Lead

[ScottHuggins]

Cafeman! How are you? Working on anything?

 

Ok... just to keep on track. Does anyone have ANY play tips? Man, this game is HARD. I love the 'feel' of it, but my scores...are....AWFUL.

NATHAN- how did you score 3890?!?!? MAN O MAN. I consider myself fairly adept at video gaming....but that...is....stellar.

 

 

 

 

I tried this game for the first time just now, and wanted to say how awesome it is! Keep up the great work! Great music too!

Edited June 30, 2007 by ScottHuggins

[Guest moonshot22]

Hi Simone!

 

I like the looks of the 3rd stage! I haven't completed it yet, but it feels good in so far as having continuity with the game. I didn't have a "smart bomb" left when I got to that stage so I am wondering if it has any effect on the "scramble" level?

 

I had some ideas about the power ups/smart bombs for this level. Maybe have 3 of them appear on this particular level but, instead of destroying everything on screen at once, one power up only allows you one shot that will remove one obstacle.

 

 

The way you have set up the sound options is very clever! I noticed that one of the options seems to lower the higher pattern an octave.

I like that the hi hat/drum sound enters on the "dodge" stage. To further change the music for this stage, would it be possible to have that octave drop on the high pattern only on the "dodge" stage? That way you only hear the higher pitched version of that pattern for the "Fire" levels.

 

What do you think about having a "continue game" feature for training purposes? It is pretty difficult Which is what I like about it! It gives me that feeling I used to have when I played "tempest" at the arcade.

 

I don't know of any of the suggestions are useful but I thought I would throw them out there.

 

cheers---Ron

Edited June 30, 2007 by moonshot22

[+Nathan Strum]

Ok... just to keep on track. Does anyone have ANY play tips? Man, this game is HARD. I love the 'feel' of it, but my scores...are....AWFUL.

NATHAN- how did you score 3890?!?!? MAN O MAN. I consider myself fairly adept at video gaming....but that...is....stellar.

I've play-tested the game a lot, including some versions that weren't publicly released. (See below.)

 

What do you think about having a "continue game" feature for training purposes? It is pretty difficult Which is what I like about it! It gives me that feeling I used to have when I played "tempest" at the arcade.

You can do this in an emulator by using Save States. (In Stella hit F9. Hit F11 to re-load.)

 

I never post scores achieved by using Save States, but it does allow you to play through the whole game in order to test it for bugs (and to see if it's even possible to clear each level without dying). As a side-effect, you get better at the harder levels, faster.

 

Personally, I'm against 'Continue' features in games. It tends to ruin them, unless there's some sort of penalty involved. For example in Tempest, it would start you back a few levels, so you still had to be good enough to play your way through them. But far too many games allowed the player to just endlessly dump in quarters and hit "Continue" to essentially cheat through the game (some don't even reset the score to zero). That was done solely for the purpose of earning money off impatient gamers. Unfortunately, a lot of that has carried over to console gaming.

 

If there were a practice feature added, I'd suggest it only let you start three levels from the highest level you cleared during a game, and wouldn't register any score during practice. So if you died during level 8 (having cleared 7), you could start no higher than level 4. But no matter how far you got in practice mode, you'd still have to play the game in order to increase the maximum starting practice level.

 

Oh, and the smart bombs do have an effect on the "scramble" level.

[r_type2600]

Awesome new update Thanks Simone!

 

- continue feature: I would welcome one in the cart version (no emulation cheating possible). The difficulty itself is very well balanced, IMO, but it tends to get a bit tedious to have to restart from the beginning all the time. Clearly, the Tempest approach should be taken though, for the good reasons Nathan spelled out.

 

- scramble level: cool! Admit that I at first thought it was just a dodge! variation, but it quickly became obvious that it has its very own gameplay style - more like sliding between the enemies

Don't think it needs to be changed as it's been greatly implemented and the collision detection is very fair. Plays very smoothly once you got adapted you mindset to "sliding"...

The only shortcoming is the missing exclamation mark in the stage title :!:

 

Some comments/ refinement suggestions:

 

- game intro: I love the stage transitions - find they work like butter now, and keep the flow of the game very smooth.

