Combat and EVA

The game needs some challenge so I started working on a swarming alien hive enemy. I've got a swarmer and a nest building that launches its population when attacked.

Here I'm rocketing around with the new fuel consuming EVA jet pack.

The hive enemies don't attack yet but you can see them swarm around as I kill them with the new submachine gun. The effects on the new ammo weapons are pretty cool, the ejected casings even respond to the different amounts of gravity each world has.

Here's a look at the rays I use to see the component velocities that make up the boid flight behavior. The boids avoid obstacles, attempt to align, orient with and avoid their neighbors, and fly towards a shared formation goal.

The new ammo weapons were really fun to play with, so to test the limits I added a vehicle mounted Gatling Gun turret.

I still need to get the hives dynamically spawned in and give enemies the ability to expand their bases and send attacking parties against your bases. Bases will then need an overhaul to gear them up for sieges. Then some enemy motherships that periodically arrive at your world to drop off new colonizing swarms could provide some fun boss like gameplay.

Plenty of work to do but it's already making the project way more fun!