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Hello JiradTheRake,

This is not the case, the game is tested on Windows 10 and 11 with official Xbox controllers and they do not have the A button mapped to both jump and map button. If you're using third party controllers that aren't officially supported it might be different. It's also not possible to bind any inputs to the Pause and Map Screen via the in-game options menu, so it's more likely that something is wrong with the input device itself, you can open the README.txt file to see the full default control bindings in case your controller is tied to some software that causes it to emulate keyboard controls in case they're set to the same keys.

Try resetting the control bindings to default, and/or adding it to steam and enabling steam input like samthefireball did.

If you're still having issues please provide more information with any screenshots and videos where possible, thanks!

Hello Linky439!

Thank you for playing the demo, highly appreciate your feedback!

Regarding the notes;

If you rebind the controls, pressing RB still highlights the missiles icon and Alt-fire does not. Not a major issue but thought I'd let you know!

Don't think I was aware of this, thanks for raising it!

Having an option to set up the deadzone for the sticks would be appreciated :) I think it will make stick users (like me :p) quite happy to have that option ;)

Didn't cross my mind to be honest, will set it up!

As someone else pointed out, I found confusing how the map was moving: maybe have it as an option to invert it?

I've heard this from a few people so far, will be adding it to the next (and big) update!

I had a small issue after dying once: I returned to the title screen and when I selected new game, I had no music until I reached my first save room, where it triggered and exiting it made the main theme of the area play again.

This one I'm actually aware of, and it has been fixed, so don't expect to see this issue in the next build.

The high jump feels a little too fast, it's nice to have that range in height but it might be a bit hard to control. I'll check if it bothers me for the rest of the demo!

Currently it's deliberately done that way, since although it's obviously inspired by the big M I did want it to be different in its own way, so the gameplay will end up being a bit faster paced. Changing the timing for this would probably mean tweaking other things as well.
I'll keep it in mind, but as it stands don't expect to see any changes yet.

Work on the next (and potentially final) update to Demo 3 is in the works but currently on hold as I do this in my spare time and I'm buried in work at the moment. One of the bigger QoL improvements you can expect is actual, proper, good audio SFX.

Stay tuned!

My main gripe is that bombs take too long to explode and make using them to jump and kill enemies in tight spots frustrating, also the charge beam doesn't feel satisfying to use because it's so difficult to hit anything with it.

You'll be happy to hear that the next demo fixes for both of these issues.

The bombs have quiet a few quality of life changes in the form of bomb jump assists that make bomb jumping and morph jumping in general feel a lot more natural and intended rather than the game punishing you for not being pixel perfect.

All the beam and missile hitboxes have had their size increased as well, making it easier to hit enemies. The Splitter Beam also moves beams farther apart, making it even easier to hit enemies.

Hello RarraxS!

Glad to hear you loved the demo, public updates are slow and sporadic, but there is work being done on the game in the background.

I would like to say that I played with a PS4 controller, so my feedback on the control buttons will relate to that controller.

On the PS4, the button to accept/interact in menus is the square, which feels a bit awkward. Usually games use the X button on the PS to accept (the A on the X-Box), so all games speak a common language and it's easier to play your game.

Glad to hear your PS4 controller worked, personally I don't have one to test with, but the project should be set up to use the 'South' button which is the 'A' button on Xbox and should be the 'X' button on PS controllers. I'll have another look but I tested the game with a xbox controller while writing this post and it seemed to use the 'A' button just fine, not sure if I changed it since I posted the last update though.

The buttons for diagonal aiming are also weird (L1 and L2). Personally, I would prefer AM2R's. The ability to aim diagonally without having to press a button, but also having one for it just in case you want to aim diagonally while not moving. I also think the buttons chosen for this are a bit awkward, as they are both for the left hand. It would be good if you arranged them at the same height like in Super Metroid, one for the right hand and the other for the left, like in Fortnite. Triggers are usually seen as pairs, so if one is aiming up, the other is aiming down. Another solution would be, like in Metroid Fusion, to have a trigger for setting the diagonal aiming mode and then using the joystick to set whether you aim up or down.

