Project Landsword
A downloadable game for Windows
The once peaceful surface of Mars has decayed into a violent battleground between arms corporations and Earthly governments.
To join the fight would be crazy. To survive would be downright psychotic.
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Landsword is a top-down mecha shooter with a heavy emphasis on destruction and gameplay that combines elements from classic shoot em' ups with contemporary action-stealth games.
Featuring fully destructible environments, players must use their wits and surroundings to outsmart and defeat enemies in combat, while still retaining an arcade feeling to its gameplay.
This early prototype demo currently includes five different missions with nine different weapons to choose from.
[ Landsword is a working title, final name subject to change. ]
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"D3DXCompile failed / Fatal Error in Vertex Shader Compilation"
Upon starting a mission, you may encounter an error screen that says a shader named shd_outline_old failed to compile. This error only occurs because your computer does not have DirectX9 or later, so please see if your DirectX driver is up to date or installed at all. You can download the driver patch directly from the Microsoft website. This will fix any shader compile errors if you are having them, and should work on any Windows version (including XP and Windows 7, 32 or 64 bit)
- If you are having the same issue on a Linux emulator, please use Winetricks to install the DirectX patch and then try again.
- A dedicated Linux build will also come eventually, but currently I do not have the ability to compile one.
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This demo is 100% free and the game is a work in progress, but any donations will go to paying for a proper soundtrack and some additional programming help for things such as shaders.
Download
Click download now to get access to the following files:
Development log
- LS Update V.0.7.0Jan 04, 2025
- 60 FPS hotfix for Windows 10/11 usersNov 14, 2024
- LS Update V.0.6.0Nov 08, 2024
Comments
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I experienced a spontaneous crash in the middle of mission 5 of the demo.
Executable: `Project Landsword Demo Build V.0.7.1.exe`
Error message:
```
___________________________________________
############################################################################################
FATAL ERROR in
action number 1
of Alarm Event for alarm 0
for object o_grenade_linear:
Variable <unknown_object>.sprite_index(24, -2147483648) not set before reading it.
at gml_Object_o_grenade_linear_Alarm_0
############################################################################################
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
stack frame is
gml_Object_o_grenade_linear_Alarm_0 (line -1)
```Hey, sorry about that! I recently encountered that error too and the next build will have it patched. It happens very rarely when a building object is destroyed and the grenade's reticule is still over it. It basically fails to locate the object that it was hovering over. I've rewritten the grenades since this build to use a completely different method of detection which fixes it.
really fun but maybe have a option to go to the hanger from the menu
Good idea, I'll see if I can add that to the options.
So far solid 9/10, only -1 because of some funky intersecting behavior between landsword and borderless gaming.
Sorry about that, next build will have additional display options that'll hopefully fix that.
this is really cool can't wait to see more
Cheers! More to come.
Wonderful game, sound design, and gameplay! Keep up the great work! :D
Thank you kindly!
Thank you for playing and making a video! <3
I really enjoy this demo and would love to play a more flushed out version of the game. I think simply having more levels and weapons to play with, along with additional enemy variety would be enough to justify an 8-10 dollar purchase. Ideally I'd like to see the ability to customize the Landsword. When moving through the cityscape, it can be challenging to see the Landsword and differentiate it from the opponents. I'm mildly colorblind as well, so having a high contrast mode would be helpful too. Controller support would be a nice addition as well. A broader audience for the game and making it functional on a handheld device are good reasons for that work to be done.
The Sound effects are very satisfying and explosions are loads of fun. Keep up the good work, I'll keep an eye on this one. :)
im not colorblind, but I second the high contrast mode, that'd be a great way to make it more accessible to people!
Thanks for playing and the feedback! Pretty much all of those features are planned, and I've been working on improving the readability a bit further along with adding a lot of requested accessibility settings such as different cursors, switching indicator arrow positions, and an aim assist line. Controller support is also coming, I'm in the process of rewriting menu code for navigation.
Thanks again!
Game goes hard and is hard. I love the style, art, and game play! Thank you so much!
Thank you for playing!
The game is really cool, someone know if we can change the commands if we want to play in AZERTY
Next build will have full key rebinding in the settings, I apologize that at the moment there is only WASD and arrow key controls.
oohhhh, the game looks so awesome is there going to be more options of mechas we can use in the future? like some variants or different models?
I think in other replies Mezzsoft mentioned they werent going to make different main mechs, but there might be different armor and engines, since theres two whole customization slots for those two things, which may change the appearance of the Crawler a bit, just a guess though!
thats cool to hear, it would be nice if the mech changed visuals depending on what weapon hes using, it might do that already but i cant notice, i really loved the game so far and cant wait for more, im hoping to see civilians or ground troops in the future, since we have horse-like martian aliens in the last mission
Eventually! I'd like it to change visually too.