As a start-game intro the effect is a bit weak though. My suggestion for this is a take on the classic (and tired) mothership dropoff intro. Let's call it "motherbubble"

The sequence would be like this:

1) a bubble, slightly bigger than the spaceship enters the screen from bottom and flies to the middle at normal speed. Stops.

2) a text appears on the top half of the screen: "This is living!" - setting the tone for the "funk meets existentialism" mood of Lead, as to be experienced with stages like Fire!, Dodge!, Catch!

(and a nice spoof on that funky PS3 ad campaign)

3) bubble bursts, ship appears in its place. (-a ship is born!)

4) ships drops to the bottom at normal speed. Game starts! (-ship sets off to discover the universe he was born into)

 

- catch stage: looks beautiful and plays like a charm. Could you add some (red) flash effect when the player misses an enemy? Either full screen, or probably better, in a strip below the player ship. Would add some drama and keep the player excited...

Also - I never managed to catch them all, so I could not verify it: is there any "perfect score" bonus? Just think it would add some extra motivation and kick to this stage...

 

- catch bonus items: perfect implementation of this great idea! Integrates smoothly and really adds to the gameplay!

Only wonder what happens when the player already has accumulated a full arsenal of five smartbombs? I managed this once to watch what would come next, but was a bit deceived to see yet another smartbomb icon. Caught it, but am not sure what effect it had. The number of bombs in reserve remained the same, and I could not notice any score effect.

Would be nice if you could introduce a new bonus icon in this situation, that would increase the player's score: say by 20, 50 or 100 points - maybe a random effect, like the UFO in Space Invaders.

In that case the bonus "friends" should be distinguishable by color or shape...

 

- attract mode: missing right now, but would add to the first class arcade quality of Lead.

Hopefully easy to implement, yet very efficient:

A continuous cyle between title screen and demos of the most characteristic stages. For instance:

Title - Shoot demo - Title - Dodge demo - ... repeat.. Title - shoot ...etc.

 

- option screen: beautiful now. Great to see the attention you're giving to improve and finetune even secondary aspects of the game!

One mini-suggestion: since Lead1K is less of a tuning option, more like a fullblown extra feature, maybe it could be decently distinguished by having it, for instance, "encapsuled" (like a hieroglyph).

 

Hope Simone it's obvious that all this suggestions (and I guess the others') are fed by the enthusiasm for the great game Lead is! Once again, hats up for this great creation!

Eric

[+atari2600land]

Can someone tell me how to play this? I start and three seconds later, I get a game over screen.

 

Edit: Never mind. I figured it out. It's not to let an alien get at the bottom of the screen, right? Nice game so far. I'd like a "slow" speed. Something below normal.

Edited June 30, 2007 by atari2600land

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Uhm, just shoot everything you see?

[+Nathan Strum]

I'd like a "slow" speed. Something below normal.

Go to "Options" and play the 1k version for awhile.

 

Then the main version will seem slower.

[+Nathan Strum]

Tip: Save your smart bombs. You'll need them later on. Like on Level 9, for instance.

 

Level 12 - 5,795

 

[+Nathan Strum]

The only shortcoming is the missing exclamation mark in the stage title :!:

Yep. It needs to say "Scramble!"

 

- catch stage: looks beautiful and plays like a charm. Could you add some (red) flash effect when the player misses an enemy? Either full screen, or probably better, in a strip below the player ship. Would add some drama and keep the player excited...

A screen flash or even a sound (appropriate, given the rest of the game) for missing would be good. I think the collision detection needs to be a little more forgiving here, since it seems you have to be lined up in exactly with the oncoming objects. It seems even if you're only half out of the lane, it counts as a "miss".

 

You might also consider penalizing the player for each one he misses, and for every ten he misses, he loses a smart bomb. Then for a miss, you could flash the score (or smart bomb) as the indicator.

 

Would be nice if you could introduce a new bonus icon in this situation, that would increase the player's score: say by 20, 50 or 100 points - maybe a random effect, like the UFO in Space Invaders.

Cool idea. Rewarding the player for not using his smart bombs. But unlike the smart bombs, make this one shootable, so it's harder to grab.

 

Another thought regarding smart bombs - it would be nice if using the smart bombs didn't destroy the smart bombs that were falling.

 

Or maybe it's okay the way it is. I'm waffling here. The game is achieving a really nice balance.