I know you can change this in the settings, but it would be nice to have this from the start.

Funnily enough the diagonal aiming control scheme is actually the same configuration as AM2R's controls, the biggest difference is that I never got around to implementing the movement controls affecting the diagonal aiming. You'll be happy to hear that this is no longer the case, so in addition to being able to aim diagonally via the buttons, you can now do so solely via the movement controls (although aiming directly up while running has now been sacrificed).

As for the Metroid Fusion solution, that is a possibility as well. At some point I'll probably transition the controller from being configurable to having set layouts with different styles.

I would like to talk to you about the map, especially the control schemes. Since the camera is inverted, I would include an option to move it without the inverted schemes, just that.

This will be in the next update due to popular demand.

The splitter beam throws three beams, and in games like Metroid, one of the three beams is near Samus legs, so she does not have to switch between diagonal aiming and non-diagonal aiming. As this beam is usually found near the end, it helps to destroy everything easily and get through the different rooms quickly. In doing so, it vaporises any enemy at Samu's feet so that she does not lose momentum, because by the time the player gets this upgrade in Metroid, they have already shown that they can easily take out these enemies, so the game makes it even easier and empowers the player.

This has been changed from the current public version and thus will be in the next update, the beams and missiles have wider hitboxes and the splitter beam now also spreads the beams farther apart. There's also been some general changes to the beams in terms of optimization.

The last point I wanted to give you feedback on is the collisions. Be more permissive, players will not care if a collision is one pixel bigger or smaller. So make the hitbox a little bigger so it's easier to hit enemies, players will not notice that the hitbox is bigger, and that makes the whole experience more satisfying.

This has been taken care of by making the weapon hitboxes a lot bigger, previously there were roughly 1x1 pixel so your hits had to be on center.

I will be following the development and once it's complete I will write a full review of your game. I love it and have seen these things, so I wanted to give you a heads up. I hope the development goes well ;)

Happy to have another fan of the game, unfortunately it might be a while though.
Between work (75 hours a week on average now) and private life, I barely have any time for my own projects.

My idea was to finish up Demo 3 completely to a fairly higher level of polish than what's currently shown, and hopefully make a successful crowdfunding attempt or something using Demo 3 so that I can pivot to working on the final game full time. Demo 3 currently isn't finished, it's still lacking several small and large additions that I have on my to-do list. Strictly speaking Demo 3 is behind schedule by at least 14 months, I wanted to finish sound design by end of July and move onto making some cutscenes and bosses but I haven't had the time or money to do so (this is funded out of my own pocket and worked on in my spare time, hence the super long development time).

Hello Kiyoshi!

Glad to hear you loved the demo!

1) Adding a dot for minor items and circle for major items on the map.

That will be in the next update coming soon, I've already added it to the game it's just not released yet. 
Although it's just a empty + sign for items not acquired in general and a simple dot sign for when they're acquired.

2) Make wall jump a power up to prevent early sequence breaks.

I would but having seen so many people playtest and not realize it exists led me to not putting it as a separate ability.

There's also the fact that I feel like that would just be padding out the abilities needlessly. The game doesn't explicitly tell you at any point how to do it or that you even can do it.

So for sequence breaks I'd say it's fine, it's more of a level design issue honestly. Since this is just a tech demo instead of an actual game demo I wouldn't really worry about it too much.

3) Rest of game when?

I work on this entirely in my very spare time and on a shoestring budget so it might be a while.

I'm aiming for the final Tech Demo 3 update to be released roughly end of July, start of August, which will contain a lot of updates along with the game's name reveal. After that's released I'm looking to start working on the actual game, which would mostly be work on levels, enemies, and audio since most of the player mechanics are done at this point.

Currently I'm applying for a game development grant to be able to potentially work on this full-time for a while, but there's no guarantee I'll get it.

