2023-01-06 Edit: Game finished! Fixed blending animation a bit from 12/24 release. New latest download is SDR101.ZIP
A few years ago, I made Santa's Christmas Rescue. Which was a challenge I made for myself to create a Christmas themed game from December 1st to Christmas Day. This year, I decided to try doing the same again but went for a bit more ambitious game.
In this game, you're again playing as Santa in a mad dash to deliver all the presents on Christmas Eve before time runs out. Each level has a set number of presents you must take from the sleigh to the Christmas tree while avoiding late night "snoopers" trying to catch you in the act (Don't forget to go back to the sleigh once all the presents are delivered!)
Santa has a few tricks of his sleeve to avoid the snoopers. He can "blend" in with the background. This causes him to be invincible to snoopers at the cost of his Christmas Spirit and movement speed. He can also run at the cost of Christmas Spirit. If a snooper hits you, you will automatically use some of your Christmas Spirit to put them back to bed. If you have a present, they will take that as well and stay asleep for the rest of the level. If not, they will be back up looking around shortly! Be sure not to lose all your presents to snoopers or it's game over!
There are also a few items you can pick up in the game to help you (or hurt you!). Some of these include a timer that gives you more time, a helpful elf that will deliver a present for you, a sleep item that puts all the snoopers to bed for a bit, and more.
I wasn't able to complete the whole game in the amount of time, but I was able to put together a playable demo of the game. The demo includes three levels to play as well as the tools I created to build the levels and assets.
Please read the readme.txt in the zip file for more information as well as the instructions in the game for controls and story.
To run the game, open XMAS2021.BAS in QB 4.5 and run. Make sure that all the files in the zip are extracted to the same folder and you're running the game from that folder.
I wrote this game on my 486 and also tested in DOSBox so it should hopefully run just about anywhere. Please let me know if you have any issues or encounter any bugs. I'll be sure to fix them for the full game release.
Screen shots:
Title screen:
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/rJ8JnD6.jpg)
Game play:
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/TKHBkCj.jpg)
Thanks!
-Erik
Edit 2021-12-29: Updated demo download link with latest version with some bug fixes (probably introduced some new ones as well
![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_smile.gif)
Edit 2021-01-07: Updated demo download link with latest version with a bunch of bug fixes as well as better controls.
Edit 2022-12-24: Game is finished! Added final release download SDRUSHV1.ZIP to post.
Edit 2023-01-06: Updated finished game with fixed blending 'animation'. Latest download is SDR101.ZIP