Cruiser-X 79 is back

After a very long delay of this game project since May last year. 2022 is the year, which I hope I will finally get this game finished (If all goes well that is). The last time I was working on Cruiser-X 79, I was working on the level multi-load system on disks, and also a temporary title screen. There was no other progress apart from launching a playable demo of the game near to Christmas 2021. Why was the project stalled? The majority of the code for the game was more or less complete, but I waited patiently very long time for the level graphics. Sadly nothing happened on the graphics front during the pandemic.

I needed to make an alternative plan as I believe that with the shortage of graphics, and possibly may have to wait longer. I have decided to go into Plan B. Saul and I both agree with my Plan B suggestion, where I use the existing tiles, and character sets data for the game - then if there is time, later on the character sets can be altered, and the level map designs get tweaked slightly. This will be ongoing, and hopefully a much faster process to getting the project done. Mind you, the demo graphics actually consist of 3 different level designs, which is very handy.

Last night and this afternoon, I have been working on the very first level, using Charpad (free edition). The very first stage is intended to be a pretty easy first level. The player is flying through space and also flies over the enemy bases (A bit like Uridium, but there is no turning back). The very first stage should not have any form of deadly background during game play, but it will have power ups and shoot-able background objects.

The majority of the project for the next 2 or 3 weeks (or probably slightly longer depending on free time available) will be based on level map design, and very little programming. Of course I will also have Exomizer V3.1.1 (crunching memory in V2, mode to support the Exomizer V2.0 backwards decrunch routine). This is handy for level crunching of the level's charset, tiles, map and music data. Then after loading each level file, it unpacks. I don't use any custom fastload-unpacking as I find it really awkward and complex to use those type of sources. I like to keep things nice and simple.

After testing the game with the first level map, it didn't turn out too bad. One level done, 15 more to go :)