Abduct or Vaporize - FREE on App Store

STRAN

Happy to announce the release of Abduct or Vaporize! Check it out and please help a GS brother out by rating and providing a review. Cheers!

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/abduct-or-vaporize/id551904198?mt=8







Steve

xforce

screens look good. any trailer about?

carlblanchet

Cool game! Nice graphics! Downloaded, and Reviewed!
I'm finding it a bit difficult to keep an eye on everything that is happening on the screen, and at the same time spotting the controls to move. Have you ever considered perhaps constraining the player ship to the mouse position? Or maybe using a joystick type control pad instead of directional buttons?

Good luck with downloads(sales)!!

STRAN

@xforce, thanks, I haven't made a trailer and I'm not sure if I will. The game is free and I've found that people are downloading it just as is. Maybe I'll make one, we'll see..

@carlblanchet, many thanks for your support! I've thought about using a joystick but the directional button is just more consistent and requires less rules. I'm confident that with more time playing the game, muscle memory will take over and you won't even need to look at the directional buttons to move the UFO. Constraining to the mouse position is a good idea, thanks! I'll make this change if I get a lot of comments regarding the directional button. Again, thanks for helping me out.

carlblanchet

@STRAN My pleasure! Anything to help a GS brother out.
It is true that you get more and more use to the controls' placements as you go, although I'll still accidentally hit the wrong control at times, which usually causes me to die lol (which is annoying).
Another thing that could improve gameplay; perhaps constraining the running characters to the abduction ray as they're being abducted (for realism purposes ). Just my two cents.

This is a pretty fun endless runner, and once again, the graphics are awesome!!

STRAN

@carlblanchet, haha, I know what you mean about pressing the wrong button. I just tried your constraining idea but I ran into a problem. In order to make this game run as smoothly as possible, I interpolate the runners' movements instead of using the other movement options. I find the other types are too buggy. So the issue is when I release the abduction ray prior to the runner hitting the UFO, the runner jumps to another X position. It's doing this because it's catching up to the position it was supposed to be at while it was being interpolated in the X direction. The runner looks like he/she is being teleported rather than just falling back down to the ground and continuing on. I would have loved this option to work because you're right, it would look more real.

I could make the runners have no option to fall back down, that once they hit the abduction ray they'd float up to the ship regardless if the ray is active or not. But, wouldn't that make abductions far too easy? I want to give the runners a fighting chance!..haha

carlblanchet

@STRAN Definitely don't make it an automatic abduction once they enter the ray. What kind of interpolation are you using? You could maybe have that interpolate rule go to false when being abducted, and have it go back to true if abduction is stopped, in my mind that would start the interpolation back from its self.position.x.
Let me know if that works.

STRAN

@carlblanchet I've tried wrapping this in a rule but it failed. From what I've read on the forum and my own experiences, I don't think it's possible to stop an interpolation once it's begun. It needs to run it's course and may only stop when it reaches its destination.

carlblanchet

@STRAN There's gotta be a way to do this, but I'm just not too sure how. I guess the way you have it now will have to do until you can figure it out, or until someone can help you.

Gyver

Nice game Stran.

But I think you should consider changing the directional pad. I die all the time because I can't see the object hitting me. My left thumb is in the way. You could make it a bit smaller and move it closer to the left bottom corner.

I would also try to change the touch rule for the directional buttons to "inside" instead of "pressed". This will make it possible to slide your fingers across the pad instead of releasing and pressing. It's a much smoother way to control the UFO.

Great graphics and game idea. Just right up my ally

STRAN

@carlblanchet I'll keep thinking about it. Sometimes the solution just kind of hits ya, we'll see.

@Gyver Thanks for your input. I tried out the "inside" rule and I like it because it acts just like a joystick. I'll work that into an update. I tried a smaller sized button before the initial release and I just didn't like it. The smaller buttons were actually harder to hit correctly. Regarding not being able to see due to your thumb being in the way, I never experienced that problem during testing. I'll see if anyone else is experiencing that problem too. Again, thanks for helping me out!

carlblanchet

Best of luck with the solution!