4) Future randomizer.

I'll think about it, thanks for the idea.

Hello Dinar87,

-There's sprite issues like when pressing down while midair the character sprite is upside down.

This isn't an issue, it's a recycled sprite and is intended because pixel art is really expensive.
I've left it in for so long because it seemed fun and used the art budget at the time on other animations.

-Some annoying collision issues like the floor sided doors being slightly lower than the surrounding collision blocks meaning you have to jump to get over them

The doors is intended as a workaround to a collision bug in Unity/PhysX where if you have two separate colliders next to each other, even if they're exactly lined up perfectly, other colliders (i.e. the player) will get snagged where they meet, causing them to stop moving.

-cannot aim diagonally

Controls are included in the README.txt located in the .zip bundled with the game, these controls include the keys for diagonal aiming.

They're shown here in the Controls Menu, although I apologize for not expressly naming them "Aim Diagonally Up" and "Aim Diagonally Down". I will include this change in the next update. Should probably remove Inject Tank as well since that's a disabled feature.

Also included in the next update coming soon is automatic diagonal aiming if you hold the left or right movement keys along with up or down.

-moving on the map screen feels bad because of the inverted controls.

If you look at the map tiles, you'll see they follow the controls, they're not actually inverted. Might look that way because of the grid.

-charging animation is not clear when it's finished charging.

This is fair, the next update coming soon has a color tint that flashes on the player to indicate the charging is complete.

Hope you enjoyed the game, and stay tuned for more!

Hey Kiryhnn,

The first energy tank in the jungle area is actually the 4th in order in the demo, sounds like you did a sequence break to use the elevator to get to the jungle area earlier.

As for losing your morph mode and missiles, there's no bugs or mechanics in the game that disable them, you likely just hit the debug keys by accident. On the keyboard number row, you can press '1' to toggle the the missile ability on and off, enabling it this way maxes out the capacity to 255, if you press '2' on the keyboard, it toggles the morph mode ability. You can open the README.txt file included in the demo zip to view the rest of the debug commands.

Other than that I hope you're enjoying the demo, playing with a controller is highly recommended. You can rebind input for both keyboard and gamepad to your liking if you don't prefer the default control scheme.

There will be an update next month near the end of April with some level design changes, proper audio sound effects, and the actual name of the game. I hope you like it enough to check it out again then.

Feel free to post any other feedback you have with the demo!

Any chance of getting a follow-up tile set, or whether you're available for freelance?

Hey Mike! Are you still active?

Hey Sam! 

Glad you're loving the new demo, as for the bugs:

If you the pure black and frozen state happened after you selected continue and haven't saved in Demo 3 yet, it likely tried to load an old save from Demo 2 then couldn't find the room to load and bugged out. I'm aware of the bug but haven't had time yet to fix it, it shouldn't happen as long as you either: haven't had a save of NiTL when you player OR have saved at least once in Demo 3.

One sided door: That's intentional, rooms reset after leaving. Bit of a troll, I know, but intentional.

About the scrolling on the map, that's intentional and also kind of an optical illusion of sorts because:
If you look at the grid, then yes it's inverted.
If you look at the map tiles, then it follows the input.

As for the save and elevator stations,
I plan on updating them to have an "charging" animation so players are aware things are happening, the actual delay is 1 second but it only counts down if you stay still. It's something I noticed over the weekend while I was presenting the game at the Cancer Society Games Fair in New Zealand.

There were some other bugs, one of which was game-breaking (resulted in not being able to shoot or drop bombs) but it's been fixed and the build got stealth updated about 20 hours ago with the fix and a couple others things. So if you run into that just redownload the demo.

