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Vampire Slayer Squad

J

Joe Shmoe

Lurker
Vampire Slayer Squad

This game is awesome - it plays just like SPACE HULK board game by Games Workshop. Shame the graphics aren't better, but you soon forget that once you start playing. I wish there were more levels though.......

Are there any more games like this on the market ? I love Turn-based tactical games.

I wish someone would make BATTLE-TECH or something simular.
 
Great game. However, it misses an "undo" button - its easy to mis-touch and in this kind of games, the results of a single mistake can be grave.

Pity there are so few turn-based games on the market.

Muminus
 
Hi Guys,

Doing a search on Google to see if anyone has mentioned my game (I'm the dev of VSS) and you lot popped up :)

Anyway, thanks for the kind comments and I'm always open to suggestions so please let me know what you want! Sorry the graphics can't be better as this is developer graphics but I'm always trying to find ways to improve them with my limited skills. Ideas on what you think would improve the gfx welcomed, bearing in my mind I'm certainly no artist. For one I have improved the map (not released yet).

Really wish I had more time to put into the game and have neglected it recently but will try and put in some effort in the next few months. This includes some new maps. I've already created some but they are based on the new stuff I've added and still testing (dynamic maps where you press buttons to open remote doors, timed traps etc).

I have created a Windows based map editor but no one has really pushed me to want to do anything. I'd like to add map sharing but I reckon that'll be several months off and only if people really request it.

On the 'undo' feature, I really would like to add that as I've been caught out by 'fat fingers' syndrome ;) You are right, it's pretty much game over when you accidentally hit the wrong move. If I added it, do you think it would be acceptable to have the undo not always be available. For example, if you moved into line of sight of a mist and converted it to vampires I think allowing you to undo that move would be unfair and open to cheating? In other words, fair enough if the move didn't affect the map in any way that would give you an advantage if you un-did the last move.

Sorry about all the blither above, it's just I've had very little feedback so it's nice to actually hear what people think. Where I've had feedback I've always done something about it. I'm contactable via my website or via the market place email address so if something annoys drop me a line.

Cheers,
Phil
 
hey man, thanks for making an awesome game.


UNDO BUTTON:

I quite like the fact that there is no Undo button. Its annoying sometimes, but firstly it makes the game tense if you make a mistake, and puts the pressure on. Secondly, like you say, you would need to prevent players from using UNDO if they had revealed any blips, or saved action points by shoot doors while moving and failing (does that make sense?) and having another go etc.


LEVEL EDITOR:

I would love to use the level editor, but I have no programming experience, but DID play an awful lot of SH when I was much younger! I think a level editor or perhaps even an expansion update with loads more maps would be awesome!!!


ASSULT CANNON

Perhaps a third type of team-member with an assault cannon equivalent..... (not area effect like the flamer) , but lots more powerful (accurate) than the normal crossbows etc ?


DIFFICULTY

I have completed all but one level on the hard mode, and I think the difficulty level is perfect.

I THINK the way you have programmed is to have 1blip per round on easy, 2 on medium and 3 on hard, but I think it would be better on the larger maps to have random amount of blips. Perhaps hard mode could be random from 1-4 blips per turn to add some suspense ?

I think that 3 blips per turn is a bit overkill on some maps, (even on hard mode) and the only way to beat those maps is to ensure you have your team blocking entrances within 6 squares, so it doesn't really matter how many blips there are per turn?

I think you need to make larger maps so its more of a journey from start to finish, which will allow your squad to be picked off here and there, rather than 10blips being stuck in an entrance being unable to enter.


2 PLAYER:

Shame you cant get 2 player mode, (Like Uniwar) but it would need to be 2 players against the CPU vampires, otherwise I think you would get quite a lot of players just sitting there on ALERT ( overwatch :P ) and not moving about.



All in all, this is a brilliant game. Thanks once again for making it!!!

If you need any play-testing on a HTC DESIRE HD, please let me know!!!!
 
I'll admit first off that i haven't actually played the game yet (but fully intend to when i next get a free hour!), but with regards to undo, why not make actions a two step process to begin with? ie one click to say where you want to move/who you want to attack or whatever, and then a second to confirm the action. That way you wouldn't change the map until the second click, it would just give you a chance to be sure that was what you meant/wanted to do. Loads of PC games do that (think Civ, Heroes of Might and Magic etc).
 
Sorry for the delay in getting back, thought I'd subscribed to this thread!

UNDO BUTTON

Well you've hit the nail on the head, Joe. I certainly will consider the option as it's been asked for by a few. Stranded87 makes a good point and that would be such a slick solution. Although some people might find it cumbersome I reckon if I add it like that I'll let people choose if they want the undo available or not. Anyway, will think about this a little bit more and try some ideas out to see what you think.

LEVEL EDITOR

You don't need any programming experience to build the levels. I've made it all point and click. That said the newer features (triggers, timers etc) do need a clear head to get them to work properly! Also at present you cannot actually test your map at all so kinda a bummer.

ASSAULT CANNON

I did try to keep it simple on the number of 'classes' of slayer but having an uber-dude would be easy to understand as he'd work just like a normal slayer only with better kill rates. I'll add this pretty quickly as it'll be a dead simple. What kind of attributes should he have? Would it just simply be better chance of hit? Shall dig out the old SH rulebook....

DIFFICULTY

Great to hear the difficulty is balanced, it was a big concern for me that.

The blip counts are actually set on a per map basis. However on hard the blip count per round is increased by 1. See Vampire Slayer Squad Game Rules

I like the idea of random blip count though, would be good on the larger maps. I've now added this feature into the game but you'll not see it for a short while as I'm still putting in some major new features.