[Guest moonshot22]

- catch stage: looks beautiful and plays like a charm. Could you add some (red) flash effect when the player misses an enemy? Either full screen, or probably better, in a strip below the player ship. Would add some drama and keep the player excited...

Also - I never managed to catch them all, so I could not verify it: is there any "perfect score" bonus? Just think it would add some extra motivation and kick to this stage..

 

Maybe make that the only way to earn an extra ship?

 

 

Simone it's obvious that all this suggestions (and I guess the others') are fed by the enthusiasm for the great game Lead is! Once again, hats up for this great creation!

 

I second that!! Hats off to you and all of the homebrew authors on this site!!!

Nathan, Eric, and myself are flooding you with suggestions while you are the guy having to do all the hard work!!!

 

All of this makes me consider how cool it is that "AtariAge" draws such diverse multi-national participation.

Edited June 30, 2007 by moonshot22

[seemo]

Thanks for your comments and suggestions !

 

This version introduces 'practice' mode: if you set the Right Difficulty switch to 'A', when you start a new game, you can choose what level to practice by pressing up/down, and confirm it with fire.

 

You start this mode with a smart bomb, and the game ends at the end of the stage.

 

This way you can 'learn' how to play each stage, and be prepared to run through all the stages in normal game mode.

 

So, don't miss this opportunity to beta-test enjoy all the 20 levels of Lead !

 

Simone

lead_8k_20070630.bin

[+Nathan Strum]

Hi Simone,

 

There are some tough levels in there - but they are all beatable! It just takes some work.

 

That said, I'd suggest making the last two Dodge stages (12 and 17) a bit harder. By the time you get to that point in the game, they seem pretty easy. Maybe move 17 up to 12, and make 17 harder (narrower passageway? closer-spaced asteroids?).

 

I think the practice solution you came up with is a good one, since the player still has to play all the way through the game to beat it, but they can practice those harder ones. And actually, you have an advantage during the game, since you can stockpile smart bombs for the levels where you need them the most.

 

I did save-state my way through the whole game (it took more attempts on level 20 than I'd care to admit ), and noticed at the end... there's no end.

 

After level 20, you get this screen:

 

 

Then it goes into an endless (and very slow) 'catch' level:

 

 

The score eventually tops out at 9,999, but the game never ends.

 

A few suggestions for possible endings (in increasing order of work involved) :

• A simple congratulatory message, while music plays. (Which would be at the end of the following ideas, too.)
  
• The player's ship flying up and off the screen while fireworks explode (not sure how you'd do fireworks on the 2600, but it would be a neat trick if you could pull it off. )
  
• The endless 'catch' level also got me thinking. What if, after level 20, you still had to escape by flying through a narrow and winding tunnel (no enemies, just flying) where touching the walls was fatal. One last challenge for the player before the end. Then you escape from the tunnel, and the ship flies off screen (maybe doing a couple of loop-the-loops on the way out).
  

[r_type2600]

Thanks Simone for the level select, allows to playtest all the levels - glad to report that I also found all of them beatable

Would still prefer a continue a la Tempest in the cart version, frankly, as this level select makes it too easy to see all the game and spoils the fun of discovering new aliens in later stages and the feeling of accomplishment in doing so...

 

I also noticed the score-limit issue (probably due to have to limit it to 4 digits, I guess?), but that could easily be addressed by reducing the scoring for enemies, e.g. bring it down to 3 or 2 points per enemy.

That would also facilitate including the random score bonus catch items and "Perfect!" catch stage bonus

 

Did not manage to play through the end, but agree that a game so accomplished like this, needs a worthy ending -

Nathan's final "Escape!" stage is a great idea, would fit smoothly into the game experience.

As for the ending sequence, here's my suggestion:

- after escape level, ship centers at the bottom

- message apeears: Congratulations! Mission Complete (or something like that). message disappears.

- new message: Lead!

- ships slowly flies off. After some time (a third or halfway through the screen), the various aliens he beat before start scrolling in from the bottom in formation (not all of them to keep it to a reasonable length, 10 or 20 or so of each species): they are following their newly found leader

Some fitting music would enhance the effect.

- this goes on until the last aliens have exited from the top of the screen.

- Return to title screen.

 

Two more presentation suggestions:

- on the title screen, could you have the Lead logo slowly hover up and down? That should be easy to implement, and would add some motion and further character to the title screen.

