Tales of Androgyny

A game about birds, bees, flowers and trees. · By Majalis

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Some concerns regarding UI and combat mechanics.

A topic by Mr. Nexus created Jan 08, 2017 Views: 936 Replies: 6

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Mr. Nexus8 years ago

I played a bit of the 1.13 version of the game, and while I enjoyed it, this most recent version has some issues that i'm a little baffled as to why they're here considering they were fine originally.

Specifically, the fact that your stats have no "numbers" assigned to them. They are simply ambiguous gauges now, which for an RPG I feel is poor, as it results in you having no tactical way of telling what you can and can't do. Before, it was very clear how much health and stamina you had, so the "uses 3 stamina" had meaning, but now it seems less so, as I don't KNOW how much stamina I have.

Moreover, blocking, and defensive abilities in general, seem completely worthless. Parrying has the same text blurb as "guard" but doesn't recover as much, so why use it? Does it return damage? I can't tell! And then there's the fact that it SAYS "100% effectiveness to block", yet you still eat just as much damage as always, making it...useless? There seems to be literally zero reason to block at all. And if the idea is that you have to be faster than the opponent in order to make use of it, then I really feel like that should be tweaked--preferably to something that immediately let's you block the next attack, and just scrap the 100% thing in favor for something like 50 or 75%--and maybe it leaves you "open" or something, so if you block incorrectly you can be punished, and then THAT's where "parry" would be useful, as you could be left in an offensive stance just after parrying to negate that, but maybe at the cost of less damage negation or recovery. Nevertheless, even being the fastest starting class, I still seem to "go after" every enemy in the game (from what i'd seen), so i'm not even sure if that's what it is.

I actually really like this game and some of the ideas it has, and i'm genuinely impressed by what you two have been able to put together with just yourselves (and i'm guessing SOME assistance). The game is also very, very hot, so you succeeded in the most important, basic parts, but I hope some of these "issues" I have can be fixed, or at least addressed, in the future.

I'll keep playing t'see if there's anything i'm missing otherwise.

MajalisDeveloper8 years ago (1 edit) (+1)

Hey there!

Yeah, that's just a product of v0.1.14 - we implemented the bars but didn't introduce the number displays that would replace the old ones. They're back in v0.1.15 already. The battle interface does still have work we need to put into it, particularly as the battle system is built out. One of the goals of v0.1.16, point of fact, is an overhaul of the way agility works, and there will be some interface changes that come with that.

The blocking abilities aren't fully fleshed out yet at all; there are supposed to be meaningful differences between blocking an attack, parrying an attack, or dodging it, and that's currently not implemented, and the different guard moves don't really have much that differentiates them aside from potential effectiveness. Parry, Block, and Guard currently all have the same effectiveness, actually, so they're identical aside from costs, although the potential is there for them to have different effectiveness. Successfully blocked attacks will negate damage entirely currently, and partial successes will halve it, but that's not really what blocking is going to look like once it's fully implemented. This is currently on a diceroll (and will likely not remain that way, as it's currently one of the few non-deterministic elements of the battle system), and the way it's calculated, there should be a 50% chance of negating full damage and 100% chance of negating half, but I haven't done much testing to confirm that it's working properly, since it's going to change fairly soon.

What you're thinking of in terms of immediate trade-offs in terms of stamina consumption or effectiveness for stance advantages, setting up future offensive techniques, is exactly what the system is designed for, but the vast majority, if not all, of the existing techniques don't have their full breadth of their working elements, so that interplay isn't quite there yet.

One thing I will clarify that should be currently working is that turns are simultaneous - the technique that you and the opponent use are compared against each other (so blocking, or ducking under an opponents attack, for instance, can occur), but the actual calculation of outcomes should have both of you affecting the other as if at the same time. You can see this when an attack of yours knocks over the enemy or vice versa; the person who is knocked over will have already executed their attack successfully.

So yeah, there are things that are half-baked currently, but that's not by design - there are just elements which aren't built out yet. We're still a while away from where the battle system will eventually get to; this initial build out of it was more proof of concept and laying down a framework for producing battles that worked enough to show off the game mechanics that are, if not fully baked, pretty golden brown already.

Mr. Nexus8 years ago

Well that's a relief to hear.

It's kind of funny, makes me think that we must think alike if half the things I suggest are already the conceptual end result, heheh.

As far as the "simultaneous battle" things goes, it makes more sense when explained that way; The only thing i'd recommend (which honestly i'd put money on "is probably going in the game at some point" anyway) is a more descriptive battle log. Something simple even, like: "You used X, SUCCESS" so that it's certain no matter what if it worked or not. So in the case of blocking: "X used Y, SUCCESS...You used Block, PARTIAL SUCCESS! You managed to defend against half of the attack!" or "SUCCESS! You block the attack for no damage!", something alone those lines I feel would really clue the player in much better.