Love your game! the music and the level designs remind me of old great animes of the 90s like Macross Plus and an even older Gall Force!
Great job! Please keep going!
Cheers! I'm glad it reminds you of those classics.
Absolute cinema!
Thank you!
Great game!
Thanks!
woah dude, like this is insane! can you tell us about the design process? i am trying to design mechs/armors like these but i could never manage it. i'd really appretiate it.and again great work!
Thank you for playing. I don't really have a specific process for designing things. Try to look at lots of real life military vehicles and break down their shapes and features. It's just something you learn with time, sorry.
Hey so this is awesome do you have a patreon or discord?
Thank you for playing. Sorry, no Discord yet (not enough content). A Patreon isn't really necessary since there's already an option to donate on the page.
Just wanted to say this is a gem of a game and I cant wait to see the progress it makes!
Thank you!
mech! very nice!
<3
I AM I LOVE WITH THIS GAME
comming from those 100gb "quadruple A" trash games to this felt like i just woke up from a nightmare.
ultra respondsive pixel mecha game with great artstyle (i actually envisioned everything orang cuz mars but man i'm still impressed)
time till finished:12mins
actually i played for more than 3 hours trying out different loadout, combination ,strategy ,speedrun and no hit run(never get these as collateral damage is kinda hard to avoid)
yay gun goes brrrrrr
it was so much fun
bug: when turning on alternate sync on my 120hz free sync monitor, the game run crazy fast at 120fps i literally can't respond, but the game become alot lot smoother
so i just played with normal vsync but it's only 60fps, would be nice if it can do 120hz
(retested it freesync on or off doesn't affect anything)
storage required: a whole 50MB of diskspace (like all those textures,how?)
memory: entire 200MB of ram
cpu+gpu total power draw (8845h): eat a stagering 5W of power
suggestion: a mode where both the player and enemies have alot more health, i like the idea that humanity is so good at destroying things vs how weak we are at defending things but it felt like we were all too fragile
some times the text is kinda hard to read, not sure if it's the artstyle or me cuz i stopped sometime to figure out what that text say
(pardon me i'm not native english)
if this game is 7$ or less on steam i'll instant buy (whole game ofcourse)
thanks for making this game, i felt like a kid again
Thank you for playing and the detailed specs on performance! I appreciate it.
Sorry about that. I'll see if I can figure out a way to modify it so it can work on 120hz monitors. I'm using an old engine, so I might need to write a fix by modifying some of the engine code by hand.
Lots of careful compression, especially with audio assets. All the sound effects in the game are only around 10 or so megabytes, but still high quality thanks to .OGG format.
Noted!
I've had a few people ask for the hangar font to be changed too, sorry the text is so small right now. I recently changed it and modified the typeface for the rest of the game to be way more readable as well, so the next update will be a big quality of life improvement.
You're welcome, and thank you again!
Cool! Very fun game!
Cheers!
For absolutely no good reason whatsoever this makes me think of the old "... Strike" (Desert Strike, Jungle Strike) games on SNES, but way cooler.
It definitely has some similarities to it. Glad you liked it!
looks amazing, been looking for a brigador-like game to play 'till killers is out. what were your inspirations?
Cheers for playing.
A large mix of east and west influences, way too many to name.
Ok. How is it THIS good.
I'm a sucker for a mecha game but this just ticks so many boxes it's not even funny. Everything is so smooth and responsive. The weapons feel and sound amazing. The movement is so fluid and natural. The UI is super cool. Art style is amazing. Animation quality amazing. 6/5 stars.
Favorite game I've played in ages. I'm weeping that this is just a short demo. Give me 200 or more hours of this please. A full game of this would belong right up there with Mechwarrior, C&C, and Brigador as my all time favorites.
Things I'd love to see added:
-A ton of lore and backstory and relatable characters/pilots.
-A campaign map maybe with territories to gain and or lose along side the main story events.
-More objectives like convoy protection, base assault, base defense (or wave defense).
-Hard bonus objectives that give you some kind of boon (or even just a moral choice with a little "thank you for rescuing me!" or happy ending).
-And if I can be greedy, a bunch more enemies, weapons, mechs, equipments, tech, and environments :)
This made me feel like a little kid again. Giddy and excited and a wondrous desire to discover. Even if nothing else ever comes of this, thank you for making it. I love it.
Hey, thanks for playing and your kind words! I'm glad you enjoyed the demo, sorry it's so short right now.
Pretty much all of this is planned! It'll be a while though.
Much appreciated, thank you!
i love this game
Thank you!
Hello, I made an account to comment this lol. Honestly one of the most promising games I've ever come across on itch. Destruction is super satisfying, the enemies are fun to fight and still challenging, and the immersion is amazing. I was wondering if there was anything out there like a discord or a reddit for this game? Would be cool to have a place to talk about it and get updates lol.
