Hello, ludonauts.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🟢Environmental Trigger Switch building upon our Switch and Events systems in Godot Engine. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonauts.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🔵Destroy/Defeat Score Reward leveraging our Game Resource System to compose a Score System in Godot Engine using Autoloads. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonaut.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🔴Patterned Enemy Routine for using the Godot Engine's AnimationTree to create a cool AI leveraging its built-in Finite State Machine. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonaut.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🔴Precision Platforming using the Godot Engine's CharacterBody2D node. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonaut.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🔵Depletable Health Pool using our Game Resource System in Godot Engine. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonaut.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🔴Environmental Hazards gameplay pattern using our Health and Combat systems in Godot Engine. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonauts.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🔵Ability Loadout Switching to create a Weapon Swapping system  in Godot Engine. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonauts.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how to implement the 🔴Facing-Locked Shooting using our Weapon System in Godot Engine. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonauts.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how we implemented the 🔴Input-Aligned Movement for Top-down Movement in Godot Engine. Click the image to read the tutorial.

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonauts.

The asset pack implementing the 🟢Encounter Containment is available in the Ludonauts Inventory. As an owner of the Gameplay Library you can access it for free.

Click the image to access the asset pack.

It also implements the 🔴Enemy Wave Sequencing, but we are going to make an asset pack exclusive just for it in the future.

Thank you for your support, Ludonaut tapping out!

— Henrique Campos

Yes, guys. The aiming system is bad. BUT we will release the asset pack for the 🔴Decoupled Aim soon. Follow to get notified

Hello, ludonauts.

We just pushed a new update. TL;DR: we are unifying the properties presented in the gameplay patterns into dedicated databases so we can pull them from common sources of truth. Click the image or here to read the complete update.

Loved it! It was very intuitive to understand that everything should eventually lead to finding Luig (thus making us explore how each item would branch into finding him).

As mentioned in other comments, the thrilling of eventually finding something too absurd kept me with the guards up tho

Hey McKinley. This was a great concept. But...I gotta say, the overall execution is not good.

You used a 🔴Turn and Thrust Control for the movement, I'd recommend replacing it with 🔴Input Aligned Movement for better control.

Turn and Thurst (aka tank control) only makes sense for games with very limited inputs (like Asteroids back in the 80's) or when the Action dimension isn't as important as the Strategy gameplay dimension. In other words, when you deliberately want to limit player's reaction time in favor of resource management (like in Resident Evil).

The very nature of Bullet Heavens offers the character's movement as the only Action element in the game. Everything else leans towards Strategy. So the movement must feel right otherwise the whole gameplay breaks.

As a fan of space-fantasy games myself, I'm really interested in seeing this "Lovecrafitian ancient cosmic star eater" idea turning into a full fledged game. Let me know about its progress!

Hey Helianthus! I love your tool, I've been following for quite some time. Do you have any alternative or direction on how I could get "flat design" (Kurzgesagt-ish) renders?

My motif is space-fantasy games, and your tool would be like...a well of resources for my games, but it doesn't fit my drawing style. Something like in Milkyway Mailing Inc. (my current game).

https://itch.io/embed/1803313?bg_color=494d7e&fg_color=fbf5ef&link_color=8b6d9c&border_color=51516e

🔵Loot-Based Economy

A Strategy element inspired by Mega Man, but more prominent in economy-heavy games like Flinthook.

This is a system in which consumable resources such as health, ammunition, coins, or energy are embedded within the game world as collectible pickups, either placed statically in the environment or released dynamically upon defeating enemies or destroying objects. It builds on top of the 🔵Pick-up Score Token essentially.

One interesting possibility of this system is that it builds on top of our Spawning and Randomizing systems, allows us to quickly setup drop rates using weighted randomization while also leveraging the Distribution system to position the loot in the game world.

🔴Air Jump

An Action element inspired by Hollow Knight's Monarch Wings.

This is a locomotion mechanic that grants the player an additional jump while airborne, typically by consuming an “extra jump charge,” letting them extend airtime and correct positioning after leaving the ground. Something unique about this approach is that it leverages our Game Resource system, meaning you can establish how many jumps the character can perform mid-air (thus Air Jump not just Double Jump).

Since the system works as a micro economy in itself, you can set the amount of jump resources consumed by each jump to zero meaning the player can perform infinite air jumps. I made a flappy clone using this approach.

🟢Non Linear Level Selection

An Adventure element inspired by Mega Man level selection screen.

This is a progression structure in which players can freely choose which level or stage to attempt next from a predefined set, without a mandatory sequence imposed by the game. The nice caveat here is that the system is aware of player's progression, meaning you can trigger new events based on level (or levels) completion.

For example, you can unlock the "final boss" only after players' completed all the levels.

Hello, ludonaut.

We are working on this week's tutorial for the 🔵Pick-up Score Token gameplay. We would like to know from you which should be the next tutorial about.

You can vote by Upvoting the replies to this post. The one with most upvotes will be our next tutorial. Currently, we have these in line:

Thank you! Ludonaut tapping out!

— Henrique Campos

Hello, ludonauts.

We've just revamped the landing page to help potential ludonauts gauge our Gameplay Library features and join us if they like the offer. You can read more about it in the latest post.

Thank you for your support. Ludonaut tapping out!

— Henrique Campos

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

The game is amazing, congratulations! It's a mix of Mega Man with Sonic that just feels perfect.

