SENTRY – Devlog 3

Hi, I’m Sean Noonan, lead designer on SENTRY. In this third devlog, I’ll be highlighting the new content and features of our first major update, including an in-depth look at our new campaign.

In Devlog 2, I outlined how we approach enemy creation by identifying areas underserved within SENTRY’s combat loop. One such area was enemies that promote player movement. The first of these is the “Rambull.” This bipedal beast strides through levels at quite a pace, only deviating from its path to charge an unsuspecting SENTRY, causing massive damage. Its armored “face” can soak up shots easily, but if you bait it near a wall and dodge at the last moment, it will charge into the wall and get stunned long enough for you to loop around and fire a bunch of rounds into its exposed rear.

Sticking with the theme of armoured enemies that keep you on your toes, we’ve added a new shield-wielding enemy to the roster in the form of the “Storm Warden.” They barrel through a ship’s breach into battle with a large shield in one hand and a flak-firing hand cannon in the other. Outside of explosives or penetrative gunfire, their shield will protect them from incoming fire. A SENTRY’s job is to stun the Warden, causing it to stagger and expose its body (and faceplate) for additional damage.

In addition to the Storm Warden, we have added extra tiers of Assault Wardens, each with different health values determined by their tier.

We also identified a lack of aerial units. Alongside Needlejacks, you can expect to fight the fireball-spitting Flamejacks and the toxin-spewing Bilejacks. These enemies have attacks that burn and poison respectively. To coincide with their inclusion, we have introduced a new status system. Upon receiving certain types of damage, you’ll receive a little additional damage over time. This feature has also been added to the Bile Hound.

And status effects aren’t just tools for the Collective; we’ve added some new 3-slot weapons to keep the MP-45 company. The first is the Flame Shot. While lacking fine accuracy, this automatic napalm-powered weapon hurls burning projectiles at its targets, causing significant damage with a small chance of inflicting a burn. The weapon’s secondary fire releases a large, short-range fireball that guarantees a burning state to all caught within its radius at an additional ammo cost.

The second weapon is the Peacekeeper. This drum-fed shotgun fires in two-round bursts and features an underslung launcher for firing stun grenades. The stun grenade is an excellent counter to Storm Wardens, providing a powerful 1-2-3(?) punch to deal serious damage alongside your deployables. We have also introduced a throwable form of the stun grenades for your gear slot, for any SENTRY lucky enough to find them.

This nicely brings us to the next batch of items you’ll likely encounter on your travels…

First up is the Extractor, a device placed on ceilings to counter flying enemies. It sucks up and instantly minces any airborne beasts that come into its vicinity, but will eventually fill up with… “meat”. After a couple of enemies, the Extractor must expel the fleshy gibs before recharging to handle the next batch of flyers.

Speaking of counters, our pest control device, the Rivet Grid, has received a significant buff. It is no longer a one-shot trap but now restocks rivets every Preparation Phase. Along with the Rivet Grid, we’ve also performed a balance pass across all other deployables to enhance gameplay.

And making a return from the demo are the Explosive Barrels and Landmines. These provide two different approaches to one-shot destruction: dynamic and static, both resulting in explosions… sometimes a lot of explosions!

Before we take a look at campaign, let’s take a quick look at the levels. There have been numerous tweaks and updates to maps, too many to cover here, but I’ll highlight two significant changes.

Firstly, Fuel Exchange now has a slightly longer exit from D breach. While still difficult to defend, the additional corridors allow players more time to cover both A and D breaches, should they be unlucky enough to be attacked from both simultaneously.

In contrast, Mess Hall now features a split near the exit (formerly C breach) and an additional breach point where the sub-system exit was previously located. This change further divides the map into upper and lower sections, rather than all paths converging in the upper corridor.

Following the changes to Mess Hall, I wanted to provide players with another level with a clear split between breach points and a long line of sight from their convergence points to the sub-system exit.

Introducing The Crossing, a map featuring two large bridges connected by walkways over a pit. This map should be a fun playground for experimenting with different deployable combinations.

Now, let’s switch gears and talk about the campaign. When we started developing SENTRY, we aimed to bring something new to the FPS-Tower Defense genre – a strategic layer that informs your decisions throughout the campaign.

SENTRY’s campaign begins with Earth on the brink of losing its final battle against an alien threat known as The Collective. In response, civilian vessels are fleeing to join the fleet at the far reaches of space. These ships and their crew have been enlisted into the SENTRY Defense Program to defend against alien invaders during their escape.

To start, you must select a ship. Each ship features different attributes and effects, defining the flavor of your run. For example, if you want to experiment with deployables, you can utilise the scrap bonuses of the Cargo ship. Struggling against the Collective’s stronger units? Try the Medical ship for additional crew and a full heal every prep phase. Ships will continue to evolve and develop as we progress through early access.

Once you’ve selected a ship, you must then choose a campaign to run. Each campaign adds complexity with progressively more difficult modifiers and is completed on a per-ship basis. In this update, players have access to two campaigns: the base “Initiate” campaign, featuring a run that goes two sectors deep with a chance to find common supply beacons, and the “Starfarer” campaign, a more challenging run that allows access to uncommon supply beacons and plots players across three sectors, with a ship-destroying missile in tow!

And that’s all we have time for today. We’ll continue to closely monitor discussions and feedback in the Steam forums and Discord. Your input is invaluable in helping us refine and enhance the game, and we’re committed to making the next major update the best yet.

Thank you for joining us and for your continued support. We can’t wait to get the next update of SENTRY out to you. So until next time, thanks for watching!