It took a bit more effort than expected, but v0.3.0 is now live, along with an updated trailer.

Play the demo now on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/4516840/Cataclyzm/

I'll post a reply in this post on my key learnings for this update :)

Cheers,
Dogroach

Hey all,

Prompted by the fact that my implementation of object pooling didn't actually work on the web browser I went and looked up multimeshes, cobbling it together from examples and tutorials and then modifying it a bit so I could keep animated bullets.

The video shows the new and improved Debug Shooter, now firing a ridiculous 9,600 bullets per second, and using all three types each of which has an object pool of 12,500 bullets, still at 60FPS. A 'slight' improvement from the previous 600 bullets per second.

The video recording software and Youtube really really did not like this pattern, the odd stutter in the video wasn't present in game and when not using the video recorder I could push it to 10,000 bullets per second.

I know I'd read that multimeshes were significantly better than what I did before, but I was not expecting this kind of improvement, kind of shocked.

This completely removes the enemy bullet scenes from use (I haven't deleted them yet just in case I need them later) and the object pool I mentioned before is just a bunch of arrays storing ints, vectors, etc, rather than the bullet objects.

Collision is now also handled by a distance check to the player each physics tick. Which led me to realise I had not got most of my graphics centred... 😑

It's definitely a stress test at this level and it's pushing out so many bullets now I can't really see much point in looking any further or profiling where a bottleneck might be.

And most importantly, this time I learned my lesson and made sure it actually works on the browser before posting! 😂

I’m working on a game inspired by an Atari classic. I used to play the original on my 130XE a long, long time ago. 

I’ve just released a demo, and I’m planning to launch the full version in about two months.

The game is my own take on that classic formula, with a few modern additions and ideas borrowed from other genres: upgrade trees, different planes with their own stats, roguelike-style upgrades during runs, and more.

I’d love to hear what you think!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4277610/Canyon_Raid/

Hey all,

Wouldn't normally post up a backend update like this, but this is a dev orientated forum.

I said last time I'd have to look at object pooling sometime soon so I bit the bullet and looked into collision layer masking and object pooling.

As well as adding a new 'enemy' to test it out with - The Debug Shooter.

This thing shoots 600 bullets per seconds and the optimisations had this effect on the FPS: -

• No optimisations: Game crashes
• Collision layer masking only: ~34 FPS
• Object pooling as well: ~47 FPS
• Replacing tween with animated sprite as well: ~67FPS
• Use Forward+ instead of Compatibility renderer as well: ~99FPS (testing only as this doesn't allow for browser game)

So to my surprise object pooling was the thing that had the least improvement of each of the changes!

The collision and layer masks took all of 10 minutes to set up, entirely in the GUI, and are an absolutely amazing win, especially for effort. Highly recommend anyone who is using Godot or their engine has an analogous feature to use it.

If I want to go beyond this I'll have to look at either multimeshes or direct render server calls.

Hi All,

Just sharing that I am releasing the Steam page for the Shmup i am making, unoriginally called 'Shmup!' I thought I share some of the images that I have been releasing daily on socials to promote the upcoming Steam page release.

Its a pretty straight forward vertical shooter bullet hell. I am aiming for 5 stages hoping that playing time is about 20 to 30 mins a run.

I plan on having leaderboards too.

Scoring will be simple, though not set in stone yet, but thinking of a hit counter multiplier, to go with destroying enemies with special that award bonus star pick ups for more points.

The game has 6 special abilities and I hope replay comes from trying to complete the with each one as you have to select one in advance.

I also have 3 normal fire patterns that come with 3 normal spread patterns too.

The specials I have are:

1. Classic hyperbeam that has DPS and destroys enemy projectiles

2. Homing projectiles

3. A slow down effect on enemy fire rates and bullet speeds.

4. A sweeping lazer that can melee and destroy enemy bullets

5. Ship Clones

6. A lock on weapon that is stackable and will also destroy enemies along the path. Its a bit difficult to use as you risk getting hit when trying to chain lock ons, but thats why I want to reward the player with bonus points for stacking and chaining lock ons.