- this is taken from Lady Bug: could you color-code the score according to the selected speed? Would be justified to distinguish it IMO, as the different speed levels do alter the gameplay...

 

Thanks again Simone, for listening to all our suggestions - I think the game is now really approaching completion, you should not be bothered for too long any more by those enthusiastic homebrew commentators

[+Nathan Strum]

frankly, as this level select makes it too easy to see all the game and spoils the fun of discovering new aliens in later stages and the feeling of accomplishment in doing so...

That's a good point. It would be nice to leave some surprises that the player had to earn by playing all the way through the game.

[Guest moonshot22]

This is definitely becoming one of my favorite games! I have cursed quite a bit while playing it! Which is a good thing!! Ha Ha

 

As it should be, stages 19 and 20 are extremely challenging! I like how the ships fluctuate in size on stage 20 which seems to add a subtle increase in difficulty.

 

I also like that you added the ability to train on the various levels. I think I like your solution better than the continue I originally mentioned. Either way, each player can choose how they approach the game. Everybody has a different opinion so options are good.

 

I like that you only get one ship to start the game. I think that really lends to the sense of urgency this game creates! Still, this brings me back to something I mentioned yesterday.

 

It's nice having a reprieve knowing you can't be killed on the "Catch" stage but I think the relevancy and tension of this stage would really ramp up if you made it the only opportunity to earn an extra ship if you "Catch" every object.

I think extra lives are needed to play this game. Just like Nathan, it took me a lot of attempts to clear those last two stages.

Regardless, please don't make it any easier to play. I love that it's so challenging!

 

STAGE 21? - I like the tunnel idea that Nathan mentioned. Call it "Worm Hole"

if you do touch a wall it drains one "Power Up/smart bomb" which promotes the

thinking ahead strategy. Of course if you don't have any "Power Ups" you die.

 

I am calling them "Power Ups" because I have an idea that might be cool to pursue.

 

With the "dodge" and "scramble" stages being about avoiding hitting things rather than shooting.

It might be more strategic and challenging if the power ups on these 2 stages gave you a 3 to 4 second shield instead of a "smart bomb". I know this would require more coding and may be to much to ask. Still, I thought I would throw it out there.

 

Once again, thanks for entertaining our suggestions! You were able to take my "scramble" idea and turn it into something very cool.

 

cheers---Ron

Edited July 1, 2007 by moonshot22

[Guest moonshot22]

Going with the "Worm Hole" Theme, it could be the backstory for the manual.

 

"You are the LEAD Protector, a lone patrol ship on the outskirts of the Ataria Solar System that has discovered a hostile race is utilizing worm hole technology to launch an invasion."

[r_type2600]

It might be more strategic and challenging if the power ups on these 2 stages gave you a 3 to 4 second shield instead of a "smart bomb".

I think shields in the "Dodge!" and "Scramble" stages would make them too easy, but Ron's idea would make perfect sense in the final "Escape!" (prefer that name to keep consistent with the rest of the game) stage-

Each hit of the walls (with flash effect?) would deplete one of the stock smart bombs, only once all are gone the next hit would end the game. It would really be too harsh to end the game with one single hit after such a long journey...

To ensure that the player will still be encouraged to hit the walls as little as possible, any remaining smart bombs would then be added to his final score (say value of 100 for each bomb) at the end of the game. (after the congratulatory message and before the end sequence).

 

As with the catch item bonus and perfect! bonus, this would add another element of score flexibility, ensuring that even after beating the game, players will be motivated to play it again to try to achieve an even better score

[Guest moonshot22]

I think shields in the "Dodge!" and "Scramble" stages would make them too easy

 

Perhaps you think I meant unlimited shields, I am only talking about getting 3 seconds of a shield per "power up" you capture.

 

Consider that when you use a "smart bomb" you have destroyed everything that's on screen. I can't imagine anything easier than that.

 

If the obstacles were still on screen instead of being destroyed, you would still have to strategically guide your ship to be in a good position for when your 3 second shield expired.

 

As with the catch item bonus and perfect! bonus, this would add another element of score flexibility, ensuring that even after beating the game, players will be motivated to play it again to try to achieve an even better score

 

I would like to see the game continue after the "victory dance"

A "Cold" ending feels good for say Adventure or the Super Mario Brothers type of games but it wouldn't feel right for a fast paced shooter like Lead. That's another reason I would like to see extra ship bonuses.

