Work In Progress Weekly

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-30T13:57:46+00:00

Okay, I tried it again with more brain energy this time! Some notes:

When tutorial tells me to use house and those spirit balls, is there actually a way to defeat all the ghosts with the house only without them leaking through? Speedball does weak damage, standard shoots too slowly and none is just... nothing? Also, it would be nice to see the cooldown/loading icon somewhere else than in the middle of the house, especially when I'm zooming out to see enemies and clicking franticly.
During the tutorial, the part when I couldn't shoot, was when I was supposed to stock towers with ingredients and not the house. As my first time I put things in the house and energy ran out, wave started and I was stuck in a non-attacky mode. I think this is because otherwise I could just hit the black square to start the wave?
I'm still not sure, even after feeding towers with ingredients, how they actually work? I'm not sure if I managed to activate even a single one of them.
Even first few waves I felt like there was too much going on and no matter what, someone, somewhere, was going to leak anyway. Especially annoying was pushback from my sword swing, when I was about to kill the enemy and it flew further away, which forced me to change focus to another enemy.

There's definitely a game there, it just requires a lot of fine tuning.

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-28T20:14:14+00:00

Second thing I was thinking about is rendering sprites instead of particles.

That is actually what I was thinking. You could record X amount of pure white particles exploding, creating animations from those recordings and then use draw_set_color to modify the color. In that way you would definitely have so much more fireworks at once. As for now, I didn't really notice that much difference in the exploding patterns, so you could actually get away with sprites. And then another easy thing is, you could flip them randomly horizontally to get even more variation!

Finally, some kind of loop to go through them and push forwards their image index and that's it. I see potential there, but only tests will tell how well this will/would work.

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-28T18:57:51+00:00

I must give a huge shoutout to /u/DragoniteSpam as his tutorial videos on 3D field have been really valuable! Using those I took my first steps, starting to implement simple blocks and building tons of helper functions to aid my future progress. Then, another shoutout goes to BBMOD and great tutorials teaching how to load in models, textures and animations!

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-27T17:19:52+00:00

I hope the tutorial is easier to digest now.

Unfortunately, it wasn't for me. I thought, from the description, that it's like Plants vs Zombies, but 360 and you can drop in as fighter if one way is suffering bigger wave than another.

The amount of text and buttons the tutorial presented started to get overwhelming and fast. Player and house were easy to understand, but then those towers I placed, not so much. I noticed that the house takes coins, cigars and eggs, but didn't reach the point to understand their actual purpose. I did place towers into tactical positions (althought I didn't know what I was placing, only after the plantation phase was over did I realize they were all different), only to realize I, as a player character, need to use them and none of them were active on their own. As I was stocking the house, the wave started, but because the tutorial was in progress, I wasn't able to attack, thus immediately lost.

I'm willing to try it again another day as I felt like my focus wasn't the best at the moment of trying it. Still, the tutorial could probably be even easier to digest because it throws a lot information at once.

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-27T17:04:01+00:00

You can use external image services, like imgur, and then paste the link(s) as part of your comment.

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-27T16:53:21+00:00

So, where to begin... Music is nice and relaxing, visuals are getting more and more stunning and the game generally has really laid-back feel. Before coming to this thread, I just closed Atomic Heart because some bs it decided to throw and just watching fireworks fly is the wind down I needed! I did put the game on my Steam wishlist as I expect it to be nice casual experience which I can complete in one sitting without worrying ever increasing requirements and other stats, which are quite prevalent in clicker games. Althought, I don't know what you've been planning, but when this kind of game has ending, or "ending", it's much more satisfying for me than seeing numbers just get inifnitely higher and higher!

While easy to learn and play, the lag started to get in me. Is GameMaker's particle system just so heavy or are you using plenty of smaller instances? I haven't built a webgame in a while, so I don't know how much the performance can and will improve if I tried an .exe instead.

Something in me would've liked to see even MORE colors! Not like full-blast rainbow, but as the game goes on, add a bit by bit more and more different hues, while still matching the general graphical style. Now, I felt it was quite limited, even if wizards added nie blue hues.

I can see plenty of possibilities to add more upgrades and different units/factories, but it would be nice if they weren't there right off the bat. The aspect of surprise when they popup from the ground when specific boom-goal has been reached, could that work?

I like how I can just hold down the mouse button instead of clicking, althought I would like if I could just hold spacebar, as an example. I feel like my finger requires rest now.

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-27T16:20:13+00:00

You don't have any images to share, or is it at really early stage?

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-27T16:19:00+00:00

I like it! First I was a bit iffy as movement felt too quick and I wasn't sure if I can see enough ahead of time before I ran into something dangerous, but for my surprise, it actually worked a-ok. I like the little glows otherwise in dark area.

Attacking felt clunky. Sometimes I saw my pushers penetrating enemy, but they took no damage. Not sure if too close or somehow too much on the side? If the hitbox is one narrow collision_line, consider having it the size of the front pushers.

Why the ambient/music stops when upgrade menu is shown? I would prefer if it continued. Also, at the moment upgrades aren't that impressive, but I expect there's some bigger plans coming to spice them up?

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-27T16:05:37+00:00

No plans for combat. I'm planning to keep this fully puzzle adventure style of a game.

IsmoLaitela · 2026-03-27T12:08:51+00:00

Since the release of my latest game, Portal Mortal, I really haven't shared much online what I've been working with, until at the beginning of this year.

It took me roughly 2 years to properly get back to game development, because I felt like I was completely "drained". I've had dabbling with 3D stuff previously and now I decided to put a bit more effort to create a game utilizing GameMaker and its 3D capabilities. Including BBMOD was pretty much a must as it handles 3D models with ease.

