Is adding a Boss into Aleph One Possible?

[Corruptinator]

Now I know that most of the Aleph One/Marathon Scenarios are mostly Linear gameplays with a solid storyline, but recently this came into my head: Could it be possible to modify the sprites and the properties of the Shapes file to make a certain Shape become a Boss Character somehow?

Like for example: Amplifying or doubling their health? Adding new weaponry? Changing appearance?

Because, I was thinking of implementing Bosses for my <Yet-To-Be-Announced> Scenario to add a little taste in gameplay and I know that its rather unusual and or untraditional to pursue this, but it is an idea of thought and creativity.

P.S. If possible, would I be able to Program (Using MML) the original boss that after it dies it somehow spawns the second form of the same boss? (A.K.A. Change and or Evolve?) Cause making the player endure a 2-part to 3-part battle adds carnage to adventure!

[Wrkncacnter]

You can make enemies with more health, but they'll still be pretty stupid like all other enemies. To make the fight interesting, you'd probably have to make the environment dangerous as well. I've never played it so I could be wrong, but I thought Phoenix had boss type battles? Unless I'm just making that up, you may want to take a look at how it was done there.

Lua is what you want for spawning a second monster once one dies.

[PerseusSpartacus]

I've never played it so I could be wrong, but I thought Phoenix had boss type battles? Unless I'm just making that up, you may want to take a look at how it was done there.

Close. But rather than having one big nasty enemy that is insanely overpowered, Phoenix has lots of little-ish, but still very nasty opponents that operate really more like slightly upgraded versions of the originals. And to be honest, it worked. I remember the last level was a serious pain, and I was playing on Kindergarten! Don't get me wrong, I don't use Kindergarten for the main trilogy now - I've gotten to Eupfhoria on Major Damage, even. And yet, Phoenix ups the difficulty to some ungodly state that is matched by only a few other scenarios.

[Corruptinator]

Ouch, sounds hardcore for Phoenix! So I would need to modify adding a second monster by LUA. If anybody has any idea how that can be achieved I would appreciate it. Otherwise, I'll check through the LUA reference on how it can work.

[$lave]

Attributes like health, attack speed, projectile damage etc. can be edited in the physics file. The colour table the monster uses can be chose in the physics file as well, but the colour tables themselves (as with the rest of the graphics) are located in the shapes file.

To add any ~really~ new or complex behaviour not already present, you'll probably have to resort to LUA.

EDIT: Also, for what it's worth, people generally use rarely used monster slots (such as tiny BoB, tiny Flickta, tiny Fighter etc.) to replace with new/"upgraded" monsters. That can all be done within the physics file.

[Zott]

Here's a lua script for replacing a dead monster in-place you can use. Untested.
A splitting enemy would be pretty neat and easy to do. As long as the enemies don't get stuck on each other, you can spawn them in the same spot too.

function Triggers.monster_killed(m,killer,proj)
if (m.player == nil) then
if (m.type == "YourBossHere" and killer) then -- killer being true prevents sounds from Lua kills
if (m.valid == true) then -- May not be needed.
spawned = Monsters.new(m.x, m.y, m.z, m.polygon, "tiny pfhor") -- The Monster spawned must have its shapes collection preloaded or else it won't appear.
spawned.active = true
end
end
end
end

[Corruptinator]

Thanks for the example! I'll fiddle around with it regardless that it is untested and see if anything works...