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Cavadius

The Official home of the vertical space shoot'em-up                   

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Introduction

What's New

16th December 2012

GS - This project have been put on permanent hold and will no longer be updated.

25th February 2012

GS - Project still cancelled, I just thought I would update the section to the new site wide style, no new content.

11th October 2008

GS - I've had no contact from Fortemp3 for almost a year, I would now say that this project is now dead and will no longer be updated.

20th April 2008

GS - Updated the look of the site with a new comic book style logo, various colour changes and other little things here and there.

I think the new one looks very sharp and clear.

Original Logo

Cavadius Logo Old

New Logo

Cavadius Logo

26th May 2007

GS - I've updated the email form and generally cleaned up the site code.

1st May 2006 (We're just pining for the fjords! LOOK AT THE PLUMAGE!)

I would like to apologize for the lack of updates, those responsible have been sacked... Okay, no they haven't, because I would be sacking myself.

Seriously though, finals, work, and a lot of other things have, I admit, slowed Cavadius down, as has the fact I am now working on a new project.

However, for the record, this project is directly related to Cavadius, and when it's done, the development of Cavadius itself may very well speed up.

The project is what will end up being an open source set of scripts for GameMaker, called bulletGameMakerLanguage (or bulletGML for short... Get it?), bulletGML is going to hopefully make bullet pattern creation and difficulty adjustment involving them a WHOLE LOT EASIER.

This means Easy Mode will be easier, Hard Mode will be harder, etc. Once finals are over, I intend to continue work on bulletGML and once bulletGML is functional enough, it will be incorporated into Cavadius.

At that point, I plan to try and finish Stages 2 and 3, adjusting things as needed due to the use of the new bullet system.

Overall though, I'll say this... Come the end of finals, things should be looking up, I hope. I apologize again for this horrendously overdue update.

Those who are still following Project Cavadius? Thank you for your continued loyalty.

1st February 2006 (Better late than never, right?)

Well folks, it's good news, bad news time. The good news? Cavadius is FAR FROM DEAD. ...The bad news? Progress is quite slow. But a bit more good news, I've FINALLY had some time in real life to work on Stage 2 somewhat.

While it isn't done, a good portion of it has been started. It introduces a few new enemies, and a miniboss to make things interesting.

Ah yes, new screenshots are now available showing Stages 1 and 2. Take a look!

31st August 2005 (IT'S NEW!)

Well, I made a promise, and damnit, I'm keeping it. After a long delay, Cavadius Trial Version 0.90 is finally out. The changes are as follows

Expect to see more time between these new releases though, as I'm now going to be focusing less on the engine, as it's more or less done at the moment (except for the Weapon Edit feature and Edit Weapons themselves) and more on stages, enemies, and of course, bosses. I've been looking over what I have, and some of the enemies just aren't manic enough, like the Mini Cores, as they only perform their pattern once and leave. Anyway, my priority will be on enemies and bosses. As I begin to improve them, I'll also be working on later stages.  Internet Ranking is on hold for indefinite periods until I find a way to get it working properly.

A slight bugfix release of V.90 will probably be out later once I figure out how to deal with some minor issues in the visual effects/particles I'm using at the moment. These bugs shouldn't cause gameplay issues, however, as they're cosmetic/visual bugs, not gameplay ones. Gameplay wise, the game should work just fine.

6th August 2005 (Not dead yet folks!)

Wow, it's been way too long since my last update folks, and for that, I sincerely apologize. Rest assured, Cavadius is NOT dead. It's going slow, I admit...Blame this on the fact I now have to juggle my personal life, a job, and developing this game. However, the good news is that I have made progress, and Stage 1 is almost ready for a public release. Big Core MkI Kai has been tweaked a bit, and should be a much more feasible boss (though right now, I think he's too easy...Four options will kill this guy in seconds!)

This also means that I should be able to hopefully get to work on future stages, though I still have to code a few things to make them behave properly...For one, I need to make it so that Options carry over (This should be easy though) not to mention I'm going to see if I can't come up with a smoother transition, but that's on the maybe list.

A new scoring feature will be available in the next public release, which I call the Gauge Multiplier. Basically, this system will reward players who collect, but do not actually use their capsules. For every rollover of the gauge (going from ? to S) you will have a multiplier added to your combos. It starts at 1X, and on your first Gauge Multiplier/Rollover, it becomes 2X. Continuous rollovers add 1X to the multiplier, meaning those who can go without powering up will get some INSANE scores (Seeing as you get over 10K per hit after 110, multiply this by 2X or 3X, and that alone is pretty sick..). However, there are some catches to this system...

Currently, the multiplier displays under your combo bonus, so it looks something like this...

