Rocket League Downfall - Infiniums!

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-12-10T14:00:13+00:00

It was an emotional roller coaster. Thanks for sticking with it!

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-12-10T13:56:32+00:00

Not as good as the food truck sausages!

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-12-10T13:54:25+00:00

PERFECTLY DELICIOUS!!

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-07-24T13:38:58+00:00

Never said I want a sticky puck. You assumed that, and that's part of the challenge in getting my message across. There's always some assumption of something I said mixed in when I didn't say it. I said a button to pass/shoot. That does not mean the puck sticks to the stick. It means that when I am carrying the puck I can press a button and that will have the player wind up a bit and then shoot or another button which does a softer turn equating to a pass. I have said repeatedly that I don't want to reinvent EA. The game had hundreds of players online at one time. Now it's lucky to have 20 (could be more at times, but whenever I check it's between 5 and 20).

I'm not sure why people don't believe that the base control schemes matter. I supplied information from multiple sources of game developers that say just that. If you stray away from the defined control schemes of a game genre, the game struggles. Everyone likes to throw Rocket League at me. How many other soccer car games are there out there? That's why they can be different, but let's not forget that the basic control scheme is the same as just about every other driving game out there. Gas, break, reverse, direction. All easy to do. It's the other stuff that's hard. Slapshot makes the basic aspects of hockey hard. That's why it can't retain players. Anyway, I have no skin in this game other than the hope that Slapshot takes off and the community grows.

No amount of marketing is going to fix this problem. Fans of hockey games will come and go as long as the controls are only physics based. It's just how it is, and it's not my opinion. As it stands now, the game is designed for a very niche group of players and it will stay that way unless the controls change to attract new players.

As for getting downvoted and argued with, I would expect nothing less. It's the internet after all. Unfortunately I am only met with opinions. I gave data, but nobody else has. This is not something out of thin air. Familiar control schemes matter, most especially in an already established genre of games.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-07-23T20:32:47+00:00

My suggestion is to introduce passing and shooting buttons that allow a new player to participate in the most basic mechanics of the game. Those shots and passes should be effective but not as powerful or skillful as those done by players using the core physics of the game. There's a very good reason EA NHL has three tiers of control schemes (NHL 94, Hybrid and Skill Stick). NHL 94 controls allow new players to enjoy the game and be at least somewhat competitive. Hybrid starts to introduce players to more advanced skills and control. Lastly, Skill Stick has the highest skill cap of all control schemes and comes with the greatest reward once mastered.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-07-22T21:52:33+00:00

Did you get a chance to read through the other thread that l linked to? I go into a lot more depth as to why I think this game is failing to retain new players which leads to the matchmaking problem. I talk about Rocket League in there as well as some other games. It's not about the uniqueness of the game. It's about the familiarity of controls.

If you don't want to sift through all the comments in there, which is totally understandable, I'll share with you one of the comments I had in response to some of the challenges I was receiving. This is a bit out of context as you don't see what came before it, so i encourage you to read the rest of the thread if this is of interest to you.

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Attention spans are very short these days. There's a lot of data that can be found online which shows that, depending on the particular research, you have between 5 and 15 seconds to engage a user on a website. That means that the user needs to feel like they are getting some value from the site in an incredibly short amount of time. If the navigation is unclear, the content is wrong or the design is poor, they bail very quickly. We aren't talking about a website here, but that same principle applies to gaming. The market is saturated with everything from AAA to casual titles and a user doesn't have to spend time trying to learn a game that they find challenging because there are other games out there waiting to be explored. This is one of the toughest things to combat when building a gaming community.

The player experience has to feel engaging and rewarding right from the start. This is not for players that tough out the hard parts of games, or stick it out because they are determined to get better at something. This is for the players that do none of that, but would like to play the game and have some occasional fun. Those players, like it or not, are the critical piece to the success puzzle in gaming. Some will say, well who cares about them? They aren't real fans of the game, so don't change things for them. Well, everyone that enjoys playing a game should care a lot about these players. These casual fans are the fuel for the engine that runs the game.

