Not to worry, I think the only thing holding me back as a game dev is good ideas for story, mechanics. etc. Once you've got those you really only have to worry about the coding, marketing, etc, but I'm sure you've got the art down pat.
I assume the player goes in the direct of the train track. I think this is a clever way of subtly telling the player where to go so you can still have the massive environment without players getting lost. Well Done
I'm in a similar boat, just starting to learn how to concieve making a game. If it helps there are some great Youtubers who talk about that sort of thing (more of the theory side) 'Extra Credits' and 'Game Dev underground' just to name a few
Found 21 friends, and my first thoughts are that add a button (perhaps the SHIFT key) to make him sprint instead of him speeding up over time because this gives more control to the player.
-Consider creating an up and down walking animation as I think it would give more life to the protagonist.
-Consider setting up a menu screen where you can Play game and Quit the game too (it can be that minimal) + it could set the mood.
-I liked the introduction with the images but unlike the last few pictures depicting the boss of the Gordon City Bank they're aren't coloured, consider doing so but thats entirely up to you :) you might be going to a black and white theme to reflect a depressive state. (If so then maybe as they get more friends the colours of the town become more vibrant. OR people who you aren't friends with are colourless but when you become friends they become coloured, just an idea that popped into my head.)
-Also consider adding a town theme song which plays everywhere there isn't a music box (if you want to be thematic you can make it a dummed down version of the music box tune so when you find it, it sounds more invigorating).
-Whenever I get to the edge of each side of town I run into the wall and are teleported to the middle of the screen. This feels a little jarring so just set up some normal collisions there and consider having something physical in the way so this barrier is more believable in the game world.
-As with all game of a similar style, such as Castle Crashers its hard to perform certain tasks from that perspective. For instance putting in the basketball was quite hard due to the nature of the style of game you've used. So consider thinking of other approaches that rather than show weaknesses of the style embrace their strengths. Every game style has weaknesses and advantages.
- Finally think of what you could say with this artwork (game), friendship is a pretty important part of all our lives. Does something happen and he has to rely on his friends for help? Do they all disappear the next day and you have to find out what happened and save them? etc.
Apart from all that I think these are the humble begginings of something really cool. I'm glad you've posted your game here because player feedback is arguably the most important aspect of learning how to make your games better. But make sure to get more than just one opinion because unfortuantly some people won't like your finished game, while others will you have to focus on this group. As long as you make it engaging (it doesn't have to be just fun) you'll make the most out of what you've made.
Stay Determined :)
Just a side note, THANKYOU for making it playable on browser. I think what really stops people from playing demos of games on any website if if they have to download to play anything. So always have a demo online linking people to your full game if you make one :) Good work.
well starting out in any game you'll wanna start out simple and introduce new things at a certain pace so you can grasp them. Like imagine playing a metroidvania but you have all the abilities from the get go. You'll probably just use normal attacks anyway because using special movies and such is too much to think about until later on when you've mastered or atleast gotten used to the normal controls like jump and strafe or interacting with the world.
I tried teaching myself for about a month before uni started, I progressed a little with Unity and C# but now I'm learning much faster in 'Processing' (basic java script) now that I'm in a class where you have to learn it.
Just saw this thread and yeah I'm just getting into the whole game dev thing. I've just started uni studying coding amongst other creative things. I'm currently chipping away at my first game Project: Ceed or 'Search for Sunlight' (thats the title at the moment anyway) about a seed who finds themselves in an infected underground kingdom and they somehow must find their way to the surface.
Yeah its early days and I don't even have a demo (yet) so hopefully I learn fast and make something I'm proud of.
With this in mind then perhaps its worth for developers to release a demo of the game (of finished quality after releasing the whole game) which is easy to access and simple to understand. For instance create a demo playable on the browser (thats most likely to get people to play it since it literally a click away). If your game has complex systems then you could have a demo with a simpler form of the mechanics and such just to give a taste of the experience. Then if your game is larger than 400MB which can be a lot of games these days, people will be happier to go the extra mile of downloading bigger files and learning complex mechanics (if you have any) if they liked the demo.
And yes of course K.I.S.S.
...keep it simple stupid. do this as well as excite/engage people to play the demo. (easier said than done)
Regarding graphics I do really like simple stuff, one of the main reasons I played Hollow Knight in the first place was because of its art style. Same with Journey, Firewatch, etc.
