Decision: Red Daze News

Welcome back, survivors! Time to expand on our weapons, some of which we already talked about in a previous devlog:
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1621760/view/3146323379896888486
This time we’ll be talking about some of the more high-end tools of destruction out there in the Wasteland, the challenges we faced while implementing them, and more!


Starting off with something SPICY!



When developing the flamethrower, we were obviously concerned with its functionality, but we also had its visual effects in mind. Our main challenge was a programming one: the flamethrower does damage gradually, unlike every other weapon. In addition, all flamethrower animations include fire effects. Other major questions we needed to address were the damage particles that would be emitted by the weapon, their rate of fire and cone of damage, and even how much damage the flamethrower should do. In the early stages of the game, our main approach was to showcase it as a heavily modified version of an assault rifle with custom animations, balancing nuances and models. But for this one weapon, we decided to create a whole new framework as a starting point for models of different versions of the flamethrower. We are also working on improving the animations and particles of the flame, so it looks etter and stronger by the time the game reaches your hands!
Since flamethrowers deal damage to everyone, no matter your allegiance, we also created models of incendiary knapsacks to help you distinguish all your flamethrower-wielding teammates!



We managed to solve this puzzle, but some of the other puzzles ahead of us are more difficult and will take way more time to crack.

For example, the rapid-fire machine guns and assault rifles required us to pay attention to the game’s performance and frame rate. The first few tests we ran showed us all the weaknesses that we had to fix, some of which were EXTREMELY delicate. One of the most memorable bugs we encountered when working on weapons was that fire rates of most automatic weapons were tied to FPS. This bug is not that uncommon. You’ll notice it in many games that have been launched recently, and it’s clear that this issue can very easily break the game for most players if not dealt with promptly. It took us a while, but we managed to resolve this issue by making some major tweaks to the game code. So by the time the game launches, you shouldn’t notice this bug. HOPEFULLY.

As for machine guns…



The machine gun charge bar also has its own features. While you hold the charge bar to increase the power of the shot for single-shot weapons, machine guns get more powerful as you fire them. This required us to make some changes to the mechanics of the machine gun charge bar. We solved this problem by increasing the power of the shots for as long as the attack button is held. This is perfect for machine guns because now their effectiveness scales properly. The more you fire, the more damage your enemies take, but we’ve compensated for this by increasing ammo and stamina consumption as well.





While guns are undeniably fun, explosions are WAAYY more cool and satisfying, while helping get rid of WAVES of monsters instead of forcing you to deal individually with every little critter that jumps at you.

The Deacon grenade is the best grenade you’ll find in the Dust Bowl, and its explosions are HUGE. This thing can raze any patch of land you deem unworthy, but we balanced this out by making every grenade use up a bunch of ammunition material when thrown. These high-power explosives are great for dealing with oncoming Mutants and will turn most Zombies into wet paste or a bloody smear. A bullet might have your name on it, but grenades are addressed “to whom it may concern”. Check this out!



If you haven’t trained your throwing abilities in a while, a rocket launcher may be more your speed. The Buzz rocket launcher is essentially a tube with a faster and more deadly rocket projectile in it, and it’s awesome. Using an anti-tank rocket launcher on a Zombie, Mutant, or Human is something you don’t really see talked about much, but it’s a little insane, and well worth your time and money! We picked a simple one to showcase here. It’s the most basic rocket launcher in the game, but as you’re about to see, its power is unquestionable. Observe!



Plans for the future

Now on to the ideas board. This is where we theorize about some of the weapons we’d like to implement in the future, plus ones we’re already working on. Since most of these are in the planning or early development stages, we’d love to hear your ideas on them, what else you’d like to see, etc.

The first one, which we’re working on right now, is the shield. Seems simple enough, right? But we have some new mechanics that might make our shields a tactical mechanism instead of a throwaway loadout choice. Shields will, of course, increase the wearer’s defense. Simple, and you’d think that was it. But we’re not done. We want the shield to attract the attention of enemies, so that anyone with a shield acts as a tank in the player’s squad, giving you a bit of extra depth and strategy in squad planning, as well as in the actual gameplay. We’ll need to keep in mind that this tank can also deal some damage to enemies, so we’re planning to put a gun in their free hand, but who knows how the development will go? :)

Another weapon on our minds is the mine. Given the structure of the game, mines would make a great addition, add an extra layer of strategy, and spice up any battle (especially settlement defense missions) with a little tactical thinking. Players would be able to plant a few mines before the enemies approach and leave a big, deadly surprise for them! This one is also in the very early stages of planning. We hope to have it in the launch, but knowing how complex coding these weapons will be, it remains to be seen how the development will shape the path we take.

