Dev blog - New weapon, improved pathfinding, new level

New update!

There are some minor spoilers in the gifs below. They don't spoil much, but it does show some (concept) artwork from the prologue and contains 2 screenshots of a later level.

New Weapon: Grenade Launcher [Concept art]

Info

Say hello to the MGL-II!  This is Sal's second attempt at creating a hi-tech grenade launcher (The first attempt ironically kept exploding). Dawn and Sal have always had their suspicions about how ACE are running things as the two of them have been thoroughly investigating the whole thing for years. Now that Dawn is a captain at the ACE Security Force, she is getting closer to the truth and is in more danger than ever. If the occasion would ever arise where the two of them would have to fight against the most powerful organisation of Selaco, they’d better gear up and make preparations. This Grenade Launcher should function as a great way for Dawn to keep a crowd under control by using either lethal or (incase of civilians) non-lethal grenades. In case things get really out of hand, Frag, Ice or Acid bombs can be used.

The MGL-II supports multiple different grenade types which can be swapped out using Alt Fire. This weapon will be introduced relatively early on in the game, but more powerful / advanced grenade types will be introduced later on, which will be a common theme in Selaco. New toys will be given all the time and the grenade launcher is no exception. Let's talk about the grenade types!

Grenade Types

- Fragmentation. This is the most common ammo type and will appear frequently as an ammo pickup. Almost identical to the hand grenades; the physics are similar and the damage output is the same. However, the explosive radius has been reduced and the detonation timer is much faster. Grenades don't explode on contact by default so you will have to time them properly.

- Ice. Average radius and deals no damage, but applies different effects depending on the enemy type. Lower-tier enemies will get frozen in place and will be unable to move (and shatter in a single blow from your weapon!). For Higher Tier enemies it functions as an immobilizer; Juggernauts will get their firing rate reduced and lose their ability to jump and dash, Siegers will permanently lose their ability to fly (hit them high in the air to make them drop to their death!), Sentry Turrets get stuck and become easier to hack and so on. This grenade type goes deep and does a lot more than you might expect, so experiment with this one! On higher difficulties the Ice Grenades become a near-essential part of your toolkit.

- Acid. Pure pain. This turns the MGL-II into a weapon of mass destruction. Large radius and the highest damage output out of all the guns in your arsenal. In case the enemy does somehow survive the initial explosion, the acid clouds will apply a damage overtime effect, hurting them further until nothing but their bones remain. This is a rare ammo type so use sparingly!

Like all other guns in Selaco, the MGL-II can be upgraded in a workshop. ‘Explode on Contact’ will make grenades explode whenever it hits an object that isn’t a wall. ‘Increase Radius’ increases the radius of an explosion, ‘Mini-clusters’ will spawn additional tiny bombs after the initial explosion.

Can be upgraded to be made more powerful. Including ''Explode on contact'', ''Increase Radius'' and ''Mini-clusters''.  Hold Alt Fire for 1.5 seconds to engage Panic Mode, where all remaining grenades are fired within a second around a 90 degree arc.

This is probably the most technically complex weapon we are working on. Lots of overlay trickery and 3 different ammo types to implement and worry about. The grenade types are currently implemented and the 3D model is currently being made.

A*-Pathfinding

The original Doom engine is a very fast engine, and it had to be! Graphics like these were hard to pull off in the early 90’s so compromises had to be made in order to make it work.  Doom’s so-called “A_CHASE” method relies a lot on randomization and luck in order to find the player. It’s fast, it’s efficient and in most cases it gets the job done nicely. Actors will face you (even through the walls!) and rotate around 45 degree angles to reach you. If they can't reach you, they will try many different angles until they finally manage to get close.

Pathfinding for Doom has been relatively effective back in the day but for today’s standards these can be lackluster.

Selaco puts a heavy emphasis on AI, it’s where the meat and potatoes of our combat is. We felt the need to improve upon this by implementing our very own pathfinding algorithm while keeping some of Doom’s DNA intact.

The A*-Pathfinding system we currently use ensures that enemies will try to take the shortest route towards the player. This is achieved by placing so-called ‘Path Nodes’ in the level. After a level is loaded, these path nodes are connected with each other to serve as a database for each and every path the AI can take to reach a certain location. When a soldier tries to chase you, they will check for each possible route and chase you down. In case multiple soldiers are chasing you, they will often take ‘second best’ or ‘third best’ approaches which increases the likelihood of being flanked. We’ve done some tests using this system and the combat is cranked up to 11 because of it. You can no longer safely hang back and take your time because A_CHASE was struggling to reach you.

A_CHASE is still being used to some extent to add some randomization to the paths they take; making them ever so unpredictable. The A* Implementation is used to assist them.

This change will be added to the Pre-demo soon, so if you are an Admiral, you can help us improve this system!

It’s a hard thing to show on video, but I’ll see if I can upload an impromptu video to show the differences at a later time!

Timelapse

[If you cannot see the GIFS correctly, refer to the imgur link at the bottom of this post.]

Here are two time lapses of how Selaco’s artwork is created. We often make bits and pieces using 3D Software then use these models as a drawing reference. This allows for assets to be fully consistent. Illustrated above are the ACE Ships evacuating a large portion of humanity, and a younger Dawn arriving at her (shitty) apartment in Selaco.

[If you are on mobile, click here to load the GIFS in Imgur] 

Conclusion

It’s a shorter blog than usual. Most of this has to do with the fact that we started working on the later levels of Selaco which we are hesitant to show off. We want Selaco to be fresh when we release, hence why we only really showed the first few areas of the game. Here are 2 work in progress screenshots of Level 3-3 (Full Bloom Florals), the facility responsible for replicating Earth’s plant life.

Thank you for your continuous support! We hope to see you again for our next blog post. If you are a Tier 2+ Patreon, I’ll be making an additional blog post this week with some early concept art of the Grenade Launcher.

Much love,

Wesley de Waart