🥊 Knockout Combos + Smarter Enemy Waves: Behind the Scenes – Dev Log + Production Diary Notes

🥊 Knockout Combos + Smarter Enemy Waves: Behind the Scenes – Dev Log

Ever wondered how Ka-Pow! City knows exactly where you are in your combo sequence or why the enemies seem to move and track you so smoothly compared to earlier prototypes? Let our lead programmer Lance Dean and associate programmer Tahnee Worland shed some light!

⚡ Combo A-Go-Go

In the first two iterations of Ka-Pow! City, the player only had a standard attack and a special attack. But what kind of beat ‘em-up would that be without a combo attack system?

Here’s how Lance brought Neon Striker’s combos to life:

Neon Striker’s combo system keeps track of not only the nearest enemy to you, but also which body part has executed a hit. The character sprite has colliders attached to certain body components, which have correlating animations to create different attack states;

• Attack 1: First hit in the combo, duration 0.5 seconds. Attacking again within this window queues Attack 2.
• Attack 2: Second hit, duration 0.45 seconds. Attacking again queues Attack 3.
• Attack 3: Third hit, duration 0.4 seconds. Attacking again queues Attack 4.
• Attack 4: Fourth and final hit, duration 0.5 seconds.

💡 Programming hint: Each attack has the colliders enabled and disabled independently, so damage is only applied when an attack is active. This ensures enemies are hit only at the right moment. How’s that for some programming wizardry!

👾 Enemies… are Smarter!

Enemies feel smoother and smarter thanks to Unity’s AI NavMesh system.

Previously, enemies were hard-coded to follow the player’s transform. This caused glitches, such as enemies getting stuck or losing the player if they jumped onto objects.

💬 Tahnee:

“Initially, we focused on the core game loop. Enemies were just hard-coded to find the player and deal damage. Playtesting showed us we needed smarter movement, so we integrated AI via Unity’s NavMesh system.”

The update required minor scripting tweaks for movement and damage handling. Each level now has its own NavMesh component, which allows enemies to navigate the environment intelligently.

🚇 Subway Level Challenges: Platforms were slightly higher than the tracks, causing AI to get stuck. The team fixed this by adjusting Humanoid Model settings in the NavMesh Agent. After some trial and error, enemies now move seamlessly across platforms and tracks.

👀 Wrapping Up

Thanks to the combo system and AI NavMesh integration, combat feels smoother, more dynamic, and challenging. Neon Striker’s attacks flow naturally, while enemies respond intelligently…making every encounter a true beat ‘em-up thrill.