That’s it for the latest devlog. A lot of cool new mechanics are being worked on all the time, and we really want to add even more awesome things before the launch. What would you like to see? Perhaps, a spaceship? No wrong answers here. Your suggestions will help us make the game the best it can possibly be, so please do let us know your thoughts and ideas!


Thank you so much for reading,

The Decision: Red Daze team

Greetings, survivors! Welcome to our latest Development Log.

One of the essential elements of Decision games has always been a variety of weapons for destroying hordes of enemies. Some might even say it’s the most essential element, but we cannot confirm that as our “unarmed” players might quit the game, and we won’t have that. You know we love you, even though you’re crazy.

When designing weapons, we had to consider that the game is viewed top-down (close to isometric, but in a three-dimensional, modern perspective). For some weapons, this was very important because their use depended directly on the distance to the target.

For example, Sniper Rifles and their unique ability to aim at long distances. Since this particular mechanic has to work waaay more differently in our top-down game, we had to engineer the entire mechanic from scratch. Now, when aiming, you’ll get a reticle that, while reminding you of the regular sniper scope you’re used to from other shooter games, will also feel new, fresh, and incredibly difficult to explain. Good thing we have a visual aid, or this devlog would feel awfully dull. OBSERVE!



If, however, you prefer a little bit of an older spin on warfare, the BOW might be more to your liking. As fans of the series know, the Bow has been prominently featured in another one of our games, Decision: Medieval. While we meant to create three different bow styles, each one with different looks and play styles, we just, uhh… [insert random excuse, something about a cat, idk]. But who knows, maybe they’ll still make it to the game once it’s been released? ;)

To work the bows, you’ll have to hold and charge them. The longer you charge the arrow, the further it’ll fly and the more damage it’ll deal to your enemies. We tried to keep the bow as simple and as fun as possible, so there aren’t many complex mechanics to contend with while using it, just a lot of fun. The bow is good to use in the game’s early stages, as it has a longer range than other starter weapons if you’re too chicken to take on the monsters head-on.



Finally, we come around to the guns a real soldier (one who’s not afraid of a little Alpha Zombie) would use — SHOTGUNS! A true classic, there’s not much to improve on here, but we still like to mention them as much as possible, just because.



With great stopping power comes great responsibility, and our responsibility was to balance these bad boys so that they wouldn’t just become sniper rifles that you simply aim in the general direction of an enemy and watch them turn to dust.

To achieve that perfect “oomph”, we created several small projectiles with different trajectories, which created an area damage effect. There were uhm… difficulties in adjusting this. We had to consider the parameters of each shell and its probability of hitting the target, as well as the impact the range would have on their damage. Having stayed up a few nights with a spreadsheet and all kinds of simulations open, we got the effect down nicely, and the shotgun is now powerful as all hell, but not so powerful that it’ll play the whole game for you.



Now, you may be asking: “CAN I USE ALL THE WEAPONS RIGHT NOW? BECAUSE I REALLY WANNA GET A MINIGUN ON THE FIRST NIGHT!11!!1!1”

And the answer is… uh… kind of?

You have to know how to use them in order to, you know, use them.

For context: weapons are divided into three main classes: Melee, Firearms, and Heavy weapons. To utilize the full potential of any weapon, your survivors must have the appropriate skills at the necessary level. If your skill for, let’s say, firearms is coming up short a few points of the required amount for your shotgun to be effective, it will not be as powerful. This will not prevent your survivors from using these weapons, mind you, but it will massively reduce their effectiveness.



Your weapon skill increases as you use a weapon, but you can also improve your weapon skill with the appropriate equipment. For example, a combat helmet will increase your skill in heavy weapons.
Each weapon requires a different skill value, with more powerful weapons requiring a higher skill level.

So there you go. No miniguns at level 1.

There are more than 30 weapons in our game. We tried hard to balance this many different weapons, and we knew that balancing so many just by eye wouldn’t work, and we couldn’t adjust them by experience either. We had to create a massive table with all the parameters and formulas to help us distribute the values for the different weapons. For example, we considered parameters such as damage, rate of fire, reload time, impact radius, range, ammo consumption, etc. All of this was taken into account when calculating the effectiveness of each weapon. When adjusting efficiency, we carefully changed all parameters to evenly distribute the weapons from the weakest knife to the most powerful rocket launcher!



