Coders Nightmare

About

Coders Nightmare is a 2D shooter where the player has to defeat oncoming enemies to prevent them from corrupting the players code.
It is highly inspired by Space Invaders and made using the same mechanics as a basic starter game for myself.
The whole idea for the game was a starting school project to get the idea and the hangs of game designing. In my eyes it went quite well, but it did bring some problems in my everyday life to adjust the timing of certain projects and the game. In the end, I found this being a success for a starter project. Later along the line I try to improve this game and upcomings aswell.

The game can be found here

Screenshots

Here are some screenshots of the progress from the game starting from week 1 up to the end of the project.

Concept Idea

Here's the earliest stage of the project to understand the mechanics and see what needs to be improved.

In-game

Here you can see the progression of the game especially the change of sprites.


Menu

Here is also a quick peek at the Main Menu.



Details

Here I have listed the technical details about the game varying from the graphics to the appearing bugs along the way

Graphics 🎨

Most of the graphics were made by an AI, due my low level artistic experience. I am satisfied with the result and may change if needed. The background was used with Visual Studios coding background to give the game more of a coding feeling. The players graphics were from a player sprite sheet generator where it also gave the sheet used for animations.

Mechanics ⚙️

The games mechanics are similar to the original Space Invaders controls. It was a simple way to imply the originals feeling. Most of the enemies mechanics are a simple left-right movement, but 2/3 of the enemy types have an additional shoot mechanic that increases the difficulty. The boss has a slight difference where it shoot double and it may have another change.

Problems ❌

While coding and throwing ideas, I encountered many problems that stayed for a long time. Some were simpler to fix some way harder. I managed to make a playable version after some time, with a few major and minor bugs, but that's part of the process. I've learnt a lot of new mechanics and ways to improve. I knew that the industry isn't on the easy side but that's why I enjoy it as it gives me a challenge.

List of bugs/problems

  • Some bullets not dissapearing when needing to
  • Borders not working properly
  • Resolution wrong in some scenes
  • Audio problems

Improvements 🛠️

While making the game I always list me improvement ideas where most may go through. I intend to make games that the player will enjoy and not get overly bored after 5 minutes. Most improvements that I choose are from others who have played it as they know from the players perspective what needs to be changed to make the gameplay smoother and enjoyable. I don't mind criticism as it can give useful intel for improvement.

Progress ⌛

This project was a solo run. We all did a solo game to get an idea what the course is before we move onto group projects. The game came out well in my opinion as a solo game. The game got good feedback from my teachers and my classmates. It also got a high grade for it aswell.