Update - Roaming the Land of Death (alpha v1.48)

download now (10MB)

Change log

- Enemy sprite changing more accurate
- New enemies and a new demo level
- Improved water texture
- Fixed bug with dying and added respawn points
- Updated lava texture animation and added glow
- Refined dungeon textures
- Turned on movement cheat for quick-start for easier testing
- Modified portals and added lights
- Modified day/night cycle
- Modified player lights
- More shrubbery
- Enemies get less stuck on pillars in the dungeons

Blog notes

This is the third anniversary edition of the game. It's come a long slow way and may take more years to complete, but that's OK. It's been a great learning process and creative exercise.
I said this was going to be a fast update, but it doesn't really matter that it isn't. The progress is very slow because I don't have much motivation. This game is for myself more than anyone else, but I intend to put many strange jokes and lighthearted humor to entertain potential players.

Update - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.45)

Download - 6.5MB

- Added spawn tile
- Improved boss variance
- Updated portals to "teleporters" with particles
- Added quick start button
- Fixed: doesn't snow at game start any more
- AI enemies can no longer walk into solid objects
- Changed how enemies react when colliding with each other
- Added shrub cover similar to rocks and now makes player invisible for 2s
- Updated textures on covers
- Can no longer shoot from cover
- Enemies can shoot through trees
- Stealth powerup (purple) now works, 15s
- Rewrote stealth script
- Replaced "clouds" with particles, now accompanies rain
- Updated sprites for trees and bushes
- Removed old transport pads to second area

Update - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.4)

Download - 6MB

Misc + bug fixes
- Improved performance since last version
- Merchant offers reiki
- Dungeon tiles updated and pillars added
- Walls and pillars have sfx
- Pathing updated
- New Cryomancer ability that shoots ice spikes
- Power-ups spawn in the dungeons (only blue works)

- Water tiles updated

- Inventory, power-up bar, score display- disabled until working

- Name change dialogue no longer shows up in game (bugfix)

- New fire tentacle beast with a special attack
- New brick path added and map altered
- Fireball sfx added
- Auto mapping grass
- Weapon upgrade merchant (upgrades are cosmetic only right now)
- Depth improved for walls
- Rock decorations added
- Dark ground textures improved

Dev Blog - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.4)

Why have I not updated recently?
I have upgraded my computer from an AMD 990X and Phenom II x4 955 3.2+, to an Intel i7-4770 3.4-3.9 and H97 board. The transition was delayed by operating system and hard drive problems, but I now have Windows 10 installed on an Intel 330 SSD.
I was able to make progress on design and level ideas while that was happening.

I delayed releasing a new version because I felt there were too many bugs and too little progress. But now some good progress has been made, particularly in the areas of texture and map work.

What are the plans for the release of the new version?

Improved textures. There is a pattern here... the textures are always in need of improving. I got rid of the variance in ground textures and just made them better. I made grass auto spawn on regular ground, making mapping easier. Improved path tiles have been added, but they aren't perfect yet.

Randomly generated power-ups. This version will have cooldown reduction power-ups (blue).

Improved pathing for all enemies and minions. This means that I don't have to place the pathing points individually, they spawn themselves. Creeps will hopefully no longer walk over water/lava and through walls.

Removal of features that don't work. As someone has rightly pointed out, there are things in the game that have no functionality but are there to make it look better. I will strip them from the game until they work.

What are the plans for the version succeeding that?
I plan to add a new level that I have been brainstorming for a while. I may introduce a level key system so you have to unlock levels by completing quests. I will wait to reveal much more about it.

Update - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.30)

Download - 6MB

Bugs and Map improvements
- Fixed lighting in boss room
- Added lighting directly under the player
- Some player lights have been tweaked
- Dark wizard area has been improved with some walls
- Water now has perspective, and cannot be walked on
- A river has been added to the first map
- A lake has been added to the first dungeon
- Lava now has perspective

- Shortcuts added to first part of the level (mages only)
- Teleporters now lead to a town level with minimal content
- Dark ground now always turns to snow

Known bugs
- Shortcut text gets too big with change of room
- Ground tiles don't update to the conditions after switching rooms
- Mobs can walk over water/lava

Dev Blog - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.30)

25/09

I have been working on the new systems that I will be using to provide interesting ways to navigate the game world.
The first of these systems is shortcuts. I have an object that teleports the player when activated by the correct ability class, if the player has the required level.
Soon I will be  making some more content now that most of the effects are looking good.

