DASH - Low-res 2d Platformer Creation Tool [Update #020: Player Ghost & More Crates] news

Hello! If this is your first time, there is already lots of content to explore with updates every Wednesday and Saturday live on Twitch with development and game play. Go follow and get notified as I begin the stream. All development streams are uploaded to the Baby Duka YouTube Channel. DASH stands for Danger Action Speed Hero - the ultimate 2D, low-res platformer creation tool. The official reveal of the prototype was on 1st of February 2018. I'm a solo dev doing all the stuff myself so far ♥ The game is being developed in Game Maker: Studio 1.x

It's update 20. Yeah!

Updated Load Slots:

I had some issues with the way I was saving the level thumbnails. It tool up all the memory and as the list of levels got longer it made no sense the system I was using. I ended up taking a smaller part of the screen and the system is now loading smaller images as the thumbnails instead of the huge ones I was dealing with before. This is how it looks:

The Ghost of Previous Runs:

One thing I had really been wanting to get into, was the player's ghost from previous runs. It creates that special feeling of the computer being alive and there is no one better to compete with than your own ghost!

The gameplay in DASH is repetitive and you simply just wanna respawn and respawn and respawn. So there are many ghosts. I solved the problem with it being too cramped by letting each ghost's image alpha be relative to the player's distance.

//ghost's step event
image_alpha = .1 * (plDist / 400);

More Crates!

So during last stream I managed to get the crates working in an okay state as well as the splinter particles which I had a lot of fun with. Since then I have polished the particles a bit, and made a system where one crate (wooden) can be destroyed by dashing into it or by shooting it, causing damage to nearby crates, and another crate (armored) which can only be destroyed with projectiles (takes three hits). This is a fun way to block the passage of the player while she/he still being able to go through with a bit of effort. Also the wooden crates now appear with random indexes so that it gives a bit more life to them. Some plain, some with stickers, and some just with a board and some nails on it.

A Bit About the Co-op and Competitive Part:

I have slowly begun the scripts for multi-player purposes. I don't want to get too deep into today, but I have an interesting idea about a head-to-head game I want to make:

Hero vs Hero:

• 4 random level (rounds) 1. Easy 2. Medium 3. Hard 4. Oldschool
• 4 lives each in each level. Each player takes turn to complete the level before dying four times or reaching the goal.
• Points counted after each round where you score highest if you have completed the levels with less deaths and most coins.
• The best Hero is the one with the most points after the rounds are completed

Besides the 1vs1 system there is always a global best time written to each level's file. You can always try to beat a level's best time in Run mode.

I have lots of other ideas, and I will get much more into to it later.

During tonight's stream I will be creating a parallax background for the Mech theme. I will also be playing the s*** out of the game because there are some new neat polishes and implementations I haven't even really tried yet, so looking forward and hope you will be joining.