So now that the update has been submitted, what should I work on next? Keep in mind that I'm going to take it easy for a couple of weeks. But in my down time I may start work again. Vote here!
a. More challenge levels b. Evil story line c. Endless mode d. Hard mode e. Background graphics f. Alternate build method* g. Besiegement 2!!! h. tutorial or in game story (added this)
*buttons only show when a tile or tower is selected, appear near selection
What would b2 consist of? I think you should try more challenge lvls, maybe endless and hard so you don't have an app that younonly put one update out. Those 3 should not be too difficult to code. maybe do b2 but after b2 put one last b1 update to show you are not abandoning it.
IF creating the alternate build mode would allow you to get rid of the right side with all the towers on them, then I would recommend doing that first before creating any more stories. That way you could create even more complex games using the added space.
You've got a point. The code supports levels larger than 15*18 now. If I am designing new levels, I could take advantage of this. But I'll still leave the stained glass in. I prefer to play with two thumbs.
Another suggestion for next version. Add the medal system to the Challenges as well. If I get a bronze or silver medal, I find myself very motivated to keep trying until I get the gold medal. But with the Challenges I don't feel the same sense of motivation to make sure I win with no enemies escaping.
So, this is more a tweak suggestion for your next revision.
When you use the transparent overlay to show where towers cannot be laid down when placing them, that is great and really helpful, but after a bunch of the beta testing, I've found that it is very hard to tell where the entry points are for the mobs along the edges. Which makes placing towers on the maze maps pretty hard initially, when you are fighting the time to get your first set of towers in place.
Just a suggestion to either drop the transparency on the red back a bit or perhaps use a different color for those spots (like purple or something).
I also intend to find a way to dynamically show a grid based on tower placement and mob location. I think I have an idea, but it involves even more memory cutbacks.
Kmonsefi, I'm not sure what you are saying? Should there be levels to the challenge rewards? Or the number of achievements increases your medal? My original plans included achievements giving points which you could spend to increase damage, rates, etc. But I decided to keep them in just for fun. They are a bonus to the game, not a necessity.
Chad, what i'd really like to see hit the market is a really fresh RTS game. That or, another game i thoroughly enjoyed was game called "Loot Master" released on the iPhone by this guy named Doug. His graphics weren't anything spectacular but it consisted of waves of enemies that would drop loot such as armor, swords, maces, shields, gloves, rings that would boost your stats and pending on what gear style you decided to hold on to determined how your character played and you tried to last as many waves as possible. The problem was he dropped the project which was sad to see. It had much needed update attention that it never recieved. If you could do a hack n/ slash type RPG with a intricate loot system that'd be absolutely amazing! Even if you make it more like a survival like "loot master" consisting of waves of enemies and where inbetween waves you could shop for more items or upgrade other items...and with different ways to specialize your character pending on what "class" you choose and what spell tree you go down. I know a RPG hack n' slash survival game would be much more easier to make, where a true RPG with level layouts and large maps of content could take ages to do. Haha i should prolly stop my imagination right here, If only I were a developer!! On another note, im pumped about your update. I certainly appreciate you not giving up on your product and making the improvements. You're easily my favorite developer. Keep up to good work!!
Oh, I'd love to do a real RPG. When I was a kid (20 years ago) I worked on several RPGs on my C=64. The problem is, it does take ages to make a decent RPG. I remember one time, I taped about 16 pieces of graph paper together and drew an entire world on it (similar to Ultima 4). I actually coded some assembly language to read the world from disk and display it on the screen. I had movement, characters and inventories. You could enter towns and everything...
...the problem being it took at least a year. And I still didn't have a functioning game.
Now, I could do something similar to Loot Master. I'd love a Diablo style game, especially in 3D. (Loot Master appears to borrow heavily from Diablo/WoW's itemization.) Even if the game was on "rails", where you could only move forward/back and cast spells/attack. A free-world would definitely take ages to make, especially for a single developer.
Consider that it took me nearly a year to work on Besiegement... and it is still unfinished (in my eyes). A decent RPG would have 10x as much content and graphics. So 10 years? Is anyone willing to wait that long? Am I willing to dedicate 10 years of my life? (this is only a joke...)