10 HIT
+100
1X
[=====]
(Take note that the +Points part only displays your 1X bonus, so if you had a 2X, it would still say +100, not +200)

If anyone can think of a better layout for the combo display, feel free to share!

While I'd hoped to have internet ranking available for the upcoming release, problems have prevented this from happening. While I can't ensure I'll find a solution in the near future, know that I'll do my best to have it available before the final release (which probably is going to be awhile)

Finally, a potential help wanted message:While I've done some okay bullet patterns, I wouldn't be against some assistance from the community. Drop me an e-mail or PM on the forums if you're interested in helping with designing some of the enemy/boss attacks, or tweaking what I've come up with. I'll give details of what bosses I plan to use, and what kinds of 'themes' I'm looking for.

Whew, this was an overdue update...Anyway, can't say much else, my shift starts in three hours!

ForteMP3

16th June 2005

Just another development update for today folks, and I am incredibly, INCREDIBLY sorry about the lack of updates. While I've been trying my best on this project, work is still going slow. Rest assured I have NO intentions of abandoning this project, considering it's already developed a fanbase. However, it may be on a brief hiatus for awhile, due to a personal tragedy. I'm afraid one of my friends recently passed away in an accident, and I'm attending his funeral tomorrow.

On a somewhat lighter note, progress on Stage 1 has been made. Screenshots should be up sometime after you read this post. While enemy layouts and such need some tweaking, and some changes may be made to the background, this stage is coming along fairly nicely. Stage 1 will be a fairly easy stage with good chances to practice your Combos, as most of the enemies will be of the 'Fodder' variety (Green types that only fire one bullet, instead of clumps and spreads and the like).  The boss is undergoing some tweaking, and still needs difficulty settings added. However, for those who watched the Test Video of Big Core MkI Kai, here's the changes you can expect from that:

On easy, the random small bullets will not be fired. Only a single spread of bullets will be fired to each side, and the big blue lasers will not be a 3 way, and instead only the classic 4 forward beams of a Big Core will be fired. Less bullets will be in the "Big U" spread fired right before a pattern loops. A delay will be added to the Core's attacks, so you have more time to shoot it between its patterns. Oh, and the needle sweep will only fire every other shot, as opposed to what you saw in the video.

On normal, things will be the same as you saw in the video, but with a brief delay between attacks (Shorter than the one on easy) so that you have a chance to land hits. All other attacks will likely remain the same, with the exception of the random bullets, which will slightly decrease in their rate of fire so that it's easier to dodge the needle sweep.

Hard mode will be like what you saw in the test video:No delays between attacks, meaning you have to combine dodging and shooting into one tactic, instead of waiting for easy openings. The random bullets will fire faster and more often as well. All other attacks will remain unaltered.

As for enemy types, I'm still working on various new kinds to add to variety. While they won't appear in Stage 1, here's some upcoming enemy ideas you can expect to see later down the road:

While I'm still debating some outside help for a soundtrack, or possibly a secondary soundtrack (A-La Raiden DX on the PSOne) the current soundtrack which uses a variety of Gradius tunes has been decided on. The tracklist is below:

18th May 2005

ForteMP3-No new demo yet, but I do have a test video I've already sent to some advisors. It's a .wmv of the current first boss candidate, Big Core MkI Kai (You'd know him from Nemesis 90 Kai). I may tone down some attacks on this one, but it seems fairly dodgable, and somewhat fair for a first boss, but I figured I should let the audience have some say too. Check downloads for the test video. Oh, and sorry about the bad screen ratio, it's the compressing program's fault...I need to get a real video program on this computer of mine...

16th May 2005

ForteMP3-Terribly sorry about the lack of updates folks. It was a crazy couple of weeks due to college finals. Once I get back to a normal routine at home, I should be updating more often. For those who are curious, I'm currently working on the boss for Stage 1, and I will probably do the stage once I have the boss working in a manner that fits a first stage boss battle.

26th April 2005

GS - Uploaded the new logo and then changed it a bit (I hope you like it), added some screenshots to that section.

ForteMP3 - Much thanks to GameStone for helping me with improving the website. I never was much of a web designer. x.x;

Seriously though folks, today we've got a treat. Cavadius Trial Version 0.85! And I think you'll all like what's new this time!

See the download page for details.

21st April 2005

GS - Updated the site layout and cleaned up all the website code (should be easier to update now). Made the pages more consistent.

21st April 2005

Cavadius Trial Version 0.8 uploaded, several bugs fixed

Official Cavadius Forum opened

Downloads page opened

Credits page opened

20th April 2005

Site Open (Sort of...)

 

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