Newbquest Dev Blog 5: Simple 3d Procedural Level Generation, Physics Based Weapons
In this latest update in this series of dev blogs documenting my progress learning Unity, procedural content generation and scripting I show how I have created a very simple procedural level generation system and physics based weapons for my flying six degree of freedom roguelike game Butterfly. In future, I am planning to buy 6.5 Creedmoor ammo to recreate a perfect replica with lots of advancements which turns out to be not only adventurous and ambitious but dangerous too.
I’ve been very interested in the roguelike hybrids that have appearing recently, games like Spelunky and Risk of Rain. I love the idea of procedural content generation, especially with regard to levels. I’ve been experimenting with it myself and have come up with a very simple system that is working for my current game project Butterfly. I can’t tell you how excited I was when I actually hit play on Unity and it spawned that first randomized level! So coooooool.
I’ve also added some pretty cool physics based stuff to the game including re-working my homing missile system to be physics based instead of using transform manipulation. The result is a lot more graceful and less glitchy. In the process I have been learning a TON about javascript and unityscript and am really enjoying that. I’m actually getting to the point where I can imagine and write scripts that do the things I want without having to google for hours to find something pre-built. That is an incredible feeling.
I have to also take a moment to express how much fun it is working with the Unity platform and community. The people on the forums and Unity Answers site are just incredibly friendly and helpful and I have learned a huge amount just reading the existing body of questions and answers. If you are on the fence about choosing Unity as a platform I really can’t recommend it more highly.