Marines: Alien Invasion - Strategy/Tower defense game for ios/android (WIP)

Hello everyone,

For last couple of weekends I've been working on my new game and now I've finally found some time to share some info about it here.
In Alien Infestation you assume the role of the commander of the security forces on the military science vessel "Osiris". After the interrupted space jump weird things start to happen. People are lost, strange shapes are being reported lurking in the corridors. It is your duty to investigate what's happening and defend the ship agains deadly alien plague. And one after another ship subsystems start to fail and turn off.
From the description it might sound like something else but in fact game is a tower defense type of game. You start with only one marine type, and have to mae you way through the ship, protect the civilians, collect resources,unlock new units, upgrade existing and above all kill as many aliens as you can Overall my inspiration came from the Aliens movie. I always liked the idea of small group of marines defending agains hordes of aliens

The game is going to be released on android in the first place, windows phone version will probably follow.
Attached you can see some early movie from the game. I will try to update the thread with some info once it's available.
Feel free to let me know what do you think about the initial version. It's not much to comment right now because it's early stage but I hope to give you more info and move movies in days to come.

 

Some update from the last few days.
I've been working mainly on the upgrades, new enemies and some visual improvement.
Here is the same level as previously but with changed lighting.

The marines have a better muzzle flash effect, simplified shadow to improve the performance. Let me know what do you think about new look.

Thanks.

 

Hi
Some fresh screenshots from the unit upgrades screen.

Basic marine. It's the unit you start game with. He've got decent stats and is quite cheap.


Assault Mech (here still as War Mech) is one of the last units you will be able to unlock. It has huge firepower but it's really slow. Very good in missions where you need high firepower but really poor when mobility is a key point.

Few words about the upgrades. Each unit is going to have few upgrades - I plan to make 4 or 5 for each one but some might have more and some less than others. On average there is going to be around 4 of them. The base cost of the upgrade is 1000 resources, but with each upgrade cos get's higher. It's going to be 1000 base cost + 1000 for each upgrade already bought for this particular unit. Which means each upgrade will cost 1000 more.
There are different upgrades planed - some increase speed, some health, other upgrade attack strength, wepon cooldown time. There are also going to be some upgrades that affect the whole team. For instance on the very beginning you will be able to field only 4 marines, but then you will be able to unlock the upgrade that will allow you to field more. Those general upgrades are not going to be obtained in the upgrade screen but instead are unlocked by completing specific missions. The same apply to unlocking new units - you will have to complete a side mission to unlock new unit.
Upgrades are being bought using the resources that you can collect during the missions - there are boxes located on levels that you can open and collect the resources. You can play one mission several times to collect more resources but with each play you will get less resources from the boxes. That means you won't be able to buff your units to maximum stats by repeating first few missions over and over again.

Feel free to let me know what do you think.
Till the next time.
Cheers.

 

I think the light setup is too cheerful

 

Yeah, I do realise that. I guess I will have to refine it.
Thanks.

 

Hi,
I wanted to share with you some fresh images and movie from the game as well as some info about the recent progress.

Finally I found some time to create the main menu. I guess It will need some refining but for now I'm quite happy with it. And I've also renamed the game to "Marine:alien invasion". Don't know if it's going to stay that way but I think it's better than the previous one. You can see the main menu below and in the attached video.



The lighting settings changed a bit since last update. Now the levels are generally darker. I like it more than the previous one.

Few words about the progress since last update.

• Aliens now attack the units that stand in their way. Previously they were just running to the exit point and they were ignoring the marines. Now every marine that stands to close will be attacked. It means player will have to think where to put his soldiers. There are still some issues but I hope to fix them soon.
• Each wave can have a different destination. It means it won't be enough to just place a large group of your soldiers in one spot and stay there untill the end. Now mobility will be very important.
• When placing new soldiers or selecting existing one the panel with the marine data will appear and you can cancel placement or deselect the soldier.
• Map movement has been fixed. Previously when soldier has been selected when you tried to move the map you also sent the marine to the place there you touched. It's now fixed but map movement needs some refinement. I will add the inertia and probably also small zoom feature.

Feel free to let me know what do you think.

 

I've been quiet recently - mostly due to the christmas and new year. Now I'm back to work.
Just added the new level type - it's breakthrough. In this type of mission you can only spawn your soldiers in one particular place and have to fight your way through the enemy hordes to the exit area.

The first mission of that type takes place in pitch black environment. All lights are down and only few working devices cast some blueish lights. During those missions your units wield some light sources.
In normal missions aliens try to reach the exit area - in breakthrough mission type aliens hunt down your marines.



Starting position.



On a way to the exit point.



One of the computers cast some light.

I plan to have few breakthrough missions. I mostly plan to use them in side missions where you can unlock additional units or options. In order to do so you have to reach the destination.

I will try to post some more info about the units next.

 

First of all - the project is not dead. I'm just pretty busy with non-game related stuff. We bought a new house and I had to take care of the refurbishment. But now as this process is slowly coming to an end I'm hoping to find some time to do some work on the project.

Below you can find the video I did few days ago to show the latest changes that that were made in the game.

I finally found some time to sit down and note down all that I could on the whole story. I've described all the missions so now I finally have something that I could use as a refference instead of making everything up as I go.
Hopefuly now I will be able to post more frequently.
If you like the video/game I would be gratefull for any feedback. If you don't like it then please let me know what you don;t like it. and if you think it's boring - post it. All feedback is important.

Cheers

 

Here's another update.

First of all I finally decided to migrate the project to unity 5. It came with few minor issues but nothing that couldn't be handled so now it's using latest version of unity. One thing that I've noticed is that lights seem to be a bit brighter in some scenes. I guess I will have to adjust them a bit.

I've been also doing some play testing the game and came to the conclusion that it's a bit too hard. Especialy on the easy setting. I was thinking about adjusting the health/damage of the marines and aliens but i nthe end went a bit different road.
I decided to implement the unit promotion system. It applies to all the living units (mech and cannons cannot be promoted to higher rank). It is quite easy system. You can use the resources to promote the unit to higher rank and gain additional bonus to attack and health.
There are two levels:

• seargeant - this is the first upgrade that gives the unit +15 to health and damage. Cost 3x base unit cost.
  
• major - second level adds additional 20 to stats. This one cost 5x base unit cost.

I need to test it a bit more and eventually adjust the stats but now it seems to me it works fine and allows player to win some levels that otherwise would have been very hard to win, but at the same time it keeps player focused because loosing the high level soldier is very painfull.



Recently I've also implemented the plasma rifle beams for the plasma marine. It still need some changes but IMHO it looks quite nice.



for the following weeks I've got plans to work hard on next levels and adding some missing bits and pieces that are required to build those levels. I also need to add some missing sounds and details to player units.
Till next time.