We observed a lot of people play Lifeless Vanguard and noticed that some wanted to get straight to the action, rather than go through the slow and steady progression in the 9 levels leading to the final boss fight.
That’s exactly what the endless mode is all about.
Face the most powerful enemies in the game a few seconds into your run. Handle the chaos and survive as long as you can. Rip and Tear!
This might sound intimidating, but it is all about having fun right away.
You’ll immediately start at a high XP level, giving your main gun a significant boost right from the start.
You’ll have plenty of opportunities to use super weapons and consume health packs.
Furthermore, we have a new toy for you: the Rocket Launcher!
Rockets are quite effective at dealing with large groups of enemies. Just don’t forget that you’re still a vulnerable little spaceship, don’t let the frenzy distract you from protecting your hitbox.
The endless mode is also a great opportunity for practice. You can always get back to the classic mode afterward and try taking down the mothership.
To celebrate the release of the 1.4 version, we remade the gameplay trailer and created some new art for the store page.
Please find the detailed release notes below.
Gameplay
- Added a new game mode: Endless. With a separate local score and Steam leaderboard.
- Added a new super weapon: the rocket launcher.
- Reduced shooting angle of Level 4+ machinegun bullets from 35 to 15 degrees. This narrower shooting angle gives much more control over the main gun.
- Changed player max move speed from 8 to 9. This makes the playable ship move a little faster while still maintaining the accuracy of movement of a bullet-hell shooter.
- Some enemies now have a 10% chance to drop a super weapon.
Music
- Composed two original soundtracks for the endless mode.
Optimization
- Enemies do not consume as much processing power as they did previously since we removed an old component from the AI code and replaced it with a simpler component.
UI, Graphics and Sound Effects
- Better bomb reloading (radial) bar
- Better score and score multiplier HUD
- Better explosion visual effect and more varied explosion sounds.
Other
- Added an option to toggle visibility of the HUD.
- Fixed typo: now displaying “Plasma Cannon” instead of “Plasma Canon” when picking up the plasma cannon.
- New title screen.