Neo Junk City - Shoot Outs Updated! (Patreon)

Inspired by old light gun games, Hogan's Alley, Wild Gunmen. We wanted to spice up encounters. Battles and boss fights in point and clicks, in my opinion, have usually been the weaker parts of those games. But if you add anything too complex, you risk overwhelming the player.

My solution is Shoot Outs! Simple point and click battles. Take out a gaggle of foes in a fast-paced but easy to understand segment.

So I made this mock-up, where I was really trying to employ the art style of the inspiration, Hogan's Alley. Simple NES style graphics and solid colors. And while it looked okay, it felt underwhelming in motion.

So, I overhauled the location and decided to bring it in line with the visual style of the rest of the game. And the glow up was immediate. It is more work, but the results are worth it.

Our First Foe!

The Walker bot. Not to be confused with Walkbot (Nefarious). These clunky old junkers are leftovers worker bots that have been repurposed to defend gang territory. Simple, and straight forward.

They serve to ease the player into the basics of the gameplay. They are stationary, only appear in doors and windows. They fire from their eyeball, so a player needs to only continuously fire on their big dumb heads to safely blast them down without taking damage.

But then what happens once a slight complication is introduced? A mobile enemy, suddenly you can't only focus on the stationary ones. But this guy isn't implemented yet, but he will be by next monday!

-Josh