GoldSpace (Working title: Space Pirate)

Hi Space Pirates,
i am going still through the whole game fixing bugs but also still polish the levels.
Level 12 felt for example a bit empty so i added another mini boss:



Have a great day

Hola Space Pirateros!

...oh it has been very quite here...let me explain why.
I was going through the whole game with the author of the script and revising it. Polishing levels, advancing the endings as you see here:



I actually had to create an earth tile set just for one of the endings. You could argue that most of the players might not see it but i hate endings which are not satisfying.



I also had to replace all drawing events because they would crash the game in fullscreen and cause performance issues without any understandable pattern. So i recreated them with pixels:



All this....working 4 weeks a lot and hard on it. And then my notebook started to burn.
I am a backup guy but you know...not for the last 4 weeks though.
I cried.

...but got my energy and focus back and started recreating everything.
I am almost done

Stay tuned!

All this....working 4 weeks a lot and hard on it. And then my notebook started to burn.
I am a backup guy but you know...not for the last 4 weeks though.
I cried.

Man that feels devastating! I'm so sorry it happened. A brief moment of disbelief, then a lot of swearing, quickly followed by a hollow feeling and cold sweat... Just crazy.

Have you considered using "Backup and Sync from Google" desktop app (formerly called simply the Google Drive app) to automatically sync your project folder with a Google Drive folder? 

Hi again, I get a runtime crash when I Start a game -> Exit to menu > Select New Game -> See warning about existing game -> Press Escape.

By the way, is Visual Studio / hxcpp debugging disabled for your public builds, or it only works on the developer's machine? I wanted to send more info but it doesn't allow to Break the execution.

Thanks for your comment

I definitely need to work on my backup system and will take a look.

Hi again, I get a runtime crash when I Start a game -> Exit to menu > Select New Game -> See warning about existing game -> Press Escape.

What you are describing is design. Pressing ESC on the main menu will kill the app/game. I see how it can be confusing if you have the warning prompt open though.

By the way, is Visual Studio / hxcpp debugging disabled for your public builds, or it only works on the developer's machine? I wanted to send more info but it doesn't allow to Break the execution.

All debugging should be disabled yes. What would you like to send?

All debugging should be disabled yes. What would you like to send?

Since killing the app on ESC is not a bug, nothing at the moment!

Hola Space Pirateros!

i finished the game a few weeks ago and took time with the author to test, polish and fine tune  the game.
I actually spend quite some effort on both endings even though most players might not see it. We wanted to have a satisfying ending.  We reworked dialogues, removed bugs and just made the game better. Much better. This is big learning for me that i underestimated.

For the next game: I will force myself to have the game ready after the 2/3 of the games production time.  Because i know i will make the game so much better in the last third when i already thought i was finished.

So? I am only fixing minor last parts now and i will turn my focus towards a release soon
Have a fantastic week!

Great news, looking forward to the release!

Hello everyone 

so...the day has come...this is my final beta after months of fine tuning and bug fixing.
Its called beta 5 and actually the 545th stable build of the game i released after 6 years. I will still keep this running for a few weeks to find bugs the testing pool didn't spot and remove all cheat codes and console inputs for the final full release. But this is pretty much it I will create a new trailer in the next week and start rolling it out.

Play latest beta version:


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CHEAT Mode:
Press W,A,D,SPACE to active or deactivate the cheat mode.

This will give a you:
A lot of credits
20 skill points to spend (Max is 50)
Laser Weapon Mark 3 (Max is 5)
Health 10 (Max is 20)
Being able to finish a goal in a level pressing "x"

It also allows you to jump levels. Press 1 to go to mission 1, 2 to go to mission 2 and so on. Press F1 to got to mission 11, F2 to mission 12 and so on. There are 17 max. You will not understand the story if you do that but its a nice way to check the different levels.

DEBUG Mode:
Press W,A,S,SPACE to active or deactivate the debug mode which shows a lot critical parameters which can be helpful if you want to send in a bug screenshot or video.

Hello everyone!
i have a new trailer for you.
but even better, i have a couple of people who played through the game and i think i fixed everything (well until there is the next bug). I will now decide if i go to itch.io or if i look for a publisher.

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/cYqj450eO4w" target="_blank" class="new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/cYqj450eO4w</a>

Play latest beta version:


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This game is such an achievement. It looks great. 

Thanks Jeffrey!
I got a lot feedback (through discord) also from possible publishers and did some last bug fixes as well.
The feedback was in general very positive which made me very happy.

