Fluffy Land (level)

[annikk.exe]

Hello all,

Here is my first attempt at a level.  It's pretty basic but should hopefully be fairly hard...  all feedback appreciated.  :>

*Update* Changed the initial greeting text to make the lose condition clearer.

[Jazz Ad]

Really nice job, thank you!
It was really entertaining to play. The plot isn't too obvious, you don't know at first how things are gonna go.
I like how the enemy makes surprise attacks at fluffy.
However, once again the main issue for map developers is to try making the game challenging.
I beat it in only 2 tries, which doesn't make it very difficult.
A very nice effort anyway, I hope you have more coming.

[annikk.exe]

Thanks for your comments :>

Yes I gathered that making maps difficult is... well, difficult.  I'm working on some heavily scripted stuff now, not quite sure where it's going yet but check back in a week or two and hopefully I will have something finished.
There aren't many people designing levels, are there?

[Jazz Ad]

I would but I'm terrible at coding, actually I know pretty much nothing about it.
Unless they come with a wysywyg editor it ain't going to happen for me.

[smeece85]

I made an account just to say thank you for your work.  I have played your level a couple of times and found it to be fun and to also have a little variety!

The first time I played it, the powerful planet decided to create three upgraded defense trees, so the constant barrage from the laser mines was a challenge.  The second time, it was easier since, for some reason, the planet decided to only make one.

I beat it both times, but it was fun each time.  I just wanted to thank you and other map creators for adding life to the game beyond the single player levels.  Keep up the good work!!

[annikk.exe]

::glows::  Shucks, thanks man :>

I am knee deep in code right now.  New level Flufforia is going to be heavily scripted... I figured I would try to make something really unusual and fun, rather than just trying to make a difficult level.  There is huge scope in the editor to do awesome crazy things, like for example you could create asteroid fields based on mathematical functions, like fractals...  You can manually order a specific empire to send a specific number of seeds from a specific asteroid to another specific asteroid, so you can basically script attacks and fine tune them to be super-challenging.  There is so much scope to do cool stuff, it seems a shame there aren't more people getting involved.  :>

It doesn't really take long to understand the lua language.  If you have the slightest idea about programming in ANY language, even just pseudo-code, it's really not that hard to understand what is going on and learn the basics in an evening.


Now I'm off to figure out how to script for laser mines !

[Jazz Ad]

I played it a few other times ad it is still interesting. I liked it.

[Rudolf]

Excellent stuff. It is really nice that people are making levels, and we will try to promote this as much as we can!

[annikk.exe]

I made another new thread where I am posting solutions to problems I've found.  There are some problems that I've not been able to fix yet, such as naming your asteroids.  Help with those would be greatly appreciated :>

Man, this scripted level I'm working on has taken on a life of its own.  It's getting pretty damn complicated...  Currently I'm trying to figure out why part 3, wave 2, is not triggering.  I've been trying some cool stuff like hiding asteroids to the player as they move along the belt, and that has all been working great.  I've also thrown together some code which in theory cause 2 enemy laser mines to instantly spawn on a frontline planet and instantly start attacking....but there are bugs preventing me from getting to that part of the level at the moment :P  so eh.

Could take a while to finish and properly test this new one... it's up to 13kb already and there is still at least double the amount of code needed to finish it off.  I hope there isn't a hard limit to the number of "If" statements allowed or anything...? :P

[TorchFire]

Great work.
This level is very well crafted.  It offers challenges in both offense and defense.  It took a couple of tries for me to create a strategy for myself against this enemy. 
Very enjoyable.

[Jazz Ad]

I think this is the first level I which flowers are so important. Actually if you don't use them properly you have no chance to win.
You're onto something. Keep the good work coming.

[annikk.exe]

Problems with new level are sorted again.  Part 3 of the level is just about finished now :>  I think there will be 5 parts in all.

::codes::

[Rudolf]

Looking forward to it!

[annikk.exe]

15kb and counting!  Enemy laser mine spawns are working now ^_^

[annikk.exe]

20kb and counting!  Although probably about 1kb of that is code that I've commented out and probably won't use now.

I've spent ages and ages trying to figure out different ways that the player can screw up the scripts or the level, or get their seedlings stuck, etc.  I'm pretty sure I've accounted for every eventuality now, and the enemy won't do anything excessively stupid.  One of the hardest things to do is to detect accurately whether the player has failed the mission, or if they could (in theory) still recover and go on to win.

This thing is look pretty shiny now.  I should have all the functional components finished by the end of tomorrow night.  By the end of the weekend the balancing should be done so currently it looks like Sunday 31st of January for the release of this monster of a level.


My hope is that the level I am working on will inspire others to learn how to make levels.