I’d like to introduce my game Dagger Run: Aerocombatic Racing
I’ve been working on the prototype for a few months and have it at the point where I want to start showcasing it and seeing what you all think.
The intention is for this game to be a single player rpg/racing hybrid. With sections of gameplay on foot where you can source vehicles and parts to stay competitive in increasingly difficult courses on a wide range of fantastical planets.
So far I have been working through getting the basics of aerial racing down. I’m liking where it is at so far so I will be hitting pause of gameplay development and moving on to art-ing it up for a while before moving on to prototyping the ground gameplay
So right at the start i expected that those vehicles will fly faster and the overall speed just feel kinda slow. After like 30 min of playing this game it would be pretty easy to master the flying so afterwards it would not be a real challenge to complete those obstacles and flying around the corners. Besides that i like the music. Would there be any power ups that you can maybe collect on the way like weapon upgrades or something ?
Thanks for checking it out! Getting in the sense of speed is my next big goal with it. The vehicles are moving pretty fast at the moment, they touch the speed of sound at full speed. I think a big part of the problem is that my placeholder art doesn’t have many small details to set the scale. I think some edge blur and air effects would help sell it as well. I posted on the screenshot Saturday thread and got a similar comment so it is definitely something I need to address.
I’m not planning on having weapon upgrades in the race itself but I am planning on having weapon types and vehicle parts that you can pick between and install prior to racing. I like the idea of a system that rewards aerobatic manoeuvres but I haven’t given a lot of thought on how I would go about doing it just yet
I must admit, “Dagger Run” looks pretty promising! The music choice by Sebastien Pierre was a solid choice for this introduction! I’m interested in seeing more and watching Dagger Run evolve; keep the updates coming.
Thanks Dovah!
The course is roughly 30km long over a roughly 6km radius.
The demo is currently set over 3 laps, and it takes about 4 minutes to complete a lap. I picture it as being about midway through the games progression, so it is a bit on the longer side.
The player can crash, I’ve got it set up so you can graze the walls or floor and not lose much speed but if you hit something with too much force or head on at speed you’ll get destroyed and respawn at a nearby checkpoint.
I also have a “force-field” that stops players from going out of bounds, the entire track essentially has a wall and roof around it, with a glowing grid material that fades in if you get too close to it.
It’s been a bit longer between updates than I had planned but I have been working hard on Dagger Run in the background.
I’ve gone through and added the major pieces of geometry to the level. It’s still a work in progress with updates to materials, smaller meshes and vfx needed but I am pretty happy with how it is going. I’m going to be hitting pause on the art for a bit now to get AI up and running again and get the ground gameplay up to scratch so I can showcase that. Thanks
I hope you’ve been doing well @Korda! The terrain looks great, and It’s awesome to see you’ve gained a ton of developmental progress on Dagger Run; keep up the great work! I’m definitely looking forward to seeing more updates on this one.
Over the last few days I’ve been working on a new AI solution. Previously I had tried having my opponents on a spline path. This was fine but they stuck too rigidly to it and it didn’t look very natural. I also tried a purchased solution which was better but when I had multiple racers in the scene my fps tanked.
So I ended up with a solution where I get my enemies to find a point ahead of them on the path, turn to face it and then I use a physics force to push them towards it. It looks much more natural, has the appearance of matching the player movement and so far seems to perform pretty well. There are multiple paths they will randomly choose between and a random margin of error so they aren’t too predictable
Next step will be to get some behaviour in there to get them to decide to chase and shoot at the player or try to overtake when they are near. Going to need to spend some time on weapon behaviour soon
Hi Everyone,
I’ve recently finished up with a big update to Dagger Run, trying to get it ready for sharing with the wider public. The main thing I have been working on has been updating the player’s vehicle. I’m calling the modelling on this one done now, though it will go through another pass for texturing in the future. Above you can see how I’ve iterated the vehicle from the first blockout to now.