29/09

Made some more floor tiles. some of them are for the first dungeons and some will be for future rooms.

02/10
Made teleporting easier/better, and opened the new area as a hub/teleporting zone.

04/10
Fixed some bugs and improved part of the map where the dark wizards are.

10/10
It took longer than it should have, but to got auto perspective tiling working for water and lava. This is quite good for the feel of the game as well as saving me wasting my time with spaghetti code.

11/10
 Fixed the bugs with auto tiling and added more to the dungeon. Tidied up a lot of the map, still more to work on. Currently the second level looks like a total mess.

This is probably the end of the 1.30 dev blog, it will be released shortly.

Update - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.28)

Download (6.4MB exe)

Dungeons and Misc
- Improved xp bar and level display text
- Reduced size of enemy health text
- Hunter sprites finished
- Class rotating previews smoother, added scientist and hunter
- Abilities are once again destroyed if they kill an enemy
- Improved dungeon tiles, and walls are now solid
- Cleaned up dungeon mapping
- Improved enemy shadow wizard


Lighting
- Player lights added for more vision at night and in dungeons
- Day/night cycle and in-game time is now persistent between rooms

- Day/night cycle lengthened

- Torch lights upgraded
- Added ability lighting effects
- Added lighting for loot drops

Update - Roaming the land of Death (alpha V1.25)

Download - (6.1MB)

New class - Brute (for testing)
- Ability 1 is a a short range "melee" attack
- Ability 3 (aura) blocks enemy attacks
- Ability 4 (aura) regenerates health if below 70%
- Ability 5 (aura) bombards nearby enemies with damage
(auras have a bug where activating a different one will stop all)

Hunter Changes
- New sprites (not finished)
- Ability 5 (aura) marks enemies for bonus damage (possible bug)
- Ability 3 now locks-on to targets in a limited way
- Hunter abilities now have impact particles
- Abilities 3 and 7 now have particles

Weapon changes
- Weapons modified
- Weapon origins changed

Ability changes
- Auras will now drain mana when used
- Auras are persistent between rooms
- Shadow aura no longer returns mana
- Auras now have varied spawn limits
- Aura healing and damage modified
- Enemy attacks now have impact particles
- (spaghetti part 4) GUI now properly shows skillshots depending on abilities

Update - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.2)

Download (6.1MB)

Ability damage (spaghetti code rewrite part 3)

- Every ability now has its own damage value
(you don't want to know what it was before)
- Ability damage coded to be easy to change
- Light ability 4 now fires its secondary projectiles
- Damage values changed for most abilities (mostly buffed)
- Aura abilities no longer get stuck in trees
- Ability impact particles updated
- Ability type parents created

New class - Hunter (beta)

- Ability 1 fires an arrow
- Ability 2 fires 3 arrows
- Ability 3 fires a healing arrow
- Ability 7 fires an explosive arrow

Weapon update

- Weapons now have aiming sprite
- Depth fixed

Pet update

- Health now drawn in GUI
- GUI now includes text indicating the pet and it's level
- Pets can now level up
- Armour stats added
- Health buffed
- Upgraded pets now fire elemental abilities

Misc

- Shadow ghosts are now partially transparent
- New tentacle beast variant
- Player now has an armour value

Known bugs

- Enemies sometimes path towards the edge of the map then come back due to a pathing fail-safe

v1.2

Update Notes - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.15)

Download (6.1MB)

NPC update
- Merchant now works, sells full health and mana recharges
- Trainers have more information
- NPC names are now drawn in GUI layer
- Merchant added to checkpoint area

Boss update
- New health bar style
- Random name generator v1
- Enemy HP text moved
- Parent made for bosses and boss abilities
- Test bosses added to the map
- Bosses now drop an improved mana pickup

Armour update
- Armour is now % damage reduction
- Updated most mobs armour values

Spaghetti code rewrite part 2
- All abilities now transitioned to the rewritten system
- Removed  all of the old system and associated objects
- Fonts are consistent again
- Filled in ability gaps with random abilities from other classes
- Mana costs are now shown on GUI, and coded to be easy to change

Scientist
- Can be tested but not fully ready
- Health pack now works
- Ability 4 added, no effect but it looks cool

