AGGRESSOR (Dev Diary)

Previously the first mission, aka the "Demo Mission", was two unconnected levels snapped together. The bottom was a store front, and the top was an apartment block. I hadn't notice because I had so much on my plate. So, I sat down and made three consistent levels for the first mission, based off a real town hall. I figured, as the first mission revolves around a politician, it was a fitting backdrop.  I'm happy with the layout, apart from the main atrium. It's too open. As enemies can patrol through it, they open the doors on either side and have unobstructed line of sight. Bad. So I'm going to sort that out. Apart from that, I'm happy. Needs a second art pass to purty things up, but not half bad. I've also almost entirely finished the frontend. Options menu works, exit works, play takes you to the briefing for the first mission. Everything as it should. The city pans very slowly, just to make things a little dynamic. I manag

As the demo level is very near to completion, I decided to finalise the designs for both the protagonist and antagonist factions. Here are some design variations on the "OSS", and the "Freikorps". The "Office of the Secret Service" - or OSS - are the shadowy secret police. They operate outside of the law and are primarily responsible for political assassinations, kidnappings, and raids. They are fanatical and loyal to a fault. In Downfall, Inc , you play as an OSS Captain. I like the body of #2, with the head of #3 for the standard OSS and #1 for the Captain.  The "Freikorps" are an army with no allegiance, a rag-tag mix of foreign mercenaries and disgruntled patriots. They mostly work for the booze barons and artisans. For the right price, of course.  The Freikorps are the primary antagonists of the game, and are the most prominent enemy. They are hired by most of the high value targets to protect them, and aren't af

So, I got thinking. How do I pause the game? It sounds simple, but it's not. See, if I freeze everything, I freeze the script that handles the pause function too. Which leaves you frozen in place with no way out. To freeze every individual object would be headache inducing, since each can exist and cease to exist during the course of the mission in no direct pattern or order.  I found an unusual solution. When you hit pause, the game takes a screenshot of the view, and then sends you to a different level. The background of this level is set to the screenshot, and the pause logic is handled here. When you resume, it goes back to the level you were just on.  This, oddly, works a treat. Everything pauses as it should, shell casings freeze mid air, rounds wait patiently an inch from their victim's noggin. Corpses are still corpses. Pickups remain. I know it's a pretty unorthodox solution, but I'm kinda proud of it. This whole game is made out of

Kept you waiting, huh? Yeah I'm making a habit out of this. Best laid plans and all that. Problem is, I spend a lot of the time tweaking at the moment, and it doesn't feel worthy of a post. However, here are two of the big things I've done; The HVT (high value target) is coded, and in-game. Here you can see them in-game, when you aim at them they surrender and you subsequently capture them and escort them off-site. You can't give them commands, they have to follow either you or your partner. I've done this purely because a frightened prisoner would run off given the chance. They follow your partner so you can take point, telling your partner to wait means the target waits too. If your partner dies, the target follows you. There's a simple menu in place, which will shortly be properly designed and revamped. Huzzah! It's all coming together. I'm slowly piecing together the first level, and the frontend, bit by bit. So excited! Right, back to