Week 3 has been a very active week of development, new game mechanics, and improved artwork. Just see the size of the changelog in this post! In fact, so much has been completed, I’m not sure I’ve actually noted it all.

The most important change made to Lunar Pioneer this week is the addition of a combat ready area. Right now I’m referring to this area as the “Mines”. The combat is a mix of Asteroids and Binding of Isaac — the player moves around similar to Asteroids, but there’s static walls, and spawning enemies with a (rather simple) AI.

Right now there’s two types of enemies and only 1 level. A tiny “slime” and a small slime that spawns tiny slimes when it’s killed. Future enemy plans include a boss, an enemy type that can shoot at the player, an enemy type that rushes the player when in close proximity, and lastly an enemy type that would release a shock blast when close enough to the player.

Farm Changes

This week there was very few changes made to the farm area of the game, I have made a few graphical improvements, but the main focus this week was on Inventory & HUD changes, variable systems improvement and adding the combat system to the game.

I did plan a few changes for the farm this week though, the planned changes include a randomised “dusty” state for crops each morning, this would require that the crops are cleaned by the vacuum, otherwise they will not grow, or will not generate oxygen.

I also have plans for a dust storm event that will be the games first weather type, during a dust storm day the player cannot remove dust from the crops, and cannot remain outside without losing health.

Lastly, I have plans for an overnight asteroid strike event which will create a new crater on the farm, destroying any crops or objects that it meets.

A New Interior

It is now possible for the player to move locations. This was always going to be required so that the user can visit NPC’s, as well as having their own space, but it’s a real pleasure to have the system in place, working and designed.

There’s a lot of changes to come to the interior, including functionality for the storage chest, crafting conveyor, and the addition of a computer for the player to receive mail from the other inhabitants.

Development Week 3: July 7th to July 14th 2019

• Updated globalvar to global.variable for future compatibility
• Redesigned inventory screen
• Add player oxygen value & icon to inventory screen
• Add player money value & icon to inventory screen
• Add oxygen storage value & icon to inventory screen
• Add oxygen backpack value & icon to inventory screen
• Redesigned HUD
• Added currently active item to HUD
• Added button press event to switch through currently active items
• Improved day end event sequence
• Seeds need to change amounts when used from inventory
• Add system for harvesting oxygen from fully grown plants daily
• Harvested oxygen goes into the player backpack
• Added deposit to storage system
• Add a meter to the player backpack displaying currently held o2
• Updated inventory system from an array & key array system, to a matrix — much more flexible
• Added basic inventory item re-ordering
• Redesigned player character ready for tool animations
• Design house interior
• Added room change player positioning functionality
• Diagonal collisions cause the player to get stuck is now fixed!
• Added – Basic combat area and basic combat system
• Added – health display to HUD
• Spawn soil on each shovel interaction
• Make crop hole decay after x days, instead of the next day