(http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a263/Royous/FreeSpace/SSLogo.png)
What is SHMUPSpace?
SHMUPSpace is an arcade style mod for FreeSpace Open engine that follows the lines of more traditional shoot em ups (or shmup) of the late 80s and early 90s. Games like R-Type, Gradius, Thunder Force, and Gleylancer were my key inspirations in designing this mod. Then again, I did put a few nods here and there to Spoon's TDS (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=68047.msg1343625#msg1343625) (Please, please play that as well!) mod. TDS was what gave me the initial drive to make this mod in the first place.
That being said, it's time for something different. ALPHA ONE is always claimed to be the godlike being...now he really is!
Is There a Story to This?
No....well kinda. Even if there is a story there, don't expect it to make any bit of sense, even much less sense than Loliquest Dimensional Eclipse. Just don't expect it to follow FreeSpace continuity any one bit if it makes the game non deterministic (shields and flak guns never existed for anyone! Beams are called flux cannons instead are used only for bosses or really, really major enemies. Flux cannons only fire in a fixed direction).
How Does This Work? (AKA How to Play)
The goal of the game is to fight through each of the missions, blowing up as many bad guys as you can (cruiser class ships and below are valid targets to destroy, though larger ships take more effort than smaller ones) where at the end you may or may not face an end boss of that stage. You're given 3 lives at the start of the mission. If you die, you lose a life. When you restart the mission from either death or from the escape menu you are sent to a predetermined checkpoint (you get NO choice whether you go there or not) and lose all your upgrades in the process. If you die on your last life, you start from the beginning of the mission (at least in the first mission which is of course this release. Later releases will send you back to a selection screen after the first mission).
There are 3 types of upgrades, each of which are found inside a TTC 1 container and can be exposed by blow the cargo container up:
Red - Symbolized not only by being the color red but also have the letter "P" on them. These weapons upgrade the laser your ship has. This upgrade does carry between levels.
Blue - Symbolized by a blue spinning ring with the secondary acquired in the middle, it loads your ship with that secondary weapon pictured. This does not carry between levels.
Green - Green spinning right with a green plus sign in the middle, this restores 25% of your ship's health. Mr One Hitpoint Wonder doesn't get these anymore.
The controls of this mod are as follows (when you initially create your pilot):
Arrow Keys - Move
Z - Fire primary.
X - Fire secondary.
C - Change Primary Bank
V - Change Secondary Bank
Shift V - Change Secondary Fire Mode
If you decide to not use the pilot file, this mod only uses these controls in the control menu which you may just want to rebind:
Left Thrust
Right Thrust
Up Thrust
Down Thrust
Fire Primary Weapon
Fire Secondary Weapon
Cycle Primary Weapon
Cycle Secondary Weapon
Cycle Secondary Fire Mode
PITCHURES
Cause everyone loves pictures!
(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/17350885/frees2-20120702-211250.png)
(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/17350885/frees2-20120705-202510.png)
^ That's what it looks like when you play on Insane difficulty. It gets noticeably easier on lower difficulty levels. (Slightly dated image)
Installation Instructions
1. You'll need to use the BP builds (I've tested it on the BP builds, but it *should* work on the 3.7 builds since I'm not using anything specific to the BP ones) and ALSO RUN THIS MOD IN A 16:9 SCREEN RATIO RESOLUTION. Why do I have to run it in that ratio you may ask. Well, unlike space sims, side scrollers are very dependent on what ratio the screen is as well as the field of view the player is given. This is a major impact on game balance and I'm not going to rebalance the mod for 10 different screen ratios. If you don't know what valid resolutions would be, here's a list of some of the resolutions supported by this mod:
1280 x 720
1600 x 900
1920 x 1080
Also, don't try to be a wise guy and run something other than those three, because the mod will error you out if you try anything else. :p
2. Extract the mod folder in the usual location and run it like you would any other mod.
3. Create a new pilot for this mod. This is essential that you do unlike most other mods because the entire control layout is different.
DOWNLOAD YES
Go get it boy 1.2 baby123! (http://www.mediafire.com/?82rqa5b5g9cmnt1)
Honestly I don't know how well this will fare to the world since my testers all ran out on me saying they're no good at this type of game. This release only contains the first mission as a way to get a feel for the reception of this mod.
Update! Version 1.2 Changes:
- Gameplay
- You are now a one hit point wonder. One hit you're dead. Kaboom. Disappear. Wooooosh. Goodbye. EXCEPTIONS:
- Splash Damage from missiles
- Beams
- As a result of the above, you are also more powerful. Powering up makes more a noticeable difference. Except at unpowered, where the player gets a small damage nerf.
- Significantly reduced the health of "popcorn" enemies. Lokis and Watchdogs should not be able to be one shotted even at unpowered levels. Alasters two, Hercs three.
- Buffed damage of the Rockeye to 100 damage and Tempest to 150 damage
- Lower difficulty levels reduce the firerate of enemies much more greatly (4.0,2.5,2.0,1.5,1.0)
- Base fire rate of lighter enemy weapons increased slightly
- Reduced difficulty of Big Core Rev 1.2 fight by increasing base fire rate for both the ion rings and the spread shots
- Other Changes
- All 16:9 based screen resolutions are now supported.
- To let its spirit live on, I'm using the This badass soundtrack (http://zanrai.com/heavenvariant/) instead of what was used for 1.0 and 1.1. Farewell LIVER USUALIS, you had your time. :p
- You no longer need mr ShmupKing. Controlconfigdefaults.tbl has been implemented will autoassign the proper keys when you create a pilot.
To do for 1.3:
- Remove Big Core Rev 1.2. It's cool and all, but I need to make room for a very very special corvette that has some surrendering to do *hinthintwinkwink*.
- Rework Stage 1 entirely. It really doesn't work out all that well since ALPHA ONE is a one hitpoint wonder, this could become way too hard for a first level. While I did do some rebalancing, I feel that I just want to redo the level anyway to add some more new features regarding levels
- Add a scoring system
- Finalize what I want for the levels
Aha that was so awesome! A totally new take on freespace gameplay and it WORKS! It works quite well. Everyone play it! play it now!
[harsh]
You know what I am going to say Andrew. Why all the text at the beginning? There's not much to the plot so why all the freakin text explaining nothing?! Everything is skippable (I did not skip!) and you do skip I don't think it takes away from the game. Fleet x is moving to... fleet y is engaging at... blah blah AAAH!
[/harsh]
I'm surprised you can't manually change default control schemes with some kind of modding table or something. Be nice if you could.
Death happened shortly after "destroy the core". I was playing on easy. I'll let bosch win that one lol.
cool use of the powerups and really great atmosphere. There was a lot of action in the background and the foreground flying through the NTF fleet. Felt like a true schmup. Who needs the third dimension?