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Need feedback on my game that I just released into early access.

A topic by Tyler created Feb 09, 2024 Views: 275 Replies: 4
Viewing posts 1 to 4
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True Human Tribulation: Errand Run is a free game where you complete objectives to win. Formerly known as: Project Lorenzo, it's something I have been working on for almost 7 months. It's the furthest I've ever gotten with a game before, and I consider it a great achievement as I finally got something substantial done.  

However it's not perfect as it's the first game that I've gotten to playable state. That's why I really need feedback and constructive criticism on the game at it's current state. I am also willing to hear suggestions on what should be added or what should be changed. There is a devlog on the game's page if you want to know more about the game's development history.

Link to the game: https://lorenarc.itch.io/tld-lorenzo

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Recently, I implemented a radar to streamline the game a bit.  The reason I did this is to fix a problem I noticed while play testing. It was something to do with the number of objectives the player receives not really affecting the game that much. Mostly due with the chance that the player would have to search the whole map anyways even if they were given a small number of objectives.

I also changed the pause screen, and I wanted to hear everyone else's thoughts on it. I rarely get feedback, so it would be much appreciated.

I played and downloaded your game, and these are the notes I've got:


-In regards to your title theme, an issue I hear is that you've got the same backing arpeggio playing with no variation while you have a large number of dissonant chords playing on top. The idea itself isn't bad, but the way you have it mixed and arranged it produces clash that doesn't sound dissonant so much as just out of tune in general. I would recommend that your backing arpeggio matches the same intentional lack of tonality you've got going on so that it feels more integrated into the music, as opposed to fighting with it. Atonal music is tough to pull off well, but it can still sound musically coherent when done right (an atonal song I once wrote serves as my point of reference for that statement).

The control scheme could use some work. Pressing LSHIFT to run while having to use WASD to move feels really uncomfortable. I would also recommend that you allow the player to access these controls again  while playing the game so that they can reference what they are, as well as allow players to bind keys as they see fit. I didn't like having to restart my game to return to the main menu to look up the controls each time I forgot something.

Another suggestion for your control scheme would be to have the mouse be context-sensitive. For example, you could make it so that clicking the mouse when a prompt comes up instead does that thing - so instead of pressing E to pick up an item, you can instead point and click to grab it. This would feel more natural than contorting your left hand to press all of the different keys required to perform actions, IMO.

I notice that the ability to fire my weapon was not consistent - I'm not sure if this is a gameplay mechanic, but if it is I didn't see any indicator or timer on the GUI that showed me how long I had to wait in between shots. I kept getting killed by enemies because I wasn't able to fire my weapon, and I'm not really sure why. I found that to be frustrating. I also wasn't a fan of the missed shots while moving. I see why you put that in, but personally I didn't find that to be an enjoyable mechanic. This is exacerbated by the high difficulty of the game starting out. Enemies feel really strong compared to the player's low power level and slow speed at the start, which made me not want to keep playing after dying multiple times.

I'm not sure what morale is supposed to do - I think it would help to explain this at the start, since it appears to be a core mechanic of your game. Same thing with the radar - I read your devlog post on it and loved the mathematical explanation of how you got it to work, but players still need to know what to do with it.

It seems odd that you can't run if your stamina bar is at 50% or below, yet you can still deplete it to 0% if you start running when it's higher than 50%.

I think having some exposition beforehand would really help the player get a sense of why they're doing what they're doing. I can see the missions in the top right-hand corner, but because there isn't an apparent story yet it doesn't get me invested in the gameplay. But your game is still early in development so I'm sure this is something that is being worked on.

The music in the first level feels really grating after a while. I can see that you're using the out-of-tune internals and chords to establish the disconcerting/tense mood of the game, but the near-complete lack of musicality and apparent song structure just make it sound more annoying than anything. 

The 8-bit style graphics should have proper chiptune music to go with it. But I compose chiptunes for NES hardware, so I am very biased in the matter. ;)

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You've got the foundation of a solid idea here. You know your sense of art direction, and I think you're doing a good job setting the mood of the game with the direction you're taking. I like the NES-style graphics, though I did see a few sprites that could use some work (example:  the spiders are the same color as the roads, which makes them really hard to discern - the roads could be made a dark shade of gray to avoid this).

But the game definitely needs work - I didn't find the current gameplay loop to be fun, but that's more due to the current lack of polish than the actual idea itself IMO. I saw that your devlog is updated fairly regularly, so I'm confident that your game will get a lot better in the near future. Keep up the hard work!

Hi, thank you for the feedback. It really puts a lot of things into perspective! There is a couple things I got to say though.

I absolutely understand your complaints about the music. Writing music is definitely not my strong suit, and the game's music were one of the first I ever made. I will making moves to at least make the music sound more bearable. Especially for the Streets music. While I'm at it, I may as well try using chiptune like you suggested, to see if it would work. 

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As for the Flintlock Musket. A while ago, I was "sort of" aware of the issue so I tried to lower the accuracy penalty. I  know now that it is most likely not enough. I realized that combined with a long reload time, the feature could be very aggravating  to deal with. Maybe instead of punishing the player for not  standing still while shooting, the game could REWARD for the player for doing it instead.

Perhaps the Musket could deal extra damage when the player is standing still? A simple reversal on how things would work before. On top of that, it would make sense in universe as it could be the protagonist just taking the time to get a better shot.

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I personally think that the control scheme is just fine the way it is for now. I may consider giving the player to set their own  key bindings later down the line. I will also get to work on displaying the controls on the pause menu as well, and it making it more clear whether the musket is finished reloading.

Your concerns about stamina are valid. I'm not sure why I decided to make it that way. I'm guessing the reason is that I don't want the player to exploit the system by going in and in out of sprinting. Luckily while reading your criticism I already thought of a hopefully better way of doing this.

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The Radar and Morale are one of many systems I intend for  the player would figure out on their own. I like games that have silent tutorials. Where the tutorial doesn't feel like a tutorial at all. Some of those games I could think of is the original Super Mario Bros for the NES, and Portal. In my opinion, I dislike tutorials which spell out even the simplest mechanics and systems.

Even when I can't explain certain mechanics this way, I utilize other methods rather adding a tutorial. Y'know that cutscene that plays in the beginning of the game? The first message is random each time, and its mostly used to provide hints to the player. I also use the controls menu to hint at certain mechanics as well.

One notable place where I apply this philosophy is the locked room you start in. It works well as a safe place for the player to get a feel for the controls. They also start near the door they need to interact with once they completed all of their objectives. To top it off they can't leave the room unless, they learned  three key things:

  1. Interacting with objects in the world.
  2. How keys and locked gates worked.
  3. How crates worked. (This is optional.)

Most of these, the player would be able to learn by just exploring the room. This is how I want my game's learning curve to be. If you have any suggestions on how I could do this better, please let me know.

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The story is not meant to be the main focus. That would be the gameplay. It was only something I put thought when sometime before I release the game on early access. As development goes on, I may add some things that might hint at the story, but rarely any more than that. I'm intending for this game to just be something you pick up, and play once in a while, not something to be majorly invested in. That is also why I'm gonna be focusing on replayability and some randomness.

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Again, thank you for the feedback and constructive criticism . It's something I rarely get! Because of it I'm more set on what I should do with this game moving forward.

Okay, so I made a couple changes in response to feedback.

  • I added a controls button to the pause menu.
  • I replaced the musket inaccuracy entirely with a much better system.
  • Added exhaustion, with you now being able to activate sprinting even if you're stamina is below 50.

I want to know what's everyone's thoughts on the game now that I've made these changes.