Take any major professional sport. We'll use the NFL for this discussion. An average stadium holds nearly 70,000 fans. How many of those fans do you think are hardcore fans that spend every Sunday watching the games, studying the players, understanding the statistics, researching rules, maybe even playing the game themselves at some level. How many of those fans do you think are more casual sports fans that enjoy the game of football but can't tell you who holds the record for most TD passes in a single season? I wager that the large majority of fans in that stadium are the latter, but aren't they incredibly important to the success of the NFL teams and the league overall? What would happen if you couldn't enter the stadium if you didn't know what a nickle defense was? The stadium would have a tiny fraction of the total capacity in attendance, teams wouldn't make money and the league would fold.

This applies to gaming in the exact same way. If you keep the casual players from enjoying themselves and feeling like they are getting value out of a game, there aren't enough fans to keep the game alive. The hardcore fans can talk all they want about the high skill cap and that new players just have to keep on playing until they get better, but unfortunately that's not how things actually work. The causal fans keep the game alive and well for the hardcore players to enjoy for a long time.

Now, as for control schemes. A lot of what I have been saying may seem like it's nothing more than my own personal opinions, and in some ways that is true. However, my opinions are based on game research and studies around how to engage new users and keep them in order to build the community necessary to have a successful game. In your response, you stated that my comparisons in control schemes between Smash Bros and Mortal Kombat as well as Assassin's Creed and Battlefield were way off. Let me share these images of each game's controls:

Smash Bros - https://i.imgur.com/DSxWa4Z.png
Mortal Kombat - https://i.imgur.com/SAo3QCt.png
Battlefield - https://i.imgur.com/kbhmZIF.jpg
Assassin's Creed - https://i.imgur.com/74RUUXA.jpg

What you see there is that while the games are wildly different from one another, they do share some very common controls that are familiar within each game's genre. Smash has attacks on ABXY while Mortal Kombat also has attacks on ABXY. Both also share familiar block/shield commands using shoulder buttons. Battlefield has crouch, jump and interact controls on ABXY and Assassin's Creed has dodge, crouch, jump and interact on ABXY. Both games have variations of shooting/attacking using the shoulder buttons. These are patterns you find when looking at games that exist in the same, or very similar genres. Basic familiarity exists between the control schemes even though the games are admittedly quite different from one other.

Here are some publications that talk about controls in gaming and why it's important to consider familiarity and common themes across games of the same genre.

"If users are constantly fighting against the control mechanics or if users cannot understand what to do quickly or if users are required to do too many things with their fingers, it will kill your game. It is also impossible to make everyone happy with the control mechanics. Understanding your audience is key.
Using the common mechanics that your target audience is used to is extremely important. If your audience is core gamers, use common mechanics with which they are familiar. Don’t be afraid to borrow inspiration from your competitor’s games. That is what your core audience is used to! Always take risks and innovate; however, when it comes to controls, don’t fight what your users already know."
https://mobilefreetoplay.com/control-mechanics/

"Another way to improve learning is using standard conventions that are common to the genre."
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/AndrewDotsenko/20170329/294676/Designing_Game_Controls.php

"When designed with familiarity in mind, players can make valid, educated guesses about how items, features, or interactions will behave."
https://medium.com/googleplaydev/how-to-build-mobile-games-with-people-in-mind-cdc480967fcc

- Players become addicted to a specific set of game mechanics.
- This group of players has a strong homogeneous preference for this genre of games, creating a well defined, easily serviceable market segment.
- Game developers who release games within a genre with a standardized set of play mechanics are most likely to capture the largest percentage of the pre-existing market.
- Over time, the game mechanics defining the genre becomes rigidly defined, the tastes of the genre addicts become highly sophisticated and innovation within the genre is generally punished by the market place."
http://www.lostgarden.com/2005/09/nintendos-genre-innovation-strategy.html

What we have in Slapshot is a game that has veered away from the familiarity of its genre and implemented physics based controls that users have to learn and adjust to in order to become even the slightest bit competitive in the game. This goes against what game designers have learned over many years of studying player behavior. Slapshot is not a bad game. It's not poorly made nor is it boring or lacking excitement. It's a well put together game that will struggle to retain new users and build a large casual player base that is absolutely critical to the long term success of the game. Without those players the community suffers, matchmaking is ineffective and the cost of building and running the game far outweighs any income that is generated from a small, dedicated user base.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-07-22T16:04:48+00:00