Each weapon has to be useful at different stages of the game, and each weapon also has to have compelling and exciting mechanics. To that end, we worked hard to create each weapon, sometimes facing difficulties when developing more sophisticated weapons such as the flamethrower, which you’ll get to read more about in a later devlog!

Since we simply cannot cram all of the exciting weapons into one Development Log, we’ll have to end this one here, and in the next devlog, we’ll talk more about the less conventional Dust Bowl weapons, like the Flamethrower, Grenades, and even a sneak peek into some weapons that we plan on adding to the game later on in its development cycle! ;)

Thank you for reading, we hope to see you in the next one!

Decision: The Red Daze team

Howdy!

Halloween may be over, but who said the spookies have to end? We've been thinking long and hard about that very question for a while now, and have decided that the spookies stay. And what is more spooky than zombies, you may ask? Umm… Mega Zombies, of course!



That being said, welcome to our newest Development Log, where Big™ things are the order of the day. Big™ Zombies, Big™ Mutants, Big™ Trolls… you get it. Here we go.
If you played any of the previous Decision games, you know that there were no bosses in any of them, but they all featured (and still do feature) large-scale horde attacks on your settlements. These levels were a relatively small part of the games, but we and most of our players really enjoyed them. They reminded us of the Tower Defense minigames, although less nuanced and more involved: you were the one doing the shooting and the defending on your own, like a real soldier, instead of staying back, upgrading buildings and giving instructions about where to place them (we're not babies here).



They were good mindless fun and played great on Flash, but as our technology improves, so must our game. Hence the improvements to the Assault system, Bosses, and Red Daze.
Around most of the settlements you’ll come across in the Dust Bowl, there are Hideout camps. DO NOT GO CHARGING INTO THEM HEAD ON! These locations are incredibly dangerous, and inhabited by Leaders and Bosses of various hostile races: in the northwestern part of the map, the land is ruled by Zombie Bosses, while Mutant Leaders roam the southeast. Their skill sets and appearances differ. While they may look like a nice little challenge, trust me, they WILL take you down if you're not well prepared.



That said, the bosses are not meant to be ignored entirely. They're responsible for every attack your settlements suffer. As a boss's army grows, the Red Daze and the area of influence widens, restricting players’ movements in this area and making a larger zone around the settlement unsafe for survivors. The longer you let a boss summon forces, the larger the area becomes and the greater the threat of getting attacked. With each passing day, bosses attract more and more wild monsters to their side. They bide their time and gather their strength before unleashing all of their might upon the settlement nearest to them.

That’s where the aforementioned settlement defense kicks in, and you’re thrust into the madness that is making sure a HUGE horde of monsters does not get through your defenses and wreak havoc throughout your settlement.



Successfully defending your settlement and taking out the boss's army will leave him weakened, and gives you a window of opportunity to strike back before they gather their strength AGAIN. If you miss your chance to take down the boss, they’ll keep regrowing their army and hitting your settlements until you learn your lesson and go over there to finish him off.

Now, killing bosses is no easy task, and you’ll need more info on them if you want to have even a CHANCE of taking them down. So here goes.

Although bosses can't use long-range weapons like some regular enemies, they are good with melee weapons, which are designed specifically for them. You might end up facing a pipe wrench, the back axle of a car, or other heavy things.

In addition to regular hits with these things, bosses can make a series of hits that are unstoppable. These are called Combo Hits. There are also Heavy Area Strikes, which are even more dangerous because everyone nearby will almost certainly be knocked down or seriously wounded and require medical care. Sometimes bosses will strike after taking quick and dangerous leaps toward your squad. This is perilous because you don't know at what point the boss will make that deadly Charge. Bosses are also capable of throwing heavy objects at your squad, such as barrels, tires, or wooden cases. With all these features, you'll have to keep your guard up: you won't get bored, even if you keep the boss at a distance and use firearms. And don't forget that the boss still has the rest of his loyal army.



Since the bosses are the most ferocious and like the Red Daze the most, it's also easy to distinguish them visually from regular enemies thanks to their enormous size and the vibrant blood red color of their skin and equipment.

Bosses are what we call the antagonists that pose the greatest threat to the Dust Bowl's inhabitants. As developers, we are really glad to have found a good, simple way of explaining things to players who are agonizing over the mystery of all of these periodic attacks on their territory. And the guys from the screenwriting team came up with great unique names and backstories for each boss, taking into account the sprawling history of the Decision world. We hope all our players enjoy battling bosses and bringing order to the Dust Bowl!