I also love RTS games... but I don't think I'd like to create one. These would take a little less time, but again, a lot of work goes into the A.I., and story for the campaign (which is a must).
This is the reason you haven't seen a real RTS or RPG on the iPhone (besides ports). Even with a large development team, you are looking at years of work.
I'm suggesting having To-Do's in the Challenges games (I don't think these are the same thing as Achievements), like you do in the Easy and Normal Story modes. Medals are awarded depending on how many of the To-Do's you complete.
For example, in the Easy Story for Forest Critters, you have the following To-Do's: - Have 50 gold remaining (if you do this, you get a bronze medal) - Build at least 5 arrow towers (if you also do this, you get a silver medal) - Let no enemies escape (if you do all three, you get a gold medal)
I hope this makes sense. I don't consider myself an advanced Besiegement player, more a mid-level one, so perhaps I'm not understanding how the medal system works?
Man, Chad if you seriously made a hack n' slash/Diablo style/arcade like RPG survival game that would be amazing. Because the big thing about the iPhone is that most games you only want to play for a few minutes because that's all you have... or a game where you can save here and there and continue later... and if you had a Loot Master like game but being able to move around, loot a plethora of items, have bosses that join in on waves, different classes.... aww man it'd be so original and addictive! With highscore system and everything! I do agree that a true RPG would take absolute ages! Especially since you're alone in this. Whatever your next project is, i dont doubt that it'll be amazing! If you do consider doing something of the RPG genre i'd be stoked!
Please improve the interface graphics. It's still one of the biggest graphical problems.
For you next time think about something like an RPG / Tower Defense Mix. I don't believe your graphic skills are good enough for a decent Jump&Run game.
Congratulations on getting the upgrade released. It looks great! I like what you did with the ending. Having the towers disappear is a nice touch to signal the end of the level.
My suggestions, as unrealistic as they might be, are the following:
1) Some higher resolution backgrounds, at least with regards to a few details that could add "punch" to your visuals.
2) Some higher resolution enemies. You've put a lot of work into upgrading the towers, so a similar upgrade to the enemies would be nice. For instance, archers that actually shot arrows at your towers would be nice. Damage to your towers would be even better. Flying enemies that flew straight towards the exit, rather than follow the previous enemies. Killing a Boss could release a jewel into the air that would then floated across the battle field and onto to the right side of your interface. There's a lot of interesting things that you could do with the visual representations of your enemies, provided you didn't bust through your memory limitations.
3) More information about the strengths and weaknesses of the different enemies, in the Statistics section. And some way to identify the various enemies, maybe by touching the progress bar and having their names pop up?
The interface looks ugly in my opinion. Read the thread in Touch Arcade if you are looking for more negative comments about the interface graphics. For example one user said it looks like the first tries with MS Paint. I really like your game, the update and the new tower graphics, but I have to agree with those negative comments about the interface. The glass look doesn't work for me. If you compare your interface graphics with 7 Cities, Fieldrunners and The Creeps you will have to agree that your graphics are worse than the competition.
The glass interface goes with the medieval theme of the game. The interface is fine. You are the only one that has said it looks bad on these forums and in the app store comments. Just ignore him chad and enjoy your vacation if you haven't left yet.
Honestly... who gives a shit about interface graphics? Poor fieldrunners and 7 cities gets old within minutes of playtime from lack of content. Besiegement is packed with levels, challenges, and even achievements. Personally I like the next interface a lot, but I think those other graphic heavy games should learn a thing or two from what Chad's cooked up here. This is a complete TD game. Period.
@Jeffrey: I agree that Besiegement has more content than the other games. That's the reason I like the game and play it, but it's never a good idea to only see the advantages of your own or your favorite game. If you think 7 Cities is getting old within minutes I guess you have never played or understood it.
@ChadWRandall: I hope she's worth it. I'm sure that this interface and the resulting screenshots will cost you some sales.