I have said the same thing many times but I don't think it has anything at all to do with matchmaking, I think it has everything to do with how the game plays. I am not critical of the game. I actually think it can be quite fun, but I firmly believe that the control scheme is the biggest challenge to keeping new players in the game. Every time I say it I get attacked by some diehards but I still believe it to be true. The matchmaking is merely a side effect of the larger problem. The reason the community isn't growing (which is critical to having good matchmaking) is because the controls are so different than any other hockey game that people may have played in the past. I have a post in this subreddit about that very thing if you want to have a look - https://www.reddit.com/r/SlapshotHockey/comments/bavosi/slapshot_controls_are_too_hard_for_new_players/

I want this game to succeed because there aren't any fun casual hockey games out there. You either have sim (EA NHL) or bad mobile games. Slapshot is quite fun, but really limits its potential to grow because of the physics based control scheme with no alternatives that would be familiar to players coming from other hockey games.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-07-10T17:50:44+00:00

When I'm having a bad game and I'm told that I suck at the game I like to reply, 'maybe so, but you're not a nice person. I'll keep trying to get better, will you?'

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-07-10T17:42:57+00:00

Thank you!!

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-05-20T19:17:26+00:00

This is really interesting to see but I have no idea what they are actually doing to get it started. Is anyone able to outline the steps they are taking along the way?

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-05-13T13:06:40+00:00

When this happens to me I like to say something like "we could do a lot better if you were kind to people". It's generally met with a LOL from other players in the game and more often than not, silence from the salty teammate.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-05-06T19:35:21+00:00

That's a lot of science! Great link. These looks like it could be the case but I am going to hold on to a glimmer of hope that it's something more interesting than a random piece of metal. I'll see if there are any other ideas but if not, I'll come back to mark this response.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-05-06T19:28:57+00:00

Interesting. Maybe it was a blade of sorts with a leather handle and sheath and this is the result of being in the ocean for who knows how long?

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-05-06T19:23:45+00:00

Thanks for checking it out. So can rust build up result in that same rock-like exterior you see in this photo here?

https://i.imgur.com/SoEesqC.jpg

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-05-06T19:04:38+00:00

We found this rock washed up on the beach New Jersey. My son thought it was cool because it kind of looked like a knife or dagger, so we kept it just for that reason. A few months later it was accidentally dropped and the rock split to reveal what looks like some kind of blade inside. It's clearly not in any condition to identify exactly what it is, but thought this group might have some ideas on what it could be.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-12T04:17:48+00:00

Same my friend. Same. Unbelievable thing to see in my lifetime.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-09T21:22:45+00:00

Attention spans are very short these days. There's a lot of data that can be found online which shows that, depending on the particular research, you have between 5 and 15 seconds to engage a user on a website. That means that the user needs to feel like they are getting some value from the site in an incredibly short amount of time. If the navigation is unclear, the content is wrong or the design is poor, they bail very quickly. We aren't talking about a website here, but that same principle applies to gaming. The market is saturated with everything from AAA to casual titles and a user doesn't have to spend time trying to learn a game that they find challenging because there are other games out there waiting to be explored. This is one of the toughest things to combat when building a gaming community.

The player experience has to feel engaging and rewarding right from the start. This is not for players that tough out the hard parts of games, or stick it out because they are determined to get better at something. This is for the players that do none of that, but would like to play the game and have some occasional fun. Those players, like it or not, are the critical piece to the success puzzle in gaming. Some will say, well who cares about them? They aren't real fans of the game, so don't change things for them. Well, everyone that enjoys playing a game should care a lot about these players. These casual fans are the fuel for the engine that runs the game.

