BRKRX
There was a time in my life where I was really into autochess games. What interested me the most about the genre is the shop and upgrade mechanics, so I set out to apply those mechanics to another genre. BRKRX is the result of autochess, arkanoid, and JRPGs.
Enemies and Combat
In BRKRX players fire projectiles at enemies that are advancing toward them. In classic Arkanoid / Brick Breaker fashion, you are highly incentivized to make your projectiles bounce around behind enemies to hit them as many times as possible before the projectile makes its way back to the bottom of the board.
Enemies have all kinds of different behaviors. Some of them simply walk forward, some will fire projectiles at you, some split into multiple enemies when they die. Ultimately though, all enemies are trying to damage you in some way. The player takes damage when an enemy attacks them or when an enemy crosses the line at the bottom of the board.
Player and enemy actions are broken up into turns. The player shoots, and once all of their projectiles have returned to them or disappeared, their turn ends, and the enemy turn starts. Enemies will perform an action at the start of their turn if they have one, such as the green skeletons firing a projectile at the player, and then all enemies move in unison, stronger enemies spawn in, and then it’s back to the player.
After a certain number of turns the player gets to go to the shop where they can spend their gold to buy projectiles, skills, trinkets, and healing. Trinkets and skills are not implemented in the available build.
The Shop
If you are familiar with autochess you should already be familiar with these mechanics. The player spends gold to buy new units, or in this case, new projectiles. If a player buys 3 of the same projectile, it will upgrade and get stronger.
Players can also spend gold on re-rolls to try to get the projectiles they want, they can buy healing which will get more expensive with each purchase, and they can spend gold to upgrade the shop which makes more powerful projectiles appear for purchase. The upgrade portion was not implemented for this prototype.
If a player wants to buy a projectile but they don’t have enough gold to do so they can choose to lock the shop in its current state, which means it won’t reroll on their next visit, and they can buy the projectile at that point.
Projectiles and Formation
All projectiles have two values, damage and HP. The damage value is, as you may have guessed, the amount of damage it deals when hitting an enemy. The HP value of all projectiles gets added together, and gets added to the players base HP.
The type of projectile the player has is important, but its placement in the formation is often just as if not more important. Players can have up to 8 unique projectiles at a time, and they can rearrange the order in which these projectiles are fired. This order, or formation, is broken up into two categories. Vanguard, the first 4 projectiles, and Rearguard, the last 4 projectiles.
When a projectile is placed in Vanguard it gains an attack damage bonus. When placed in Rearguard it gains an HP bonus. Some projectiles get bigger benefits from being placed in a specific part of the formation, or even in a specific slot. Here are some examples.
Spearhead
Gains 10% * Level damage while in Vanguard.
Shieldbearer
Gains 20% * Level HP while in Rearguard.
Sheep
Copies the damage of the projectile in front of it.
Spotter
Increases the damage of the projectile in position 1 by 25% * Level.
Projectiles also gain various bonuses, apply status effects, and deal damage based on what they have collided with when fired. Here are some of the more complicated ones.
Link
Link together all enemies collided with this turn. Those enemies share damage done by this projectile.
Curse
Deal constant damage in an AoE around this projectile. Leveling up increases the frequency of damage dealt.
Ricochet
Gain 1 * 0.5 * Level damage for every collision made this turn.
Tinder
Catches on fire when colliding with a burned enemy. Applies burn to the next enemy it collides with.
Status Effects
As you may have gleaned from the previous section, projectiles can apply status effects to enemies. Usually there is a chance the status is applied, but in some cases (such as Tinder) status effects can be guaranteed, and this is the key to controlling the board.
I won’t list them all here for fear of this page becoming lists of things, but all of the classics are accounted for and basically behave as you’d expect. Burn will deal damage at the end of the enemies turn. Freeze prevents them from moving. Bleed makes and enemy take damage when moving, and increases with distance moved.
Stuff That Didn’t Make It Into This Prototype
Skills were additional actions the player could take on their turn such as applying burn to all enemies with a 50% success rate, healing themselves, shuffling the board, and many other effects.
Trinkets are items that grant more passive bonuses, usually more dramatic and beneficial than any one projectiles effects.
Bosses were the next big thing to add to really challenge the player, and to provide clear points of progression and roadblocks.
More projectiles, more enemies, more everything!