I had a similar question! I just didn't wanna bother Mezz more, a discord would be great
nice to see someone else wants it too lol. just somewhere to nerd out over the game
Yess, it'd also give me somewhere to post progress on my model im making of the Player mech!
Hello. Thank you kindly for playing and your interest!
I feel there's too little content at the moment to set up a Discord/Reddit, plus I'd have to take time to moderate it which would distract from development. My updates are also quite infrequent so there wouldn't be much to see on there either (rest assured it's being worked on daily though). But maybe in the future after release I'll put one up, I'm sure there'll be plenty to discuss then!
Honestly just having a community where people can discuss ideas and build up hype would be great even if there isnt a ton of content yet, its clear a lot of people are excited already, but on the other hand yeah moderation takes time out of other things, when the game is larger/out there'd be less worry about that since theres less to do + you could probably get some moderators to help
I'm an artist (or used to be, at this point) and I have to say, super jealous of anyone who can design a mech. My brain falls out when I try to do anything technical, I usually stick to organics, but I recognize that's a hurdle that I just need to clear. Seeing this page has ignited my spark to learn new skills and get better at making new things. Every now and then, itch proves to be the place for such inspiration. Awesome work. I'll post notes later after playing, I just saw the preview gifs and felt a fire ignite inside of me and had to share.
That's very kind, thank you! Good mechanical design takes time to learn, try to look at lots of real world military vehicles for details and shapes, as well as industrial machinery and how they're put together. Once you get the hang of it it becomes very rewarding to create new designs. It took me almost two months to come up with the final shape of the player's quadtank.
Thanks for the quick response! The game is awesome, the environment destruction is very satisfying and the challenge is properly tense. I've been fiddling with steam input to try playing on my dualshock. I added an input to toggle snapping the cursor to the center of the screen when releasing the joystick, to make aiming on a controller easier. It sort of works, I just have to remember to toggle it on. Obviously controller support isn't even necessary especially at this stage, I just thought you might find it interesting. Honestly, doing stuff like that is a big part of why I rarely sketch or practice music. It's a self-discipline issue.
This game is awesome. The pixel art and aesthetics are impeccable. I can't wait for it to release. I have a few suggestions thought:
-The visual clutter in this game is part of the charm, don't remove it. But sometimes, the cursor can be a bit hard to see, so add toggles for an aiming line and for making the cursor rotate constantly so it's easily separable from the scene.
-Allow changing controls, obviously. I wanted to change the 'Fix camera' key to C because I use it often to stop and line up a good rocket volley, and Tab is a little far.
-The overworld looks gorgeous, genuinely beautiful, let me rotate freely with Q/E so I can get lost in it, it's really nice. Maybe make the Z key return it to North orientation. The red line is a great detail. I hope there are more planets or environments later because the feeling of floating around in the map with that music is unmatched.
-Not really that important, but a fun little Survivor-like mode where you could upgrade your weapons after defeating a few waves could be nice.
-Not sure if it's normal, but on Mission 3, a few enemies weren't moving (and they couldn't see me behind houses) until I threw some smoke grenades at them.
-Not that big of a deal, but I play on a 120hz monitor, and it sometimes looks a little blurry when moving.
-Add a Shagohod :D
Again, great game! I wish you the best.
I agree with the cursor bit, when im trying to focus on dodging and use my peripheral vision to aim all the enemy arrows get distracting really fast, i also like the idea of keybinds, which if i had to guess will almost certainly get added.
Also yesss a metal gear style enemy would be amazing, a large singular boss rather than many smaller hordes, that'd be super fun to fight against if balanced right!
For sure!
Thank you for playing and giving feedback!
I'm glad you enjoy the clutter and chaos; I think it's a big part of the experience too. I've added a laser line and four different cursor variations in the settings menu, the next update will have them implemented.
Also added to settings, with different methods of firing grenades too!
That's a cool suggestion. I plan on having 3D objects eventually on the map to make the rotation seem a bit more interesting. I'll definitely let you rotate the view freely, and having it reset with Z is a smart idea too. Thanks!
Sure! Maybe something like an unlockable VR simulation mode.
They should be standing guard until they have line of sight or something sets them off like an explosion or collapsing building nearby.
Not too sure how to fix this issue at the moment, I'll look into it.
I wish, but Kojima will sue me, haha.
Thanks again!
I love Val, I wish there was a picture of the booklet with her in higher resolution
Samee, tall buff woman whos a smidgen crazy based on the dialog ive seen, peak character design
I'm glad you like her! That particular illustration is a little outdated as I've since redesigned her suit, but I do have this old illustration that was once on the page. You'll be seeing a lot more of her hopefully soon.