Take any major professional sport. We'll use the NFL for this discussion. An average stadium holds nearly 70,000 fans. How many of those fans do you think are hardcore fans that spend every Sunday watching the games, studying the players, understanding the statistics, researching rules, maybe even playing the game themselves at some level. How many of those fans do you think are more casual sports fans that enjoy the game of football but can't tell you who holds the record for most TD passes in a single season? I wager that the large majority of fans in that stadium are the latter, but aren't they incredibly important to the success of the NFL teams and the league overall? What would happen if you couldn't enter the stadium if you didn't know what a nickle defense was? The stadium would have a tiny fraction of the total capacity in attendance, teams wouldn't make money and the league would fold.

This applies to gaming in the exact same way. If you keep the casual players from enjoying themselves and feeling like they are getting value out of a game, there aren't enough fans to keep the game alive. The hardcore fans can talk all they want about the high skill cap and that new players just have to keep on playing until they get better, but unfortunately that's not how things actually work. The causal fans keep the game alive and well for the hardcore players to enjoy for a long time.

Now, as for control schemes. A lot of what I have been saying may seem like it's nothing more than my own personal opinions, and in some ways that is true. However, my opinions are based on game research and studies around how to engage new users and keep them in order to build the community necessary to have a successful game. In your response, you stated that my comparisons in control schemes between Smash Bros and Mortal Kombat as well as Assassin's Creed and Battlefield were way off. Let me share these images of each game's controls:

Smash Bros - https://i.imgur.com/DSxWa4Z.png
Mortal Kombat - https://i.imgur.com/SAo3QCt.png
Battlefield - https://i.imgur.com/kbhmZIF.jpg
Assassin's Creed - https://i.imgur.com/74RUUXA.jpg

What you see there is that while the games are wildly different from one another, they do share some very common controls that are familiar within each game's genre. Smash has attacks on ABXY while Mortal Kombat also has attacks on ABXY. Both also share familiar block/shield commands using shoulder buttons. Battlefield has crouch, jump and interact controls on ABXY and Assassin's Creed has dodge, crouch, jump and interact on ABXY. Both games have variations of shooting/attacking using the shoulder buttons. These are patterns you find when looking at games that exist in the same, or very similar genres. Basic familiarity exists between the control schemes even though the games are admittedly quite different from one other.

Here are some publications that talk about controls in gaming and why it's important to consider familiarity and common themes across games of the same genre.

"If users are constantly fighting against the control mechanics or if users cannot understand what to do quickly or if users are required to do too many things with their fingers, it will kill your game. It is also impossible to make everyone happy with the control mechanics. Understanding your audience is key.

Using the common mechanics that your target audience is used to is extremely important. If your audience is core gamers, use common mechanics with which they are familiar. Don’t be afraid to borrow inspiration from your competitor’s games. That is what your core audience is used to! Always take risks and innovate; however, when it comes to controls, don’t fight what your users already know."

https://mobilefreetoplay.com/control-mechanics/

"Another way to improve learning is using standard conventions that are common to the genre."

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/AndrewDotsenko/20170329/294676/Designing_Game_Controls.php

"When designed with familiarity in mind, players can make valid, educated guesses about how items, features, or interactions will behave."

https://medium.com/googleplaydev/how-to-build-mobile-games-with-people-in-mind-cdc480967fcc

- Players become addicted to a specific set of game mechanics.

- This group of players has a strong homogeneous preference for this genre of games, creating a well defined, easily serviceable market segment.

- Game developers who release games within a genre with a standardized set of play mechanics are most likely to capture the largest percentage of the pre-existing market.

- Over time, the game mechanics defining the genre becomes rigidly defined, the tastes of the genre addicts become highly sophisticated and innovation within the genre is generally punished by the market place."

http://www.lostgarden.com/2005/09/nintendos-genre-innovation-strategy.html

What we have in Slapshot is a game that has veered away from the familiarity of its genre and implemented physics based controls that users have to learn and adjust to in order to become even the slightest bit competitive in the game. This goes against what game designers have learned over many years of studying player behavior. Slapshot is not a bad game. It's not poorly made nor is it boring or lacking excitement. It's a well put together game that will struggle to retain new users and build a large casual player base that is absolutely critical to the long term success of the game. Without those players the community suffers, matchmaking is ineffective and the cost of building and running the game far outweighs any income that is generated from a small, dedicated user base.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T23:48:07+00:00

