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Introductory Gameplay:Quote from name:Introductory Gameplay
Photon Rush is the new age Player vs Player action massing game. The goal of the game is to kill the enemy photon cannon base before they kill yours! To do this you must strategically build units for your representing computer player who manages your teams units and battles with them. The simplistic and addictive strategic elements of the game shine when you must manage upgrading your income, unlocking your race ability, using you 2X unit booster and building units. Photon Rush is an addictive and fun, yet hard to master game, join the RUSH!
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Map Specs.:Map Specs.
- Players: 6
- Tileset: Space Platform
- Genre: Strategy Builder
- Map Dimensions: 96 x 128
- Locations: 207
- Trigger Count: 705
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Screen Shots:Screen Shots
Left = gather minerals, Right = gather gasBurrow that zergling for a tutorialAn example of your building areaUnits spawn here, bring them to the beacons to give them to the computerAction shot, destroy the enemy Shield Generator before you can attack their baseIncrease income with 200 gas, and going to the top beaconPeace out Shield GeneratorUnlock your race ability with 250 gas and moving to the corresponding beaconTerran ability has been usedGame, Over _______________________________________________________________________________________________________
In-depth Gameplay:In-depth Gameplay
Income:
As you already know, the object of the game is to kill your opponent’s photon base by building units for your representing computer player. To build these units however, you need income, specifically, mineral income. Every player can choose to gather either minerals or gas but they can NOT gather both at the same time. Mineral Income is used to create everything that will help you destroy the enemy. This includes units, buildings and race abilities. At the start of the game, you start out with a mineral Income Level of 1, which gives you 5 minerals per every ½ second. There are 9 Income Levels, and every time you upgrade your income level your rate of Mineral Income increases. For example, at Income Level 2, you gain 8 minerals per ½ second, and Income Level 3 gives you 12 minerals per ½ second…etc. Now, to upgrade your Mineral Income, you use Gas. Remember though, you canNOT gather minerals and gas at the same time. So as you are gathering gas to upgrade your mineral income level, you are vulnerable because you are not gathering any minerals. It’s kind of risk/reward. Anyways, you must gather 200 gas and then use your Civilian in the middle of the map to upgrade your income level. Gas also has another purpose however. You need to gather 250 gas to Unlock your Race Ability, which is very important and you will learn about in the next section. In conclusion, you must manage your income of gas and minerals efficiently if you want to stand a chance.
Race Abilities:
Race abilities can be game changers in Photon Rush. They can save your team from annihilation or win the game for you. Race Abilities must be unlocked through the process of gaining 250 gas before you can use them. Once you unlock your race ability, you can use it by building an Evolution Chamber, Engineering Bay, or Forge, depending upon if you’re Zerg, Terran or Protoss. These abilities give big boosts and advantages to the team who uses them and can Combo them effectively. Their descriptions are as follows:
Terran Ability: Mortar Strike
Grants temporary invulnerability to all of your teams units and rains down mortar strikes near your teams photon base.
Cool Down: 30 seconds
Primary Use: Defensive (Although this ability is defensive, it can be used in combination with the other abilities because of the “temporary invulnerability it grants)
Protoss Ability: Plasma Beam
Fires a powerful beam of energy down the middle of the battlefield killing enemy units; leaving a trail of plasma encrusted warriors in its wake.
Cool Down: 45 seconds
Primary Use: Neutral
Zerg Ability: Higher Evolution
Essentialy doubles the amount of zerglings, hydralisks and mutalisks owned by your team and morphs overlords to queens and defilers to infested terran.
Cool Down: 60 seconds
Primary Use: Offensive
As you can see, abilities can be game changers if used correctly. They turn an ordinary unit battle into something much, much more. You can destroy a huge enemy spawn or attack force with a single Ability.
2X Unit Booster
Each player in the game has the option to use a 2X Unit Booster once during the game, whenever they want. The booster doubles all of their teams units when they bring them to the battlefield. The booster lasts for 30 seconds however and can only be used once per person. So each team essentially has 3 unit boosters. These boosters can be used in a number of different situations to give your team a lift. You can use them to double your units and get a good mass going, save your cannon or rush the silo. Use it wisely though because you only get one.
