Space Battle

||Seizure warning: game contains sprites flashing in bright colours||

||Platforms: Windows XP to 10 (and potentially above), except 8||

Not being able to find a Windows remake of Space Duel from Atari, I decided to make one myself. This uses an early game I made called Game Maker Defender as the base file.

This is technically the 3rd vector game I’ve attempted. If you’re unfamiliar with Space Duel, it’s quite like Asteroids, but with more elements to make things new. Shooting a UFO causes it to drop a power-up, 3 of which correspond to the options in the Atari 2600 version of Asteroids, plus 2 original ones.

At first, this game was intended to be a lot like Game Maker Defender, with only 4 stages plus a boss. Thinking the game was too short and preferring to play this continuously, I removed the 5-stage thing and made it gradually more and more like the original Space Duel (which accounts for the relatively increase in difficulty compared with the arcade version, as whether you could survive the 5 stages was a matter of skill. However, this is why I added the intermediate mode, to reduce the difficulty while still having the core elements. Also, you have more lives here, which more or less acts as a compensation), save for some parts that were either too hard to implement, or that I don’t like in Space Duel or didn’t like about Asteroids Deluxe when I was making Game Maker Defender. The neon glowing effect of the vectors was inspired by the Sokurah’s vector game remakes and the AAE emulator (which I haven’t actually been able to get working).

A few things implemented after hearing comments on my original Game Maker Defender: the annoying UFO/Hexagon sounds have been removed (though they are absent from Space Duel, and this is a factor that influenced me in basing the game after Space Duel rather than making another version of Asteroids Deluxe), the ship now rotates faster (though I find this a bit more annoying).

Other features that were added include “frustation-prevention” mechanisms like preventing hyperspace from warping you outside of the playfield and an attempt to prevent enemies from spawning on you, and new explosion animations and sounds.

Overall, I’m pleased with this game, unlike a number of my previous games.

Things that were made, but later scrapped:

• Splitting objects split depending on the bullets’ angles (I found out that this isn’t the case with Asteroids Deluxe or the original Space Duel, and ultimately decided just to do it the way Space Duel does it, but without overlapping objects)

• Phosphor effect for the saucer bullets (they just didn’t look very well in my opinion)

• Special waves offering extra lives if survived (just didn’t work out well enough in my test runs)

Things that are abandoned from the final version but were planned:

• options for starting lives

• options for a 3D-esque background

• Letting the Space Station take 2 hits before being destroyed (removed cause they seem quite a bit more powerful as is already)

• Easy mode
  #shooter #retro #atari #vector #arcade