Feeling Underpowered? Weapon Updates!

Update: Lots of changes recently. Too many to list, but overall, changed several Weapon/Buddy behaviors, added more Weapon power levels and alternate fire modes. Working on adding special attacks in addition to all that. You can also switch your main Weapon at will!

Your life will be easier if you actually do take advantage of switching your main Weapon and enabling the alternate fire modes (in addition to pairing it with a complementary Buddy). The level enemy spawns will now be aggressively tailored to take advantage of your new capabilities. In other words, yes, switching  your Weapon/Buddy combo will actually be useful AND necessary in some cases! This makes everything more tactical and strategic in that you now have to think about what Buddy to keep for later or discard for another, as well as when to switch to your main Weapon, in addition to activating your alternate fire mode to get out of a given "situation"! Whew!

Due to the Weapon and Buddy changes, there are now 336 unique Weapon/Buddy Combos. My math may off on that (it's really, really late), but even so, there's a lot. Forgetting the technicalities, there are 8 main Weapon/Buddy combos, plus adding bombs and special attacks to the mix give you a lot of options. Remember, these numbers are not for show - the level spawns/patterns are being redone to take advantage of that! The combinations will be key to making your job easier, but you always have the option to just use your default Weapon and leave it not powered-up if you want... Good luck with that!

The bad news: adding and tweaking these features may delay the release date, but its ok because it will make the game better in the end! (maybe...)

Oh, how about a screenshot of the newly maxed-out Magma beam (and "City" level):
 

Screenshot Backlog (from twitter)

Updating the blog with screenshots I've posted to twitter already (playing catch-up!):
  

Not the time to lose one's head...

 

Austin Powers: "That's not the way to get ahead in life."

Snops Attack! Zombie Defense Squadron Video

Posting video to blog now since I was too busy to do it last week.

Pig Buddy Weapon Defense System™

It's hard to see in this screen shot, but if you look really carefully you'll see the Pig Buddy Weapon Defense System™ equipped! (click for a larger view)

ブタはともだち! Xbox Indie Games Snops Attack スクリーンショット

ブタはともだち! In Snops Attack, you don't just save Pigs, they will bravely help you in the Zombie War! Collecting the special Pig Buddy Weapon System™ will reduce your offensive capabilities, but will greatly enhance your enemy "bullet eating" abilities!

Xbox Indie Games Snops Attack: 爆弾!

Some more development images. Top one is the new bomb artwork.

This shot shows the result of poor bomb management... You can see the chain BONUS award value in the upper left going off (since the chain has ended with the player's demise!).

The boss "WARNING" message. It's big, and has a big sound to go along with it.

Xbox Indie Games Snops Attack: Gameplay Video

This is not a trailer (besides, my video editing is really bad anyway). This is just an early gameplay demo which shows some typical action on level 1. All the enemies and their patterns are subject to change (still working on the bosses). Mikki told me to make it better, so I guess I'm not done with level 1 yet!

Game Pic of the Day™: There's a Dragon on my 360 Controller!

Now this is cool and unexpected. I was at Walmart looking for Doritos when I stumbled upon this Xbox 360 controller. It's black and white and actually has art on it: something that looks like hair on the left, an eye, lips, an old school phone... and on the right side a Dragon! Yes, a Dragon. Sold. Ok, I'm female and I don't need pretty art to make me buy something, but it helps in this case - after all, who wants a boring controller that costs the same anyway?

Ahh yes, the price. The best part, it came with a matching black and white headset and all for $39.99. That's the price at some places for the plain old controller without cool art and without a matching headphone. Schweet!

CoD WaW: Tanks for the Memories

Well, it's been some weeks now that Tanks have been removed from the Hardcore play lists - and for what? So a few weenies could giggle giddily when Downfall or Seelow comes up just so they can pull out their polished rifles with their beloved scopes and snipe in peaceful, unmoving bliss? They have nothing to fear!

On those large maps, the Tanks were the equalizers, the wild cards, the random element that actually made those maps fun in HC. Most of all, snipers didn't like them. Now those same maps are quiet, barren wastelands - the tranquility only broken every so often by the crack of a weenie bullet shot from what seems like the other side of the world. You can actually hear the ambient noise on these maps now, so I guess it isn't all that bad.

So, the weenies prevailed and have their sniping maps, sans Tanks. Guess what? Those same maps are now the most voted down maps as well. Perfect!

What a waste of a good map or two. How about we put the Tanks back in the HC rotation, but with a few changes so we don't scare off all the snipers (it's ok to scare off the weeniest of the weenies):

1. Drop the tanks back in, but make their spawn times and spawn locations randomized, to prevent predictable camping.
   
   
2. Make their armor weaker than the normal mode Tank armor. The troops die easier in HC, why not make the Tank a little bit more vulnerable as well?
   
   
3. How about the Tank having limited main gun ammo? Why not? The weenie sniper has limited ammo. Can you feel his silent painful tears as he tucks himself into a corner surrounded by Bouncing Betties (until someone hits him with a Rifle Grenade at 70 yards and laughs). Limited Tank ammo will also prevent someone riding in the Tank for the whole match and getting 1 million kills .

Of course not everyone will agree with these changes, but so what. Not everyone agrees with taking the Tanks out of HC in the first place. Maybe they can put them back in, but take away some of their fear inducing power. Snipers can then snipe without wetting their pants too much, and we can have 2 more maps to play in again.

CoD WaW: Last Stand/Second Chance Shenanigans

Aside from the fact that Last Stand/Second Chance is a weenie perk (designed for people who can't kill someone the normal way, i.e. in a straight up fight) with no counter-perk, I still say keep it in the game - but it definitely needs to be modified in the next iteration of Call of Duty multiplayer.

The problems with it, amplified by playing in Hard Core mode :

• The perk is instantaneous: as soon as the player is hit and goes down, they have a pistol in their hands, and if they are aiming and firing at an opponent when this happens, their aim is not altered. This does not make sense. You're mortally hit, you fall down, your main weapon magically vanishes, and even more magically a pistol appears in your hand ready to fire - that instant. All the weenie player has to do is keep pulling the fire trigger and they will seamlessly keep firing.
  
  What should happen is: you get hit, you fall down and automatically lose your main weapon, then you have to press the "switch weapon" button to pull out your pistol. This will fix the instant-pistol-in-hand-firing-syndrome.
  
  
• When in Last Stand/Second Chance, the pistol has better accuracy - and seemingly range - than when used normally. You're supposed to be dying, bleeding to death and all of a sudden you become a pistol marksman who can head shot a rifleman at 75 meters, in a split second. Why is this? No, it doesn't matter that you're on the ground, not moving, in a reverse prone position - you are still dying.
  
  Your aim should be messed up and blurry, similar to when you have a close call with an explosion. Not only should your aim be blurred, bloodied, wobbly and semi-controllable, it should get progressively worse as you lay there bleeding to death. As it is now, once you go into Last Stand/Second Chance, you just kind of recline on the ground as if on a beach blanket, enjoying the breeze, popping off accurate rounds clear across the map, until the timer expires or until your buddy brings you up with no detrimental effects.

Yes, like everyone else, I've been hit at 100 yards from insta-fire last standers, but that doesn't make it a good perk. It just solidifies its status of "Weenie" perk. Instead of keeping it that way, hopefully Infinity Ward/Treyarch can modify it and make it behave in a more sensible manner.