Vigilantes - Kickstarter Live

Looks like it will make the goal, but probably not much in the way of "stretch" goals. Good! I hate stretch goals. I don't mind if they exceed their goal by 5000%, I just hate it when all of a sudden, there might be more to the game. If so, it should have been in the initial pitch

Hopefully so. I guess stretch goals emerged due to Kickstarter's all or nothing nature. It would be really good for the game if we could hit the stretch goals. We can add an awful lot of content to the game, for a relatively small amount of funding.

Thanks for the votes, ladies and gents. Have noticed a small surge since posting the link. It's very much appreciated

Hey, not sure if anyone is interested in this, but here's the script for Cuda's character introduction. We've received a couple of great auditions for this role, so we'll be making a choice sometime over the next few days.

Cuda Intro Script

28th September 2016. Agent John Street. Report ID ZX9-422.

We busted up the biggest cigarette smuggling ring in existence. The payoff? A name: Cuda. An organisation grunt revealed, under duress, that it's an abbreviation of “Barracuda”. Alias aside, all we know is he's male, caucasian, north of 55, and has the sort of smile people disappear around.

Following the disintegration of the ring, Cuda went underground for nearly a decade, before turning up at the head of a medium scale opium production operation near the northern border of Myanmar. He disappeared again, status unknown, after what appears to have been an… industrial dispute with a competitor.

Cuda surfaced again three months ago, this time at the helm of a black market operation smuggling low quality firearms to conflict hotspots around the globe. Damn things were almost as dangerous to the tin pot militiamen wielding them as the unforunates they were pointed at. Intel suggests he's operating out of Reiker. Been on this guy's tail for almost 20 years. We're close. I can feel it.

[Hacking cough. Brief dark chuckle.]
And that's what agent Street would have to say about me, were he still around to say it.

Originally Posted by Timeslip
Hopefully so. I guess stretch goals emerged due to Kickstarter's all or nothing nature. It would be really good for the game if we could hit the stretch goals. We can add an awful lot of content to the game, for a relatively small amount of funding.

Got a chance play around with the alpha demo for a bit. Shows great potential. I think one small but very useful missing is the ability to switch between weapons / equipment with the keyboard. Since you may want to, for ex:, throw a punch and then swing a bat, being able to toggle between your equip with the tab button would be preferable to having to use the mouse to change what attack / item you have selected.

I didn't even realize your KS had stretch goals listed until now. I can understand how you might be able to complete your first stretch goal (extra maps & environments) with a relatively small amount of money; i.e., It is really just a matter of your artist knowing how much time it takes her to create a new map. Shouldn't really require much if any additional coding.

However, I'm a bit more skeptical about the 2nd goal.. For only an additional €400 Euros you'll be able to add 10 new character perks? (I currently see only 4 perks in the demo but it appears they all have min. skill requirements so I'm not sure exactly how many are currently implement).

It seems that sort of thing could potentially require a great deal of coding time and possibly even some new art / animations if they're perks are ones that affect combat. But maybe it isn't as much work; A lot of the perks in the first two Fallout games basically just stat adjustments which shouldn't be too hard to implement. I'll just trust that you know how much extra work is involved in that.

A few things which are not present as far as I can tell (probably require a great deal of work to implement) but which I think would add a lot to the tactical depth: Attacks of Opportunity, Flanking Bonus, and Overwatch.

I do hope the funding picks up and you get a bit more than the base goal. I have mentioned this in the KS comments of a few KS I've backed. I'm hoping that a developer or two might give a shoutout in their next KS update as that sort of thing can give a huge boost. If nothing else I hope a few backers notice my comments and check it out.

Glad you enjoyed the demo. Will look into adding more hotkeys for functions like switch weapon, reload etc in the next few updates. It's not a lot of work and anything that improves usability is good.

There are 18 (I think) perks in the game so far. When in the perk screen, you can press the arrow to switch between unavailable, available and owned perks. As you observed, the amount of work in a perk varies quite a lot. Generally it takes between 2 hours to a day to add one, depending on if there's additional coding required or the perk uses an existing system, writing up descriptions, testing. If we can reach the stretch, the perk will be a mix of more and less complex additions.

I do hope to bulk up the combat system - overwatch, though I haven't tried to add it, is likely to be quite complex, as it involves interupting fairly complex code. That's not to say it can't be added - a lot of this falls to how much time we can spend on Vigilantes. Cover is directional, so there is a flanking bonus of sorts - the more you move around the cover, the easier it is to shoot the enemy behind it.

By attacks of opportunity, do you mean free attacks given when an enemy moves past a melee character?

Thanks a lot for all the help daveyd. Had a fairly good day yesterday and today, much better than day before, so it's likely your mentions are helping out. Thanks!

