Feedback Friday #75 August 16 – 19, 2019

Welcome to Feedback Friday! 75 Feedback Fridays so far? Awesome!!!

Want design feedback for your new game? Then you've found the right thread! Feedback Friday runs from Friday to Monday every week.

What To Show

• Minimally Viable Product (MVP) - Core game play > everything else
  
  
• How To Scope Small (Unity tutorial)
  
  
• Post a link to a playable game, preferably WebGL. If you don't have a playable game, post something substantial, not just text.
  

How To Ask For Feedback

• Be concise.
  
  
• Specify what you want feedback on and what you don't.
  
  
• Resist the urge to write an immediate defense to feedback. Take the time to understand their points. Remember that your friends here are taking time out of their busy schedules to help you for free.
  

How To Give Feedback

• Be positive. Every game has some redeeming quality.
  
  
• Focus on the design, not the designer.
  
  
• Be specific and constructive. Don't like something? Explain why.
  

Let the feedback begin!

 

Hello, guys! Friday mornings move so slow. I need a few more cups of coffee I think.

 

Hi, I'm Aynsley, a female game dev, and the creator of project ETS. This is my first game ever, and I'm looking for some feed back to help put in onto the next level.
I'm a artist by trade, but also a writer, and I knew I wanted to tell a story using Unity.
But I do want to give some credit where credit is due.
Thank you TonanBora and Dennis for helping me get my dialog system functional before Feedback Friday.

Here is the link to my Demo (Patched)


I'm looking for feed back on:

Level design: Did it feel to easy? was it to difficult? Was it interesting and did it keep you engaged?

Art: Did things stand out enough? Was it consistent? Was it pleasing to look at or was it like visual cat screeching lol?

Character movement: Was the character to slow? Was his jump force strong enough? Was it boring to play as that character?

 

Welcome, Aynsley! Congrats on your first game ever! And kudos to you for not being afraid to get feedback. Early feedback can really help.

 

I had trouble interacting with the door to get into the level, but after typing E several times, I got it! I am not a platform player so I amused myself while I tried to to run around, hitting walls and stuff.

As a purple color lover, I really enjoyed the palette.

 

Oh dear lol sorry about that, I caught that too, it was due to the fact I had the same door linked to two transition points in the scene.
I'm rebuilding with a fix. Thanks for finding my first bug!

EDIT just patched the build and swapped out the link, it should work fine now,
But in case you don't want to scroll all the way up, lol here is the new link

 

Works now, just do not click multiple times on the E at the door, like I did. lol

Also, might be good to put a cue at the Door, letter E or something like that. Seems intuitive but you get folks like me that need that extra information.

 

When interacting with the door, hit E ONCE, strange I know, but for some reason it won't work if you press E multiple times
The strange pink thing that floats is called PIXIE you can interact with her too

 

I like the message from Pixie. Are you planning to give information throughout the level or just at the beginning? It might be a nice way to move story elements along.

 

Pixie will communicate with you through the whole game, as a guide and to keep the player informed about the story.

 

So you said the game has a story. As someone who loves a story in a game, can you tell us a little about it?

 

The government has issued a purge on all level seven AIs or high, and the protagonist is a level twenty AI (Basically indistinguishable from humans) The story is about escaping the city, and uncovering the mystery of why the purge is happening in the first place.

 

As platformers are not my kind of game I will focus my feedback on the art, as I do love anything with a sci-fi touch.

Your art style is really consistent, everything fits very well together. I really love the more square looking roaming robots that look like they have a cable as their "tail", looks really funny and well thought, as if they're real big guard dogs.

When being higher up in the first level after the first door, there's a few windows. The background of these windows look awesome, but I would make the border of these windows a bit darker as it's hard to see the outlines of the character when moving/jumping in front of these.
The mainframe computer room looks very cool with all those screens, especially the computers there reminded me of SD Snatcher which I've played a lot as a kid. It did look like a weird perspective to jump in front of the computers but behind the screens though.

I like the overall atmosphere you're creating and would love to see more of it in the future.

 

Thank you so much for the feedback!!! This is great! also SD Snatcher, wow that's a big compliment!
To address your points. lol yeah I noticed the screen issue after you told me about it, it was noob mistake on my part.
I put the screen of the mainframe on the wrong sorting layer.
Darker areas around the windows is a really great idea, I didn't even consider the fact that the character would be hard to see! thank you so much for that!

 

New bug found, for some strange reason my death state is not triggering. So eh? Your immortal I guess? lol the bug has been noted.

 

So ok, I'm not a big platformer guy - so feel free to take all of this with a grain of salt. I think you have a really nice foundation here. What I'm going to recommend is a lot of the higher end polish that starts to make a foundation feel more like a complete game.

1 - Interactive elements need to be clearly indicated. I spent a ton of time running around hitting E on stuff that was just background filler. I spent around 30 seconds trying to hit E on a red background tile placed between two platforms you had to jump for, although I couldn't trigger anything. I'm not sure if there was nothing to trigger, or if I just did it wrong.

