Metal Slug: Tactics

Story
It's the year 2028. The world has been wartorn for years as the Regular and Rebellion army fight endlessly in a stalemate.

The Regular Army is a well-equipped, modern-day force run by various nations around the world. However, it lacks efficiency due to the widespread corruption within the senior-level chain of command. Other officials often deny the reports and recommendations given to them by intelligence officers. This often leads into intelligence failures that result in dramatic consequences.

The Rebellion, however, is comprised of various small yet organized militant groups, ranging from terrorists to splinter groups of military forces driven by a hunger for power. Their leader, Donald Morden, is an Ex-Vice Admiral of the Regular Army Marine Corps, and defected after an intelligence failure resulted in the death of his son. Sick of he politics that run the world, he is now on a mission to destroy them.

After multiple intelligence failures, the Regular army is almost destroyed, and their counter-attack thwarted after the Rebels siezed the newly developed 'Super Vehicle-001', also known as, the Metal Slug.

The Peregine Falcons and the Sparrows, both small special strike forces, unite to begin their greatest and most important mission: To save the world.

Characters

Marco Rossi
Major of the Peregine Falcons
Marco is the founder and leader of the Peregine Falcons.
Although cocky and sometimes arrogant, Marco quickly distinguished himself in the Regular army. He completes the mission at all costs.

Tarma Roving
Captain of the Peregine Falcons
Tarma is quiet and mostly keeps to himself, but on the battlefield he lets loose and becomes a fearless soldier, living up to his father's name.

Fio Germi
Sergeant 1st Class of the Sparrows
A mild-mannered young girl, forced into the military by her billionaire father, she quickly rose in ranks once demonstrating her innate combat skills.

Eri Kasamoto
Sergeant 2nd Class of the Sparrows
Abandoned at birth, Fio grew up on the streets, learning the hardships of the world first hand. Her invigorating, tom-boy personality and keen fighting sense make her one of the deadliest soldiers on the battlefield.

Gameplay
Features:

• 1-4 Players, each controlling one of the four main characters.
• Fight together (or solo) through action packed missions.
• Different difficulty levels based on the number of players.
• Unique Enemies and Bosses.
• Unique and multiple strategies for each enemy encounter.
• A multitude of weapons to defeat foes. From pistols and grenades, to rocket launchers and flame throwers.
• Control various vehicles with destructive powers. Metal Slugs, Slug Copters and more!

Features currently being considered:

• Randomly spawned enemies and enemy groups. A unique experience everytime you play.

1 - You have no idea how the military works. Don't pretend you do, I know you don't. Vice-Admiral of the army?
2 - You haven't given any details about camera angles, control methods, etc. etc. etc.
3 - Examples, examples, examples:
"Unique Enemies and Bosses.
Unique and multiple strategies for each enemy encounter."
Such as...?

In future armies can consist of spaceships, which have admiral and vice-admirals.
Sci-fi is weird like that.

Its then called a fleet, rather than an army.

Metal fucking Slug, man I love that.

That depends on a specific book and author :)

I'm sorry for the lack of information, I really wanted to post about it but was in a rush to go to work so didn't have a lot of time to go into total detail. The game is still near the end of it's conceptual stage and nearing the development process, so not everything is set in stone or totally thought out.

Morden was actually the Vice Admiral of the Regular Army Marine Corps, but I didn't think people would be so picky so I didn't mention that :P. I suppose I'll change that.

As for camera and controls, the camera will be above head, locked onto your character, you can move either by mouse or using the arrow keys. Enemies are attacked by left clicking them.

Some examples of weapons:
-Murder .50AE pistol
-HV-01 machine gun
-RK-02 rocket launcher
-FS-03 flamethrower
-SG-04 shotgun
-Stielhandgranate (German Stick Grenade)

Some examples of enemies:
Suicide Bombers
Grenadiers
Guerrillas
Metal Slugs
Slug Copters
etc..

I don't have any specific examples of bosses yet.

As for encounters, you may sneak up on a camp of sleeping enemies with a guard dog. Do you want to charge in guns blazing and kill all the enemies, silently kill the dog with the risk of waking the soldiers, or give the dog the piece of meat you found earlier in an enemy camp?

Most encounters will offer choices, and all choices will have their own rewards. Also, maps will have multiple paths to reach the end.

This game is going to be designed to be VERY challenging (much like the real Metal Slug games), and will take a lot of team work to win.

I hope that was a little more informative, sorry for not posting it with the original post :)

I really love this, is it being made and if so, how far are you?

Like I said, it's still very much in the conceptual stage with some basic things like the keyboard movement and attack system implemented.

For something set in the year 2028, I think it won't be a problem at all if someone has like "Vice 2nd in Command Commander in Chief of Special forces" considering it's metal slug, it's meant to be funny. Tanks can jump!!

Tanks can jump!!

Tanks can jump!!

It sounds to me like a basic "control one hero do stuff" map without much difference. Except for the illustration of a scenario that actually does offer many equally viable alternatives (but how will you tell the difference between sneakily killing the dog and not sneakily killing it?)

Can you explain the significance of using arrowkeys/leftclick control interface?

How exactly is teamwork integral? Forcing players to stick together out of neccessity is not teamwork. Having them require to do the right things at the right time together is since it requires communication and trust... but you will you achieve this?

Edit:
Tanks can jump!!
Tanks can jump!!

Encounters such as the one I posted will be unique based on what weapons you use, or what items you have (such as the meat). For the scenario I posted, to kill the dog without waking the soldiers would be sniping the dog from far away.

Well Metal Slug is a 2d Side-Scroller. It would be REALLY hard to duplicate that in Warcraft 3. So I'm just using the next best thing. I find using the keyboard to move and using mouse to attack easier than using the mouse to move and attack, so that's why I implemented it - Plus it gives it sort of the arcade feel from the real game.


As I said, the game is going to be VERY difficult, so without working together and killing enemies quick (and there will be lots of them), you're not going to last very long. Also there will be healing items that drop, you're going to have to use them on each other, not only yourself, if you hope to get very far.

As for communicating, there will be multiple paths in missions, so they will be forced to communicate which way they want to go. Also if someone has a sniper rifle, someone will need to speak up so they can set up an encounter to their advantage. (ie: Sniping the dog so that they get a surprise attack, which will have it's own benefits.

I don't see keyboard movement working, since that has unavoidable lag time. How is it working presently?

PS: Marines would have a vice-admiral, but they are Naval forces.

When the game says Army, I think they just mean military in general.

As for keyboard movement, it seems to be working pretty well. I've been playing around with movement speeds, and turn speeds for the units. Also, projectile speeds will be messed around with as to be avoidable and have room for movement lag.

Ive always wanted to see a metal slug, ive thought about doing it myself. But it would be hard to implement the gun/ammo system right, would you use wood/gold as the base system?

Or you can use items with like phoenix fire and remove them after x seconds.

I don't have the whole ammo system fleshed out but heres how I've been thinking of doing it:

All attacks are ability based, picking up a weapon disables your previous attack and enables the new one. Each item for the weapon will have a certain ammount of charges, a charge is taken away each time you attack. When you run out of charges, you lose the ability and just have the pistol ability again (which has unlimited shots).

Grenades are also going to be item based, but won't take away your ability to use your weapon.