{"author_link":"\/users\/sean-s-leblanc","author_name":"Sean S. LeBlanc","author_uid":"sean-s-leblanc","comments":[],"epoch":1524972401,"event":"LD41","format":"md","ldjam_node_id":95222,"likes":7,"metadata":{"p_key":"114406","p_author":"Sean S. LeBlanc","p_authorkey":"1000682","p_urlkey":"330366","p_title":"Postmortem - MATCH3+CONNECT4","p_cat":"LDJam ","p_event":"LD41","p_time":"1524972401","p_likes":"7","p_comments":"0","p_status":"WAYBACK","us_key":"1000682","us_name":"Sean S. LeBlanc","us_username":"sean-s-leblanc","event_start":"1524182400","event_key":"72","event_name":"LD 41"},"node":{"_collation":{"body_sanitizer":"TextUtils::SanitizeHTML via existing importer","event":"LD41","removed_author":false},"_superparent":73256,"_trust":4,"author":682,"body":"![match3connect4_8.gif](\/\/\/raw\/aa2\/z\/146b3.gif)\n\n# What Went Well\n\n## Idea\nIt took me about half a day to come up with an idea I liked, but once I came up with this one, I was set on it. All of my earlier ideas were things that were funny to say like \"tabletop + mmo\" or \"physics-based + text adventure\", but none of them felt like something I wanted to _make_. I was feeling pretty dumb and getting close to giving up on entering this time around, but \"match 3 + connect 4\" managed to be both funny and strangely compelling.\n\nWithin a couple hours of having the idea, I was already well on my way to a functioning game:\n![match3connect4_2.gif](\/\/\/raw\/aa2\/z\/146b1.gif)\n\n## Animation\nOne of the first things I mentally planned out was a small animation sequencer. I didn't end up building this until after getting the mechanics mostly working, so it took a bit of refactoring, but once it was in, adding polish was almost trivial! The snazzy intro, the explosions, pieces falling into empty spaces; all of this was driven by the same basic system. Having a solid plan for how this would work let me add tons of little details that would have taken much longer to implement otherwise.\n\n![match3connect4_6.gif](\/\/\/raw\/aa2\/z\/146b2.gif)\n\n## User Testing\nTo be honest, I left this later than I should have, but doing it at all had a huge positive impact on the end result. Towards the end of the jam, I had a couple quick sessions with my sisters which led me to make crucial balance changes.\n\nBefore testing, the game was almost the same as the final product, with one key difference: there were no swap points. Players could swap pieces on their turn whenever they wanted. This conceptually seemed fine, but testing proved it was a terrible idea: it became far too easy to prevent your opponent from getting close to a win by swapping to make match-3s with their pieces and blow them up. The games inevitably became boring, perpetual stalemates.\n\nI went through a couple quick iterations, but effective use of swaps always ended up dragging the game on. The first version which actually made a difference was the one in which I introduced points: in this version, every time a match was made, it gave that colour an extra move on their next turn. De-incentivizing blowing up the other player's pieces made a big difference: the board actually started filling up a bit, and complex strategies started emerging.\n\nUltimately, swaps still ended up being over-powered, and planning around extra turns made thinking ahead more difficult than I was comfortable with. In the final version, the players have to earn their swaps by matching pieces. This provided a great balance: defensively blowing up the other player's pieces is a trade-off between denial and giving them a powerful resource, and it also gives you incentive to blow up your own pieces in order to bank up swaps for later.\n\n# What Went Wrong\n\n## No AI\nPutting up a local multiplayer game without an AI is always a big ask for LD. Some folks'll have ready access to a willing partner, sibling, friend, etc. to play with, but most people are just going to be able to demo it on their own. I had planned from the start to make an AI, but it was already submission hour by the time I had something _kinda-sorta-but-not-really_ working. I think I made the right decision to scrap it, but should have budgeted my time better so more people could have a chance to play the game as intended.\n\n## Menu\nA number of people have had issues with the default enter key behaviour in PICO-8. It's easy to take PICO-8 stuff for granted when you've been using it for so long, so this one kind of surprised me! I think this could have easily been fixed by changing the start menu to read \"press z\/x\" or something along those lines.\n\n# Conclusion\n\nOverall, I think this is one of my best LD entries to date. It's not perfect; there's definitely more I would've liked to do with it; but I feel like it was both a solid idea, and a solid execution of that idea.