Infinity Raider - Post Mortem

I "shipped" my first game today: Infinity Raider. It's a game about space pirates which I created for the procjam 2014. Besides of being the first shipped game it was also my first game jam. There are even a few more "firsts" like working with the new Unity UI, adding sound effects made with Bfxr or procedurally making sprites (and those sprites look even better than sprites I paint by hand).

The optional theme of the jam was "infinity" and one of the first things that came to mind was "space" followed by "space pirates". As to be exspected of a beginner, I overscoped my project. The gameplay is divided into organizing your ship/crew, battling other spaceships and boarding said ships after successful battles.

The part of organizing ship and crew was greatly cut out, the only thing remaining is the option to buy ship parts (which isn't really necessary considering how powerful you are compared to your adversaries).

The space battles were greatly inspired by the G-Castle battles in Mugen Souls (Z) and a certain story about space pirates. Basically you try to disarm the opposing ship either using weapons or electronic warfare. If I had more time I could have experimented with different weapons, maneuvers and a more complex damage model, which for example could allow to target specific ship systems. The sprites for the space ships are procedurally generated. The first version looked similar to aliens from the original NES metroid while the second version (which is part of the release) atleast somewhat resembles spaceships.

The boarding battles are classical turnbased strategy and can be won either by defeating all enemies or by conquering the bridge (the room in the top center). The maps are procedural generated using a variation of the dungeon building algorithm. After fighting with the new Unity UI for a while, I decided to scrap the equipment feature. Originally different kinds of equipment should have been available, to increase tactical options. Also the "Artificial Intelligence" doens't really deserve the "Intelligence", as the AI only reacts when enemies come close enough. In a worst case scenario the map is created in a way, where the bridge can be captured without fighting a single enemy, removing any challange from the game.

All in all I'm happy with my results. During the jam there were moments where I wasn't sure, if I could deliver a game before the end of the deadline. There's still a lot to do, if I should return to working on Infinity Raider, e.g. tying the different gameplay elements together and adding more meaning to the procedural generation parts. If you see a ship you should be able to tell if it's a warship ("Retreat right now!") or if it's a trade ship ("Tonight we gonna party!"). Also the enemies encountered, rooms created and the size of the boarding maps should reflect the kind of ship your boarding.

Thanks for reading and happy plundering!