I not only own, but have beatin 7 Cities... Don't get me wrong it's a solid TD, but it's all pathed, no maze. The ruby system was pretty cool giving you incentive to play on and unlock upgrades but other then that man.... It's the same old stuff and was pretty easy. Am I bias to Besiegement.... yeah probably. I just know if im gonna cry about something it'd be over content and gameplay... not the UI. Now if the UI affected gameplay then it'd be a different story. But in this case it doesn't. But back on 7 Cities... it was way too easy and didn't have much variety besides the upgrade system... which i will kudos to.
Guest, everyone has an opinion. Apparently you don't like the interface, although other people do, and I'm sure that some are simply indifferent, one way or the other.
However it appears that you insist on voicing your opinion, over and over, with at least 3 negative posts. Why? All developers have to weight their options, prioritize their resources, and spend their time working on the things that really wants to change. Sometimes they modify things that you think are significant, and other times they update things that other people have identified as being important.
Making comments about Chad's girlfriend, simply to support your own personal opinion is pathetic, completely unacceptable.
first off, i loved the game before the update and now it's better. the graphics are pretty good. honestly, it's not as good as FR but i think someone on Touch Arcade posted about how it's easier to do better graphics on a game like that. anyways, the gameplay is still much better and deeper than that game anyways. also i like the new interface and the stainglass IS good. if i had to change anything i would make thicker black outlines on the objects; the outlines within the stain glass is perfect. stuff i would change: the 3 ruby's are taking way too much space. why is it in a triangle? why not just have 1 ruby and a number next to it. as it is now, we can't see how many more we have after 3. in terms of stuff you could add, i'd say a more intuitive speed control system. the toggle system is kinda akward. i would suggest a 3 button system. it starts off with [.5x] [1x] [2x] at regular speed. if you press [2x], then it shifts over and then 3 buttons are now [1x] [2x] [3x]. press [3x] and now the 3 buttons are [2x] [3x] [--]. in other words, the current speed is always the middle button. also someone mentioned the grid overlay. instead of having just red, have one colour for a "path square" and one colour for an "environment square". and the 'buildable' environment squares can stay clear. another thing i would change is a grid toggle button like 7C. right now we can only get it when a tower is selected which leads to accidental placements. also i don't know if this is feasible but how about a quarter or half square buffer along the top as right now the tops of towers and enemies get cut off.
@Guest. [EDIT: I started writing this before your last post, so this is in reference to your two previous ones]
Keep in mind that Besiegement does not have a team of developers or an in-house artist rendering out detailed graphics. It's a one-man show, which is pretty impressive! All things considered, I'm quite happy with the new tower upgrade animations, and the "stained glass" interface is a nice touch. Granted, the enemy and landscape textures remind me of the NES era, (and I still vote for hiring a professional artist for the next release!), but even so, Besiegement has what the others lack: CONTENT!
I mean, ranking on the online scoreboard alone has kept me busy for more hours than I've played ANY iPhone games combined! That's not to mention all of the unique levels and gameplay modes...
You have to admit, Besiegement has the best TD gameplay & content on the iPhone. Hands down. I beat Creeps in a few hours, no replay value, and they only have half of the levels they advertised! (check out my feedback on the iTunes store!! same username). Creep's cartoony graphics made my little sister giggle, but didn't make up for lacking gameplay. Same with Fieldrunners... fun for a few hours, then there's nothing more.
These other TD games are like flashy summer 'popcorn movies': fun to watch the big explosions and cheesy cliches, but lacking any real depth or inspired moments. Watch it once, then forget about it.
Besiegement, on the other hand, is like an incredible epic. It doesn't rely on high-dollar actors or special effects, but it's depth and complexity brings you back time after time...
Would I like to see improved graphics in a future release? Of course. But that's just eye-candy. I certainly wouldn't call the game "ugly"! It does what it does very well. So we should give it some respect on that. Calling someone's creation ugly doesn't do any good. Perhaps you could consider some more "constructive" criticism next time. Suggest how it could realistically be made better. If you really have some good ideas, make a sketch, and share them with the developer!