Hey Mezzsoft, I come back every day to check on your comments because I love reading your enthusiasm for this project and the vision you have for it. I've said before that I love the game, but watching the process, your receptiveness on feedback and taking the time to answer questions is simply amazing, keep up the good work!
Thank you for your kind words and support! I always enjoy hearing people's thoughts and feedback, it's one of the best parts of gamedev and keeps me motivated to continue working on it. Cheers!
What programming language/game engine did you do this in?
It's all written in GML.
Game Concept is awesome, reminds me of armored core and chrome hounds.
I am really interested in seeing where you take this game and you appear to already have a really fun foundation. The sound effects are excellent, although the boost could maybe use a volume increase. Enemies so far are fun to fight and offer different challenges. Visual design is impeccable.
I do have a few questions about your future plans for the game
Do you plan to have multiple mech types or just the one for the player to control?
Are there plans to have some form of progression in terms of unlocks?
Might we see boss type enemies such as rival pilots or near peer enemies (1v1, 1v2 style missions)?
Lastly, not a question but I think indirect fire weapons like an artillery gun that allows shooting at long distance over buildings would be awesome, such as an upscaled version of the current HE grenade with its own drawbacks obviously. Both as a weapon for the player and an enemy type.
I know developing games is not as simple as to permit scope and design plan changes on a whim but if anything I just think these things would be great additions the already solid game you have managed to put together. Regardless great work on the demo.
Thanks for playing!
It will most likely be just the one, but with a lot more customizable options for loadouts and different parts that effect how it can move (i.e. dash, ram through buildings, etc)
Yes! New missions will unlock as you complete them. The plan is to have both story missions and also optional ones that'll explore the world a bit more and earn the player some special parts.
Absolutely, it'd be a waste not to have that honestly.
I'm working on a few new secondary weapons that will work like that, but I feel like letting the player always be able to shoot over buildings with a primary weapon might make things too easy like with the railgun. I could see enemies using flying drones to coordinate artillery strikes though.
Thank you! It's a lot of work and it really does take time to develop these things, but hopefully it will all come together in the end.
For the artillery, maybe it's more like a howitzer and is direct fire, not allowing for arcs over buildings but still an explosive burst of damage at range, the explosion could even damage to player if used too closely. So far Landsword's only other weapon in the high damage per shot is the Railgun, a very endgame weapon. The rest of what we have are predominantly fire rate based, so more burst damage based weapons may be nice, like the aforementioned howitzer, High damage in a single shell, explosive aoe, direct fire without arcing over buildings, and a burst fire gun, likely firing 3 in each salvo, decent damage per shell but mostly for hit and run strats. I cant think of any other burst damage weapons but tbh idk if they'd be necessary, Maybe some form of charge up laser weapon but idk
how do you plan on expanding the game play? IK the game is about controlling a mech. But have you ever thought of making certain missions to where you control a helicopter like the enemy ones? Or will you only be playing as a mech? I’m not saying you should add this I just thought it’d be a nice suggestion.
For the most part, you'll be playing as the mech in game right now but I think there could be a few special missions where you're forced to pilot something unarmed or a completely different type of mech/vehicle entirely.
Hello - I am loving this. Only thing I think is missing is a resizable window mode - the native one is v.small on my large screen
Thanks for playing! I'm working on some additional resolution settings and the ability to play in windowed mode, sorry the options are a bit limited right now.
I get a Microsoft Defender alert on launch, is there any way to make windows happy with this?
Not that I know of. The engine it runs on is a bit old, so it probably sets it off due to the age of the software. Try running it in a VM if it won't let it launch?
:The game is beautiful, I adore the art style, the flow of combat is really smooth, definitely could add an endless mode
Thank you! An endless mode would be nice, I agree.
This game is so clean! If it became more developed, I realllyy want to have an endless mode!
Cheers!
I am in love with this game! My only issue with it is that it shows the most recent run on the score for a mission, not the best one.
Thank you for playing! Sorry about the scores always overwriting. I've since completely rewritten the save system so it saves new bests now, the next update will have it.
Thank you both for fixing the issue and replying to my comment!
Very well made thus far.
The only thing missing is a proper progression system and more levels, maybe even a fleshed-out story (outside of the texts already given) if you are up to it, which I believe is just a matter of time considering the amount of effort put into this.
Can't wait for the full release!
Runs really well on my Steam Deck with Proton. Can't wait to play the full game!!
Awesome, glad to hear that!
Please make a Patreon/Subscribestar/Ko-fi so we can support you. You've made something truly incredible and there are lots of people who want to see you succeed.
That's very kind, thank you. At the moment people can donate a dollar on this page if they want to, and I think that's more than enough. I don't release updates frequently enough to warrant making a Patreon page, and I don't think it's fair to lock things behind a paywall. I greatly appreciate the support nonetheless though, thank you again.
I can't wait to play the full release!!!
Thank you for playing and making a video!