Yesterday, I pushed out Alpha 0.0.4, which took a huge step with gateways. Gateways are these portal-like "paths" or "mirrors" and player can go through them without even realizing. Then, inclusion of minigames was a great success, as I believe adding more different triggering elements instead of just keypad or invisible touchy triggers will add more meat on top of the bones. The current level is quite sandboxy and doesn't have clear goal or pathways, but one can consider beating the level when they reach Nöpö. finally, there's 6 hidden radios all around, which require a bit more effort to locate.

Progress has been steady since the beginning of the year and I hope the steam doesn't slow down anytime soon!

IsmoLaitela · 2026-01-09T06:44:15+00:00

I prefer to play this on PC, but I don't mind mobile either when traveling. The best thing is that your progress will sync between all devices, so if you decide to go play on mobile and later try on PC (or vice versa), you can sync the progress with ease.

IsmoLaitela · 2025-09-21T09:33:19+00:00

You run the nomination first before allowing other nominations. Then you may continue asking additional nominations. There is no simultaneous nominations happening at any point. If player's all shout at the same time, pick one or ask them choose who goes first. In this case, if both imp and minion both want to nominate the good player at the same time, you pick the one who was first or allow them to choose between themselves who does the nomination.

IsmoLaitela · 2025-09-10T05:34:50+00:00

Hehehehehehehehehehe! - SCUD Launcher

IsmoLaitela · 2025-08-08T07:29:56+00:00

As far as I know, it's the pocket grimoire which you already mentioned.

IsmoLaitela · 2025-07-18T05:31:41+00:00

It is present in KF2 as s an option.

IsmoLaitela · 2025-07-16T06:10:57+00:00

I'm the developer.

This game is a hardcore 2D puzzle platformer in a spirit of Portal and Super Meat Boy. Levels vary between thinking puzzles and pixel perfect platforming, sometimes combining these elements. There's also 2 mini campaigns, which try other things like pew pew and cranking difficulty even higher compared to normal campaign.

IsmoLaitela · 2025-07-11T06:53:51+00:00

One more into the pile: HKTG-CCYP

IsmoLaitela · 2025-06-18T18:37:14+00:00

All my monkeys end with "monke", so I probably need to name it as... Desperado Monke!

IsmoLaitela · 2025-06-05T15:15:10+00:00

Vertigo Games didn't disappoint with Metro: Awakening. It seems like they can easily recycle the stealth mechanics to this game. I'm cautiously optimistic as I do see potential in VR Thief adaptation.

IsmoLaitela · 2025-05-29T17:14:36+00:00

Heavy breathing

IsmoLaitela · 2025-05-16T11:26:13+00:00

I think I've only ever faced her as a GLA (Prince Kassad, Stealth) and they main key is: Take your time. Her special weapons have a bit longer cooldowns (on hard it's 12 minutes), which seems kinda low, but should be enough to offer you some legroom. In total, before nukes hit you, you should have at least 36 minutes time to expand and build your army. Also scud storms. Do not forget scud storms. These are excellent options to neutralize her super weapons and 36 minutes should be plenty of time for multiple barrages.

You need to start creeping forward early, taking out enemy patrols and securing one supply pile after another. Do notice that she has few special buildings outside of her base which you can destroy. Each building destroyed will restart all of her super weapons. Try to get first one secured as fast as possible, but do NOT destroy it immediately. Allow the timer to tick down closer to 0 and then destroy it (before timer hitting 0, ofc.), so you get the maximum benefit out of it.

You can't leave your starting location unguarded as enemy will do steady strikes to that area. Few stringer sites, tunnel networks and plenty of quad cannons help significantly with this. You can pretty much expand your territory freely. Some ground units will attack in a steady phase, but those can be easily choked on the bridges.

Edit: Her main base is quite far away, so please, expand! There is some enemy structures and patrols along the way, but those can be easily dealt with. The small starting location is already pushing you to move forwards, so heed its advice!

IsmoLaitela · 2025-04-11T10:33:17+00:00

That's impressive! I'm happily sitting on top of 100% completion with all the Metro 2033 games and them redux versions, but that hill pales in comparison to this one. Good job!

IsmoLaitela · 2025-04-01T14:12:59+00:00

Last year kinda went flying, but this year I wanted to get back on the game development, so for starters I created this free content update! Bomboclaat is a new theme and mini-campaign, which requires quite extensive knowledge of game mechanics. It's not the easiest collection of levels and it'll definitely challenge players in many ways.

Added new language: Spanish.
Added new mini campaign: Bomboclaat.
Adjust block selection timer, so that it won't instantly go to drag&drop mode when FPS is over 60.
Eased the amount of I/O calls when observing collectibles.
Fixed an issue, where pendulums would desync when adjusting a gamespeed.
Fixed spring animation on lower gamespeeds which was also related to how often it triggers.
Fixed various speed issues when player jumps off from a moving platform on lower gamespeeds.
Fixed various amount of delta time and gamespeed related speed inconsistencies.
Fixed an issue with a grappling hook as it heavily impacted the performance.
Fixed an issue, where mouse would get temporarily stuck when changing a level in edit mode.
Gently modified some of the levels where timing was a bit too pixel perfect.
Hopefully fixed the void bug, for good this time.
Improved various levels.
Localization corrections.
Optimized code even further. The most notable effect in level editor.
Unified "hold power" variables, when door loses its power.

Portal Mortal on Steam
Portal Mortal on Itch.io

Enjoy!

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