Some topics which were high lighted as "could be improved":

Reactive environmental elements: Fire, oil, ice, blowing up walls is fun and you like it a lot. I will advance some levels to incorporate this even better. I also added a new feature. An oil pump which lets you flood certain parts with oil which…well can catch fire



Advance one of the strengths "Exploration": I am adding some more exploration possibilities in the levels (advancing the levels introducing more oxygen refills also outside the space ships.

Positioning of the game: I will rephrase the positioning of the game because some like "sneaking" were a bit misleading. I might use something like: "Goldspace is a delicate twin-stick shooter pixel game, packaged in space exploration. Simple controls with highly explorable levels each with its own mechanisms and puzzles. A versatile weapon system and reactive environmental systems like setting liquids on fire, blasting walls or shutting down complete levels invited the player to explore and have fun."

Skill points and level design: I might combine hacking and lockpicking into one skill. Its is too confusing what it will bring. I will also add feedback if you opened something successfully because you have the skill.

Boss fights are too simple: I can see that point but this is currently out of my resources to change.

Resolution of game: Windowed mode is too small for some and full screen shows the game too big. I will try to work on this but this might be a tough one. I am currently experimenting with irocks windows resize behaviour but this might be too late because i am not relating all UI to the screen hieght and width. Redoing all of this might be too much work.

I will see what I can do but keep also a lot of the feedback for a successor which I will start maybe end of this year.
Talk to you soon!

Aloha Space Pirateros!

I think i have the final version ready having incorporated a lot feedback that i got.
One exercise that i made before working on those final fixes was sorting all that feedback into:

• ...in Goldspace
• ...will be implemented in a possible successor

Because we all know how hard it can be to say no to a nice idea

So what has made it in?

Skillpoints and hacking/lockpicking

• I reworked this system and combined the lockpicking skill and hacking skill to one "hacking skill". Its easier for the player to understand the impact of upgrading this skill because every terminal, computer and credit storage is affected by it.
• I also made the skill check when hacking visible so the player is aware and gets a positive feedback whenever she/he uses the skill. Very nice feeling.
  

Reactive environmental elements:
I added oil pumps which can be activated to flood parts of level with oil (which of course burns) which allowed me to finetune some level areas and add interesting ways to kill enemies. I also did timing fixes in the environment like increased fire spread speed.


Exploration
I added oxygen bottles in space to enable better exploration and added some more secrets to discover in various levels.

Enemies:

• I fixed the Enemy Ai path walking system (which was broken for 1 year) and re added that into several levels. That was unexpected
• I improved the movement of the enemy when the player has been detected
• I adjusted the aiming of the enemies (game got a tiny bit more difficult)
• I added view points of enemies when player is about to get noticed

So is the full version (last one where you can cheat) and i will only fix critical bugs if i or a player finds some.
I will take a quick break and then start releasing it.
Have a great day!

Play latest beta version:


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Hello everyone!

I added one last feature which was requested by many.
Different scaling modes additionally to the fullscreen mode.

Why? Fullscreen was too big (because it scales the game) on big screens while too small on smaller screens. I could not use unfortunately different screen sizes because most of the UI is looking at coordinates and not at for example half of screen to align.



What next?
I am pretty sure that i consider this devlog done:)
I will still post numbers and performance of the game here but not post more around new features and development because i wont add any
Let me thank everyone who posted here and helped me. I love this community and i am thankful!

You all are wonderful:
merrak, Luyren, Justin, squeeb, dtishin, JeffreyDriver, Alexin, mikhog, Tryzna, rob1221, colburt187, mdotedot, ikomnen, MadManAdam, xTage, Hectate, letmethink, ceosol, captaincomic, KylePreston, WayneAdams, MichaelPel, zhero, rrzl, Meestar, 1MrPaul1, FadedSketch, ETHproductions, koopke, yoplalala, irock, iii, hendriza01, gurigraphics, Natrium, chongyunxiang, suitcasenuke, Zve2tr, Crovaxus17, fillergames, domagojbulat, NickamonPoppytail, havana24, ViniciusAlves, kantieno, gameo

Thanks everyone!

Play latest beta version:


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You all are wonderful:
[…] Natrium […]

So it's been years since I stopped using Stencyl (I grew up, it doesn't suit my needs anymore, other engines fit my style of coding more today, I have the feeling the community has waned a bit, and I shifted to other projects anyway…), but I still visit by habit and to follow some of the projects (yours and merrak's).

But here I am, writing this message because it's heartwarming to see my name right there in your post after so much time, although I don't really remember how I helped you. You're welcome, I guess? 

Anyway, since I'm here, I'd like to say it's been great to follow your project and see how far it has come! Good luck with it! Viel Glück! 

(Now returning lurking…)