The beta testers have been ripping this game to shreds over the past month, finding where improvements are needed, and presenting them in a positive and constructive way. People may take your opinions in a more receptive manner, if you share them in a constructive way.
First of all you should check out the options before posting because you can change the interface to classic if you like that more. Also you can turn the grid always on in the options. Lastly you don't get more than 3 gems. If you don't use em you lose them and don't complain that you should keep gaining gems cuz that just means you don't know how to build a good defence if you have to rely that heavily on them. 3 gems makes the game more difficult, you have to plan when to use them. Considering that you are the only one complaining this much about the update ( many others have changed their rating to a 5 out if 5 in the app store) how are we not to know you aren't the competition trying to sabatage this game? On the other hand I do like your idea about the .25x .5x 1x 2x 4x thing.
Guest, finally some constructive criticism. I really like some of your ideas. This was what I as looking for, ideas. Not just "it sucks". Anyone can do that.
I too hate the speed toggle. I was going to look at it in the near future. I had thought of a drop down menu, but I like to toggle the speed a lot when I play, and two taps would be annoying. I like the idea of a pseudo-slider. The tap spot would still be 50 pixels, but you'd see three buttons. It might work. But for this to fit, the entire gem triangle and compact-mode numbers would need to be relocated. I'll look into it.
I am also planning a no-interface play mode once I make the levels larger. Perhaps you'll enjoy that more than the glass mode. I, for one, like to play with two thumbs, so the glass interface made sense to me. But many other TD's went down the pop-up menu route.
The only way to get the buffer along the top is to modify the levels so you can't place towers there. Most of the levels have the buffer zone. I might revisit this when I re-vamp the level data and backgrounds.
MetaChimp: I do plan on working on the backgrounds. I'm going to have to double the size of the graphics... see these numbers:
Current memory for backgrounds: (512*512)/2 = 128k, *2 = 256k
Proposed memory (1024*1024)/2 = 512k, *2 = 1024k
On some levels, such as "Everything Dies", the low memory flag already goes off. This is 768k more memory, which really pushes things over the edge. I would have to cut into something else. Or handle the grid differently (right now it is a single texture). I'm not sure if there is enough drawing power left to draw a hundred grid squares.
Programming this game has been quite the challenge. In recent years, I've never worried about memory allocation. In fact, I would allocate huge amounts of memory to get things to run faster. Conserving memory brings me back to programming on machines with as little as 5k of memory (yes, 5120 bytes... that is smaller than the size of a single graphic now). It sucks!
I am currently trying to think of solutions. Until then, they will be a bit low rez.
that would probably require health bars over each tower, which would be clutter when the graphics are already so small... there should be a way to nerf the earth towers since my main strategies involve earth towers, arrow towers, and sometimes water to slow them down around the earth towers. possibly more runners per level since they seem to be able to run past their attack intervals. how about a map that's like a forest/cemetery where there's single unbuildable squares spaced out evenly and no big open spaces at all? or a map with different terrain where some certain towers can't be built like a rocky area that can't have earth, a shallow water area that can't have fountains, etc.
You the snae guest poster as before? If so great ideas and sorry if I came across the wrong way. Constructive critisism goes 100 times further than negative. Chad is currently on vacation so this area will be pretty dead for a while as he didn't take his laptop with.
Of the suggestions you listed, these are my favorites (in order):
a. More challenge levels c. Endless mode d. Hard mode
I've been playing the new version and loving it (who am I kidding, I loved the old version too, so I'm really saying nothing changed).
Here are a few minor suggestions after playing the new version (sorry I couldn't really participate in beta testing - these probably would have been more useful there, I know):
1. When you are drag-placing a bomb or snowflake, and change your mind (this often happens to me because my fat thumbs select the flake instead of the bomb) I used to be able to drag it off the screen to the right, into "the black", to avoid placement (this is easy with a tower - just place it on the path and it will be denied). After the update, however, the bomb/flake somehow stays "active" out in the black, you can see part the green radius, it stays selected in the UI, and when click the "rush" bar it makes the "denied" sound and shows the "nope" symbol. It usually stays like this for me until I go back and really place the bomb.
