Dragon's Havoc - Homebrew Side-Scrolling Shooter

[Revontuli]

The Dragon of Storms and the Dragon of Embers fight against hosts of beasts commanded by seven dragon monarchs...

 

 

The game features parallax scrolling, mazelike cave levels, 21 stages and 7 bosses, and an option for 2-player simultaneous play.  Hit enemies to increase your speed and havoc meter, miss enemies to slow back down - full your havoc meter to gain a shield and double your points!  You need to balance bold attacks with cautious strategy in order to master these skies...

 

I'm curious how much cross traffic there is (or isn't) between this forum and the programming sub-forum.  I've posted about this game there, and it's been mentioned in another thread with my other 7800 games, but I'm focusing on finishing the game now, and have a demo available (with the first 4 stages) for those who want to try it:

 

DragonsHavoc_2_17_2022_Demo.bas.a78

DragonsHavoc_2_17_2022_Demo.bas.bin

[Cousin Vinnie]

IS IT DONE?

[Revontuli]

16 minutes ago, Cousin Vinnie said:

IS IT DONE?

I have a "first full cut" that I'm testing by myself right now - the build I posted above is basically the first half of the game for folks to try out.  No beta version of a game survives contact with the players, so consider this an early test screening   I imagine I'll have a lot to fix and adjust in the game after some folks give it a proper road test...this is the time where folks can give me feedback about gameplay, sound effects, color choices, etc. and I might be able to make some changes accordingly. ?

 

Oh, and here are some more screenshots:

 

 

 

Edited February 19, 2022 by Revontuli

[Cousin Vinnie]

Supppppppppppper Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuper

[Trebor]

The game is visually super impressive and needs to be seen live in its full glory.  The number of colors, parallax scrolling, filled busy background, and super smooth animation.  Numerous stages, enemies, bosses... all done within 48K!   

 

If you're a fan of side scrolling shooters, this one will test your skill and amaze.  If you're not a fan of the genre, this may change your opinion.

 

It's possible to play Dragon's Havoc now under JS7800 online 

[SlidellMan]

I think you should post a gameplay video when you get the chance.

[Revontuli]

New build showing score and lives at the same time:

DragonsHavoc_2_20_2022_Demo.bas.a78

DragonsHavoc_2_20_2022_Demo.bas.bin

 

Before, your lives counter only showed up when you were hit.  7800 graphics are largely limited by objects-per-screen and objects-per-line, and by the time I'm hitting the bottom of the screen and want to add a bunch of numbers, I'm running pretty low on both.  I shuffled around some code, and now that I have a better idea of how I'm practically using my graphical limits, I *might* be able to get away with this

 

Thanks to everyone who has played the game, and to those who have responded with feedback!  As I mentioned before, this is basically an early user/beta test!  Certain features will be much harder to change as I make final commitments to the ROM...

 

[Revontuli]

Posted another gameplay video (different from the rougher one in the programming thread):

 

 

This playthrough gets to the second boss, but there are two more levels after that in the demo!

 

I'm still welcoming any feedback from folks who've given the demo a try - this is the time to ask any questions, note any bugs, complain about any sound effects, etc.  It'll be easier for me to respond to something involving the game now than when I'm burning it onto a cartridge!  

[Silver Back]

Like I said I love this game and it feels like a retail quality game. My only complaint is the orange level hurts my eyes but if I'm in the minority then please ignore.  I'm playing 7800 today as I'm off work and don't have much to do so I'll run through the demo some more. But I personally feel this is a fantastic addition to the 7800!

[+swlovinist]

Looks like another quality game and thank you for sharing.   Just looking at the speed of the shots fired, is there a plan to offer an option to have rapid fire while holding down the button?   Any adjustment for the speed of shots fired planned for future updates?   Looks great!  

[Paul Westphal]

Hard to be even slightly critical of this, but I find some of the colors are hard on the eyes.

 

Nowadays, my old fingers get tired so maybe a auto-fire power-up would ease the orange button cramps

 

Very impressive and smooth paralax. WOW.

[Revontuli]

4 hours ago, Paul Westphal said:

Nowadays, my old fingers get tired so maybe a auto-fire power-up would ease the orange button cramps

5 hours ago, swlovinist said:

Just looking at the speed of the shots fired, is there a plan to offer an option to have rapid fire while holding down the button?   Any adjustment for the speed of shots fired planned for future updates?  

Autofire is in there, but your rate of fire is tied to how how accurate you are. Hitting enemies = go faster, missing enemies = go slower.   

