After the initial release flurry, and some late nights making some amazingly fast quick-fixes for our fans, we’ve finally settled back to the task of making Danger Alliance even better.
We’ve listened hard to user feedback (both good and bad) and we’ve been making a lot of significant changes to help the way users play and experience Danger Alliance. Our next release introduces a new game mode to address player feedback but it also contains so much more including many feature requests and some amazing performance boosts.
First, the game mode. I don’t want to give too much away but here’s the user feedback we’re addressing:
* AI Think Time : For some, the idea of waiting a few seconds for the computer to think is a bit tiresome – even if the AI does do an excellent job. Because Skirmish games pit you against an even team with the abilities to do everything you can, the AI problem is more than 100 times more complex than other game modes! So for those who want a zippy computer opponent a new game mode gives you more opponents to fight against with each one taking only a tiny fraction of time to think.
* More Soldier types! : The soldiers in the game provide a wide variety of skills and abilities to produce many different teams to suit play styles, but there are still many more soldiers and weapons up our sleeves. Our next update introduces an upgrade for the Captain to give him Dual Pistols – perfect for the new enemies that are also making a debut.
* Pickups : to add an extra tactical consideration, the new mode also introduces collectable items for the first time with medkits scattered around the levels. Do you keep your guns blazing from a safe vantage point or venture out for the extra health? You decide!
* Save whenever you want : To make sure saving was out of the player’s mind, we made the game save automatically at the start of each turn but what if you wanted to quit the game while half way through a turn? Well, now you can save your game from the in game menu – and restore at a later time. We’ve also made the saving more robust so go us!
* Music, Sounds and feedback : In game music has been added and a whole bunch of sounds that were scheduled for inclusion have finally made it in. You’ll love the experience as the music swells and you hear your sniper flip out his dagger to make a swift hand to hand attack.
* Star ratings : In a move towards game centre achievements, each level will now get a star rating to see how well you did. Keep blasting those enemies to achieve the illusive five star rating on hard.
Finally, there are some important Game Engine fixes that should have you salivating.
In a few shorts weeks, all the things above along with everything related to a whole new game mode should have been more than enough to keep us busy. But we’ve pushed the envelope yet again and brought some exciting stuff to give you the best experience.
* iOS 5 support : A few users were experiencing very low frame rates in iOS 5. I’ve found the issue, fixed it up, and I’ve also trimmed the fat around some of the other time critical parts. All in all, the performance will see a massive boost in performance on iOS 5
* Massive framerate increase : apart from iOS 5 issue, iOS 4 was smooth but not silky smooth. I’ve made many fixes and you’ll see enormous frame rate boosts here too, especially for the earlier devices – so get ready for that.
* Reduced memory footprint : In the quest for Retina on iPod Touch devices, and for faster load times, the memory has been analysed and I’ve been chipping away at any excesses I can find. While not quite there yet, we’re getting ever closer to fitting into the iPod Touch memory with retina graphics.
So there you have it, a massive update. And stay tuned for more details and screenshots from our new game mode :)