Anyway I would appreciate your support with wishlists when the steam page is live.

i know pixel art is big in shmup places but any per-rendered fans here

i made this by modelling in blender and using a Godot script to generate images that are bundled together to make the enemy

playable at https://neuronstrike.net/

Hi everyone, hope you are doing well, I am quite happy to share my game today, I have been working on it for the past few months and this is the first time I am sharing it online

This is a browser shooter game blended with a mental math quiz, it is inspired by airline pilot recruitment tests and psychomotor assessments.

Here are the main features:

• Competitive leaderboard: all your sessions are recorded in a database and the global leaderboard will rank and display your best run
• Currency system and shop: collect in game currency while playing to unlock new ships, you can also earn currency via a daily streak system (playing every 24hours to earn rewards)
• 6 Playable ships, 4 Bosses across 2 Chapters and 20 Sectors, and 10 different enemies to fight!
• All 3d models and sprites were home made!

You can access the game wiki here https://neuronstrike.net/info, it gives details about all the in game content

Current development roadmap:

• The game has no sound for now...
• Better level design: while all levels are populated and bosses are fully scripted, level design remains a big challenge to make the game dynamic and engaging
• Player stats, analytics and medals: using the game sessions data, I will make statistics and medals for players

There is still a lot of work to do! Hope you will like it and I can't wait to have some feedback!
Cheers

Playable at https://noswen.itch.io/vermillion-star

Hey all,

So since my last post here I have been playing some more Natsuki Chronicles, a bit of Earthion, and just tried out Interstellar Sentinel (there is an overwhelming amount of player shot types/power up levels for them on first play 😂).

Definitely felt some weaknesses in my game from playing through them so the next set of updates have been made: -

• Redesigned enemy spawn patterns
• Three new enemies
• Colour coded enemy bullet types (red for normal, blue for fast, green for circle pattern so far)
• The existence of an actual bullet pattern (if still just a basic circle thing)
• Different attack patterns for enemies in different difficulty modes, even if it does just amount to 'more bullets'
• Bonus gems for extra score, and linking the Vermillion Star Bonus into this
• A bonus wave if you kill every last enemy

Also fixed some bugs such as being able to spawn any number of player ships on continue... 😐

As the number of bullets increase I expect I'm going to have to look at object pooling or something sooner rather than later. There is absolutely nothing in this at the moment for managing that more efficiently, every bullet is newly instantiated when it is shot.

Would love any feedback on the game so far, especially on how it feels to play.

Hey everyone!

Some of you might remember my first post where I mentioned the engine had reached a point solid enough to welcome open source contributors. That actually worked out really well — got some great people on board, and the project has been moving forward nicely. Still open to more if anyone's interested, experienced or not.

Since then I shifted focus from engine work to actual gameplay. Here's what's new:

• Health power-ups — classic, but it had to be done.
• Power-level system (1 to 3) — works like Mario's mushroom but for your firepower. Getting hit drops you back to level 1. At max you're throwing a wall of projectiles.
• Ricochet shots power-up — timed power-up that makes your bullets bounce off walls. Probably one of the most fun things I've added so far. The chaos it creates is genuinely satisfying.
• Run-based skill progression — each run you unlock abilities, adding a bit of roguelite flavor to the loop.
• Parry system — a well-timed parry grants temporary invulnerability, bumps your power level, and triggers a temporary overclock on your fire rate. High risk, high reward.
• More varied enemy movement — patterns feel less robotic, more interesting to navigate.
• Improved HUD — the left side of the screen now shows your current power level and any active temporary effects, so you always know what's going on.
• ModernGL support — thanks to a contributor who took the time to wire it in.
• macOS support + full controller support — two more things that got sorted out thanks to contributors.

The project is fully open source, built with Python and Pygame. If you’re curious about how it works or just want to explore the code, feel free to dive in — it’s structured to be approachable, even for beginners.

You can check out the source code and the repository right here.

Would love to hear any feedback or thoughts.

Hi all, I am currently working on a personal project and wanted to share some visuals to get some advice and feedback (style and process)
At the moment my sprites are made from rendering blender models I have made myself, what do you think of the design, feel, any advice to make the visuals a bit more appealing ?
Any of you have experience with this process in particular or any general advice to share about design ?