 

If you watch the boss fight in the video around 5:25, with the player letting loose over a dozen shots into the boss at close range, that's me holding down the button, there's no way I can tap that fast (nor do I expect others to do so  )

 

Your rate of fire is slow to start, and tapping the button faster doesn't make you shoot faster.  Hitting enemies makes you move faster and increases your rate of fire.  (I put that last part in bold because my aging thumbs require autofire as well - I can't ask folks to damage their fingers and controllers button mashing).  This can make it easier to miss (and slow back down), but at full power at close range you can let loose a ton of shots *very* quickly.  Really, the game is knowing when *not* to fire. 

 

I might make this instruction screen the first thing folks see when they boot up the game, it comes up in attract mode if you wait a few seconds on the main screen.  I can't be too wordy with the space I have, but this at least tells the player "hitting stuff = good, missing stuff = bad":

 

 

I'm one of those odd folks who demands autofire (my thumbs can only take so much), but also need a reason to *not* shoot.  This is a game where you can't just put a piece of masking tape over the fire button.  

 

I'm also working on balancing colors - my primary display is dark in comparison to a typical NTSC range, so I'm working on recalibrating some of the palettes.  

Edited February 27, 2022 by Revontuli

[Revontuli]

I hope the last post clarified a few things - people make assumptions on shooters, and I've been meaning to do something a little different with the way players power up.  The way you play might take some getting used to, but assume autofire is on- the trick is to know when to *let go* of the button.  In the video I posted, I'm *never* button mashing.  Thanks for everyone who has played so far!

Edited February 27, 2022 by Revontuli

[Silver Back]

I was gonna say due to the rage system auto fire isn't as beneficial as you might think. You have to be tactical with each shot sometimes making sure your accuracy is higher than your rate of fire. The auto fire helps mostly vs bosses or the gates in level 4 or 5 I don't remember exactly. But it's good to know that there is auto fire in the game but please please keep the rage mechanic as is. It's so good!

 

And I retract my statement about the orange levels. It looks like you've since changed the sprite color and it is less harsh on my eyes. I haven't come across any glitches or anything and I think it's excellent so far. I was gonna complain that it was too easy but levels 4 and 5 kicked my but a bit and I spent more time on those than the first 3 combined. So I'd say it even has a good difficulty curve. I couldn't think of anything to improve except that it seemed like I lost lives fast in the later levels one after another.  Like I lost 2 in a row real fast , But that's probably me not paying close enough attention to what I have left. 

Edited February 27, 2022 by Silver Back
Spelling

[Revontuli]

2 hours ago, Silver Back said:

I was gonna complain that it was too easy but levels 4 and 5 kicked my but a bit and I spent more time on those than the first 3 combined. So I'd say it even has a good difficulty curve.

That's great to hear!  Keep in mind that when you do lose a life, you're invincible for a second or two, but also you cannot fire for that window of time, so you need to use that time to get to a safer place (ideally lining up a good shot away from the bullets and enemies that just took you down!)

 

The game does get harder (particularly the bosses) as, while I wanted an easy start, I didn't want folks to be able to get through the whole game on their first try.  The game has unlimited continues, which start the player at the beginning of the stage they were on but resets their score.  This also allows you to practice with, say, a boss that's causing you trouble, as you can take some time to learn its pattern and form a strategy.  With that in mind, one should be able to muscle their way through the whole game with just a touch of patience in certain places, but a 1 Credit Complete run will be a challenge.

[SlidellMan]

I bet Shmup Junkie on YouTube would love this.

[Silver Back]

1 hour ago, SlidellMan said:

I bet Shmup Junkie on YouTube would love this.

Somebody should show it to him or anybody else that may be interested. Most people think of the 7800 as an after thought.  Especially compared to the NES or SMS even, so I bet a lot of people in the gaming community at large would be floored to see (again I assume this is right but correct me if it's not) parallax scrolling on the 7800.

 

Idk but I think this is one of the most impressive things yet, although this community of homebrew developers seem to top each other every other week since I've joined

 

either way fantastic work!

[Sapicco]

I want to buy this. 

[AtariBrian]

To me the sound effects kind of get lost with the music and the two combined throws it all off a bit. Would you be able to have a meter for both the sounds and music? Say 1 up to ten or fifteen. Other than that I think your game is looking pretty awesome from the videos and would be a day one buy for me!! 

[7800Knight]

Impressive!  It reminds me of Gradius and the TG16 game Lords of Thunder.    

[Revontuli]

I'm continuing to test the full version (which I haven't yet released) - I felt confident enough to do a proper playthrough of the full game, no "debug mode" or "cheat mode" - I did make use of my continue system, which puts you at the start of a level with your score reset.  Of course, I know how the game is laid out, and what strategies to adopt, but I'm not the greatest shmup player in the world.  With all that in mind, I was able to muscle my way through the game on original hardware in a single sitting, with minimal yelling and controller throwing.

