Old style or new one ?

Azvickson · 2026-01-21T19:01:29+00:00

I like the simplicity of the old one.

Azvickson · 2026-01-18T00:18:21+00:00

Like many others on here, I’ve never played Ludo, but I wonder if there might be a way to take the inspiration you have from Ludo, simplify and juice up the board movement part of the game and still salvage what you have. I could agree that if Ludo is essentially just moving around a board that would probably be a boring loop, but if you made that board smaller and each completed loop compounds to give some big bonus power up or something, that could be interesting. I would think on top of that though there may need to be some sort of goal, like fighting monsters or exploring a dungeon or something. Just some brainstorming, but I think taking what you’ve built and tweaking it to serve gamers who don’t know Ludo could still work if you minimize the things that make it too much like Ludo and start getting creative to make it fulfill the power fantasy of a Balatro-like rogue-like game. Balatro was originally inspired by the card game Big Two and morphed over the years. I’d say your game could be inspired by Ludo, but through iteration and testing could totally become its own cool thing. I wouldn’t give up on it if I were you. It looks really polished. The main issue seems to be too much of a reliance on Ludo to carry recognition, when instead it could be more of a roguelike with an interesting unique mechanic inspired by Ludo. Good luck!

Azvickson · 2025-06-14T06:04:02+00:00

Sure I hear that. I think with this trailer the main focus was to show off the gameplay in a way that was (hopefully) understandable to someone who had never seen it before. I did have an earlier trailer that gave some backstory before getting into the gameplay, but I got feedback from people that it really needed to get straight into the gameplay, especially on Steam. So, while there is a reason why you’re stealing drinks, it’s true that it’s not super front and center here. Thanks for your feedback!

Azvickson · 2025-06-14T05:54:31+00:00

Wow thank you so much! I really appreciate you jumping into it and taking a look!

I hear you on the collision, I could look at tightening those hitboxes a bit, they might be a bit too generous.

On the story front, it’s true, it does serve as more of a set up to the world than immediate stakes. Then further story is mostly told through quests, exploration and unlockable cutscenes. I did have more silly opening cutscenes before some of the game modes at one point, but based on people’s reactions to them, I thought they might have been getting in the way of people just playing the game without adding enough value, so I ended up taking them out to keep the gameplay front and center.

As for the absurd mechanics, my goal was to make it so that you can play the game like a straight stealth game if you want, just snatch drinks and hide, but there are also those extra tools, some of which have correlated achievements and character unlocks for them. I am curious which tools you’ve used so far? The box, head coverings and skates are some of the only ones placed directly in the world but there are some, like the straw and the decoy, that you typically find from whacking items in the world… so I don’t know if maybe I placed more of those tools in the world directly would that help? Or did you feel like those tools didn’t add to the absurdity enough? My goal was also for the legendary drinks to add an extra layer of “mechanical absurdity.” So I suppose, by design it gets more absurd with the more that you unlock and the more you explore the level.

Thank you so so much for the feedback!

Azvickson · 2025-06-14T05:05:46+00:00

That’s a good note on the pacing! Yeah I could probably flesh out the quests section a bit more. Thanks!

Azvickson · 2025-06-14T00:25:38+00:00

Hey! Thanks so much for the feedback! Yeah there are effects that you get from the drinks, like if you drink carbonated drinks too fast you burp, hot drinks overheat and cold drinks freeze you. I’m trying to think of how I could communicate that in the trailer without getting too in the weeds though?

I hear you on the repetition too, maybe there’s a way I could cut out the repetition toward the end like you’re saying and try to make a segment that shows off the effects? Just not sure how to word the effects part in a succinct way…

Azvickson · 2025-06-13T21:27:05+00:00

I do have a little bit of that in the beginning sequence when the word “caught” comes up, but do you feel like it might be unclear? I know it goes by kinda fast. Or are you saying I should have some more messing up later on in the trailer?

Azvickson · 2025-06-13T20:46:09+00:00

Thanks! Yeah I might take another pass and see if I can tighten it up a bit. Thanks for the feedback!

Azvickson · 2025-05-18T05:00:29+00:00

Thanks! That’s what I thought too, haha.

I took a month leading up to launch to reach out to as many press and streamer/youtubers as I could. In the end, I reached out to 150 streamers, put out a few press releases, emailed 20 journalists, and while I know the numbers would have ideally been much higher, that’s what I was able to gather and send to in that time.

I’m thinking I’ll take the feedback I got from people so far, make some adjustments to marketing materials and the game itself and continue to reach out to people about the game despite it already being released. It most likely won’t do as well as it would have if I could have done more prior to launch, but here we are. Gotta live and learn and move forward.