I mapped the game design to my Gameplay Library, take a look:

Click the image or here to access

I suggested two features that could help improving the overall gameplay, namely:

🔴Time Charged Attack to add an extra layer of decision making in the combat system
🔵Life-Based Retry to add weight to players' shortcomings.

Great job, Arrietty! Just added the game to my wishlist.

It took me a bit to figure some stuff (I got confused by the tutorial, the actual gameplay is more straight forward). I know the BIG "FORWARD TIME" button is BIG for a reason, but it took me some experimentation to understand that we MUST forward time.

IMO some metaprogression and optoinal content layering could increase the overall replayability and keep players engaged for longer.

In case you want to turn it into a commercial game, check it out the Gameplay Map I made!

➡️Click the GIF or here to access the Gameplay Map

Good potential and nice execution!

Thanks for coming! It was eye-opening to see how classic games stretch  some design decisions to build unique gameplay.

Hi, Pegasus! Thank you for attending the live! I'm planning on working a little bit on the prototype and posting here on itch. Stay tuned!

Gameplay Library owners now have access to the Ludonauts Inventory (with all asset packs).

You can also access it directly through the Gameplay Library page. Click the "Download" button and then pick the "Ludonauts Inventory".

Alright, Pegasus. So from what I can tell we are going to really stretch out the Patterned Enemy Routine, right? I just added the 🔴Enemy Wave Sequencing to the Gameplay Library too. I think these are the main game design patterns we will work with. The live is scheduled alright! Looking forward to that~

Alright, it would be great to have you around so you could help shape the prototype.

I will come back with the VOD in case you miss it.

Hey, Pegasus!

Let's do it! I'm thrilled to show people how this whole project is supposed to work.

Would you be up to join a workshop making such Galaga clone this Friday 10AM São Paulo Time (GMT -3)?

Hey, I just noticed we have a sorting menu now in the Projects Dashboard! Pretty awesome. This is exactly what I wanted for posts. Can we bring this same tool for the Posts dashboard?

It's a VERY solid entry for a 3h game jam, brother.

I would also have a bad time trying to figure out the mixing system to be honest. How you did it?

Hey pretty 👀

Great to see another alchemy enthusiast around! lol

Had you played Potion Craft? I'd highly recommend you to do to get some inspirations on how far you can stretch this cool concept.

One gameplay suggestion: the game seems to be mix of 🔵Strategy and 🔴Action since you have to manage the potions to execute the recipe while running against the clock.

The Action dimension could get some attention. The animations hurt a lot the reaction time preventing fast paced brewing which is the core friction in the game.

I'd suggest letting players pour the potion themselves. You could use the mouse's position on the bottle as rotation point and let the potion pour after a given angle, let's say >60°.

Let me know if we have a source code to play with. I'd be more than glad to implement this tweak with your permission. 

 Thanks!!

This is the third iteration of our Weekly Loadout program. As our continued effort to help you design and build your dream game, we are offering weekly asset packs that you can use to build and improve your gameplay. This week, you can mix the following assets to create the shoot'em gameplay signature:

This loadout was inspired by Protocorgi gameplay.

To understand how to use the Input Aligned Movement to make a Shoot'em Up, take a look at this video, where I show the multiple applications of this movement system:

Skip to 39:10 to watch how to use this movement system for shoot'em ups

To grab your Weekly Loadout use the link below. Only owners of the Ludonauts Gameplay Library can access the Weekly Loadout.

Access the Weekly Loadout

Don't forget to share your creations here on the community! That said, thank you for your support. Ludonaut tapping out!

— Henrique Campos

The Gameplay Library is a database. You can browse the game design systems and use it to design your games.

It offers insights on what is the system, when you should use it, where it can implement it, games that featured this system, and genres built on top of this system.

We are populating the database with tutorials and playable demos so people can get a feel about the gameplay systems.

Take a look at the Mega Man X2 gameplay map to get a feel of what we are making:

 Click to access the Mega Man X2 Gameplay Map

In my videos, I also present the Gameplay Library, I think is wroth taking a look too:

Hmm! I see, yeah I didn't realize the "Search" page removed exclusively the Tags option.

They could add a "Tags" list on the left portion, the "Exclusion" filter feature is already implemented...I wonder why they don't just add support for tags too.

Nah, calmdown snowflake. I deliberately said there are good games on these topics.

But these are not mutually exclusive.

You can search for "Castles tileset" and use tags to narrow the search.

What about the terror/NSFW/LGBTQIA+ slop? I'm very tired of always having those on front page.

Way more annoying than AI slop.

There are several games that deal with these topics in elegant enjoyable way. But it's discrepant the amount of slop on these topics. People who just want to bait queer people and don't care about providing any meaningful message with their stuff.

Slop is slop. AI isn't an exception. I bet you won't be willing to say "ohh we should ban games if they have more than 20% of naked characters sprites" or if "more than 20% of gameplay is jumpscares" or "if more than 50% of the characters are LGBTQIA+".

Let users curate that. Hopefully the "reverse filter" will help us with that.

itch.io staff could also add a "User Tags" feature so we can add tags on top of creators' tags so we can avoid mischievous tagging (like games clearly made with AI but tagged otherwise).

When did "sloppist" become synonym of "reasonable"? 

Why? tag-based filtering is way easier lol