2. The pause mode is good, especially now that you can scroll and zoom around. However the dimmed screen with the starburst graphic makes it hard to see the underlying game, as do the large resume/quit/options, etc buttons. It is quite useful to pause the game and see what is going on, but if the dimming and start were removed (or the dimming not so severe) and the buttons were shown in the UI pane (which is otherwise useless during a pause) it would be better, IMO.
I also completely agree with this statement from an earlier poster:
3) More information about the strengths and weaknesses of the different enemies, in the Statistics section. And some way to identify the various enemies, maybe by touching the progress bar and having their names pop up?
Exactly! There is such a rich variety of enemies, it is hard to tell is coming up and what there special abilities are, short of memorizing the guide.
A missile tower where the target range does not begin at the tower itself, but at some point further out. If a missile is launched, it would not make sense for it to be able to target something just a few feet away, but rather the target would have to be some distance from the tower itself.
Hey Chad, I saw you were on the... i believe toucharcade forums complimenting Dungeon Defense... what did you think of DD? I downloaded it, and I see so much potential in that game, but as it is right now there's very little depth and content. Only 3 skeleton types... *scratches head* and 1 map. I know they are adding another map in the next update, but I was thinking man if this was Chad's game he'd have it loaded with so much content and variation! Anyways man, im excited for your future updates and future games. Didn't know where to post this so I posted it here. Cheers
Personal life is a bit complicated right now. But I am slowly working on the next release which includes endless mode, hard mode, flying enemies and more challenges. Also I plan a free version.
Once that is done, I'm thinking Besiegement 2 will be the evil side played in a dungeon. Think of Dungeon Keeper meets tower defense. Yes, it'll be similar to Dungeon Defense but actually closer to DK.
A hard mode An endless maze small and large map An endless path small and large map Adjusted scoring mechanics based on that posts comments Perhaps an air or underground based enemy that's immune to certian towers Access to online scores in the game A few more height pixels added to the top bar not only to rush enemys in faster, but to cancel focus if you have bomb or whatever selected.
You'd be the man if you made a game that was like DK, you seriously do the best quality work, that'd be so awesome if you made a DK. Dungeon Defense has a lot of potential but i really feel such a lack of depth in DD that its kinda dissapointing and i know they are expanding on it but i still feel like it will lack. That'd be awesome my friend, i hope you'd make it as deep and rich of content as you did with Besiegement, because Besiegement is still the most content filled TD game on the market.
Hi Chad...your Besiegment in awesome! thanx from italy dude.. but i wish you could tell me how to beat the "swarms" level!! when i'm at the 7th wave those damn red elementals always manage to escape! i won gold medals in every level of the normal story..and i even beated the boss level and the hard 50 maze... well, i know, this is not the right place for posting. but the main idea was to say THANK YOU, not asking how to beat the level. So, if anyone would answer fell free to write me at ciapoide@yahoo.it ; if not never minds, i'll continue playing this wonderful TD, and there's no other TDgame on iphone as cool as this one!
You programmed on machines with 5k? Which ones? The only one I remember like that is the VIC-20, which was the machine I sold my first software on (holy crap, back in 1982, when I was in junior high). I know the original PAC-MAN arcade game was something like 4k or 8k... one of the engineers told me they didn't even use different sprites for Pac-Man "up", "down", "left", and "right" - but flipped his images around in code to save memory. Yeesh!
BTW, kudos again on a most awesome game. I *finally* just beat "Pathed 50 Hard", after about a million tries. I really love the idea of the next version having "meta" characteristics, such as HP for towers and/or power-up towers. That would add a lot of dimension for those of us who have killed every board!
Yes, it was a Vic=20. I actually used an 8k PET years before the Vic=20 (1978), but at the time, I wasn't aware what RAM really was. I used the 5k Vic for a year before my Dad got the 16k expansion cartridge. The problem was, the cartridge moved everything around (the screen locations), so all my programs had to change. But it enabled me to learn assembly. We finally got a disk drive and transferred everything to disk. A month after *that*, we got a C=64, which I used for many many years.