(The poll is old and no longer accurate) Erchius boss, intressted in finding out the consensus.

They don't quite work the same way. His way is more like an unlocked shortcut, where a "checkpoint" would also entail saving dungeon/loot status, etc.

 

They would still need a save state to know you reached the checkpoint. sooo, nothing changes. How they exactly do this is the problem. Its currently not saved like a planet as when you warp back, everything resets. If they want everything to reset when you get to a checkpoint. it might act like a quest giver and unlock a new mission "Erchius Mining Facility: Checkpoint 1. Which basically changes your starting point to that of the check point. And once you beat the boss, it takes the checkpoint out of your missions tab.

 

Not necessarily. They could make the Boss it's own quest, as once you get to the boss, you can't go back so it's pretty much it's own thing anyhow.

EDIT: This would also be a prime place to put hints on how to kill the thing too.

 

Persistent NPCs keep their health under normal conditions. Erchius also only has so many moontant spawns to use. They would need a reset. For this particular mission, yeah, the checkpoint is only the boss. but there could be longer more involved missions later with mini bosses and multiple checkpoints.

 

This is true. I'm thinking of all the bosses in the game right now as it is I suppose. Considering that there is really only one mission that doesn't have a "boss" at the end, and the rest are pretty much arena battles.

 

The most basic of checkpoints are quite literally nothing more than an unlocked shortcut. Anything else, including actually giving the player the option of taking said shortcut, is just icing on the cake.

That shouldn't be a problem at all really. If one was to use Wurner's suggestion of a teleporter(while not the best idea for this situation IMO isn't a bad one in and of itself), you'd just have its activation tied to a variable that's turned on by an IF statement(which is pretty much all a checkpoint is) similar to this:

Code:

IF checkpointReached == TRUE(

teleporterActive = True)

All that'd be left to do is to trigger the following when the mission is completed:

Code:

teleporterActive = FALSE

Tada! Checkpoint created.

 

Anyone else having issues with invisible lasers on the third stage? This is making the game unplayable for me.

 

They could make the teleporter check for something on the character, such as an item in the inventory or a specific codex being unlocked, before it would activate. And, in any case, I don't think it would be hard to store that data in the character itself; StarBound seems rather flexible when it comes to storing and making use of data.

 

It's actually kinda easy when you know what do u have to do, wearing a shield tho!

 

the "hurr it blox getting thru da gaem bcuz kant fly 2 othar worldz without reking it" or prettym uch anything like that is stupid. /admin will get you through, does the boss have problems? yes. does it block off playing the game? no.

 

Reel it in a bit. The snark is unnecessary.

 

It should be noted that using admin commands is not a preferable way of playing a game, even in beta state. Sure it doesn't block off the game, but being forced to use it is what is for lack of a more desirable word stupid.

 

After watching a couple of Youtube videos of the fight I've stumbled on another issue the devs might not have considered. I play the game on the HDTV at home in 1600x900 at a zoom of 3. This gives me the sprite size I need to see enough of what's going on and still adequately view the interface from the couch.

The downside to this is that I have a much smaller viewing area. In Erchius, this translates to reduced situational awareness. Fewer platforms are visible, so you can't see relative locations and sizes. You also see enemies and threats much later than with a reduced zoom or larger resolution. This isn't a big deal in the open mining world but in a mission where more is demanded of your skills, this has an effect. Maybe even a significant impact on your ability to navigate a demanding situation.

If I get a chance, I'll try reducing zoom to 2x or upping resolution to 1080p and see if managing the boss fight becomes easier. If so, this could be another source of difficulty for players and probably worth consideration to the devs. It's part of your UI options and so should be part of your level design considerations.


I'm still new to the scene, but have the devs considered UI scaling independent of resolution? This is hardly a demand as it might be difficult in a pixel-art oriented game like this and choices are made for a reason.




Edit: Tried it at one less zoom level. Yup. It's easier. I have some trouble as I'm still playing from a couch on HDTV so it's harder to make out details, but seeing the beams coming, where the platforms are, and where the buttons are all really help.

 

Perhaps the top platforms should be wider, or the ceiling should be higher. Most of my issues with those jumps occurred with having to deal with beams AND limited jumping space. Then you miss the jump, and zap-spit-splat, new attempt.

That, and maybe have the top and bottom platform block the lasers.

It doesn't need a huge rewrite so much as a couple tweaks to allow players to catch their breath and watch the pattern. And the platforming is kinda squishy, so a little extra room there would be good too.

 

Bosses are meant to be hard. They prevented us from getting past the stage in pretty much every platformer that defined this genre.

This discussion is less about the quality of the boss, and more of the challenge of having difficulty levels that scale to the skills of players.

 

I think its easy when you realize the patterns.

I think I had more failure in the actual dungeon itself than I did on the boss.

 

I got through the Erichus Horror on my third try -- soon as I saw from a video that it's all about activating switches, good jump techniques (and Bounce) to ignore mooks, and mitigating laser damage did the trick.

The whole instance is actually fun to play IMO -- level layout is interesting, enemies are pesky, but not impossible, boss is way different than any other from ver. Koala -- I just think it's way too early a mission to deploy.
I'd have sooner expected Dreadwing w/ upgraded attacks and a short level to progress through (and shielded ground, to prevent use of trenches) and the new Shockhopper first.

I advise if the level is too hard, to find an older dungeon like an Apex Lab, or an Avian Temple to uncover guns and special weapons first -- those instances now are shielded and force the player to navigate without posting torches, digging shortcuts or stealing everything in advance.

 

I see people complaining about having to go through the whole dungeon. There is a shortcut, you just have to look. As a matter of fact I thought the shortcut was the right way to begin with. I ended up missing the boss chamber and circling back to the entrance.

 

Those games that defined the genre are a couple decades old at least and were like that to pad out the length among the children that played them.

 

The boss itself is rather easy. With a 2h sword you can take zero damage from the lasers and parrying has no health and cools down quickly so there's no need to practice perfect blocks.
The lack of a checkpoint is ridiculous. The only reason I should go back through there is to find the hidden chests and the hidden *SPOILER* after getting Targeted Blink or Morph Ball.
I voted easy simply because the question was about the boss and not the level design or mechanics.