Going to take a small break.

Managed to fine tune the Enemy AI to a point that it will be interesting to play around with. Basically the levels will  have their own Navigation Paths (just simple way point based path system, instead of A*, I dont have Unity Pro :<) They will navigate around these, until they see the player. The enemies will also have a cone of vision and a turn rate, but they are quick and can catch up to the player quite quickly.

I’m gonna see if i can also apply somewhat of a sound/smell mechanic that the dogs will react regardless if you get too close to them or go really fast making alot of sounds. Lets see.. thought.,

DogBox chase FoxBox

Missed 5 hours of dev time by taking a nap. Oh well.

In anycase, implemented some pack-mentality to the AI, so if an Mob spots you, and others are chasing you already, they wont lose line of sight until you have lost -all of them-.

However if one drops off too far, then it will forget you, so eventually there will be too many.

Earlier on, the AI was simply losing line of sight, as other mobs were infront, blocking their view literally.

So been working on doing some minor refinements to controls. So far, got them tightened up with some bonus minor box animation when one is jumping.  Noticed that you actually have to time ones jumps quite well inorder to make past an obstacle (such as a fence)

GIF Animation of Pack AI and Trying to Avoid them. view larger to see animation

Now the player can jump over obstacles,  and there is a health system in place. The timer is also in place, but I have to tune it so that when a hen is killed the timer starts (there after, things get worse every single  ten second slot more and more obstacles comes into play, and the goal is to survive and find a place to hide (for the sake of gameplay one can hide into a bush or a den if you lose your chasers. Basically, there will be alot of hens for points, but at somepoint one has to run out and find a place to hide. This is a change from my other plan where the idea was to get as far as possible, but Since I lost some time sleeping in, I dont have enough time to work on so many levels. In anycase Im going to call it a night.

So here is a revamp:

The Goal of the game is to find a hiding place as quickly as possible, after getting as many hens as possible. Every 10 seconds or a “tick”, a new group of enemies will randomly appear on the map. the map will consist of two parts: the Farm and the Forest. The Enemies and Obstacles will appear across the map, so beware.

Hens are catches simply by running over them and give score. the longer one can stay alive, there more they get, but the higher risk to lose it all.
Farm:

• Contains Hens
• Higher Chance of hunters
• Multiplication to NPC per reinforcements
• Fences

Forest:

• Contains hide-outs
• Traps (Perhaps)
• Logs (just Fences but in another format)
• Hunter Towers (NPCs might occupy a tower, depending on how many waves you have survived)

In summary, every 10 seconds a new set of obstacles appear.
This means, you have 10 seconds to get as many hens after the first one as possible before the first wave of obstacles start spawning.
Every wave you  manage to stay alive and get a hen, there is a multiplication to your score.

Inorder to score in your points, you have to not be spotted for a minimum of 10 seconds, and be next to interact with a hide out.
If you die, all your points are lost.  Point is not to get too greedy :>.

Oh and you CANNOT ATTACK anything, so its all about evision.
However hunters may accidentally hit their dogs, or each other, and may also trigger traps.

Planned Obstacles:

1. Dogs (The Brown boxes)
2. Trunks, Rivers *
3. Bear Traps, randomly placed
4. Hunters (Red tall boxes), ranged various types

• Rifleman
• Shotgun

Shotgun Hunters have a tendency of hitting everything, so they can be used to remove other npcs but riflemen’s damage only applies to the player.

* Preplanned layout.

I’m planning to have the following following:

1. 2-3 Randomly spawned Dogs
2. 1 Hunter Shotgun
3. 3-6- Randomly Spawned Dogs
4. 1-2 Hunters Shotgun/rifle
5. etc. etc.

So Woke up and started working on the hunters, mainly shotgun and blunderbus. They behave slightly differently as the shotgun has less of  a spread, and the guy knows how to head their targets slightly.

Also Added the chickens, and Scoring. alas, there is a separate navigation tree for them so that they do not do the same paths as the hunters and dogs. Unfortunately their gizmos are ALSO red, so the entire tree is a big mess.

The Chickens also run away. quite quickly.

Not the most efficient method, but it will do.  In anycase, I seem to be running out of time, so I am not quite sure If i can get any models up and running. Makes me slightly sad, but I rather focus on the gameplay now. Next stop to add the spawning system.

The animation also shows how the hunters can hit the chickens AND the other enemies. So you can take some big risks to make your life easier. 😀

Perhaps post-mortem I could improve and create models for these.

I had to do some more feature cuts and had to dump the entire risk-stealth based approach to the game.

You can find it here:

http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-27/?uid=7440

Its slightly buggy especially with the enemies aiming, but it works, and has basic gameplay. More than what I had in my entry two years ago :P.
Im a bit dissapointed that I could pull off all nighters to make 3D models. So everything is just colors and basic plain textures.

Managed to get atleast 950+ points, but surviving over 3 minutes is sorta difficult .