Balance

Alphas... they're so fast and dangerous. The ones you get to fight in the demo gave a nice idea of how dangerous these enemies are going to be throughout the game. But, as time later showed, the learning curve for their behavior was a little steep for the non-Metroid expert.

Right now I'm in the middle of a huge refactoring and rebalancing of every Metroid fight.
Since each Metroid has customized variables (to determine how it will behave), I had to change each and every object's creation event, having to locate each room with a Metroid and tweak the code in the room editor.
Now Metroids get their behavior via script, only providing their ID. This way I can visually change the way the agressiveness scales as the player advances in the game. Also, customizing behaviors for different difficulty levels is much easier now.

Besides that, I also added more movement variety into the Alphas and Gammas. Now they don't chase you all the time, they give you a little rest, and in early fights, they even put themselves in vulnerable positions. Some Alphas just hit you and retreat while avoiding your missiles. All of this makes the flying Metroids a lot more diverse, and of course testing and balancing is necesary for each fight.

Speaking of Alpha fights... The breeding grounds located in Area 2 were expanded a little bit. Fighting alphas in corridors works well enough, but doing so with Hi-Jump boots was a little tedious, hitting the ceiling  on each jump. Now the rooms are taller, and battles are more "vertical" too.

The music engine is finally working. I had to deal with some inconveniences, like having to do volume crossfades by hand (bass.dll did that automatically), and other minor workarounds.

And last but not least. The way you acess the Map, and switch to the Equipment and Log screens changed. Instead of cycling through each screen, now an on-screen prompt apears. Pressing a specific direction lets you acess each screen, with the addition of an Options screen. Once I get that one working, you'll be able to customize the game options (and controller configuration) without exiting to the main menu.

Yes, I know, the icons are a little minimalistic. But I think each option is pretty clear.

That's most of the progress this month. Nothing that can be shown in good looking screenshots, but features and tweaks that make the game much more complete and balanced.
By the way... the great people at Sepharos-Asks.net asked me for an interview. It was improvised, and my English is a little broken in some places, but it was a good experience. You can listen to it HERE.

As always, comments and suggestions are welcome.