2 - I have no sense of purpose or progress guide. This felt kinda metrovania like and I got to the end, but I didn't know what I was doing, why I was doing it, or where I was going. This is probably the most important stuff for taking something from being a prototype/vertical slice to being a game. And if you want people to pick up and really play, this should be your next major focus IMO.

3 - Controls. I'm not a platformer, so I donno about normal controls but I felt like they were a bit awkward. WASD and space are fine, but the right hand controls felt annoying to me. Perhaps I, O, P for interact, shoot, melee - basically use WASD on left hand, and space, interact, shoot and sword with right hand? Find a configuration that is natural and comfortable. I did not like E for interact because you need to use your left hand and it should always be controlling movement.

4 - Animation. I would add some minor juice to the animation/locomotion. A couple frames to stop/slide. A couple frames on jump landing, a little particle for jump start. Don't need to be crazy, but just a little extra to make the controls feel more polished.

5 - sword is useless currently.

Again, this is a pleasing foundation and seems like its got some promise. Giving it structure and the player purpose will start to really make it feel like a game.

 

Maybe O, P or [ ] for the attacks and pinkie for interact with enter? I donno, but left hand should do all those things in a comfortable position.

 

Thank you so much for the feedback!
Yes I agree that my intractable need to clearly labeled, lol I'm sorry you had such hard time! I'll make sure I'll fix that asap.

Yes, I did have some story dialog in the project, but unfortunately my dialog system felt clunky and unusable in its
current state as far as cutscenes went, so I opted to leave it out, maybe not the best decision in hindsight. I do agree
that my game needs more purpose, and a sense of urgency.

Yes I am not a huge fan of the control scheme either, I have sort of gotten so used to it I didn't even think much about changing it before today, but going back to it, I can see its flaws.

Yes! Thank you so much for the animations tips! that is a great idea!

Yeah the sword is kind of useless lol FOR NOW!

Those controls are a great idea I will test them as soon as I get the chance, I do want to take strain off the left hand and leave it entirely for movement

 

@frosted

Great feedback! Thanks so much for participating! I like how you encouraged and gave constructive criticism.

 

I actually thought the end game dialog presentation felt pretty polished - at this point I don't think you need actual dialog options or anything - but a couple intro bubbles for example to help set the stage, and maybe a couple popups in front of doors (as a gamer, I know a door means I should go through it - but toss in some fluff "you feel your goal lies beyond this door" or whatever).

Doesn't need to be a ton, but just some hints at a bigger objective and some guidance as to who I am and what I'm doing can go a long way imo. Really don't underestimate the importance of this stuff.

Last note on the interactives, I think the way you have it now is fine (except the red tile which screams 'i'm a secret, interact with me' imo) - but perhaps have things that are interactive glow, outline or have a popup bubble with 'e to interact' - doesn't matter what imo, but something to clearly mark stuff you can interact w/.

Last note - gamers are kinda used to havign some kind of reward when they hit a dead end. So you may want to think about that - again - maybe just a health boost or a little dialog popup. But most dead ends should have something.

 

Nice job!

It could have been harder, but it really depends on whether the focus is combat or exploration, and where in the player's progression this is. Some indicators of where to go would be nice.

The palette is really nice. The art style has the vibe of a platformer-style Hyper Light Drifter. Everything stands out fine for me. Count my vote also for visual indicators when the player is on top of something interactable.

What would you think of adding parallax scrolling for the view outside the windows? It would add a sense of depth to the world.

Speaking of depth, in the area with all the monitors, I actually liked that some of the monitors are in front of the player. You could play more with environmental objects that overlap the player.

The character's speed, jump force, and gravity feel great. Movement is satisfying; I'd happily play more of the game with the same values.

The idle and run loops are very good. As frosted mentioned, some transition animations between them would make the transitions feel more fluid.

I played what I think is the latest build as of this reply. Pressing E on doors would often move the player to the destination for one frame and then right back to the original position. It looks like it's just a matter of ignoring Input.GetKeyDown(KeyCode.E) after moving the player through the door.

The fire rate on the gun is perfect, too. It's not so fast that you can spam it, nor is it painfully slow.

The game really feels like it would be ideal to play with a gamepad. That would be my number one request, in fact. The art is great and the movement is fun. Let me use a gamepad and I'd be happy to run around more even before you add more content.

 

Thank you! that means a lot, there is still some issue with the dialog canvas not closing, but its under investigation!
Thanks for the feed back on dialog! I totally agree some games can get by with very little dialog, but still be clear and entertaining, I hope I can make my game to be like theirs

Yes! interactives will now be clearly marked when the player approaches, I'm still working out the best way to do it, the best way to do that, but I will probably tie to a proximity trigger

Yes, I wanted to put a boss so to speak at the end of the demo but ran out of time, and as I said I removed my story dialog and hindsight is certainly twentytwenty now, as I have had some others ask about dialog.

