FromLefcourt

This is a long retrospective on my action-roguelike, Gunlocked. I'll have another post soon with a shorter breakdown of what's currently in the game.

Let me know if you've heard this one: A mobile swiping game, a survival roguelike, and an action platformer walk into a bar...

Gunlocked the name has existed for six years. Gunlocked the game, as it is today, is the result of three different games, whose problems could not be solved individually, becoming one. Gunlocked was one of my earliest attempts at making a game. A Fruit Ninja like mobile game where the player used a limited power resource to target enemy space ships and blow them up. Hold too long, and your laser overloaded. You had a single nuke you could use as a desperate fail safe, once per game. Simple. Also easily forgettable.

I forgot about it, in fact. Multiple times. Attempting, forgetting, and reattempting many times over the years. Each time I added new elements: powers, enemies, more action. It was never enough. Between forgettable attempts, I made another game called Astro-Mutt. Originally just a survival platformer in the vein of Flappy Bird, but with the frantic arena-based danger of Devil Daggers. I even released this one without forgetting. Most players found it too hard, and over too quick. Its run on Android would be over too quick as well. But lessons were learned.

I returned to Astro-Mutt several years later, and rebuilt it from the ground up. This time with multiple unique characters, and roguelike style randomized upgrades. The game was redesigned to be more forgiving and last longer. The unique characters and roguelike elements were great additions...that unfortunately only highlighted the design's shortcomings.

Astro-Mutt was not a combat game. Your only goal was to survive as a jetpack toting dog (or robot dog...or clockwork dog) in space as long as you could. BUT, the best upgrades were ones that let you take more direct action against the alien cat enemies that filled the arena. Jump on their heads with the Pneumatic Boots, create a huge explosion when you collected powerups, or periodically fire a laser that destroyed random obstacles. The best parts of the game were the ones that were least congruent with the majority of the gameplay which was to run away. Game #3, that's your cue.

Over these same years I had periodically come back to a small arcade game called Till the End. This was a twin-stick shooter with platforming elements and destructible terrain. Your only goal was to fend off demonic invaders with a host of unique spells and powerups until you died or all of the terrain was gone. The catch was that your spells were just as destructive to the world as the enemy's. It was fun, but a little static. You started with a few spells, and could collect potions, but nothing else really changed. Those roguelike-style upgrades from the Astro-Mutt remake were the perfect addition.

Abilities that modified your spells, your primary attack, your mobility, and even the kinds and quantities of potions/powerups you found. It was really taking shape. But it too had its problems. I'll focus only on the most relevant one to this blog: the spells combined with the upgrades had testers feeling like there were just too many buttons to manage on a gamepad. World of Warcraft, this was not. I tried pairing down the spell system, and adding an auto-shoot system to the 2nd stick so you didn't also need a trigger, but slowly (and excuse the pun) the game was stripped of its magic.

Alright, that's a long winded story about three games I didn't make, but what's it got to do with "convergent evolution" and a game I did make? Well, that's where the game Vampire Survivors comes in. After trying and failing with each of these games I found myself playing this little action roguelike where you only move around and choose your weapons. Everything else is automatic. Somebody had taken the roguelike shooter action of Risk of Rain and stripped it down to its most primal elements up to, but not crossing over into idle-clicker territory. It was a eureka moment for me.

I had slowly added more roguelike and action elements into my games, and due to feedback slowly paired back controls. My games were already adapting into the same systems I would eventually be inspired by, hence convergent evolution. I was headed in this direction all along, but it took the very stripped back Vampire Survivors to show me how. My mistake was in reducing the number of abilities along with the number of controls. I could have as many abilities as I wanted!


Gunlocked™ 2022.

In just a couple of days, a Gunlocked that combines the spaceships and lock-on targeting of its forebear with the roguelike arena survival elements of Astro-Mutt, and the twin-stick style bullet hell of Till the End will be out in Early Access on Steam. All the negative feedback of the earlier games has been nowhere to be found and I couldn't be more excited! And if that sounds interesting to you, you can wishlist it here: Store.steampowered.com