I’ve also been spending time updating the UI, squashing bugs and just trying to refine everything further.
I’m sorry I’ve missed a few updates; it’s nice that you’ve made it far enough in development to allow Dagger Run to be wish-listed on Steam. Congratulations!
I’m curious about the newest trailer for Dagger Run; will there be a third-person POV we can switch to when playing?
Thanks Zezkaii! I am planning on allowing players to switch to third-person, it’s not my preferred way to play it so I’m prioritising first-person but I know a lot of people get motion sick with first and I am trying to keep accessibility in mind. I’ve got the toggle in the game now but it isn’t feeling very good yet so it will need a lot of tweaking
Excellent, I definitely felt a third-person POV was an absolute necessity, and I am so glad to hear you’ve already implemented it, albeit it needs some work.
Hi Everyone,
I have my first proper trailer out now. It showcases a bunch of the new things I have been working on: 3rd person view, new planets, and the beginnings of ground based exploration and vehicle modding!
I have a Kickstarter that is currently running! I haven’t quite managed to get the momentum going on it yet but it is pushing me to get my demo up and running as soon as possible.
The demo has been going pretty well so far though. I’ve managed to finally get a good solution for enemy targeting, I had been trying to sort arrays and all sorts of things without too much success. I realised that I already had a system in place that figures out what position each vehicle was in, so all I had to do was check to see which AI was one position ahead.
I’ve also finally added in ammo for the missiles, they fire in 6 shot bursts, so your payload of 30 can be fired 5 times.
I’ve also added in out-of-bounds barriers to stop players from deviating off the track, it’s a distance based effect that fades in if you get too close to it.
I’ve given the enemy AI a death effect for when they run out of health or crash too hard, so no more bouncing off the walls
And finally I’ve given the AI independent speeds now, they would previously just match the player’s speed, now when they pass a checkpoint they will adjust their speed accordingly.
I also have my first pass at gamepad support. Figuring out the best options for where things should be mapped is a bit tricky. I think I will probably have to upgrade to the enhanced input system so player can set the mappings themselves but I haven’t delved into that enough yet, on the to-do list!
It’s been a busy time!
If you are interested in supporting the Kickstarter please follow the link below, I could really use any support you could offer Dagger Run - Kickstarter
Hi Everyone,
I’ve just finished polishing a demo for Dagger Run. I would love to hear your thoughts on my progress so far! I have it hosted on IndieDB right now but I am in the process of getting it added to Steam
I also have my Kickstarter campaign running for the game. It hasn’t been doing so well so far so if you have any advice on where I can find more of an audience that would be a huge help to me.
Greetings again, @Korda; I hope you’re doing well, and happy New Year! I’m curious: is it a long or challenging process to get a demo up and running on Steam? Also, I think you’re doing great with marketing your game on the YouTube side of things. Have you tried sharing your work on platforms such as Twitter or Reddit?
Hi Zezkaii, sorry for the delay in responding to you. I had taken a step back from the project for a bit after my Kickstarter campaign failed to re-evaluate things. I’m back on it again now and I’m currently working on designing my main character.
To answer your questions, setting up a demo on Steam is quite similar to launching a game on the platform, you need to set up a new page and run through all the same kinds of checks. I’ve started the process but will need to run a polish pass on it based on the feedback I’ve gotten so far.
I have accounts on Twitter, Reddit, Facebook and TikTok.
Reddit has probably been the best place for getting attention so far, a decent chunk of my wishlists have come from there. Tiktok has been pretty good for getting views as well.
Just a small update to show the progress I’ve made with my main character. This is a shot from Unreal to test how she looks with lighting and materials.
I’ve mostly been working on getting the major shapes looking right, I’ve got most of the armour modelled but will be going over everything to sculpt in the small details. I haven’t started working on the fabric parts yet.
I’m using Metahuman for the head, I’m planning on using it for all human characters which should help them to look consistent