 

Scoring isn't a motivation for me in this game, survival is. The scores for completing a stage are arbitrary and the same for everybody--500 points.

Lead isn't a game that rewards greed like say Galaga. Two different people could play galaga for 10 stages and one person could have double the score of the other.

 

I would measure skill in LEAD by how many stages you complete!

So let the game continue and become even more difficult

 

Once you start the 21 stages over again, perhaps this time some elements are combined to make it harder. Perhaps an occasional asteroid falls while on a "fire" stage which could effectively trap you to one side momentarily.

 

If by some miracle you surive that round of 21 stages then maybe the whole thing reverses polarity. Maybe your ship is on the top of the screen while things fly up at you. I don't know why, but that always messes with my head. Like playing Rescue Terra I.

 

cheers----Ron

Edited July 1, 2007 by moonshot22

[r_type2600]

I would like to see the game continue after the "victory dance"

A "Cold" ending feels good for say Adventure or the Super Mario Brothers type of games but it wouldn't feel right for a fast paced shooter like Lead. That's another reason I would like to see extra ship bonuses.

 

Scoring isn't a motivation for me in this game, survival is. The scores for completing a stage are arbitrary and the same for everybody--500 points.

Lead isn't a game that rewards greed like say Galaga. Two different people could play galaga for 10 stages and one person could have double the score of the other.

 

I would measure skill in LEAD by how many stages you complete!

So let the game continue and become even more difficult

 

Once you start the 21 stages over again, perhaps this time some elements are combined to make it harder. Perhaps an occasional asteroid falls while on a "fire" stage which could effectively trap you to one side momentarily.

 

If by some miracle you surive that round of 21 stages then maybe the whole thing reverses polarity. Maybe your ship is on the top of the screen while things fly up at you. I don't know why, but that always messes with my head. Like playing Rescue Terra I.

 

cheers----Ron

 

Well, I certainly would have no objection against a second or third, even fourth loop, after the end sequence of a 21-stage round

...some other difficulty element (like your "occasional asteroid" idea) for later loops could be a higher density of aliens, for instance.

I would however guess that this may require quite some level finetuning and extra work. Not to mention any technical obstacles.

 

As for the current rigid scoring scheme; that's certainly a valid point.

And precisely one good reason to introduce random/tactical scoring opportunities

 

Survival vs. Scoring motivation

I don't see one excluding the other, and a good chance to incorporate both in Lead

[+Cafeman]

Cafeman! How are you? Working on anything?

 

Howdy! I am fine, taking a few months break after finally finishing AdvII 5200. To answer you question (don't want to overtake this thread about LEAD in any way though), I will work on tweaked A8 AdvII in July. I have a folder of several ideas for 5200/A8 games but not sure if I'll ever do another game. So much time is involved!

[seemo]

Hi Everybody !

here's an updated version of Lead: as always, I tried to follow your suggestions

 

What's new :

 

- moving logo on title and options screen

 

- bordered 'lead 1k' option

 

- game over and options menu voices 'wrap' (press up while on first option to get to the last option, down while on last option to get to the first)

 

- 'saw' envelope option replaced by '1/0'

 

- intro sequence (skip with fire)

 

- ending sequence

 

- attract mode, if you leave the game on title screen, after a short while it will show the last played stage for some seconds, without showing the player ship (move the joystick or press fire to leave this mode)

 

- it is possible to carry only 4 smart bombs at once, but once you catch the 5th smart bomb, you get an upgrade as follows :

1st upgrade missile upgrade (red ship)

2nd upgrade side upgrade (ship can push/touch the sides without any effect - green ship)

3rd upgrade speed upgrade (ship moves faster horizontally - yellow ship)

4th upgrade 499 points bonus

 

- practice mode has been replaced by a continue mode: during the game over notify screen, you can press fire to continue the game from the '3rd last' stage. Smart bombs, score and upgrades are lost

 

- there's a 500 points bonus for perfect catch stages

 

- an audio sound is played whenever you miss on catch stages, enemies 'flash' when the ship is in range for a catch

(catch range should be wider now)

 

- the sides movement routine has been reworked

 

- the last 20 enemies of a stage are signaled by an effect on the bass notes volume

 

So, give it a try, and let me know what you think

 

Simone

 

@Cafeman : I'm really honoured to host your comments and thoughts !

