What do you think about mix of castle defence and runner?

Hi All! I'm Looking for feedback for my game: Yeti Home Defence - unusual 3D first person castle defence game:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.omega486gamestudio.yetihomedefence

You may watch trailer here -

I would appreciate feedback both on gameplay and trailer

Thanks!

 

Furthermore, here's the question:

I have created this 3d person view superattack:

And asked myself whether this game could have second mechanics: runner with collecting crystals left by dead enemies when you win the battle?
What do you think?

 

Every change has pro's and con's. What does the game gain by adding the runner mechanic? And what does it lose?

 

It's a little hard to tell from the trailer exactly what sort of game it is. It looks like a wave shooter, but with some sort of upgrade capabilities.

You might try to clarify that, if not in the trailer than in a "Yeti Defense Explained" video or something.

 

Sure, my next video would be "Yeti Defense Explained" with feature highlights.
Do you mean my game genre is wave shooter (never heard about it, could you please give some examples?)

 

That's what I would like to discuss here.
Pros: differentiate user experience, to make game not monotone
Cons? Shooter and defence lovers might not like runner, runner lovers might not like shooting?

 

A wave shooter is one where waves of enemies appear (generally coming at you) and you shoot them. QuiVr Vanguard is an example, but there are many others.

 

i watched the trailer twice but im not sure what the gameplay is. Try to make that crystal clear for the dumbest dummy, and then add sophistication as you want from there would be my advice.

as for the writing in the trailer, always look for way to condense and avoid redundancy. First scene, we see a blood red evening sky. No need to say "they came from bloody evening skies." We see that. Then, "we thought they were boulders". Don't tell, show. Show the boulders turning into monsters.

This just my personal preference, but i always find dialogue more immediately engaging than any other perspective. Like if the two characters on the tower delivered some of the words as dialogue, i just personally find that more engaging.

try to limit words to just a few phrases that summarize the gameplay. I dont think a tiny indie game like this anybody is really looking for deep lore to get into. They just looking for some rewarding game play. Everything else is expected to be low budget, so make sure oyu are selling that one thing they are interested in very well.

good luck!

 

Mage stealing crystals and Crystals healing enemies - dev preview:

What do you think?

 

Be careful with adding ideas because they're unique rather than because they are good. When you mix two different types of gameplay like this, you usually end up with one that feels like a chore so you can get to the mode you actually enjoy.

What happens is that instead of getting players that like either one mode or the other, you actually scare off both groups of players.

 

That's what I was thinking of.
So two different games would be better than one mixed

 

While reading your idea all I can think of is: "How are your 2 mechanics synergistic?"
This reminds me of Nier Automata, a horrible game, where cool hack-and-slash action is often interrupted with hacking scenes, completely unrelated and a different play style, something the game could have done without.

You should focus on making a good core gameplay loop and see what the player will be doing constantly and then throw stuff at that loop, secondary or tertiary loops, that brings excitement to the play. In most games, it is a travelling period, interrupted by combat, which is fine. The player primarily attempts to travel from A to B and in between, stuff happens.

The worse is when you try to push 2 primary gameplay loops, sometimes completely unrelated, together. Imagine you are playing Halo and mid fight you have to solve a puzzle. Doesn't make sense!
Or imagine a racing game, where you strive to be #1 and randomly you are paused and forced to fight pokemon or something... it's just weird and lacks synergy.

 

Heh, I remember MassEffect, where you had mini games to hack code and to ride on asteroid looking for satellites.

My intention was to make runner part as secondary, and obvious for real world: after castle attack you should have something to collect on field, yeah?

But as I have severe fps drops - to 20 fps - on runner part that you can see in video in second post, I have to postpone this idea to future.

Btw, do you have an idea Why I have framerate drops and what to do?

 

Depends: either you have too much to load at once or too much processing is running in the background. That is why using the update or fixedupdate method is kept to a low.
You could fix it by hiding stuff or having less stuff or using textures instead of objects in the background.

 

IF the entire MATCH is fun, when a MATCH it's just that, a MATCH, and will take 3 or 5 minutes to complete,
then, yes. If it is not FUN, then no. How to know it is fun? Share Alpha builds.

