We've all played overhead shooters where your a ship flying along a constantly vertical scrolling screen (ie, Raiden or The Gama Project). Other ships fly down from the top and you blow them up. My question is how do I make a ship creation system for the enemies that fly down? I want the enemy ships to be able to arrive in formation and have movement patterns. I've tried to create a scripted system based off of timers but that just doesn't work. Especially if I want to have a mini-boss in the middle of the level.
This way i dont have to make a massive level with the enemies already placed and can just work with a small level size with a virtually moving background.
Make groups of events with formations, like wave 1:
plane1 x = 10 y = 20
plane2 x = 20 y = 30
etc..
that way you can setup a formation, deactivate these
groups at start.
And whenever you need a wave, activate a group,
say timer triggerd, or distance triggerd.
Oh and in addation, do not make all te wave pre,
but just make 's'- and 'v'-type formations (and more)
and then call them (activate group) when you need them.
That should do the trick.
Be sure to create them out of sight and let them move forward.