Gamejam Devlog - Timedust v0.0.4 - Timedust Effect




Ok so I felt at this point I needed now to test the core mechanic of the game: slowing down time.
As I thought in the Post Zero, I was able to have that effect quite simply with a variable on the main singleton. For onw, the Timedust Effect is triggered by a button press for debug.
It is specific to each object, so I have more liberty to do some variations on a case-by-case basis:

Traps will go very slowly, but some weak ennemies could be unaffected by the Timedust, or could be even quicker, or stronger, etc. This may add a nice varieties of situations.

How I expect the mechanic to actually work:
It will be triggered by a device somewher in the level or room. So a first part would be to access or make access to that device, activating it then quickly go through the obstacles to clear the room and enter the next one.

This mechanic is nothing more than a copy of a similar mechanic I experienced when I used to play Light Crusader on Genesis: there was some time based puzzles where you had to hit a clock to stop time, then hit it again to resume time to its normal flow.
I really enjoy this game when I was younger, I played it a lot and beat it several times.
When time was stopped, you could move a bomb about to explode at a spot in the room where it wouldn't be possible otherwise, as the bomb would have exploded in the meantime.

I think it's a very good practice to try and reverse-engineer the mechanics you're familiar with!

Also notice the subtle  gears on the wall that give a nice environmental hint of the complex machinery of the room, which kinda explains the time stopping possibility.

Light Crusader is a game released by Sega on the Genesis and made by Treasure



I think the next step will be to work on the player attack move, and make it work with a time device of some kind to get closer to the ingame mechanic.

Timedust effect - autoloaded singleton

The Timedust Effect is applied via the singleton obj_controller

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