 

I have new trailer here:

Do you think it is better that first (first post in this thread)?

 

Sorry, didn't catch your idea, could you please explain in more detail?

Btw, Yeti Home Defence is published in Google play:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.omega486gamestudio.yetihomedefence

 

The new trailer is better. You could still cut its length in half. You don't need to provide as much information. Provide just enough to hook the customer. The sooner you can get the customer to the download page, the better.

Also ask a native English speaker to proofread the English text. There's a misspelling and some awkward grammar.

 

I will love to give you feedback but i see russian version from here,
i was thinking on learning russian after seeing Better than Us in Netflix.

 

Ok, what parts do you think are most attractive to customer?

 

Where do you see russian version? On Google play page?
Or you see russian page in Google play instead of English?

 

I tried to fix spelling and wording,
Latest English version here:

 

The action shots.

Cut the first 8 seconds. The player doesn't care about the backstory yet.

Cut the yeti summoning the towers.

Cut everything after 0:33.

Then refine the rest to give the player a clear idea of what it feels like to play the game.

 

Just in your game details!

 

Here you go @alex1st1

 

Strange. I see English:



If it's location-based, I'm in the USA, East Coast.

 

Ok so you open Google play as spanish user and see not English version which does exist but russian... Amazing... Any ideas why?

 

Ok got it, default page language was Russian, has changed to English, could you please confirm that you see English now?

 

Ok do I understand correctly that you like the idea of short Defender 3 trailer, e.g.
Fight (main game view)
Upgrade (upgrade screen)
Repeat!

I may combine it with mine - just put these 3 short cuts in begging
What do you think?

 

The best thing to do is try it and get feedback.

 

@alex1st I see it in English now!

 

Getting feedback is the most difficult part to me - as you guys here in this thread and someone sometimes on Reddit feedback friday replies to my posts, other forums seem to be silent...

So MANY THANKS TO YOU GUYS FOR YOUR FEEDBACK!
REALLY

 

Great!

MANY THANKS TO YOU GUYS FOR YOUR FEEDBACK!
REALLY

 

And if you look at this video, could you please tell me top 3 things you believe would distract people from the game? In other words, what should I fix, with reference examples, eg. "Fix picture saturation, see this as good reference picture"

 

1-Try Presskit and Trailer with different Typography to see how you feel with a subtle change.

Im wondering if the Typography in your trailer that explains the game features it's the best for this kind of game,
and in some places inside your Presskit i see the descriptions maybe distracting me to see the Screenshots from
the game at max. About the trailer i really don't know how to help with that, im not expert at that.

2-Music inside the Trailer: maybe to hear in game sounds a little?

Maybe the music it's too high in the Trailer too and you cannot hear in game sounds.

3-Icon

What happens if you put the main Character in the Icon?

For now i have this little quick feedback, hope it helps! Game seems fun!

 

I have changed icon on Google play page to the one attached. Can you please confirm that you see new one?

 

[] And regarding promo images - what do you think about attached?

 

I think Icon funcionability now it's more clear and users can understand the setting and the theme better..
Maybe you need to get more feedbacks now!

About promo images, i think it's good promo image. The Companion for the girl can appear too in another one?

I had one more Feedback: beware of the Marketing Text on top of the UI in some screenshots and beware
of stretching typography by hand too much, always Scale typography proportional.

 

Another thing i've noticed, when you put the USE word on the right, you are using a black border
on the typography and on the left you are not. Try to make it consistent. I think it's close
and looks good game, i will try to play it soon.

Man, this models looks awesome!

I like the Crystals you used!

Just check the BLACK border in some font
on the Presskit.

WATCHING THREAD!

 

Thanks a lot!
I have updated promo pictures and video on Google play page, video is now much shorter:

 

Looks better to me!

 

Hi All!
Have asked an YouTuber to publish small news about this game on his channel among other games he reviews.
The video had 22 000+ views, but only 38 gamers have installed the game and only 2 of those has not deleted it after a week.
Do you think the game has to be improved further or should be abandoned completely in favour of something more usual - maybe runner?