 

I'll admit the last few levels get tough - the last cave level particular requires some strategy and anticipation of what will come next, and doesn't forgive easily.  My temptation to ease up on the difficulty of that stage a tad was overshadowed by the thrill of finally getting through it by the skin of my teeth, so I'm a bit on the fence there ? 

 

My high score was 9770 - That was from me surviving the first few levels, but my goal for this run was to "continue spam" my way to the end, so I was not too concerned with score.  That will be for later runs - an "ideal" score is much higher - someone playing well in the demo can easily beat that!  

 

On 2/28/2022 at 7:25 PM, AtariBrian said:

To me the sound effects kind of get lost with the music and the two combined throws it all off a bit. Would you be able to have a meter for both the sounds and music?

Separate volumes aren't really feasible with the way I have the code set up for the sound chip, my apologies.  The 7800's sound chip was obsolete even in its own time (it's the exact same one as the 2600, which wasn't known for its melodic capabilities), and I have to do some pretty strenuous tricks with the it to have both sound and music on and be halfway listenable, a lot of which involve echoing and controlled volume decay between 2 channels.  I will say there's always the option to turn off the music - I try my best with it, but I won't force folks to listen to it

 

On 2/27/2022 at 7:54 PM, Silver Back said:

I bet a lot of people in the gaming community at large would be floored to see (again I assume this is right but correct me if it's not) parallax scrolling on the 7800.

It's a classic parallax trick where you strategically shift graphical rows at different rates, combined with cooperative art design.  It's one area where it's actually easier for the 7800 to do than the NES or SMS!  

 

On 2/28/2022 at 8:34 PM, 7800Knight said:

It reminds me of Gradius and the TG16 game Lords of Thunder.    

Thank you!!  I wish the 7800 had the audio capability to support something like Lords of Thunder's soundtrack ? 

 

I'm still running the game through various tests on hardware to look for any bugs or glitches.  I'm still figuring out how I'll manage the full version, but folks still are welcome to continue to play the demo, either though the emulator or SD cart of their choice!

[Revontuli]

I'm contemplating making some adjustments to the final build (which hasn't been made public yet).  I am probably going to dial back the difficulty on the last cave stage, just a touch.  Not really due to the inherent difficulty as much as the difficulty curve (it was the one level I got "stuck" on more than the others, by a wide margin) as well as the form factor of the Painline Proline joystick I used.  After playing for an hour+, I had to give my arms a rest.  On a challenging last level in a lengthy session, that's a lot to ask of other players with the default 7800 joystick   

 

Another thing I might change is putting the instruction screen as the second or even first image folks see upon starting up.  It shows up if you wait, but folks who button mash upon powering up their 7800 will miss it, and button mashing is generally a poor strategy when playing the game...

 

...I suppose it comes down to: How many folks "get" the rage mechanic after playing for a little bit?  Starting with the story blurb feels better, but I wonder how many folks never see the instructions, or never get the dynamic that "hitting stuff = speed up, missing stuff = slow down."  I've really only seen a few people play, and most of those were before I put in some of the graphics and sound feedback that help the player know what's going on, so I'm honestly asking how intuitive the "rage" mechanic feels at this point.

 

Putting tutorials in folks' faces can get annoying (especially since you really only need to read them once), but so is a game designer hearing stuff like "Pac-Man?  It's an ok game, I just wish there was something you could do about the ghosts chasing you." or "I wish there was a way to power up in Gradius."  As a designer, watching a player miss key game mechanics is frustrating, all the more so because a lot of that is on the designer 

 

 

I'm continuing watching this thread for feedback, so feel free to post with any observations, scores, or bugs - Thank you to those who've given kind words, and to those who've given the game a try!  

Edited March 12, 2022 by Revontuli

[SlidellMan]

Was the latest boss inspired by Ghidorah?

[Revontuli]

11 hours ago, SlidellMan said:

Was the latest boss inspired by Ghidorah?

I do see the resemblance  - I take from a variety of sources and mix & match 'em, the one in the screenshot above I kind of have a Medusa/eyeless mouth of teeth thing going on, as its title is "Lamia, the Dragon of Fangs" ?

[Revontuli]

Al posted in the programming forum, but in the interest of coverage and, um, interest I'll crosspost here:

 

Dragon's Havoc will be available for sale starting at the Portland Retro Game Expo next weekend!

 

The game should be available to order online in November - thanks for everyone's help and input!