Well my suggestion would be to make is similar to new Xcom in some ways, like having overwatch but not Attacks of Opportunity.
Or giving some weapons bonuses to hit when you are closer to enemy.
Hard West did that (kind of) and it worked for them, the game sold well I think.

Other option would be to make it super hardcore for the JA2 or old Xcom crowd, but that might be too tough for one coder as you need to introduce many mechanics and make sure they all work together.

But I feel worst option would be to stay in middle, hardcore crowd will still call it a casual game and new Xcom crowd will not like it due to being too different.

I plan to back this over the weekend, after I look at the demo. I generally back games that have at least 60 hours for a single play through, but I'll back at the minimum for a shorter game. So, unless the game is horrible, which I doubt, you'll get my $8 or whatever.

Originally Posted by Timeslip
I do hope to bulk up the combat system - overwatch, though I haven't tried to add it, is likely to be quite complex, as it involves interupting fairly complex code. That's not to say it can't be added - a lot of this falls to how much time we can spend on Vigilantes. Cover is directional, so there is a flanking bonus of sorts - the more you move around the cover, the easier it is to shoot the enemy behind it.

Ah, that might be enough as far as flanking bonus goes then. I wouldn't want it to be to the point where the only viable strategy is to flank. Is crouching effectively the same as being in cover?

Originally Posted by Timeslip
By attacks of opportunity, do you mean free attacks given when an enemy moves past a melee character?

Yes. I'd say limit it to one free attack per turn. Maybe it would be best to make it one of the perks rather than a default that all melee characters get. I think it would add a nice advantage to playing a melee character since that seems to be a bit more risky than a ranged character who can stay back in cover and shoot advancing enemies.

Also I saw you mentioned the possibility of "Interrupts" on IndieDB comments. Is that basically the same thing as Attack of Opportunity?

Originally Posted by Archangel
Well my suggestion would be to make is similar to new Xcom in some ways, like having overwatch but not Attacks of Opportunity.
Or giving some weapons bonuses to hit when you are closer to enemy.
Hard West did that (kind of) and it worked for them, the game sold well I think.

Other option would be to make it super hardcore for the JA2 or old Xcom crowd, but that might be too tough for one coder as you need to introduce many mechanics and make sure they all work together.

But I feel worst option would be to stay in middle, hardcore crowd will still call it a casual game and new Xcom crowd will not like it due to being too different.

It makes sense to try to make a game that will appeal strongly to one section of gamers. I'm very much working toward my own preferences, and Vigilantes owes more to the older, more hardcore generation of RPG, with a select couple of modern innovations, such as the cover system.

One related thing I'm considering is giving pistols, smgs and shotguns bonuses when used in indoor missions, to account for their less unwieldy nature.

Originally Posted by crpgnut
I plan to back this over the weekend, after I look at the demo. I generally back games that have at least 60 hours for a single play through, but I'll back at the minimum for a shorter game. So, unless the game is horrible, which I doubt, you'll get my $8 or whatever.

Thank you crpgnut. Do let me know what you think!

Originally Posted by daveyd
Ah, that might be enough as far as flanking bonus goes then. I wouldn't want it to be to the point where the only viable strategy is to flank. Is crouching effectively the same as being in cover?

You can hit enemies in full cover, head on, but you'll need to level up some to do it reliably, so flanking won't be necessary for a skilled shooter.

Originally Posted by daveyd
Yes. I'd say limit it to one free attack per turn. Maybe it would be best to make it one of the perks rather than a default that all melee characters get. I think it would add a nice advantage to playing a melee character since that seems to be a bit more risky than a ranged character who can stay back in cover and shoot advancing enemies.

Also I saw you mentioned the possibility of "Interrupts" on IndieDB comments. Is that basically the same thing as Attack of Opportunity?

Yes, it would almost certainly be a mid level perk. Yes, I meant interrupting enemy turns, with either ranged attacks (effectively overwatch) or possibly counterattacking after being hit in melee combat. I have to admit though - these features are possibilities, and not certain. Largely, the features on the "nice to have" list will depend on how smoothly development goes, on the level of support for the game (on KS and later on Steam).

If we are left with a block of time to implement extra features, the ones that will be implemented will be the ones we feel give the maximum benefit to the game, in relation to the amount of time they require to add. Maximum benefit is somewhat nebulous and subjective, so what players want will be a factor in helping make these decisions.

@ daveyd - regarding crouching - no it's not quite as effective as half cover.

It's been a while, but finally got around to a little development work today. Added 5 new weapons.

• Eurocorp Hades - Pistol
• Eurocorp Artemis - Precision Rifle
• Eurocorp Orthus - Double Barrell Shotgun
• Raskol 148 - Assault Rifle
• A better knife

Also added option to turn off tutorials - quite a few people highlighted this as a nuisance!

And… we're Greenlit. Thanks a lot for the support, fellow watchers!



Next stop, Kickstarter…