y'all!)
I still need to make sure combat resolution is as readable as possible, such as:
Armor impacts and damage numbers are still getting obscured.
The armor side that gets hit isn't as obvious as it should be
And of course, special moves will still need to stall the game, but that's fine for something that doesn't happen often.
However, in all it did improve the overall feel of driving and smoothness. This was a worthwhile experiment and I'm all in on making sure the game feels great and still has a clear turn-based combat resolution. Not sure where this will lead, and I know that a certain segment of the audience will want to be crystal clear on what's going on in combat, in the same way that another segment will want to cut loose and skid around fluidly. Possibly I'll leave a toggle for the roguelike turn resolution if the player wants that (should be possible).
More to come as the game continues to evolve and improve!
New stuff: Citadel Content and Sector Renown
Some great new updates to Auto Fire this month. The UI got another level up with some improved screens and a more lived-in look. You can now go to the citadel and help those people out, building renown with that city. Citadels are a little more solid in their representation also, with one of only a few corporations keeping control of the populace across the country. Finally, the visuals took an uptick with better lighting, new desert terrain visuals and cleaned up foliage. Excited to be preparing for revealing to players this fall!
Content:
Sectors now have a renown level that gates new sector quests.
Tutorial also now uses renown sector quests.
Cleared up the skull rating and show it on the challenge tablet app.
Cleaned up factions signficantly. At campaign generation there are only four corporate factions, two military factions, one citizen and one duellist faction.
Set up each sector now with a consistent resident and enemy faction.
Changed enemy and sector definitions to be able to be controlled on a per sector basis, allowing for better channeling of content across the overworld maps.
Quests now have a clearer faction reward and renown award for sectors
Fixed up sector leader quest arcs. The player can eliminate an enemy entirely from the overworld of a sector.
Quests now have a goto step or a load cargo step.
Citadels:
Each citadel is run by one of the 4 corporations.
The mayor or citadel leader will dole out a quest for you, which gives you an opportunity to increase your sector renown
The player can now abandon cargo in a citadel and it will be returned to the quest list
The player can even abandon sector quest cargo and it is returned to the sector quest list.
Cargo cannot be returned for salvage profit unless it doesn't have a quest attached.
The player cannot accept a cargo quest unless they have room to haul it.
HUD:
Dashboard elements now have schmutz on their frames as well as the glass
Sped up zooms and added functionality to make any panel zoom, plus zooming recenters the view based on the visible portion of the screen.
Improved the Travel and reward tablet app visuals
New Challenge popup when entering a combat area
Fixed up the quote panel in the upper right.
Quest steps now read out as crossed out if completed in quest list
Menu:
Mayor feed in the citadel ticks out like the quest panels do.
Revised automap and travel panels to use the same look
Menus and screens also have some schmutz added for a bit more lived-in look
Added macros for if the player chooses the gender "they", so we can say "who [is] [he]?" as "who are they?"
Added a feed to the loading screen so we can have a colorful quote from the populace on the current situation.
Visuals/VFX:
Fixed up quality settings in the settings panel, as well as setting the default quality to high.
Revised all desert terrain textures to something a bit more stylized and cleaner (Deep Desert Pack asset)
Fixed up all terrains to properly display grass again (broken links abound)
Adjusted lighting to not overbright, and made sure all views use deferred lighting so that VFX lighting shows up more effectively.
Put dirt decals under shacks so as to make them a bit clearer as obstacles.
Zoom makes a whoosh sound
Bugs:
Fixed improperly LOD'ing models by a windmill
A courier quest to a combat area now can complete and the combat quest continues properly.
Fixed bug that if I killed the sector boss, the game would eventually crash
Boss camera on encounters now zoom into the proper target again.
Fixed several bad citizen tweets, some of which sounded extra dumb and others crashed the game(!)
Fixed crashes based on occasionally building battlegrounds.
Tech:
Adjusted night lighting settings (to be used in the future) for some experiements.
Updated to Unity 2020.3.33f
Big UI Update!
I know iit's been a long time coming, but Auto Fire is back in action and cranking out the updates and improvements!
There has been a major UI revision for just about all of the supporting screens and menus. Consumable gear was added so you can manually heal up in the field if you have the right items. There is a significant and growing tutorial that pops up how to play the game as situations present themselves. (And yes, you can turn them off in the settings!) More is in the works, including the long-promised arenas, the future looks shiny and chrome this year!
Gameplay/Combat
Some garages and repair outlets have a limited amount of gas or ordnance they can sell you.
Consumable gear was created that can repair your internals, drop mines or smokescreens, or basically enact any normal equipment's function.
You can also target yourself on specific sides for armor repair gear, and the UI reflects it on your armor display.
Radar is now a dedicated equipment type and slot called "Sensors". All cars have a default radar sensors package, but this can do a lot of different things.
AI consider facing when planning their navigation routes, meaning that vehicles will plot paths more naturally and loop around their targets.
Content/Tuning
Old instant repair and armor pickups removed from drops in favor of the repair consumables.
Desert sectors should no longer have random encounters, only emplaced ones (that is, glints and smoke columns rather than just rolling dice)
HUD
Rework of the HUD colors and aiming interface.
Shrank the HUD components (gear, armor, social) slightly to allow for more playable space.
Changed social feed to dark mode, because the bright display was distracting from the gameplay.
Event-based tutorial popups appear when the player experiences various events, from taking damage to skidding to picking up gear.
Added a real date display that updates based on player turns.
Menus
Complete rework of the character and loadout screens.
Complete rework of the repair experience.
Complete rework of the vehicle stable, to show all stats for all vehicles.
Complete rework of inventory, buy and sell screens to add categories and better controls.
Complete rework of the loading dock experience to show a map where you must deliver your chosen item.
New Automap with improved visuals and interactivity.
Entirely new inventory icons, for a punchier and yet colorful look
The loadout view shows pips that indicate when a higher-level item is available to be slotted in that location.
The inventory view shows pips that indicate when an item is new and has not yet been examined.
Visuals/VFX
Enemy shouts appear in bubbles both on the HUD and over the enemy vehicles in-world.
New power lines, cargo containers, and other assets
Revised fire oil, burning objects and flamethrower VFX
Added decals on the ground from gunfire and explosions.
Audio
Vehicle audio uses Realistic Engine Sounds package and adjusts and shifts gear based on speed.
SIX Tactical Showcase
I know we've been dark for quite a while... as distractions have started to slow down towards winter, things are starting to roll more effectively again. This past summer, I made a video for the Seattle Indies Expo, who was doing a feature on local tactical games. The intent here was to show off the game with a bit of “talk from the developer” rather than a fancy trailer. Back then I didn't want to steal their thunder and post it separately, but it's a good snapshot that shows some things you haven't seen before. Have at it!