Misc
- Crypt entrance sprite updated
- Map updated slightly

Update Notes - Roaming the land of Death (alpha v1.1)

Download (7MB)

Particle overhaul

- New particle systems made for snow and rain effects
- Updated particles for falling leaves in autumn
- Updated aura particles and colours
- Updated ability particles and colours
- Updated loot beam particles
- Updated spawner particles (unfinished)
- Depth fixed for most particles

Old code rewrite

- Health regeneration works again
- Mana regeneration changed
- Shadow mage aura no longer heals past full hp
- Healing spells no longer heal above full hp
- Regeneration now scales with level
- Health and mana scaling changed
- Enemy health bars are now drawn in GUI layer
- Tentacle beast pathing changed
- Cooldown system rewritten
- XP bars now consistent between classes

Misc

- Ledge sprites added to lava pits
- Decreased the size of loot bags
- Modified loot system to not roll over after 99. Instead, loot currency will be used for different things depending on its value

Known bugs

- Invisibility sometimes gets stuck on
- Possible error related to enemy pathing

Dev Blog/Update - Roaming Death Alpha V1.0 (#3)

It has been too long since the last Roaming Death update so here is what I've been doing.
As always, fixing bugs is my number one priority.

Download! - 6.7MB

Bug fixes

Spawners have been a mess ever since I made them, so they are being fixed.

-They no longer spam particles creating unnecessary lag
-They have a limit on the total number of skeletons they spawn
-The mob spawn time scales with difficulty

Pets have a pathing update, not great yet but works OK.

-Path like regular creeps when path is available
-Attack sprite updated

Gameplay

Shadow mage has a new passive: a chance to summon a ghost on hit.
-Invisibility works as intended, except for an unknown bug
Light mage ability #4 added, needs some modification
Light mage ability #5 (aura) added: restores HP when falling below 50%

Balance changes

Skeletons nerfed xp drops - can't be farmed for xp.

Abilities scale with overall level. (needs work)

Ability scaling adjusted and armour stats added

Visual updates

The season system is being worked on and nearly ready to go. This allows me to improve the dynamism of the environment and is also important for my other game.

-Particles have been tweaked
-Ability sprites + icons were upgraded where necessary
-Ground textures are improved (change with seasons)
-All player and enemy units have el cheapo yscale animations
-Mage select screen characters rotate slower and fire abilities
-Tutorial quest improved

Roaming Death Progress Update: The Revival

I haven't done an update in a long time. I took a big break from working on this game, but I'm ready to continue tentatively. I have some fresh ideas and want to get a better demo out asap.

I have been tidying up some things like footprints and damage scaling/balancing. I added an armour stat to most of the mobs and roughly balanced it.

I have an idea for a stat screen when you finish an area that could show some kind of score based on your stats in combat like healing done, damage taken, times died, damage dealt. This is good because it gives a penalty for dying too many times.

I am having to tidy up a lot of old spaghetti code to make progress so it is very slow.

You can read about all the changes in the update coming soon.

Roaming Death Alpha V0.99

Update notes

Download
Google drive
game maker sandbox

Monsters
Skeleton mages now have improved pathing
More paths added

Abilities
Ice attacks now work as intended and slow more
Fire attacks now do more damage
Scientist ability 1 added but doesn't yet work as intended
Scientist ability 2 added and working
Scientist ability 7 added but currently has no functionality
Skillshots upgraded and no longer centre on the player

Environment
Torches upgraded
Day/night cycle upgraded

GUI
Bug fixed with day/night cycle
Weather GUI compacted
Day/night counter sprite upgraded

Other
Title screen upgraded as always
Chest for first quest moved
Scientist weapon added

Known bugs
Skeleton pathing still not the best
Taser doesn't go off half the time on fist try
Scientist sprites still not finished

Dev Blog - Roaming Death Alpha V1.0 (#2)

In the last dev blog I set some goals for version 1. I released 0.98, a minor revision recently to encourage testing and soon I will release another update - version 0.99. The highlights of this new version will be the scientist abilities and the rest of the enemy pathing upgrade.

I have been developing the first scientist ability for over a week, as it is quite different from the mage's first ability. It will be a claw-like projectile attached to your weapon that sends shocks of power when it hits an enemy, basically a taser rifle.

