·Latency
Striker Ball #6: CPU Player Update
Striker Ball is getting its first draft of computer players and implements the previously missing keyboard controls.
This month I managed to add computer players you can play with and against! From the team select menu in offline play you can now choose to play with twin-stick controls to control your team, or you can choose to play with a computer player as your partner. The CPU logic is in early stages, I don't plan to leave it quite the way it is since there are some obvious flaws in their behavior, but hopefully by next month I will have them in a finished state.
In addition to adding CPU players, we wanted to make sure that you could take full advantage of being able to try the game out by yourself, so over the last month I also implemented keyboard controls so that there isn't any immediate need for a game-pad.
A fun fact about this first draft of the CPUs, I chose to do the logic without any additional memory. The CPUs actually only read data that the game already had each frame. They don't attempt to remember anything for themselves. This may change for the finished version, but it is interesting seeing what they can do by basically reacting to what is right in front of them.
That covers the new features for this month. We're approaching the stage in the project where I will mostly be polishing the small things in the game, as well as fixing bugs and cleaning up the code in the background to make game development more sustainable for the future. This means the next steps may not involve as many fun new features, but it will mean making a better developer example out of the game and streamlining our processes for future projects.
We are excited to be nearing a finished version of our first small game and looking forward to hopefully being able to start a new game in the not too distant future.
Written by, Latency: Lead game programmer at K-tech Studio