Game link: https://ecse-csds290.itch.io/team9-s2025
Trailer video: https://youtu.be/e8B69nNBfKg
Devour the Earth is a Space Invaders-inspired shooter built in Unity that focuses on persistent progression through failure. Players control disposable hive mind entities, assimilating enemy ships across runs to overwhelm an escalating planetary defense system gradually.
In Devour the Earth, each run (invasion) is a single, expendable hive mind entity attempting to break through Earth's defenses. Individual entities are inherently weak, so failure is expected. The primary objective during an invasion is to damage the Earth by firing at it while surviving waves of defending ships. Earth's health is represented by a global HP bar.
During each invasion, enemy ships, when destroyed, occasionally drop fragments, which can be collected and sent back to the hive mind base. These fragments are assimilated between invasions and converted into minions that persist across runs.
Before starting a new invasion, players can drag assimilated minions into a radar-like area. These minions will be deployed in the invasion to assist the next hive mind entity during combat. Once destroyed, minions are removed from the Hub to encourage experimentation and risk management.
Earth's defenses escalate based on remaining HP. Every 25% reduction, including the start, introduces a new enemy type:
Standard projectile-based units (with two variants).
High-speed, homing units that self-destruct on contact.
Area-control units that shoot electrical orbs, stunning any entities they hit.
Precision-based units that charge high-damage laser attacks.
(The gif does not represent the true damage of the enemies, as the player's health is increased by 3 - 4 times for recording purposes)
Different minion types require different player inputs to activate their abilities. Basic and Electric minions fire using the player shooting input (left mouse click), Kamikaze enemies launch when the '1' key is pressed, and Laser enemies charge while holding the spacebar and fire upon release.
This input differentiation gives each minion type a distinct tactical role and forces players to make active decisions during combat.
Due to a WebGL limitation, the electric enemy's orb VFX does not render correctly on itch.io. Hence, the Windows executable is recommended.
- Designed a fail-to-win progression system, centered around the assimilation mechanic
- Implemented acceleration-based movement to achieve smooth yet slippery controls, inspired by DawnosaurDev's player movement concepts, independently implemented and adapted vector-based, top-down space movement.
- Balanced player, minion, and enemy strengths to maintain a consistent difficulty
- Built a state-based enemy AI system that idles around the Earth and chases or attacks players and minions accordingly
- Learned that the hierarchical enemy/minion class structure (base entity => enemy/minion => specific types) significantly simplifies logic flow
- @nirow1010 - custom player movement design, entity class hierarchy, and enemy/minion ability design & implementation (including particles and VFX)
- @Aisuirocellist - main theme composition, sound effects, menu UI, and CONTROLS scene
- @James-275 - assimilation system, enemy AI & pathfinding, and minion auto-targeting
- @TheSpoon7784 - enemy/minion sprites, health bars, and enemy spawn design
Each member contributed support across other areas as needed, as well as to the game documentation and core concept.
- Foozle - Itch.io - Void ship collection
- JIK-A-4. Itch.io - Space Pixel Art Asset Pack
- Deep-Fold - Itch.io - Pixel Space Background Generator
- BDragon1727 - Itch.io - Basic Pixel Health bar and Scroll bar
- Unity Technologies - Unity Asset Store - Particle Pack | VFX Particles
- DawnosaurDev - Github - platformer movement