Thank you so much Frosted for taking the time to help me!

 

Thank you so much for the great feed back, and yes! Game pad support is coming!
I'm working on a solution to the interactables right now it seems like it'll be a simple fix.

parallax scrolling for the backgrounds is a great idea! and your right it'll add some depth to the game and make the world feel deeper, and ground the player more in the world.

Thank you, the monitors were actually a fluke on my end, but I'm glad you liked the depth! I'll certainly mess around more with that concept.

I'm so glad the character feels nice! and I'm so glad you liked so of the animations, however I do agree with you and frosted that some of the transitions are to snappy and could use some more "juice" so to speak.

As for the issue with the door, I believe I have a potential fix that I plan to implement as so as possible.

I can't thank you enough for your great feed back! everything you've suggested sounds awesome, and I'm excited to get back to work!

 

Sounds great! If you get a chance to post an update before this week's Feedback Friday closes, I'll certainly give it a play. Otherwise there's always next week's!

 

First, congrats for actually making and releasing something playable. Really cool start to your game and I look forward to seeing more of it. Nothing terribly important, but a few things I noticed/found interesting:

1. Bullets go through the stone walls, but not other. Not sure if that's important
2. If you jump and press left or right then the camera goes up a bit.
3. I had to spam 'e' a bunch to go through the door. Tony already mentioned ignoring 'e' temporarily after the transition.
4. I think the level is open at the top right of the room with all of the monitors - I found this really intriguing.
5. Maybe you did, and I didn't notice: do the different bad guys do different amounts of damage to you?

Keep up the great work!

 

@Rika7567 good work! Here's my 2c.

I liked the atmosphere, and the story idea is intriguing. The artwork is good too, although it feels all a bit over bright without enough contrast. The basic movement feels good although perhaps the character's jump is a bit long relative to the size of the screen.

Improvements:

- Door interaction is hit and miss.
- Animations feel a little jerky, could maybe smooth out the leaning forward when running.
- Music overwhelms sound effects, could be a bit lower volume.
- Enemies don't appear to be hostile, they are the same general color and appearance as interactables.
- There seem to be a lot of things that look interactable but aren't, could maybe be unlit/faded.

In terms of level design, the basic structure is fine, but it feels like just a foundation. I would suggest designing small areas (e.g. a screen or two worth of level) with a specific 'puzzle' in mind that clearly differentiates it from everything else. This would give a clear rhythm to the gameplay and the player's requirement for concentration.

I also found myself stuck for a short time wondering where to go, for example after the first door when you drop down and have to go right. Something eye-catching there would be great, to lead the player's focus. It happened in another part as well.

The combat is OK but it would be great to be able to hack and slash while moving backward. Needs more impact and feedback, and the combat movements relative to the running/jumping movements feel a bit cramped.

I'm sure you're probably aware, but there's a few bugs. I died once and it seems my health didn't reset, the first enemy killed me straight away and kept 'killing' me though I was dead.

Looking forward to more!

PS instructions/controls menu would be good too

 

Thank you so much for the feedback this is great!
@timrieder Lol that's a noob mistake, the stone walls are on the wrong layer I believe, or I haven't set them to interact with the gun, they can be destroyed by the staff.

Nice catch! I never noticed that, the camera I'm using is a little buggy so I plan to look at that as soon as I can.

The door bug is being addressed as we speak along with the intractable problem.

That would be a neat addition to the main frame room and not super hard to add! Sounds like it could be really cool!

Not at the moment, they all do 1 damage, and currently no death state triggers, but the revising the enemies script shouldn't be to difficult to make a wider array of baddies to fight!

 

@Billy4184
Thank you so much for the Feed back many of your points are extremely valid, and I love all of issues that you raised.

1. Doors are fixed now as far as I can tell,
2. I'm working on mapping out new animations for both enemies and the player.
3. I've lowered the music a little bit and lowered it's priority, I plan on putting a menu that the player can pull up to do this, but at the moment this is just a hot fix
4.Yes, I will put in some more visual cues for enemies, and change the color of the doors, I don't want to change the color of my enemies, because I believe the bright silver helps them stand out.
5. Yes! you make a very good point, a lot of things to seem to be able to be interacted with, but are just level floof. I agree that something needs to be done about that.

Thank you so much for the level design tips!
I do want to add some puzzle elements I'm just trying to implement them at the moment and ran out of time before feed back Friday.
Indicators on where the player should go is a good idea, but I also want to encourage exploration so I plan to make them pretty subtle.
Yes! I will look into the hack and slash mechanic and animations.
LOL at the moment, my death state for the player isn't triggering, its still under investigation, but I'm fairly confident I can get it fixed.

Again thank you so much for the awesome feed back it helps a lot!