Yeah I remember empires on Amiga... bit like civ, but it was called Empire. A space game, with view same as your game... and cargo attaches to you like in your game. It was kind of like an elite game, but 2d, and starting ship was a triangle lol Graphics was very basic
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empire! need the “!” After empire word. Was on c64... good old days. I remember trying to programme on my commodore vic20 and the c64... I would write a program out, and then spend few hours typing it all in, for it then to not work, spend hours figuring out why it don’t work, then give up lol
Aside from the IAP, I don’t find navigating through a narrow corridor with a space ship with momentum enjoyable. Another problem is how uninteresting the intro levels are. I guess things get better as the game progresses, as shown in the promotion video. However, a good chunk of people won’t watch the video, play first few levels, and will simply uninstall.
Yeah I'm kind of bothered by that too, I am not totally happy with some of the intro levels, but after a while you get blind to stuff like that so I'm glad you brought it up. I'll try to make them more interesting.
There's now a premium version of the game available in the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/id1530152361 I also added substantial rewards for completing levels, to make it faster to collect enough coins. This version also has an option in the pause menu to show the fire button, for those who prefer it that way. Choose it once and it will always be that way.
I purchased the premium version. While the fire button lacks auto targeting within the limited angle from the nose, current implementation is much better than tapping the target. It would be nice to have a continuous firing function while the button is pressed. Also the game needs bgms after stage 1.
Thanks! Those are good ideas and easy to implement, I'll add auto targeting and continuous fire for the next version, that should make it feel even better. What is bgms?
Guntech Premium is now updated to version 1.50. It has many improvements to control and collision, and some new content, but unfortunately the continuous fire button slipped to the next release. It has been done, but the App Store review cycle is so long that it missed the cutoff. Coming soon though, and I agree it's a lot more fun. I'm also increasing the rate of fire for basic weapons so you get some more benefit from the continuous fire. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/id1530152361
I noticed the fire button now has the ship control as well. Was this a thing in the previous version?
The way the ship control works is that you can tap anywhere on the screen and start steering. No need to use the joystick (and in fact you can even disable the joystick from the controls as it's just a visual effect). I think what's happening in this version is that the once the fire button has been registered once, after that the finger becomes a joystick finger controlling the ship. This is a bug due to the fact that the continuous fire is not working. In the latest version I have, if you hold the fire button, it will keep firing, and if you move the finger around, it will still keep firing and does not control the ship. You can keep firing and fly around if you use another finger to steer. I am thinking that the fire button could control the direction of firing, if you hold down and move the finger around. Kind of like a dual stick shooter would work on consoles. I am not sure how well that would work on touch screen though. In the next release, it will just fire to the direction where the ship it pointing.
Ok. I will wait for the update. Also I think you should sync the premium and the free version. It doesn’t hurt to have both versions.
Yeah, I did submit both to the App Store at the same time, but the free version has not been reviewed yet. The only way to sync the releases would be to release the apps manually and wait for both of them to pass the review. Each update contains improvements so I rather have them out as soon as possible. When the user base grows, it may make sense to sync the releases.
Finally finished the tutorial. I think you should cut the maze and asteroid part (1-6) shorter and go straight to the combat part. Note that I don’t like a maze, so you should ask others as well. Also, it would be better to provide a radar prior to the tutorial 7 and remove the radar from purchase items if you are going to provide one for free. It wasn’t really fun to fly aimlessly without a radar to find a probe, and I ended up purchasing one before tutorial 7. I noticed that probes leave something that looks like a mine, but it doesn’t so anything. Is it some sort of a beacon to tell players where a probe is?
The maze is modified in 1.50, I made some changes to make it a little quicker to go through. But it could still be frustrating if you get going to the wrong way initially. That level is my least favorite of the tutorial levels, even though I don't dislike mazes, so there will probably be some more changes until I'm happy with it. A good point about the radar. It's actually not supposed to "give" it to you if you already have it, need to fix that. But I also agree that it could be granted a little earlier. I just wanted to start the game without the radar, as the first couple levels are all about learning how to steer the ship. For many people, based on what I have witnessed, it takes some time to learn that part. Thanks for all your feedback, I really appreciate it!
They are beacons that the probes use to navigate. Should probably make them invisible, or destructible, haven't decided.
Guntech Adventures and Guntech Premium have been updated to version 1.51! This version is a big leap, some of the changes: - Level 1 Stingray (the ship you start the game with) now has 2 tractor beams by default instead of 1. You get more as you upgrade the ship, but starting with two makes the game more fun as the tutorial levels have a lot of coin-collecting going on. - There's (finally) a continuous fire button! This works with the on-screen button as well as when tapping on enemies. Just hold the finger down the the firing will continue. - There's a fun new feature called "loot pots". These will spew out coins and confetti when hit with ammo, until they're empty (at which point they are destroyed). I replaced the first "shoot the asteroids" mission in tutorials with these and based on testing with my kids, it seems like a lot more popular. - There are end-of-level rewards, starting from the final tutorial levels and in the new levels that are unlocked after that. These can add up to a lot of coins, especially if "double up" is used in the F2P version (by watching an ad). - I enhanced the lighting model used when rendering the levels. This results in more colorful and brighter look - I hope you like it! As a general tip when playing Guntech (I need to find a way to tell this to the players within the game), focus first on upgrading the Stingray to level 4. This gives you two weapon slots, which doubles the fire power! This becomes very useful in the levels past tutorial.
Getting much better with controls. Some issues. - Selecting Vestapolis racing series closes the game. - I cannot attach a radar because there is no return button (see attached) Request - either have the rotate ship function for the firing button, or some auto aim function.
I that image darkened, i.e. you cannot click on anything? That should only happen when a popup dialog is open. Does this happen if you enter the ship config from the level selector at the start? You should be able to click on any of those slots, and a popup would open that lets you assign the radar there (there is a bug that allows you to place the radar in all of the slots if you want... doesn't make a difference though, you still only get one radar in the game). I am thinking auto fire would be better for now, as I am trying to keep the controls simple. Might add an aiming fire button as a feature to a more advanced ship. Since I think it was you who asked for the fire button to begin with, which way would you prefer for the auto fire? A) Fire towards the nearest enemy, to any direction (similar to tapping the enemy right now). or B) Allow small adjustment to the gun, i.e. maybe 10 degree sector. Automatically aim to the nearest enemy in that sector, but if no enemy in the sector, fire straight ahead. I am guessing you would prefer B, as the option A doesn't give you much control and might result cases where you want to fire where the ship's nose is pointing, but some annoying enemy comes too close and steals the focus. Anyone else please feel free to comment as well. All feedback is welcome, and as you might have noticed, I am making changes to the game in almost real time based on your comments!
