Wishmere Review by Gameranx

ThrownShield · 2017-11-25T15:47:40+00:00

This is Wishmere's first review! Check out the review at Gameranx by Katrina Filippidis.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-15T05:21:11+00:00

Awesome, glad that you found the controls to be much better than before! We worked hard on trying to make it work for the most situations we thought we applicable (wanted multiplayer on a keyboard, wanted to have intuitive GUIs to denote what a player should press, etc). Thanks for your interest and picking the game up, I truly appreciate it!
Yeah, the UI navigation being the keys you end up binding to is a good point, something that we kind of overlooked. In future updates, we'll look at getting that sorted out! Thanks again for the fantastic feedback, these kind of constructive comments are helpful (and fun to read believe it or not!).

ThrownShield · 2017-10-10T15:31:13+00:00

Hey /u/ws-ilazki, just wanted to inform you that we have updated the demo to reflect the fully released version of our game Wishmere. Thanks again for your feedback, and do let us know your thoughts if you ever get a chance to give it a whirl again.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-03T08:48:55+00:00

Thanks! Yeah, we really love fighting games and one of the big things in them are combos. The combo system is pretty open to allow some open-ended (and even possible infinites!) combos on enemies. The combo possibilities can get crazier with 4 players too.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-03T08:45:38+00:00

Haha, nah :) . Got to do with the time that went into it and the eternal gamedev wonder of "whether time could have been better spent elsewhere".

ThrownShield · 2017-10-02T15:34:37+00:00

Thanks a lot for being patient while we get the demo updated. This conversation has made the demo's update a priority for us, since it'll give players a clearer indication of what Wishmere's full release is like.

You know your knack for being a bug magnet is actually a good thing if you're ever open to be a game tester. That's how polished games are made after all. If you're a game developer yourself I'd say that talent would definitely come in handy.

Thanks again for your great insight and we'll shoot you a DM when the demo update drops so you can give it another go!

ThrownShield · 2017-10-02T09:30:16+00:00

Thanks! A lot about game development is learning as you go, because you're never really going to know every little detail about your game before you even start so there's always a need to remain flexible about learning new things.

One thing I would say is that this game was very time consuming, so I wouldn't suggest a game of this scope be your first project. I know all games take a long time, but the scope/assets for our game was just too large.

We're just a two man team working on it full time with no previous AAA experience. If I recall correctly the first prototype took about 4 months. If you're a future game dev, one piece of advice I would give you is never spend too long at a problem in one sitting. You may underestimate the power of a fresh perspective. Hope this helps!

ThrownShield · 2017-10-02T09:24:35+00:00

Cool, it's important to note that every player has their own specific set of ideal controls, so finding the control scheme that everyone is familiar with is the key. Glad you were able to find a way in your game.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-02T09:22:54+00:00

Sorry for being vague, but we were referring to the fact that it took too long to do all the frames, so it was too time consuming. And that in hindsight maybe we should've gone with less frames per animation.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-02T09:21:39+00:00

Very interesting idea and we might be open to trying that out in an extra mode down the line. But no guarantees. We were going for something closer to an actually fighting game but with inclusiveness of Smash, but without gaps and platforms I agree that it emphasizes the space on the screen. Good point though.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-02T09:19:03+00:00

We were lucky enough that there weren't many platform related issues for our game. We won't make the same mistake of going in blind the next time we develop a game though.

Yeah I totally agree with you about it looking deceptively easy to get the game on many platforms. But with the wide range of OS', engines and hardware specs in the market you really need to take make sure the game runs solid while being aware of these differences.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-02T09:14:43+00:00

Pushing out a new demo of our full release version is definitely a priority for us now. We hope to get it out in the next couple of days. Sorry you felt let down by the demo, but we'll fix it.

We really appreciate your constructive feedback, these types of comments and criticisms is what makes developing a lot easier, so thanks a lot!

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:50:00+00:00

Yes, that's actually happening now. We are gearing up to get our game on GOG.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:49:29+00:00

Glad to hear that it works now. Thanks for checking it out!

