Game speed feature.

[Cronnix]

There is one common thing most "tower defence" games have.. Which is a feature allowing you to increase the general speed of the game. Maybe I missed such an option in Creeper World? Because imho it is a must. At the moment a map in the middle of my journey takes me approx one hour to complete. Imho that is way to long. Not because it is hard or challenging.. But because it is so Goram slow to get started every time!

What is needed is a function which allows player to increase the speed of the game by 2 or 4 times, so creepers spawn faster, but even energy and structures are build faster! Would be a really nice thing to have..

If such a feature already exists, and I just missed it, would appreciate if someone pointed to me where I can find it ^^

[Blaze]

No it doesn't exist, but I think it's been suggested before....

[Echo51]

google Cheat Engine, then you can have it 50x faster if you fancy that...

[Cronnix]

google Cheat Engine, then you can have it 50x faster if you fancy that...

Issue is that AS3, language Creeper World seems to be coded in is extremely hard to.. "alter to ones benefit". I have failed to find any suggestions about how it would be possible to change the games speed. If you know how to do it with CE, you are welcome to tell ^^

[J]

I don't want to cheat. I olso have suggested before here.

[UpperKEES]

Issue is that AS3, language Creeper World seems to be coded in is extremely hard to.. "alter to ones benefit".

Finally a great feature! ;)

[Cronnix]

I don't want to cheat.

I beg to differ, making the game run faster is not cheating. It doesn't become any easier, just less time consuming. :)

[UpperKEES]

I can imagine you like the game to run faster during the startup phase, as not a lot of action is going on yet and you're only building 1-2 structures at the time. But this is also the phase that will make the difference between a good and an average score, as you like to gain as much energy as possible without getting a deficit. This means a constant monitoring of your energy and building each collector/reactor just in time. I wouldn't be able to do that perfectly (on my pc) at double speed.

[Cronnix]

I can imagine you like the game to run faster during the startup phase, as not a lot of action is going on yet and you're only building 1-2 structures at the time. But this is also the phase that will make the difference between a good and an average score, as you like to gain as much energy as possible without getting a deficit. This means a constant monitoring of your energy and building each collector/reactor just in time. I wouldn't be able to do that perfectly (on my pc) at double speed.

Well, tbh it is not the start up phase that I have troubles with. It is the middle phase. When it is clear you are going to win, you are holding back the creepers with no problems, but got to low energy to advance and spend ~20 minutes just building reactors and energy storage... Maybe I am doing it wrong, but that is my general playstyle..

[UpperKEES]

There no 'wrong' here, as long as you're having fun. Adding more energy in mid battle can indeed be very time consuming if you only have 1 unit per second to spend on new structures (just as slow as during the start of a game). This is why I like to make an estimate how much energy I will need for a certain map and build it all from the start (the growth is exponential if you invest all energy in new energy), so you'll be done in a short while if you have enough space to build. Once I think I have enough, I build my other structures and engage the creeper at full power.

If you do need more energy later on, build it before you run out of it. When you've already run out of energy (this is when I would restart the map), deactivate some mortars and blasters that are not really needed to keep your position, and deactivate drones that are on a bombing run and will recharge later. Use all this energy to build reactors (as close to Odin City as possible). Build only one at the time if you only have that amount of energy left. Building more of them simultaneously will give you worse results.

[knucracker]

So I actually implemented a "speed up" feature in the game during development.  I never included it in the release, though, because it was a totally different game when played faster.  Players would let things blow up because the investment in the structure didn't mean as much...  the whole game experience was "cheapened" a bit and the speedup became an addictive type of drug that no player would ever play without.  It wasn't completely bad, it just wasn't the impression I was going for (especially in the story missions).

Now I could put it back in and enable it for custom maps perhaps.   It used a trick to increase the speed without driving up the CPU usage too much (double the game loop and half the rendering).  I just enabled and tested it in a dev build and the feature still seems to work.

Perhaps this could be something that gets unlocked when the game is completed?  Or perhaps it can only be used on custom maps...
Thoughts?

[archn]

I like it.. Custom maps only if "Allow game speed mod" is checked.

[Blaze]

Perhaps this could be something that gets unlocked when the game is completed?  Or perhaps it can only be used on custom maps...
Thoughts?

Both. Make us beat Loki without Thor.

I like it.. Custom maps only if "Allow game speed mod" is checked.

That too.

[UpperKEES]

I'm fine with it, as I'm sure it will only lower the scores for hasty players.

No need for the story maps; Loki can easily be beaten without Thor. The speed modification won't make any difference. Let people first get used to playing the game decently.

No need for a checkbox in the map editor either; it shouldn't influence the game at all, only the style of play.

I just hope it won't introduce any new bugs....

[Karsten75]

Most tower defense games have a speed-up button. I don't think it affects gameplay, it just shortens the elapsed time. The challenge is to make sure that all aspects of the game is still equal. If that is the case, then I an certainly do without the tedium of waiting for packets to travel long distances or for the first few units to be built.

Most TD games seem to fail in some minor aspect if the double speed option is selected. The exceptions are equally fun to play.