You guys aren't a bonafide company, or development team of size or experience, you're just some really talented folks making your first game, so maybe it was a bit unfair or unrealistic of me to assume the amount of finesse in a game as a fully fledged studio--But when I think of demos, or prototype builds, what comes to mind of this done perfectly is the Indivisible build by Lab Zero of Skullgirls fame. Of course, again, you're NOT Lab Zero and do NOT have the resources, so again, my bad.

BUT, since I like you guys a whole lot, and want you to be as successful as possible, I want to give this bit of advice for the future:

Do what Indivisible did. When you guys are a bigger team or a fully fledged studio, or you have the resources, and you're making something else, please please have everything that needs to be in place, in place, and everything that you can't implement, not in the game at all. I mean it from the bottom of my heart that I like the game, as well as you guys, and that i'm only saying this from a place of endearment...But I think it'll save you guys a lot of trouble in the future, to just have everything that WOULD be representative of the game in from the get go, and then add in the touches that make it a more fleshed out product later down the line.

I really hope that doesn't come across as arrogant or anything of me, because it ain't my intent at all.

With that said: I'm again very impressed at what you guys have been able to put together with such a small (assumedly inexperienced) team. It's honestly quite a marvel, and inspirational to any budding artist in any field...Even if it is porn :p. Cannot wait to try the new version, so hurry up and finish the game already! Just be perfect! Hit the enemy all the time and never get hit ever!

MajalisDeveloper8 years ago

Yeah, there'll be more feedback about how the techniques worked out for you. We're still trying to figure out what the best way of presenting the information is.

Having things fully working as-is, barring future improvements, is going to be as much as possible our approach from here on in - we did have to do some rapid prototyping early on which led to some of that "insert working stuff here" scaffolding that you're seeing. In my experience in software development in general, you shouldn't push out half-baked things - either something is done or it's not done, and if it's not done, users shouldn't be seeing it. It's a good rule of thumb in general, and in a future project especially, but even as we continue on with this one, we're going to try to apply it.

That said, if we don't have any placeholders, it becomes nearly impossible to tell what direction the game will be moving in. If we had started off with only techniques that had their underlying systems implemented... well, there would be very few of them, and you wouldn't even see the stance system working at all. We're going to do a ton of iteration, and if we had things our way, we wouldn't be showing development this early to anyone... but that's also a lie, because the only reason we've been able to get as much as we have done has been because of feedback, positive and negative, and support that this initial roll-out has (somewhat unintentionally) brought us.

We had actually considered retreating out of public view for a while to release a "public" demo once we reached version 0.2.00, which would be at that "everything is in place and we're fleshing things out" stage that you mentioned. That was our original plan once the game jam was over, but we were pretty surprised by the response we got, and were seeing a lot of people that had come to expect the frequently updated public builds.

It's hard to say what approach will work best - everyone has a different expectation of where we are in the project, which is understandable, but if you think we're at the 90% mark vs. the 20% mark, you're going to see a very different game. I think it would be good if we put together a roadmap, and we've actually started to post pieces of that on our Patreon page publicly; we might compile it and flesh it out and post it as a sticky here in this forum, so that those who are interested know what to look out for and expect, and, if something is missing that they think should be in, to have an opportunity to let us know about it.

I will say that we are learning a ton from this, and as we center in on a more defined plan for this project, we're also keeping it in mind as a template for any future game projects to come. :D

Mr. Nexus8 years ago

Glad to hear it.

I agree that in general, things shouldn't be shown unless it's well under way. It's how we get projects that severely under deliver (coughnomansskycough) based on expectations and hype.

BUT at the same time, testing and public feedback is very important--especially for a small or new team who are still getting their bearings. Nintendo has in-company QA as well as long standing, very experienced members, who can make these sorts of decisions and calls by instinct alone. But ya'll ain't no Nintendo. (if you were i'd be expecting way more Rosalina and Samus)

But I think you guys have handled it in stride, and considering how it's been going, I think it's overall been a good investment. I think at this point, to kind of "retreat" wouldn't do much anymore, except make people worry and help nurture procrastination.

Do the roadmap thing. Conceptualize everything you want to do, and then zero in on what's realistic, and think about just how long you want to be making this. I'm sure you already know all of this, just saying. You're doin' the right things.

Keep it up.

userof8 years ago

Do you mind me asking when 0.1.15 will be made publically available?

MajalisDeveloper8 years ago (1 edit)

It'll be up sometime later in this month, once v0.1.16 is patron-live.

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Tales of Androgyny

Some concerns regarding UI and combat mechanics.