Log - 07/12/22

Notes: 

• This was an essential update. A prologue level was built to allow the player to select a difficulty, which warps them into the episode selection area. Prologue acts as a training ground to get used to the games environment. The first level was built for the first episode. As the game grows into something real/legit, saving and loading needed to be implemented, playing on demonic difficulty I was always caught dying. Save and loading is fully functional with most bugs fixed, it's still not perfect and it's not something that's easy to do. As mentioning the growing game, Virulent Vault is finished the prototyping stage and is a fully functional level. I had added a level results screen when the camera would preview the end of the level with stats containing secrets found, enemies killed etc. Scene transitioning is now smooth. pretty much can load any scene on the fly, this will be implemented in the console command eventually. I'm extremely excited to move this game from Pre-Alpha to Alpha stage. Another big one is bullet holes now attach to objects and no longer "float" when the object moves out of position.

Changes/Additions

• Saving was added into the main menu.
• Saving button animation was designed in after effects.
• Save and loading buttons open a separate menu with 8 saving/loading slots.
• Game has a fully functional AutoSave Slot, accessible in the loading menu which separates itself from manual saves.
• With auto save option [ON] game auto saves throughout the levels.
• Player input movement/strafing was redesigned, movement now has artificial gradual slowdown/acceleration.
• Player horizontal look axis moves slow for precision aiming but speeds up when player pushes harder on thumbstick when needed to whip around.
• New Prologue Difficulty/Episode select level.
• New Episode 1 Level 1 built called Virulent Vault.
• Enemy bullets are now individually separate from enemy transforms and not longer move with enemy.
• Bullet holes now attach themselves to objects.
• Ammo drops are now part of the object pool and not the enemy.
• Ammo drops can contain weapons now.
• Changed the default Theme colors from [navy green & red] to [red & dark grey].
• Result screens appear when beating a level.
• killed enemies, secrets, level time are now tracked in the game.
• Added a new prop item [Standing torch]  
• Added a new prop item [Lava Chunk], spits out of the lava randomly.  
  
• Added a new system to the ceiling lights to, Strobe, Flicker, Pulse, and Trigger on.
• Player gore system was now updated, when player gets blown to pieces a camera is attached to a chunk of meat.
• Saving and loading saves all item drops, active pickups, switches activated and enemies that are live or dead.
• Changed the footstep sound to match the gun movement for better realistic steps.
• Going into the level ending portal can exit player back to the prologue after the results were displayed.
• Changed how the acid hurts the player. its no longer instant and every 1 second per damage.

[Bug Fixes]

• Fixed issues with Enemy grunt shooting too fast.
  
• when main menu is open pressing "B" didn't close the menu.
• when opening options window,  none of the buttons got selected for the menus which stopped navigation.
• [Major bug] When overkilling enemies caused massive performance hits because of the ammo drops, particle systems and gore that gets instantiated then activated at the same time.
• Player no longer randomly walks on water.

[Issues/Problems]

1. Rain appears underwater.
2. Player can blast themselves out of the level with grenades/rockets/sigma sometimes
3. Grenades stick to walls/low gravity.
4. The player can walk on gravel and sounds still play metal footsteps.
5. UI Version 3 still has keys in corner that UI text overlaps.
6. Being outside of the map causes massive FPS loss.
7. Din enemy animation is so broken when encountering the player.
8. Level ending portal doesn't display message that demo is finished. [Scrapped]
9. Grunt enemy randomly plays shooting animation after it dies.
10. Din enemy attack sound loops after the din enemy had been killed.
11. Trigger collision timing breaks sometimes when swimming causing the inability to swim in the water while in water.
12. Player damage sounds underwater are normal.
13. New input movement system needs more work/tweaking, moving/strafing slides around too much. and acts different between mouse/keyboard & controller.
14. railgun projectile is too small making it hard to hit enemies. 

[Planning].

• Add more enemies.
• Make a boss.
• Build a terrifying skeleton enemy with a melee weapon that charges player.
• Build a flying specter enemy that fires projectiles
• Add Anti-Aliasing to options menu.
• Build Episode 1-4, 1-40 levels total. [will take my whole life to do]