Woooooo, It’s another Development Log time! This devlog is going to be a big one — today we’re talking about SETTLEMENTS!

Ah, settlements. The staple of any great survival game. You’re running around the wastes, shootin’ and lootin’ all over the place, and just when you start seeing that you’re running out of food, water, or other supplies, you see it. A shimmer in the distance, a faint sound of ‘life’ just ahead of you. You wander in further, and get greeted by other survivors, inviting you to trade for food, offering you lodging, giving you quests and asking you to find their lost grandma or whatever. If only survival in the wasteland was so easy.



Stonedale Camp - the start of your struggle

In Decision: Red Daze, only one settlement is safe. Or, I guess, relatively safe.

Welcome to Stonedale Camp, the first settlement of the game, and the starting point in your journey to rid the Dust Bowl of dangerous monsters and the ever-looming threat of the Red Daze. This is where your mentor, Frank, initially resides, and a tiny safe haven for you to sleep in between exploring, gathering survival supplies and recruiting more survivors to aid you in your cause. There is not much here, besides a bed, a place to stash your loot in for safekeeping, and a lone turret to help you defend against the first-ever hordes of zombies you’ll experience in the Dust Bowl.



Capturing settlements

After Stonedale, every other settlement, camp or city, you’ll want to enter will be taken over by either ravenous zombies, or merciless mutants, and it will be up to you to stock up well, take your best pals and your most powerful skullcrushers or boomsticks, and… uh… make them realise they would be better off somewhere else.

Sometimes though, some of these pests will not want to leave peacefully, and will have a Boss watching their backs. Even though they carry some great loot, they will put up a fight. And they will hurt you. Bad. Some of you may even die. Okay, most of you will probably die, but don’t let that discourage you. You go champ!

Clearing the settlements and turning on the Repeller will allow you to take residence there, bring any survivors you find out in the wastes, set up production facilities and defenses. Speaking of defenses…



Settlement defense

Defending a settlement comes in two ways — boots on the ground with a gun or a melee weapon in your hands, and turrets — powerful defense mechanisms with great firing power and the safety of being above your enemy. As well as helping you fight your enemies directly, the turret also increases your settlements’ defense rating, which is important in order to upgrade other buildings in that particular settlement.

Arming the turrets with the most powerful weapons we can imagine - from machineguns to flamethrowers, we made sure that defending your settlement is as fun and satisfying as possible, while maintaining the action and intensity of struggling to survive against increasingly larger amounts of zombies, mutants, and other enemies we have in store for you.



Production facilities

Supplies in the wasteland are tight, with survivors having to fight monsters way larger than them to get their hands on even on a few days of food. With struggle for supplies as tense as is, a sustainable way to produce food and building materials would be a game-changer, wouldn’t it? ;)

That’s where production facilities come in. Found in several large cities, these buildings will provide you with all the ammunition, medicine and building materials one can dream of. How it works is very simple — out in the wasteland, you’ll come across ‘Loot’ — you’ll find it everywhere — from random boxes out in the street, to corpses of the monsters you kill. When you gather enough, take it to a production facility that builds the supplies you want, and watch the magic unfold!

However, if you find yourself lacking in Loot, try to upgrade a Warehouse in some of the larger cities. With an upgraded Warehouse, you’ll get the ability to send out Rangers out to the wasteland. These squads will gather enough material to bury you, but these expeditions are costly, so you better be prepared to open up your wallet.



Shelter

While at the start of the game you don’t need that many survivors to watch your back and protect your settlement, the mid-game is where things are changed up a bit. Enemies are stronger (duh), and settlements you’ll come across are wayy larger in scope, and will require more manpower to defend. And getting dozens of survivors to come with you to your settlement is no mean feat. That’s where Shelters come in!

You can choose to look at Shelters as a type of production facilities that you can set up, upgrade, and maintain, in order to get as much of a precious resource ( in this case, Survivors ), as possible. You’ll use your gathered materials to send out scouting parties to find, rescue, and bring back the Survivors, and in return, they will help out in your settlement, and even go along with you out in the wasteland and kick some puny zombie ass! Also yes, the survivors you recruit this way are playable the same way any recruits you yourself will stumble across are.



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...Aaand that is it for todays’ Development Log! We hope this piece sheds some light on some burning questions you might have had, but if there’s still some left, don’t hesitate to type them up in the comments section!


Thank you for your support, we have much more content for you, so stay tuned for our upcoming DevLogs ;)

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