There comes a point when “it works” is no longer quite enough.
The ships move. The weapons fire. The health goes down. But does landing a shot feel satisfying? Does a huge enemy ship look as though it’s actually being damaged? Does its retreat give you a moment to enjoy what you’ve achieved?
That’s where I’ve been spending time with Galactic Gladiators, my increasingly ambitious Visual FoxPro 9 game.
The mega ship has been getting most of the attention. It’s a vast, detailed vessel with multiple hangars, smaller ships to launch and a weak spot that eventually gives the player a chance to turn the battle.
Until recently, hitting that weak spot mainly reduced its health. Now the damage builds visibly across the hull. Breaches appear, earlier scars grow, machinery glows, fires flicker, smoke rises and electrical sparks suggest that things aboard are becoming rather uncomfortable.
The damage also stays visible as the ship retreats. After all that effort, it shouldn’t suddenly look freshly repaired as it leaves!
Some of the work has been considerably less dramatic to describe: lining up doors.
Yes, really.
The animated hangar shutters needed to sit properly inside the frames drawn into the ship. They needed to open without extending beyond those frames, remain open while fighters launched, and close afterwards. The fuel-delivery sequence needed its door to behave sensibly too.
That took a few rounds of adjustment. Position, width, opening effects and closing timing all had to agree.
It might sound fussy, but these things matter. You notice when a door slides through the surrounding hull. Get it right and you simply accept that ships are emerging from a working hangar.
Sound has been another important part of bringing the sequence together.
The alien retreat order is now back in place, and we found a timing problem: the sequence carried on before the alien had finished speaking. The recording lasts 6.35 seconds, so there’s now room for the complete order and a short pause before BARF responds.
Even an alien commander deserves the opportunity to finish a sentence.
The escape portal also has a longer ethereal sound, starting as it opens and fading as it closes. Together with the damaged ship disappearing into it, that gives the end of the encounter much more atmosphere.
Working on all this has strengthened an idea I’ve had for GG: making sounds, images and stage settings easier to change. I want to be able to swap an explosion sound, adjust a volume or try a different visual effect quickly, then judge it while playing.
Because quite often you only discover what feels right when you see and hear everything together.
There are plenty of ideas for what comes next. One is a later return of the mega ship, with fighters emerging from every hangar. For now, though, that’s something to build towards.
This has been a stretch of making the existing battle more convincing, more readable and more satisfying.
And yes—all of this is still happening in Visual FoxPro 9.
Time for a Git commit.