A lesson learned the hard way - but I got there in the end

I learned a very valuable lesson last month, which is that a backup saved to the same drive as the original file isn't really a backup. Unfortunately just after I released the last update to this demo, I turned on my computer to find the development folder on my SSD empty.

I was, as you can imagine, distraught. I had a backup on an older drive but it was six weeks old and missing all the work I'd completed since the first demo was released. 

The worst part was all the lost artwork, which had taken the bulk of my time. Luckily I was able to use a program to recover some of the data, so at least I didn't have to redraw every piece of lost art. But I did then still have to reconstruct what was essentially a complete game, playable from start to finish, and rebuild it again.

On the positive side, rebuilding it gave the opportunity to fine tune a few things. Again, watching videos and seeing people play the game also really helped me get some perspective on what needed changing so out of the loss did come an opportunity to improve.

I realised that some of the enemy patterns were unfair and others I was just unhappy with. I took the chance to add some animation frames to existing enemies, making it clearer when they were about to attack, while completely overhauling the animation for others. I also expanded and substantially rebuilt the second level. 

These improvements I wanted to build back into the demo, as I'm much happier with where the game is now than I was when the demo first launched. An in all, it felt like a substantial list of changes:

• Difficulty options (easy / normal / hard) - some enemies only appear in normal or hard modes, attack patterns can vary and various other gameplay elements are affected
• Continues (the amount you get depends on the difficulty you choose)
• New bosses for both levels
• New or tweaked enemy attack patterns
• New animations for some enemies
• Updated sound effects
• Level two extended and remixed
• Difficulty has been balanced 
• Rex now becomes briefly invulnerable after taking a hit
• Increased base speed for Rex
• Reworked smart bomb function
• Smart bombs available from the start (different number according to the difficulty selected)
• Improvements to the shield power up
• Energy bars for bosses 
• Four fantastic new music tracks
• Updated title screen with options including controls and credits
• New story screens between levels, plus other presentation screens
• Some general nips and tucks to improve performance 

So if you've tried Rex before and thought it had potential, then please give the demo another go. It's your feedback that's been helping this first-timer get to where he's got to so far with this game. 

I've also now got a backup far away from my computer so hopefully I won't face another data loss that sets me back a further six weeks!

Enjoy