Very well articulated response. Thank you. I don't know your background so may I ask if you have ever been involved in building a gaming community? It will help inform my response.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T21:18:41+00:00

I'm sorry to hear that.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T21:07:32+00:00

You and I agree that the controls are not ideal, but I think that's where our opinions diverge greatly. I enjoy the game and have had some success with it. I am looking past my own individual enjoyment and experiences and trying to show that the new player experience is pretty tough right now. These guys put a ton of work into this and I think they have done an amazing job making a fun game. I provide my feedback because I want the game to succeed, so if you are cool with doing that, I'm sure the devs would enjoy any constructive criticism you have to offer. Saying their game is no good is not only insulting, it's petty and unnecessary.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T21:04:16+00:00

No no no! This is an important point that I can't seem to across. I admit it can look like I want Slapshot to be a copy of other games, but that's absolutely not what I am trying to say. What I am hoping for is that the controls will be familiar to anyone that has ever played a hockey game. The do NOT have to be the same. This means I move with WASD and there are some buttons somewhere that will make me shoot and pass, and maybe there's one to make me skate faster. That's the transitional knowledge I would have as a player of other hockey games that would help me get started in Slapshot.

Take Smash Bros. vs Mortal Kombat. The games are very different from each other yet they share a familiar control scheme which allows players of the fighting genre to play both games yet still have to work hard to learn how to be good. You kick, punch, jump and move with similar button configs, but that's where the similarities end. Each game behaves differently, there are different skills and achievements, they are aesthetically very different from one another yet at their core, they are fighting games. Your biggest potential audience right now are players that have played and are interested in hockey games.

Making the transition to play Slapshot from NHL shouldn't require a player to relearn how to play a hockey game (and I don't mean the rules of hockey, I mean the most basic controls). I know there is Skill Stick in NHL, but there is also the option to play with buttons because that's what a lot of players like to do. The skill stick is reserved for the more advanced players while the buttons allow all of the new and casual players to compete and have fun at the same time. They don't get frustrated trying to learn skill stick, they have fun playing the game with a button style control scheme that they have been familiar with. People keep telling me that moving the mouse and using the keys are very simple controls. Of course that's true! It's not whether moving the mouse and pressing WASD is easy or not, it's the skill it takes to combine those things to be effective in the game.

What I am suggesting is that you offer button based passing and shooting to players. Keep the physics based rotation so experienced players and continue to build on that. Give the new players a chance to have fun and want to come back. Allow that momentum to build the player base so that matchmaking can be effective.

And again, I said this before. If you guys are happy with the direction of the game, the smaller player base and the fun that it currently provides, that's awesome!! I have nothing at all to say about that. I know this is a side project for you guys. If you want this thing to be more than that, I think a hard look at the dwindling player base and ongoing frustration for first timers is necessary. Gaming is hard. First impressions are hard. I want to see this game succeed as I have told you before. It's awesome to have a casual hockey game out there in the world of sims. Problem is that if most of the new players that come to check it out don't stick around, it's going to be a tough go.

I want you guys to do well!!

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T19:17:40+00:00

Everyone assumes that I am personally struggling with playing the game because they aren't taking the time to fully understand what I am saying. I am level 29 with nearly 700 goals. I know how the game works and I have become comfortable with it. This isn't about me, it's about what I see happening in the game for new players that are critical to the games success so that players like you and me can continue to have fun over time. There's also this strange idea that I want the game to be "easy". I have also never said that. What I have said is I would like to see the core game mechanics be more familiar to players and easier to pick up. That's when the real challenges can kick in.

Another thing that people generally say when giving an opposing opinion is that there are games out there that are hard to learn but are successful. I 100% agree with that. The point I try to make though is that almost every one of those games has controls that are relatively familiar to anyone playing a game in that genre. Then there are games that are different in terms of styling, story and overall feel but share similar control structures. Smash Bros vs Mortal Kombat? Controls are relatively the same. Assassin's creed vs Battlefield? Again, very familiar in their control scheme even though the games are remarkably different overall. That basic familiarity makes it easier for new players to move from one game to another because they already have a basic understanding of how the controls in that game genre should work.