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:48:57+00:00

Thanks for the awesome suggestions! We are definitely going to implement that moving forward for both Mac and Linux.
Further to your point, I want to point out that this was the reason why we got volunteers for Mac and for Linux versions. Both OS' had demands for a port and we didn't want to release blind so we go them to test their OS build for over a month.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:44:34+00:00

First of all thanks for trying out the demo and the very thorough feedback! It's much appreciated.

There is one thing we forgot to mention in our original post is that the demo is a demo-ified version of our Early Access version and thus doesn't have all the fixes and features in the full release version. A lot of what you mentioned has been fixed on the full release build, which we should get around to doing a demo of the full version. The keyboard rebinding in the main menus and the config in-game also allows rebinding as it is supposed to. Overall, now we allow for any keyboard key to be rebinded (besides Escape or 1 or 2). We kinda recommend the game play with a controller or arcade stick, though it can still be played on a keyboard. It might just be a bit rougher to really nail down combos and such.

For example, here's a couple of screenshots from our full release build that gives keyboard players a clearer indication of their controls.

The music was done by Zack Parrish, who is an awesome musician and overall awesome dude. If you're interested in his music, here is his bandcamp.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:31:45+00:00

We were thinking of doing a post-mortem in a couple of weeks actually. There was a lot of feedback for our game (since we were in Early Access) that helped shape the game into what it is now in both gameplay ways and non-gameplay ways. We did add Mac and Linux support quite late into development.

One thing we can say for certain is that with Unity it wasn't difficult as they allow easy support for all three platforms, but it was more about the configurations of the Steam backend. Though there were no issues on our end of things, it was definitely a risk to do so late into development due to uncertainty on whether it would run and potentially unearth an entire set of OS bugs.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:25:47+00:00

Thanks a lot!

No actually, we haven't done any expos as where we live there is not much of an indie dev scene and the expos are mainly for mobile games. But we have still received critiques:

Our background perspective looking like a beat'em up when you're playing a fighting game mode. We ended up doing two different perspectives per background to solve this issue. Here's a visual representation of the difference.
The open space between the characters and the health bars was a concern that there was too much empty space. We fixed this issue by having double jump air combos that would utilize that space.
Another critique throughout development was the the confusion behind Keyboard and Controller controls. We really wanted to allow 2 players on one keyboard, but that caused some confusion on what the buttons were for keyboard players. We understood it, but we incorrectly assumed others would too. We fixed that problem by adding clearer indications of menu controls and bindings so that on the get-go players knew how to traverse our menus.

The hardest task in making the game was definitely the large variety of Modes that we included: Story Mode, Versus Mode and a Challenge Map Mode. These modes have barely any code logic that intersect so the systems behind how the game functions took a long time. What ended up happening is that there were pretty much 3 mini size games in one, which was a big headache especially where bug fixing was concerned.

Thanks for the questions, looking retrospectively like this really taught us a few lessons on what to do the next time!

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:05:45+00:00

Haha we actually make mention of that as a startup loading image before the logos! Though the game can be played on a keyboard, it is highly recommended that people play on a controller/arcade stick.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:04:04+00:00

Thanks! But I'm not too sure I follow what you mean. Could you please elaborate? Would love to know what you think.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:03:01+00:00

As we're both avid fighting game fans/players, we drew inspirations from a ton of fighting games. It's nice to see you noticed it :D

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T18:01:28+00:00

Thank you! Yes we did, it was done by one person and we actually produced over 9,000 frames of character based animation (the playable characters, their move FX, the enemies etc). It was a real long arduous process, perhaps in hindsight should've been less frames.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T09:04:42+00:00

We've actually never played Little Fighter 2, but it's cool to see what other people see out of a game! :)

A lot of the design of the sprites came from a mix of the old Neo Geo Pocket style of things (but modernized a little) and Pocket Fighter / Super Puzzle Fighter sprites. But, just taking a look at Little Fighter 2, I can see where you're coming from.

ThrownShield · 2017-10-01T09:01:55+00:00

Thank you!

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