New project, yet again

The FPS project joined the big pile of unfinished prototypes and I’m working on a new thing again.

It’s (supposedly) much simpler and it’s 2D. A non-traditional tower-defense game with roguelike elements (I could never get away without some roguelike elements).

Non-traditional part is a having a big focus on freeform tower positioning that affects and changes the path that mobs need to take to get to their target, as opposed to usually having a fixed path in traditional tower-defense game. I’ve been prototyping and testing this approach for a while and (at least for me) it adds a whole new level of depth to positioning and interaction with the map.

I have a bare-bone prototype already, including some essential pieces, like:

• map interactions for placing towers
• recalculating the paths mobs based on changes in the map
• system for creating various map “actors” (i.e. towers and mobs) with different stats and actions
• modifiers (upgrades) that can be added to towers to change their stats
• timed status effects (buffs/debuffs) that also can be added to towers to modify their stats

Looks like I have all the basic building blocks ready, so next step is creating the initial set of towers and mobs.