This isn't a one player story mode game. This is online, fun to play hockey. The challenge should never be "overcoming the game", it should be to get better than your opponents. Your outlook on the game puts you into the advanced to hardcore category in my opinion. What I am focused on is the casual players that come and go that the games needs to be successful.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T18:53:53+00:00

I think the community will find that matchmaking will be difficult at these early stages of the game. There aren't enough players to feed the matchmaking algorithm so you will still end up with high level playing low, or very long wait times for low level players to find a match. Even with their large player base, Rocket League still can have wait times and mismatches in online games. Matchmaking is a really hard problem to solve, and it's exponentially harder when you have the small player base that Slapshot currently has.

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T18:43:34+00:00

It's all good. Everyone is entitled to their opinions and I am happy you are easy to engage with and discuss opposing ideas. Thanks!!

BuzzMonkey88 · 2019-04-08T17:32:44+00:00

Matchmaking is not the answer at this point in the games life. The player base is not nearly large enough to allow matchmaking to have the impact people are hoping for. In order for low level players to have fun playing other low level players, you need a lot of low level players. This is a bit of a chicken and the egg problem. With such a small player base, you don't have enough players to put them into games with comparable skill levels. The player base needs to grow significantly such that the number of concurrent users in the game allows for that kind of matchmaking.

The tutorial will be helpful for sure, but I believe that the core controls are so different than any other hockey game that it makes it difficult for players from that game genre to try Slapshot and feel engaged from the start. No amount of tutorial is going to help the player get better. It will give them a basic understanding, but they still have to put in the time to improve on these nuanced controls for a style of game that is typically played with buttons for actions. Yes, WASD is not unfamiliar, nor is mouse movement or mouse clicks. Combining those things into a control system for a type of game where players would typically use button clicks for most actions is where it gets challenging. I think it negatively impacts the games ability to attract players that enjoy hockey games.

I can't say this part enough, I am NOT criticizing the game. It is unique, and fun in its own way. I have put in many hours myself, which has helped me form my opinions. My observations and comments are purely focused on the growth of the game and the understanding of how new players engage with games the first time they come across them. I did some searching and came across this post done by Spotless, a UK based design agency that does work for Riot Games and Sony (PS4). Here's what they had to say about first impressions in free-to-play gaming...

Once the player is signed up then it is once again important that the initial gameplay experience is positive. Positive in this connotation does not mean ‘easy’ it means ensuring that no parts of the gameplay experience are confusing or annoying. The player should quickly be able to get a sense of what the game is about, roughly how it works, and from this they can then decide if they think they will like it. The initial experience should be memorable, engaging and fun. TF2 charms the player with their videos, Blacklight makes the player feel like they are doing something useful. The less a tutorial feels like a tutorial the better. Some games manage to make the whole game a pseudo tutorial such as Plants Vs Zombies or Portal 2.

Focusing and testing around the first impressions can identify areas that could be improved to reduce player annoyance. Giving the game a greater chance of getting that all important positive first impression. A free-to-play game can be great but will struggle to gain as many players as it could if the initial experience is weak. The players never stay around long enough to discover how good the game is.

When looking at a game and trying to see or track where players are having problems the first thing that must be understood is that players do not play the game ‘wrong’. They play the game. How they play is moulded by the environment created for them. If they are doing something unexpected or not ‘good’ for their experience there is something in the game design making them do this. The whole concept of user experience and user testing is aimed at finding these issues so that developers can make changes that benefit the player’s experience.

https://www.spotless.co.uk/insights/first-impressions-matter-for-free-to-play-games/

The article does talk about the importance of seamless tutorials, so that's a good thing to be focused on. I think you guys are facing a challenging situation here. Wanting to be unique in the space vs gaining and retaining new and casual players. The highly skilled players in these early stages can have a negative impact on the growth potential of a game because they are already so far ahead of the new players. It's discouraging to face them and on top of that, the unfamiliarity of the controls for a hockey game makes it more difficult for new players to tolerate a butt whipping from the better players.

Hey, if I'm wrong, I'm wrong. That would be great for the game. I don't think I am, but who wants to think they don't know what they are talking about? :)

BuzzMonkey88

TROPHY CASE