itch.io

1. Hop bets definitely will be a pain in the butt UI wise and they are so intimidating to newer players. Perhaps as the game progresses, you can gradually add more bet types. Like first few levels, keep the current stuff, Pass Line, Come, etc. But after you progress add more and explain what they do. Also, you can automatically have these bets on by default in a hard mode.

One possible way to approach hop bets is by having a toggle open up a pop up window for all the different bets.

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Alternatively, one thing to also address the concern of the gentleman who felt the game felt "sterile" and also to potentially up the spice + fix the complicated betting issue is to have progressively fancier looking boards at higher difficulties/complexity + maybe adding some animations for times when you make an absurd amount of bank (Image below as an example). For example with Balatro, the different decks have different boosts, abilities, etc, you can add variety with different tables. And to make it exciting, instead of having them all unlocked from the start, you need to beat certain modes with certain settings on to unlock more tables.

Table 1: (Regular Green and white stripe Craps board)

Pass Line, Come, Field, Don't Come, etc.

Table 2: (Maybe a red/burgandy color scheme)

All of the above + Hardways, Lay, Odds, etc.

Table 3:  (Fancy galactic screen, etc)

All of the above + Horn + Hop Bets

And then, with my minimum bets idea:

Difficulty 1: No minimum bet

Difficulty 2: Progressively higher minimum bets. +5 per level or something

Difficulty 3: Some form of gimmick for the specific table, such as, start with a higher bankroll, but cannot add anymore with the cage, etc, etc, etc.

Reward the player for trying out different bets, or reward the player for having higher dice strategies, etc.

As for color scheme, I feel you can get inspiration from real life craps boards. Most of them do feel pretty "sterile" but look at this video hybrid craps board from Harrah's Las Vegas. Super bright and colorful. You can potentially do theming, like a cowboy western, Japanese Samurai, etc. Sky's the limit, but haha, sorry for introducing scope creep.

(This board lights up when you roll the point with all these crazy flames and effects haha)

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2. The minimum bet thing came up when I was at around level 8/10, and I was down to the last $4 in bankroll. I was doing a $1 Passline, $1 6, 8, and 10. hahaha. It was a slow and painful death hahahaha.

Seriously man, this game helps me scratch my Craps itch without it being painful for my bankbook. I am such a fan of Balatro likes, that this game is perfectly up my alley. Sorry for potentially suggesting scope creep to your project, but, I'm genuinely excited, and want your game to succeed.

3. I just thought of this idea, what about an announcer that speaks what you rolled? Snake Eyes (1, 1), Yo we have yoh (11), Craps "Oh Crap" (7), etc. Could add a nice bit of flavor. and if you do some kind of theming, different accent for the announcer.

And the announcer can also say that you can go ahead and bet on numbers, etc. Include an option to turn off the announcer, etc.

4. Possibly make it more clear when the state changes, from having a point to not having a point on. One of the games I played earlier, I didn't realize I won the pass line. Then when I rolled a 7, i was like OMG! I lost, but then realized, oh wait a second, the point is off. haha. (My fire example above could solve this)

5. Las Vegas Style Casino sound effects could do the trick on telling the other person what the changes in state have as well, as well as let people know yay they won a ton of chips!