Doug Mc Grave: In Grave Danger, a retro coin-op inspired multi level rat-rescue-em-up!

Community Devlog
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I have been working on a new, retro, coin-op classic inspired game project for a short while now and I am currently at the stage to have a three level demo uploaded to gd.games which can be played right here:

The aim of the game is to help Doug, the memorial garden gnome as he attempts to guide the Rainbow Ratto’s to safety, digging out pathways beneath a graveyard.

The game starts with 10 rats in total, each of a differing colour and they will appear out of one of multiple sewer pipes on each level.

Doug has to defeat the enemies to unlock the exit pipe and then guide the rats to it, for them to escape to the next level.

Ratto’s will die if they are hit by enemies or caught in traps, fire or explosions, and when they are gone, they are gone for good!

At the end of each level you are awarded bonus points for the amount of time remaining on the clock and number of rats rescued.

At your disposal are numerous objects which can be dug beneath to drop, ala Dig-Dug or Mr.Do!, on the enemy’s heads to squash them, at which point they will drop a yummy food pick-up to restore some of Doug’s lost health.

Coffins can be broken if dropped far enough to reward you with some treasure.

Also power-up items can be gained to dropping rocks or gems into clusters of three, something akin to Bejewelled or Candy Crush Saga… And these can give you bombs to drop or a bouncing orb, which currently only looks snazzy, but will stun the enemies for a short time in a future update.

Bombs will destroy some objects (Planned), enemies and Ratto’s so use them carefully!

Please try it out if it sounds like something you’d be interested in and let me know your thoughts…

Feedback is truly important to me, as I don’t want to steam ahead with features and gameplay that doesn’t resonate with players.

It’d be helpful to know if others think it’s enjoyable enough to play, otherwise I might get so caught up and blindsided by my own ideas that I can’t see beyond them!

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It’s great! love the pixel art and it’s very polished. As per usual I read none of the helpful instructions above and so I concentrated hard on steering clear of the rats and I figured the grim reaper might be here to help! I love dig dug and so I fully encourage you in your pursuit of retro excellence!!

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I like the graphics of the game. The animations of the rats are cool and the various visual effects are fun. Also have no idea how you did the whole tile dig thing, really fascinating stuff.

Personally I find the controls annoyingly stiff, the character is way too slow for my liking so I’m not sure if I could continue playing with this speed.

Btw how can we use the bombs?

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Thank you kindly, I’m glad that you enjoyed it!

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Thank you for playing and for the appreciation of my pixel art, that means a lot to me.

I do understand the annoyance with the speed, I have considered speeding it up a little.

And I can imagine that part of the reason for the stiff feeling control is likely due to the strict 4 direction travel of the character, who moves 16 pixel at a time, to ensure that he’s aligned with the grid, in order to dig correctly.

This works much like classic old maze/grid based games, such as Pac Man, Dig-Dug and Mr. Do! For similar reasons, and will not work any other way unfortunately.

Also the digging is created using layers, there is a 16x16 pixel grid on an invisible ‘Control’ layer which everything works around.

On top of that is a set of vertical and horizontal walls which can be seen as you dig. These delete on collision, and the dirt tile in the center has an animation of it being dug out, and is rotated to the player’s angle as he enters the grid and begins digging.

This kind of does the trick, although it was awkward to get right.

And finally, another layer on top of this has the earth texture, which can be changed in colour, as necessary and has a multiply effect added to it, so that it seemingly textures the white grid, walls and dirt tiles beneath it.

It does also texture the background image, but cannot be seen as much on that, due to the colour and brightness of it.

I hope that makes some sense!?!

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And bombs, once collected, can be deployed with the keyboard ‘Z’ key or gamepad "B’ button.

They only drop in a grid center, so again, it can feel a little stiff and I’m trying to figure out a better, more fluid method of deployment.

They work somilarly to Bomberman, in that they are timed with a short fuse, giving a couple of seconds before exploding in four directions and destroying everything that they touch, including the enemies, the Ratto’s and yourself, so be careful with them!

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Hi @SpexxyYT!

Excellent!
As i like much the retro games, i’ll say you have been able to dust off the genre of dig dug’s game inserting your own ideas.

Refreshing!

A+
Xierra

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