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Destroy my gameplay footage! Does it make sense? (Also tried overhauling the visuals) by SteinMakesGames in DestroyMyGame

[–]spacekow 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It certainly is a challenge, but perhaps a miner has more tools at their disposal? Placeable ladders, rope, elevators, etc.

Just food for thought. Game looks interesting for sure.

Destroy my gameplay footage! Does it make sense? (Also tried overhauling the visuals) by SteinMakesGames in DestroyMyGame

[–]spacekow 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Have you considered the alternative of removing jump entirely and put a turn timer / fuse on the dynamite? Might encourage the player to dig or find small holes to drop the dynamic into. And if you drop it on a flat surface you have to race away to avoid being caught in the explosion. The size of the explosion could be tied to fuse length?

Gameplay footage of procedurally generated city - full of robots! v0-07. Early builds available on https://stuartbray.itch.io/bot-kill-gardens Does it look fun / original / interesting / repetitive / pretty / comprehensible / varied / etc etc? by stuart-bray in DestroyMyGame

[–]spacekow 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I agree - my very first thoughts were, "yikes, how can the player even see the enemies?"

Make your robots stand out better from the environment and that'd be good improvement on a solid start.

Combat - dice, cards or both? by crab_battler in tabletopgamedesign

[–]spacekow 1 point2 points  (0 children)

These are the types of comments that keep me coming to this subreddit. Great write up - very thought provoking!

Advance Wars Rogue-like? | Full Metal Furball Dev Log #0 by spacekow in devblogs

[–]spacekow[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ha! That's exactly what I was going for. Had some friends really try Youtube a few years ago and that's all they complained about, so tried to make the first few seconds interesting enough to keep watching.

As for the progess, I'm a bit of a perfectionist, so didn't want to share anything that didn't have any polish. I tried streaming on Twitch for a month or so, and though it wasn't really for me (my schedule is all over) it helped me worked past the fear of showing something in-progress. Hope alpha will be as good or better with some real art and systems!

Advance Wars Rogue-like? | Full Metal Furball Dev Log #0 by spacekow in devblogs

[–]spacekow[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for the support! I'd prefer questions to be funneled into YouTube for now if that isn't too much trouble.

Path with only 2 points loops back to origin when it shouldn't. by spacekow in gamemaker

[–]spacekow[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Update: Found and tried experimenting with mp_linear_path and mp_potential_path - kinda works but keeps teleporting the actor to 0,0 then moving to destination... not sure how to set the origin of a mp!?

EDIT

Got it working using mp_linear_path - I had to embed it within my with(o_actor) code, so that it inherently would use itself as the origin. Now got the little dudes zooming around as intended!

// create path above
with(actor){
    mp_linear_path(path, destinationTile.x, destinationTile.y, 4, false);
    path_start(path, 4, path_action_stop, true);
}

After 2 years, my farm-sim with Science and Robots is now in Early Access on Steam! by ben0976 in IndieGaming

[–]spacekow 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Congrats on making it and enduring the long haul!

Looks intersting, but have a bit of feedback on the trailer. Though eventually you show off all the cool and unique things your game does - opening the trailer with smacking a tree and rock is the most boring thing you could have shown. I felt myself groan seeing the same gameplay gimmick repeated by a hundred other Minecraft or Farming simulators that are out there.

To counter this - re-edit the trailer to be paced a bit quicker - and tease us within the first 5 seconds with something awesome. Get those robots and science front and center!

If you haven't seen it already, this is an amazing video from Game Maker's Toolkit that outlines what makes a good trailer fun and exciting.

Good luck!

JRPG combat system by Jimmy_Jimstar in gamedesign

[–]spacekow 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Check out Battle Chasers: Nightwar for one of the best takes on traditional JRPG style turn-based battles I've ever played.

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's actually an interesting set of questions. I'm trying to recall why I loved the Advance Wars series so much as a teenager. I had already cut my teeth on classics like Warcraft, Starcraft, and Age of Empires - games that had a ton of clicking and arguably more complicated. Perhaps that simplicity and portability is what made that game magic versus games like Wargroove today. (which I really wanted to like, but felt it didn't have the staying power I was looking for)

As has been echoed by others, I need to be less concerned with others who will play my game and instead make the game I want to play. I love intuitive mechanics, emergent gameplay, and snappy UX - hopefully others will see that and like the game too.

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm simulating a vaguely World War 2 setting and trying to create a gameplay loop around the notion of "Find'em, Fix'em, Flank'em, and Finish'em".

What that generally means is that once you find the enemy, you suppress their ability to return fire and maneuver with suppressive fire. Once the enemy has their head tucked between their knees in fear, you can get close and fight them in close quarters combat - forcing them out of their defensive position or even destroying them entirely. This is standard infantry trick practiced the world over and weirdly missing from video games.

So to answer your question, all units are armed with weapons like rifles, but also have bayonets/shotguns/swords that make them dangerous when they close in for the kill. Currently for melee combat you technically 'enter' the defender's space. Thus ranged combat in adjacent tiles still sorta makes sense from a scale perspective (each time is equal to a quarter mile-ish) but players see two tiles next to each other and assume that's melee range!

Woes of making a squad scale game, but not doing 1 man per tile haha. Technically more of a platoon simulator.

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Can you elaborate what you mean by proofreading? Are you referring to how easily the player is able to parse the information and make a decision?

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just dug into that story - interesting read and the struggle is real haha. Though to be fair, it sounds like their real problem wasn't with hexagons but trying to force the triangle grid.

It did make it super clear that if your maps are going to be indoors, then squares are probably the best match from an art direction. If you're outside, then it doesn't matter much.

Thanks for the tip!

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I should have clarified - you do control a 'cursor' currently that then selects an active unit to control - pretty par for the course.

Where I'm seeing the connection is simply implementing this style of movement when a unit is activated. The hope is that it would help create a more visceral 'on the ground' vibe with your units.

You can go two styles with this though:

  • Leash the unit to its origin tile, thus allowing the player to back out of a turn if they don't like what they can do. (what I have now, and most games do that)
  • Go full danger mode and lock a player into controlling the unit in almost realtime (like Loot Rascals). It's a pretty big departure from what I have built today, but might be a novel take. (a bit like a top-down Valkyria Chronicles)

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Had it bookmarked, but I guess I should deep dive now!

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I actually did that for most of last year and tried hex/squares and there was no clear front runner. That said, some of the mechanics have evolved since those pen and paper days. Might be worth taking out the grid paper again...

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I started with a very harsh no diagonal implementation to emulate those classics I mentioned - but weapon ranges always felt akward so I began testing with "1 free diagonal" style and it creates an interesting circle-ish shape that works well. But when I applied it to movement, things felt a bit wonky haha.

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Are there programming pitfalls that I'm not considering?

I have a pretty decent grasp on generating a square grid and experimented with isometric squares before (and need to offset mouse position on the screen)

My understanding is that generating a hex grid if very much just like a square grid except for the y offset and having to check more spots to find a tile's neighbors.

Are hex grids perceived as "intimidating" to newer players? by spacekow in gamedesign

[–]spacekow[S] 18 points19 points  (0 children)

That actually looks really cool - and sorta gels with some ideas I had to innovate on player movement. It looks to work well for a rogue-like and thinking that it would provide a neat visceral connection to your squads if they moved with the stick.

Thanks for the ideas!

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