This marks the first devlog for Radio Horror Show, my upcoming 2D point-and-click ghost hunting game! Inspired by games such as the Five Nights At Freddy's and I'm On Observation Duty series, this game aims to bring you an arcade-like challenge with a spooky atmosphere. But what does that entail?

The game's maps each have a solid layout, but the behavior of the diverse cast of enemies has some randomness to it to keep each playthrough fresh. You'll need to learn how to quickly find the spirits you want to collect, and how to avoid the ones that want you dead.

Additionally, you'll be scored on how fast you complete your mission, as well as how well you manage your resources - namely, your psyche and your flashlight battery. If either of those run out, things will start to look dire very quickly.

The main tool in your arsenal is your Multi-Rad - a three-mode radio device geared towards paranormal investigators like yourself. Its modes are:

• EMF Mode - Scan for the electromagnetic frequency of the immediate area. Finding a "Severe" spike is your best bet of finding where a spirit is hiding! Be patient - it ambiently fluctuates due to constant interference, so your readings may take a moment to become accurate.
• Frequency Mode - All radio waves are nonfunctional inside of Void's influence, but this works to your advantage. Tune the frequency to find which the spirits will respond to, and then use that to draw them out of hiding!
• Stat Mode - A basic overview of your current psyche, the spirits found in the current level, and how long your mission has lasted.

Using this radio to reveal a spirit, you can then use your flashlight to clear out the spirit and allow it to move on. Spirits come with a variety of movement patterns, some more difficult to catch than others. With enough light kept on it while it's trying to flee, it will be able to escape the darkness!

Once all the necessary spirits are cleared out, your mission is done and the ritual tethering the hostile entities to the location will end, allowing Void to move on as well.

Beware, though - some of those entities have other plans... You'll need to watch when you use your equipment. Having your light on allows you to see where you're going, but may also attract unwanted attention - but having it off and being surrounded by raw darkness isn't good for your psyche. Using your radio is important for finding spirits, but some hostiles may also try to reach you through it.

Currently, there's 7 implemented enemies, not including the Spirits or their movement pattern variants, with a total of 10 planned for the demo release - they'll gradually be introduced and get more agitated the further into the mission that you get, from calm to chaos! Each has a unique function, as well as their own ultimatum of what to do if they're the ones to reap your unfortunate soul.

The aggression of the entities goes up with each spirit you clear out, and the amount of spirits you need to clear out as well as the entities' base aggression depends on your chosen difficulty.

I hope that this gives good insight into the project and the game itself! All basic mechanics are pretty well implemented, so it's mainly about making each enemy well-crafted, functional, polished, and work well in whatever combos they may end up involved in. Development of the game is going smoothly and is on track for the demo release in October! 

That's all from me for now. I'll be hopefully making posts like this, and about more in-depth looks at individual things in the game, pretty regularly to show off what I've got done and what's left to go, so keep an eye out!

~ Tatters