Beat Them Robots Development Blog

In this blog, I'll be talking about how my game "Beat Them Robots" changed throughout this 4 weeks of development in Stencyl.

Making a Beat em' Up game in Stencyl is difficult as the game engine can be hard to adjust, especially when making the elements that make a Beat em' Up game a Beat em' Up game such as the freeze frame, hitboxes, knockback, etc..

Week 1: 

The first week of the build I started off with a Shoot em' Up stencyl template and changing the bullet angle from top to left right, as well as changing the character's animation into a guy that punches. Lastly an enemy which can't hurt the player for the time being. 

Week 2: 

This week we are required to make 2 versions of the builds, in this case it will be Build A and Build B, I also made the enemies move towards the player by just giving them speed. Not only that, I also added a tilesets to make the entire game have a robot theme. As for the Build A and Build B, the different was that A have both Punch and Kick attack and B have only Punch attack. During the testing, Kick felt extra for an attack and it is buggy so I decided to removed Kick.

Week 3:

For this week, enemies are now able to attack the players upon touching the player. This now gives a reason why player should now attack or beat the enemies. With the enemies now can hit the player, I also gave player 3 health, and as well as invincibility when the player is hit by the enemies. Lastly, I also make the player jump. However, it got me wonder that should a simple 2D Beat em' Up have the jump features. What would e the difference if there is and there is no jump in this game. So as for my Build A and Build B for week 3, Build A is the build that includes jump, where Build B is the build that doesnt have jump.

After testing with a few testers, jump is not a necessary feature for this Beat em Up game, as the players either not use it for important use at all (like avoiding the enemies) or getting killed by the enemies due to them jumping on the players. So for this case, the game will move on to Build B

Week 4:

This is the final week of making the Beat em' Up genre, as for this week I decided to make 2 more levels which includes more enemies and increasing the amount of enemies that the player must beat to clear the stage. I also added the elements that Beat em' Up game a Beat em' Up that I mentioned above. In this case, knockback on both player and enemies, spark particles when the player punch the enemies and sound effects.