The second scientist ability didn't take too long to make. It is a deployable shield that will block all attacks for as long as it lasts (timed).

There are also changes to the day/night cycle, torches, and more bugfixes as always.

Roaming Death Alpha V0.98

Update notes

Download here

-Monsters

tentacle beasts now have improved pathing

-Ice mage

added ability 5 (aura)slowing passive now works almost as intended (against tentacle beasts only)
-Shadow mage

added ability 5 (aura)
stealth ability added (not yet fully functional)

-Scientist


Added ability icons and more sprites, not ready to test yet.

-NPCs

trainers have been added, talk to them for advice

-Environmental

first dungeon texturing updated (not final)
more dead tree sprites added
torches turn on at night
new main room added (very empty right now)

-Bugs fixed

ice mage path speed bug
damage bug
spawner bug (they now spawn again)quest text bugs

-Known bugs

mana regen is broken (regens too fast, not game breaking just too easy)No exits for the second dungeon or the main rooms

Dev Blog - Roaming Death Alpha 1.0

Goals for Alpha v1.0

I am going to get more interaction into the game by introducing friendly NPCs. They will have creative names and you'll be able to talk to them to get advice or quests. I want to update the neglected quests with the quest screen I made to complete the first room.

Work in progress
-03/08
I got a lot of work done today. I upgraded the enemy pathing, fixed a few bugs and implemented a proto-save-feature (only saves character name for now). Although I say "upgraded" pathing, it works best in open spaces right now and with only a few enemies at a time, but it's getting there.
-04/08
Not too much done today, some sound effects have been added experimentally, and I'll add more soon.
-11/08
Decent progress, 0.98 ready for release.

Stealth

Stealth is being worked on. I made the ability for the shadow mage (number 7), and I got the basics for that working. Now I need to make the enemies react to stealth (confused, or not able to target properly), and make casting spells break your stealth.

New auras

Two new auras have been added.
The soul-stealing aura of the shadow mage does a small amount of damage and returns some health and possibly mana.
The ice defence aura of the ice mage intercepts enemy missiles with ice chunks and can have 3 chunks active at once.

Effects

Visual effects have been updated for the ice mage. I also plan to update more of the effects before v1.0.

Bug fixes

No one likes bugs. I fixed a couple of bugs that I hadn't seen earlier, or that weren't game breaking enough to get done. The ice mage's abilities no longer speed up enemy pathing, and using an ability right after an aura now does the correct amount of damage.

Roaming Death Alpha v0.96

Update notes

Download here.

-fixed typo causing an error (shadow mage)
-added new enemy, shadow cultist (recycled sprites)
-added music (non-looping for now)
-cleaned up the level text

Roaming Death Alpha V0.95

Update notes

Download here

-Monstershealth bars added
depth improved

-New GUI
stat screen added (not functional)equipment screen added (semi-functional)power-up bar added

- XP and Level GUI
Position modified for the other classes

-All classes
added weapon sprite (staff)

-Ice mage
bugfixes

-Fire mage
no changes, still OP

-Shadow mage
bugfixes

-Light mage
bugfixes

-Scientist 
still in development, not in this version

-Ground texturing v1.1
additional textures for lava

-Environment
Level expanded
grass added
paths added

-Title screens
overhauled again

-Misc/Engine
Optimised for speed
Depth improved/fixed for more objects.
Collision boxes improved for more objects
improved skillshot aiming graphics

Not a bug
power-up bar has no effect yet (coming soon)

Known bugs

- level text placement is still bad

- Spawners don't spawn or have any effect other than granting xp

- Fire aura can create a targeting bug when it's target is destroyed before the aura attack gets to it, making it change direction and seek the next nearest target.
-Fire aura has a targeting bug making it prefer skeleton rangers, then skeleton magi, over tentacle beasts, and it will change direction if a preferred type is in range.
-Pets do not attack spawners, and currently cannot be targeted directly by enemies
-Tentacle beast pets all use fireballs

Roaming Death Progress Update

As you can tell from the screenshot, I have added the grass decoration (with proper depth), and expanded the tutorial map somewhat. Also the grass colour has been changed to be darker.

I'm experimenting with footprints... and I have mixed results so far. They are looking good for a start but I need some way of clearing them, as they look bad after a few minutes of running around. I'll probably do that with snow, it seems to make sense.