Many many people dreamed of seeing a great follow-up to Adventure, and you made that dream come true !

...You are a true homebrew leader

lead_8k_20070730.bin

[+Nathan Strum]

Sweet!

 

I love the missile upgrade! Great changes throughout the game. This is going to get a lot of play time this week.

 

This is really a full-featured shooter. Excellent work!

[Nognir]

Wow!

 

This game is really great! It's now the first time that I play the 8K version and i'm really impressed!

I hope we will get that on cart in the near future?

[r_type2600]

Cool new version, this is really close to perfect now, with gameplay that feels and runs smoothly from intro to game over screen

 

I would only have one gameplay comment and a few small finetuning requests this time

 

Catch level:

- While it plays very well, for some reason it does still not feel as smooth as the other stages.

I concentrated a bit on this, and think the answer why it does not feel so intuitive is simple and logical - the player ship does never actually touch the aliens! That is not very coherent with the sensation of catching...

I believe it would much improve the feeling of this level if the collision routine would actually allow the ship and aliens to touch...

 

- also, it could be more intuitive to flash the player ship instead of the aliens at the catch. That should further integrate the player in the flow of the game.

 

- final suggestion here: the new miss sound works great, but is a bit feeble, IMO. One tends to overhear it easily. Maybe you could increase its volume somewhat?

 

Polish suggestions:

 

- great presentation screens now. Only suggestions I would have is to slightly reduce the moving logo speed on one hand, and stretch the intervalls between title/demo screens (e.g. 10 seconds each for instance) on the other.

Since the game itself is rather frantic and high-adrenaline, a calmer presentation would contrast better and provide a more elegant wrapping, IMO.

The Lead1K border is perfect btw!

 

- intro sequence. Superb idea, Simone! Just like the Game Over screen, simple yet very effective!

Love the dramatic text build-up - a small request though: would you mind dropping the "us" at the end? It somehow feels a bit too whimsical (poor little aliens begging for help) and does not fit well with the cool hardcore gaming atmosphere of the rest of the game, IMO.

I particularly like the blue flashing screen introduction of the player's ship.

Just a simple suggestion here: It would be cool if you could turn the ship black instead of white, giving the impression that the ship is coming out of the shadows to answer the call, adding further drama to the introduction...

 

- bonus catch items. Brilliant solution and great new features! Love the "fat" shots

Only weakness I could find here is that the same smartbomb sprite is used for all bonus items.

Hopefully you could design a couple more sprites for these (one for the upgrades - in different colors o correspond with the particular upgrade; another one for the bonus score item).

 

 

Yet need to make it to the end, and hope to at least once get a perfect score in the catch stage; but this game is tremendous fun and immensely addicting all around

Great work, Simone!

 

Eric

[+Nathan Strum]

Catch level:

- While it plays very well, for some reason it does still not feel as smooth as the other stages.

I concentrated a bit on this, and think the answer why it does not feel so intuitive is simple and logical - the player ship does never actually touch the aliens! That is not very coherent with the sensation of catching...

I believe it would much improve the feeling of this level if the collision routine would actually allow the ship and aliens to touch...

I think that's a good suggestion.

 

Related to that, are the Scramble stages. The movement of the aliens is a bit abrupt - they jump from position to position, instead of moving smoothly down the screen. Can they keep the same speed, but move more smoothly? This might also help the Catch stages.

 

Love the dramatic text build-up - a small request though: would you mind dropping the "us" at the end? It somehow feels a bit too whimsical (poor little aliens begging for help) and does not fit well with the cool hardcore gaming atmosphere of the rest of the game, IMO.

I like the "us" part. Seems to fit the game perfectly, to me.

 

One other suggestion: When you get a ship upgrade, and lose all your smart bombs, it would be nice if you could choose to downgrade your ship in exchange for the effect of one more smart bomb. So if you had a green ship, but no smart bombs, you could still activate the smart bomb, but then your ship would turn red (with no smart bombs). Then, you could either collect more smart bombs, or downgrade again by activating the smart bomb. I've run into more than a few instances where I'd upgraded, and wish I still had a smart bomb to use, instead of the upgrade.