As for larger maps, it is something I really want to do although there is a finite limit I've imposed into the game for performance/size reasons. I even have to pre-calculate the AI path distances for the vamps because our little handsets just can't do it in realtime. For a big map the number of routes the AI checks gets to be insane. I've also packed the distances into small spaces to keep the file size down so basically on a really big map the vamps wouldn't know how to get to a slayer! Perhaps I'll try something extreme but realistic and see how it actually fairs, it might be not that much of a problem and it's all in my head ;)

2 PLAYER

That would be ace but I think I just couldn't justify the effort.


Finally, that's for taking the time to give me this feedback, it really helps to know people are enjoying playing the game. To be frank I wrote it because there wasn't anything like it (TBS) that I enjoyed playing on the Android Market so thought better just do it myself and as an incentive to actually make a half-decent job of it I'll release the monster onto the world. I didn't want to put ads in it but wanted to get my $18 or whatever it was to register back. It took 4 months to do that - it's not a money spinner but any stretch of the imagination but I'd rather make a niche game than just another me-too.

I have a couple of people who do test on the Desire HD, however they don't actually play the game much at all so I might pop the game over to you to test if you wanted to try out the new bits. Only issue is you normally have to uninstall it from the market first to be able to install it manually. You'll also have to allow installation from non-market sources which is a security issue if you aren't sure. I'd never want anyone to take unnecessary risks. But if you still want to give it a whirl I'll let you know when I have something to try out!
 
As for "undo" - yes, that would be vulnerable to abuse attempts.
Therefore, maybe you should consider some other solutions to avoid mis-touch:
a. zoom - enable zooming the board. If everything is bigger, its easier to hit the place you want to hit.
b. plan/confirm move style - first you plan where you want to go, (and are able to change it as you want), then you hit "confirm" - and your slayer moves.

If you could add any more weapons that would be great - that would greatly increase the tactical depth of the game.

Muminus
 
Love the game. I have two questions:
This is VSS Lite -- is there a paid version with more levels?

I am on level 17 and cannot get past it. If I try to approach the lone vampire it kills me but it never approachs me no matter where I stand or what level I am on or how many turns I wait. Anyone have a hint?
 
yeah, that's a level that you need luck on. Vamp only moves if your within its attack distance, but due to corner blocking your line of sight, and the fact the flammer had a minimum range, you cannot block his progress with the flammer. what you have to do is move onto the sixth square away, and let him come for you. he will have enough action points for a single attack, and 1 out of 4 times you will defeat him in hand2hand when he attacks you. bit of a glitch, but I guess its just to teach you to use the flammer guy.
 
@Muminus - agreed, I think the problem with zoom is two fold; first the actions buttons may stray off-screen on smaller devices and, probably more importantly, the graphics have been picked out as weak already, zooming will be just too hard for the eyes hehe.

@kchasse and Joe - yup, as you may have noticed on the recent updates I'd tweaked the AI of the vampires so they weren't so daft that they run into suicide missions. Unfortunately it means this map is now trickier than it should be. In fact try it on Hard and you might find the vampire does a charge attack where he will actually walk into the line of fire regardless.

To be frank, if you were playing verses a human on this level and he knew that you needed to get past him, why would he make your life easy? He'd use the map to keep clear of incoming fire and force you to risk it? But my intention on this map was more of a tutorial of the demolition man so it wasn't supposed to be hard. I wanted it to teach you to target a square near a vampire to use to the area of effect to kill out of sight vampires. I will update the map to bring him within range.

That update will need to wait as I'm still up to my eyes in getting the new features in, which are nearly done. Reckon maybe one week away, possibly two. I'm on holiday for a week after that so might not risk pushing the update on before then just in case there are any issues because I'll not be able to do anything about it for 8 or so days. Anyway at worst 3 weeks sorry!

On the subject of new weapons, I agree. I'm looking at things like something similar to the Space Hulk assault cannon for one and will consider others. I do think the new features with triggers and movers will give a new set of options and choices whilst playing a level albeit based around my design decisions for the map.

Finally the question about the Lite version. I did intend to release a full version with about 20 more maps (just to begin and with more added at no extra cost) and no adverts but might consider just releasing one single free version with in-game payment to unlock more levels. I'd not set out to make money from this other than to cover costs so it's never been a high priority, to give you an idea the advert revenue since the beginning of the year amounts to a little over $30! It's too niche for a mass market but would always prefer to serve a smaller number of dedicated players, it's far more satisfying.
 
Hi Guys,

Sorry for the lack of response lately but things have been hectic and a week's holiday awaits from tomorrow!

Thought I'd just post a couple of screens to show how I'm improving the graphics. I don't think these shots do it justice. A few bits are out of place and missing but they are nearly done. There is full dynamic lighting on the map although it hits the performance so that will be something you can turn on and off. To be frank I'm certain the performance is a Galaxy S thing, since the latest update drawing transparent images seems very slow.

vss-lighting.jpg


Also here is a rough animated gif of how the fire lights look (ish):

vss-fire.gif


There aren't any actual windows, candlesticks or lights placed on the map yet to act as the visible source but they will be added. The whole edging/wall system looks far better now in my opinion too, especially with the faded internal edges.

Testing of the 'triggers and movers' system is almost complete and some maps are ready that show them off.

The new slayer that will be added is....well I don't have a name yet, but his weapon on choice is some kind of lighting/electrical arc generator. It will be ammo-based so limited to 4 or 5 shots per map. Basically you target a vampire and he will be vapourised instantly and every time. Any adjacent vampire (or slayer!) will also be hit, and anyone adjacent to them and so on with diminishing chance of hit as it spreads. So that stack of vampires waiting around a corner? Get a hit on the one in front and you could take out half a map full of them! Don't know how this will play out but hopefully be an interesting addition and be great in certain styles of map.
 
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