Positive feedback!

Playtests are great! I could play my game 100 times and find 5 bugs. One play tester could play once and find 10! So far the feedback I’ve gotten has been positive and the suggestions are extremely helpful. This also means I know I’m on the right track.

There was a lot I improved in the past few days thanks to playtester feedback. A lot of it was UI related, and UI is the bane of my existence. Menu navigation becomes quite nightmarish when making sure it works for the gamepad. A lot of my problems come from the fact that the focus is never where I want it to be. Sometimes it’s disappearing, other times it is on a button that it shouldn’t be on. I’ve learned that convenience is the top priority when it comes to menus, unless of course the game’s main mechanics are tied to some unique UI interaction or navigation. I was happy with the changes I made after a lot of my own testing through blood, sweat, and inhaling food.

I was already polishing and tightening the game, but now I’m trying to scrutinize every single thing I do. I have to think of every change I make and think of the entire game as a whole. My weakest area right now is probably the game’s balancing. I have no broad experience when it comes to teetering the line between challenging and unfair. There’s too many factors to consider especially when you take in to account a player’s experience. The best thing I can do is add a varied amount of tools and hope that players will take advantage of it. 

One of my biggest worries is when it comes to numbers such as experience gained, enemy damage, enemy health, etc.. My current process is to play through my game and see what level I am in certain areas and adjust the numbers to what feels right. And another layer of challenge for me is that since the start has three paths it is possible for the player to go to one of the higher level areas. Of course they can turn back though if they’re having a hard time, so perhaps I shouldn’t worry too much about it.

It is a great feeling hearing a player is challenged and then push through until they pass their current obstacle. That is a very typical soulslike experience. It lets me know that the game will hit my target market right. Other things to worry about is actually spreading the word and trying to get those who haven’t played soulslikes to try it. 

After this experience I can’t help but wonder what would happen if I had hundred of players finding new bugs everyday. That’s a lot of fires to put out. There’s a lot of stuff in the game I am sure I hadn’t tested thoroughly enough. So much is bound to break, it is both exciting and daunting to think about.