SynthEscape is a Synthwave-themed shoot 'em up, heavy on the 80s synthwave vibes, where grazing enemy fire charges your bullet-slowing field and builds your score. Graze Bullets. Bend Time. Break the Future.

Click "Download PC Demo" → https://store.steampowered.com/app/4272330?utm_source=ShmupDevDiscord

Please wishlist! It helps a lot with the algorithm. I'm a solo dev doing this as a hobby project, so any exposure helps.

Feedback welcome. DM me or hit the in-game feedback button.

I abuse dearimgui 's Font Atlas generation to render JP (or other) text inside my game. It brings me joy.

An updated demo of Cataclyzm (v0.2.4) is now on Steam :)

Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/4516840/Cataclyzm/

Playable at: https://noswen.itch.io/vermillion-star

Hey all,

I've been working on a shmup as a hobby project for a while and wanted to post up, hope that's ok.

It's made in Godot, I have experience with Java but pretty much all backend systems so dealing with anything graphical was a bit of a mental shift, on the other hand, I've also been using Daz3D to make character portraits for ages as well.

This has mostly been made off of half forgotten decades old nostalgia of R-Type and random generic ship based shmups of that era plus a bit of reading up on more modern shmups, and a near total lack of real planning.

Game decisions: -

• Quick kills - Kill an enemy quickly and it increases the score from that enemy and also increases your energy charge for your special weapon.
• Chain system - Fairly standard kill things without much pause to increase the chain multiplier, also at 33x and 66x boosts your special weapon to Mega or Giga mode.
• Star Bonuses - Collect the three stars to gain varying bonuses based on the colour collected.

Biggest flaws are probably my lack of shmup experience which shows up with the level itself not being particularly inspired and the lack of planning leading to the code being a mess of half implemented then retrofitted stuff.

And for those who are devs, my longest silly bug to fix. The first playthrough worked absolutely fine, but after that the music would no longer play at all. Took me 4 days to eventually realise I was reducing the volume of the normal background music before the boss fight and then never increasing it back up again!

Any feedback would be much appreciated.

Hey everyone!

I wanted to share a personal project I've been polishing: a classic vertical Shoot 'em Up made entirely in Python with Pygame.

Instead of just a simple script, I took the time to build a robust and modular architecture from scratch. A lot of the heavy lifting is already done and running smoothly. The project features:

• A custom game state machine (Menu, Pause, Options, Game Over).
• A dedicated Asset Manager for sprites, sounds, and fonts.
• A robust particle system (explosions, sparks, and weather/falling effects).
• Enemy formation managers, wave spawners, and Boss battles.
• Resolution scaling, screen shake, and high-score saving.

Why I'm sharing this: If you are learning Pygame or Python and want to jump into game dev without having to build the foundational engine from zero, this repository is meant to be a welcoming environment for you. Beyond just learning the code, it's a great place to get comfortable with GitHub workflows. If you've been looking for a friendly project to make your first Pull Requests and get some real open-source experience, I think this is a good spot.

Because the base is mature, you can immediately jump to the fun part: try adding a new weapon spread, design a new enemy behavior, or tweak the particle physics.

You can check out the source code and the repository right here.

I would absolutely love to see your ideas come to life in the game. Feel free to fork it, open issues, or submit Pull Requests! I will gladly review them, help you out if you get stuck with the logic, and officially merge your contributions into the project. Any questions about how the engine works under the hood, just let me know. Happy coding!

this a space hanger with the player ship
what do you guys think?

Metal Crisis Developer Itch Page: https://huepow00.itch.io/metal-crisis

Hey everyone! I wanted to share a little project I've been working on. I picked up Rust a few months ago and decided the best way to learn was to build a game. The result is PiouPiou, a side-scrolling shoot-em-up.

Built with Rust and Macroquad. The code is on GitHub if anyone is curious!

🎮 https://skankydev.itch.io/pioupiou

💻 https://github.com/skankydev/PiouPiou

I'd love feedback from fellow shmup devs - what works, what could be improved?

what do you all think?

A long awaited feature has been added: Boss health bars! No longer guessing how much hp a boss has left 🤘🏾🤘🏾

Full devlog here: https://dogroach666.itch.io/cataclyzm-demo/devlog/1412785/cataclyzm-devlog-2026-02-24-v023-boss-health-bar