Spawning:
Spawning units is also a big strategic element of this game. When you create units at your base, they are automatically moved to the spawn holding zone. From this zone you can save up an army and then send it to the battlefield by moving your units to the beacons. There is also a Masser that you control for this zone, allowing you to easily order your units and constantly send them as they are built. Now, you cannot see the other teams spawning zone or any other aspect of their base. However, each player automatically gets a Comstat Station below their spawning zone, so they can strategically spy on the enemy and plan their attacks. Using this Comstat Station effectively is crucial.
"The" Silo:
The Silo is a Stasis Cell/Prison that is placed in the middle of the battlefield. It has very low health compared to the photon base and the team to destroy it gains +750 minerals and +150 gas, which if you read the income section you’d know is a big deal. The Silo starts out as being owned by Neutral Player, and if Red Team brings units near The Silo it will become owned by the Blue Team, allowing Red Team to attack it. Visa Versa is true as well, if Blue Team brings units near The Silo it will become owned by the Red Team, allowing the Blue Team to attack it. If both the Red and Blue team bring units near the silo however, it becomes owned by the Neutral Player and neither team can attack it until all of the nearby enemies are dead.
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Updates:Updates
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-1.01 – Fixed a bug that allowed teams to lift off their buildings and place them on the battlefield.
-1.02 – Fixed a bug that killed Teal players income zergling when he moved to the top left of the minerals.
-1.03 - Fixed many minor bugs, nothing really worth noting.
-1.04 - Significantly upgraded lurker ai, as well as observing units and arbiter ai. Reorganized the map and created dark spawn areas. Added comstat stations (spy) and significantly increased the cost of buildings.
-Silo - Replaced Shield Generators with "the" Silo. The team to destroy the Silo gains +750 minerals and +150 gas.
-Silo 2.0 - Added 2X Unit Boosters, decreased Silo armor to 3, addressed over 15 bugs and Ai issues, added 2 tanks and 1 second to terran ability, significantly upgraded gameplay.
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Additional Gameplay Notes:Notes: When you first start playing, burrow your zergling for a tutorial
Notes: Teams are best when they have one of each race
Notes: Enjoy guys! Download Links:Quote from name: Most Current Versions
Post has been edited 19 time(s), last time on Jun 20 2011, 4:55 pm by m.0.n.3.y.
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Remember how I said this is almost exactly the same as Hacker Defense?
you really should look into that
but obviously yours has a bit more stuff..
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Remember how I said this is almost exactly the same as Hacker Defense?
but obviously yours has a bit more stuff..
I've never played hacker d, so idk what you're talking about, but i'll check it out!
you really should look into that
Any ideas? what do you recommend?
Also, i think you should play photon rush again because the game you played wasn't the best example of how the game plays. There really is a lot deeper strategy with builds and timing your income upgrades and ability unlocks and also with comboing the race abilities. When you play with people who have played also played the game at least once these deeper strategic elements start to come out.
Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on May 15 2011, 6:47 pm by m.0.n.3.y.
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Toss is op in this. All they have to do is mass sairs and reavers.
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Toss is op in this. All they have to do is mass sairs and reavers.
I was more or less thinking the same thing with the sairs, due to their d web ability, but reavers i'm not so sure are op, if the other team counter masses ultras/tanks reavers are done. And i honestly haven't seen toss as overpowered except for sairs slightly.
So do you have suggestions on how to fix this at all?
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Balance issues aside
I don't like the fact that you can see the units the other players are setting up to mass with in the middle.
It'd be more interesting to give people comsat stations with scanner sweep = 50 E.
Another bitter fact is that.. this is like any other massing games.
I mean.. there's no other ways of putting it...
Hacker Defense is an old game, and it was great for its time... but unfortunately, I expected more at this day n age.
It'd be interesting to see more strategy involved.. Here's a few ways to do it..
1. The rather spammed amounts of money and income really undermines the strategic strength of the map. While it's true that everything is just numbers, having smaller, more accountable numbers is more compelling to a player. Try making everything slower by a factor of ten..
2. Do something like the "Civlization Production Strategy". Basically, have either Buildings build really slowly/expensive.. or have Units build really slowly. This forces the players to think ahead.
3. You can risk balance and noob-unfriendliness issues by introducing hero units that have the opposite strategies of building regular units. If you made building regular units really slow but cheap, you make the heroes fast to get but expensive.
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Alright guys, I updated the game and added a lot more strategic elements! If you tried an earlier version try the new versions, 1.04 or Silo, they're MUCH more fun!
I updated the thread so scroll up to the first post to learn about the game and the new versions, thanks guys! And thanks Urine for some great suggestions!
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