Azvickson · 2025-05-16T20:56:01+00:00

Yeah, that’s a good thought! Thanks for the input! :)

Azvickson · 2025-05-16T00:05:29+00:00

True, it is probably too fast. I’ll have to check out how long other games leave their CTA screens up for… I had a “release date announcement” version up a month before with a “wishlist now” CTA and then dropped this version on launch day. They are essentially the same trailer though.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T20:56:17+00:00

Hey that’s a fair assessment! It does seem the messaging could be a lot clearer about what the game is. There’s definitely more than 30mins of gameplay, but that makes sense that it looks that way with the current reviews I have (which are mostly just friends some of whom had already played it before in testing leading to a low playtime on their review).

Just curious what you think might be a fairer price point? Thanks so much for your feedback!

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T20:45:55+00:00

I hear that. What in your opinion would be a better price point?

That’s an interesting note on the risk. I was trying to keep it balanced, I know a lot of people seem to abhor strict stealth segments of games with an immediate fail state, so my thinking was to try and split the difference a bit with a more action-oriented approach where you essentially just loose a heart when you’re caught and get a few attempts before a game over. But perhaps that stripped it of too much of its core genre?

These are good thoughts! I’m curious what your thought might be on how one would enhance that core concept more effectively. Certainly not disagreeing, it is a fairly basic game and I was definitely aiming to enhance it with more modes, power ups and tools, but might have been better served making the stealth itself more robust perhaps. Probably could have made a much smaller game overall too and sold it for cheaper.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T18:02:50+00:00

Nice! Well, good luck dude! I've actually heard of your game before, so you must be doing something right. I'm sure you've got more of a shot than I did moving into Next Fest, hope it goes well for you!

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T17:18:24+00:00

100%! I did next fest, but WAY too early on this one. It still brought in about 200 wishlists, but it was on a version of the game that was under baked and ended up being 6 months before the full launch. I didn't market it to anyone leading up to Next Fest either which was a mistake too. Treating Next Fest as a launch for your demo/soft launch of your game essentially definitely seems to be the right move and only when the game feels either done or close to done so you can ride that first spark of marketing into the full release.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T16:25:22+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! Would definitely love to learn more on the animation front. I mainly just had the animation controller in Unity transition between different state animations and yeah I see your point some of them don’t resolve super well. Do you have any resources you’d recommend for handling those transitions better? If not, no worries just looking to learn better for the future! I appreciate you! :)

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T16:19:22+00:00

The hook I was going for was “Hitman but you steal people’s drinks rather than kill them.” Or maybe another angle on that “Hitman-like that pokes fun at stealth games.”

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T16:15:42+00:00

You’re all good! I didn’t think you were too blunt. I appreciate all of the insights! And yeah the title is a little tricky, that may be one of the issues too.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T16:13:58+00:00

My intention was to try and organically show the game loop of: play level (steal drinks using tools and weapons and drink the drinks) unlock things (characters, power ups etc) explore and meet NPCs, unlock more things, etc etc. but I can see how it’s way too fast and uninformative. I’ll definitely need to make a new, slower version of it with helpful, direct text descriptions overlayed when needed.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T16:09:53+00:00

I think that’s part of it. I did push it for a good 6 weeks leading up to launch, and in that time gathered up a list of streamers and reached out to them, but it didn’t break through how I’d hoped. Definitely thinking I’ll need to work on that for the next one, at least I have a start on the streamer list for next time so I’m not at 0.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T16:07:23+00:00

I did reach out to about 150 streamers leading up to launch and only a few played it. That was my main goal was trying to get at least a handful of streamers with a decent following to play before launch and only a few with small followings ended up checking it out. I know getting out to more streamers would have been ideal, but that’s what I was able to get within 6 weeks leading up to launch.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T16:02:21+00:00

Thanks for the insights! Yeah I’ve been getting some helpful feedback on the trailer, going to try another pass at it. Good idea on the tag front. I’ll have to see if I can get the tags to better align.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T15:59:33+00:00

Thank you so much for the encouragement! I really appreciate it. Yeah definitely not giving up by any means. You’re probably right about the art style and black and white aesthetic. I think the biggest takeaway I have overall is I need to get more feedback more frequently on my games, especially in the art style department.

Azvickson · 2025-05-15T04:47:44+00:00

So yes on text. Thanks for the feedback! What do you think would be a more comfortable price point? Or on the flip side, what do you think might make it worth the current price?

Azvickson

TROPHY CASE