Demo 3 isn't fully finished yet, but enough of it was there to make a release, planned are:

• Proper audio SFX
• Mid-Demo boss
• Final-Demo boss (will be located in the room where door to the Demo Completion leads to
• Some more enemy placement and health balancing
• Bug fixes
• Minor level design changes to give it a better level of polish
• Art improvements to the lava and water that looks like acid

Demo 2 is sized at 62 rooms that are 27x15 tiles large
Demo 3 is sized at 118 rooms that are 27x15 tiles large.

Demo 3 is entirely differently to Demo 2, please enjoy!

Any chance of an attack animation on that Warlock/Biceraptor?

Hey Sam!

Thank you for the feedback, just posting to let you know I've fixed all the issues you mentioned and they'll be in the next release.

Working on the Map/Status screen also got me to made a minor improvement to the art which is always nice.

Glad to hear you got it working!

As for the the boot to the title theme when you hit Left Shift or L1, technically a feature but I implemented it rather poorly and then forgot about it.

The top left and right corners of the pause screen have L and R next to where they lead, it was supposed to be like in Metroid Zero Mission and Fusion where you can press the shoulder buttons to go to those menus.

I just checked and R for the Status Screen doesn't seem to be working (it's the A key on the keyboard currently and it switches back and forth between status and map screens when pressed) and L just boots you back to the title without warning.

Thank you very much for making me aware of this, it will be fixed in the next build where the R button will go to the status screen and the L will bring up a confirmation window to confirm or decline going back to the title theme.

I hope the rest of the demo is smooth sailing for you, but if it isn't please let me know I'm more than happy to hear any issues.

Have fun with the game, Demo 3 is coming soon!

Hi Sam, sorry to hear you're having issues.

Can you check your controller set up since you're running it through DS4Windows?
The game uses Unity's new input system for both keyboard and gamepads so the code that runs when either are used is identical.

Are there any differences in your issue when you use an xbox controller as opposed to the PS4 controller?
The other thing you can try is rebinding the keys for the gamepad in the options menu, if you go to rebind a key it'll wait for any input before rebinding it so if you still have trouble there it might be a controller issue.

Would you mind posting a video of the video?

That's because of a combination of the level seams and now-outdated ledge grabbing code.

Basically I made this demo before Unity came out with it's own Tilemap system so I built my own and it was great for the most part but it uses Edge Colliders instead of Box Colliders (because you could "trip" between tiles that way and it'd stop movement for that frame), as for the ledge grabbing it used Raycasts and now uses A BoxOverlap instead making it more reliable and fixes this issue.

So not intended, but doesn't break anything either.

Thanks! Was updating the build just now actually, if you had any issues with the player movement (i.e. stopped moving when going left), v2.8.6 will fix that.

It's a fix I've backported from Demo 3 to Demo 2.x.y because it's a game breaking issue. I hope you enjoyed the game and be sure to post your clear time :)

Hello players!

I've made this message board in order to get feedback about the demo's so far!
Feel free to post your experiences, both negative and positive, as it helps me improve the game. I'd also love to hear what you would like to see in the game in future releases :)

Cool game!

"When you say symmetrical spread, do you mean having the particles fire out at evenly spaced angles from each other?"

I guess you could phrase it that way, yeah. It bugged me that the particles would have random spacing instead of it being uniform, it wouldn't be a problem if the particles were generated at run-time and thus different every time, but since it's being saved to a spritesheet and looped (e.g. a missile explosion) the gaps become very visible.

I like the software a lot so far but I do have a few issues with it.

1. There's currently no way to zoom on the output or render preview, which makes it extremely hard to get a good look at the animations when dealing with low resolutions.

2. There's options for handling spread (0-180) but I haven't been able to find anything to make sure the spread is completely symmetrical, for higher resolutions this isn't really an issue but for low resolutions it means having to edit the sprite sheets by hand after making it, which can be quite a bit of work.

3. Changing the output scale doesn't affect the render preview. Great quality of life improvement to be able to see what the scaled output will look like without having to save it to a .png sprite sheet first.

Aside from those 3 things and a Undo/Redo button I don't feel like anything is missing at least for now, great job making BlastFX!