\n\n","comments":0,"created":"2018-04-29T02:07:13Z","files":[],"files-timestamp":0,"id":95222,"love":7,"love-timestamp":"2018-04-30T14:30:02Z","meta":[],"modified":"2018-04-30T14:30:02Z","name":"Postmortem - MATCH3+CONNECT4","node-timestamp":"2018-04-29T03:26:41Z","parent":88683,"parents":[1,5,9,73256,88683],"path":"\/events\/ludum-dare\/41\/match3connect4\/postmortem-match3connect4","published":"2018-04-29T03:26:41Z","scope":"public","slug":"postmortem-match3connect4","subsubtype":"","subtype":"","type":"post","version":281406},"node_metadata":{"n_key":"95222","n_urlkey":"330366","n_parent":"88683","n_path":"\/events\/ludum-dare\/41\/match3connect4\/postmortem-match3connect4","n_slug":"postmortem-match3connect4","n_type":"post","n_subtype":"","n_subsubtype":"","n_author":"682","n_created":"1524967633","n_modified":"1525098602","n_version":"281406","n_status":"WAYBACK"},"source_url":"https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/41\/match3connect4\/postmortem-match3connect4","text":"![match3connect4_8.gif](\/\/\/raw\/aa2\/z\/146b3.gif)\n\n# What Went Well\n\n## Idea\nIt took me about half a day to come up with an idea I liked, but once I came up with this one, I was set on it. All of my earlier ideas were things that were funny to say like \"tabletop + mmo\" or \"physics-based + text adventure\", but none of them felt like something I wanted to _make_. I was feeling pretty dumb and getting close to giving up on entering this time around, but \"match 3 + connect 4\" managed to be both funny and strangely compelling.\n\nWithin a couple hours of having the idea, I was already well on my way to a functioning game:\n![match3connect4_2.gif](\/\/\/raw\/aa2\/z\/146b1.gif)\n\n## Animation\nOne of the first things I mentally planned out was a small animation sequencer. I didn't end up building this until after getting the mechanics mostly working, so it took a bit of refactoring, but once it was in, adding polish was almost trivial! The snazzy intro, the explosions, pieces falling into empty spaces; all of this was driven by the same basic system. Having a solid plan for how this would work let me add tons of little details that would have taken much longer to implement otherwise.\n\n![match3connect4_6.gif](\/\/\/raw\/aa2\/z\/146b2.gif)\n\n## User Testing\nTo be honest, I left this later than I should have, but doing it at all had a huge positive impact on the end result. Towards the end of the jam, I had a couple quick sessions with my sisters which led me to make crucial balance changes.\n\nBefore testing, the game was almost the same as the final product, with one key difference: there were no swap points. Players could swap pieces on their turn whenever they wanted. This conceptually seemed fine, but testing proved it was a terrible idea: it became far too easy to prevent your opponent from getting close to a win by swapping to make match-3s with their pieces and blow them up. The games inevitably became boring, perpetual stalemates.\n\nI went through a couple quick iterations, but effective use of swaps always ended up dragging the game on. The first version which actually made a difference was the one in which I introduced points: in this version, every time a match was made, it gave that colour an extra move on their next turn. De-incentivizing blowing up the other player's pieces made a big difference: the board actually started filling up a bit, and complex strategies started emerging.\n\nUltimately, swaps still ended up being over-powered, and planning around extra turns made thinking ahead more difficult than I was comfortable with. In the final version, the players have to earn their swaps by matching pieces. This provided a great balance: defensively blowing up the other player's pieces is a trade-off between denial and giving them a powerful resource, and it also gives you incentive to blow up your own pieces in order to bank up swaps for later.\n\n# What Went Wrong\n\n## No AI\nPutting up a local multiplayer game without an AI is always a big ask for LD. Some folks'll have ready access to a willing partner, sibling, friend, etc. to play with, but most people are just going to be able to demo it on their own. I had planned from the start to make an AI, but it was already submission hour by the time I had something _kinda-sorta-but-not-really_ working. I think I made the right decision to scrap it, but should have budgeted my time better so more people could have a chance to play the game as intended.\n\n## Menu\nA number of people have had issues with the default enter key behaviour in PICO-8. It's easy to take PICO-8 stuff for granted when you've been using it for so long, so this one kind of surprised me! I think this could have easily been fixed by changing the start menu to read \"press z\/x\" or something along those lines.\n\n# Conclusion\n\nOverall, I think this is one of my best LD entries to date. It's not perfect; there's definitely more I would've liked to do with it; but I feel like it was both a solid idea, and a solid execution of that idea.\n\n","title":"Postmortem - MATCH3+CONNECT4","wayback_source":[]}