{"author_name":"Boltz Interactive","cat":"LD #29","comments":[],"epoch":1400486160,"likes":1,"metadata":{"p_key":"29807","p_author":"Boltz Interactive","p_authorkey":"504815","p_urlkey":"65273","p_title":"Post-Mortem: Paddle Battle Pegasus","p_cat":"LD #29","p_event":"LD29","p_time":"1400486160","p_likes":"1","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"504815","us_name":"Boltz Interactive","us_username":"Boltz Interactive","event_start":"1398384000","event_key":"22","event_name":"LD29"},"text":"

Concept:<\/strong>\u00a0Deal or No Deal crossed with an infinite runner wrapped around a sea monster… BENEATH THE SURFACE. \u00a0(Try web or download\u00a0here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

\"splash-screen-art\"<\/a><\/p>\n

What worked<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The Whirlpool
\n <\/strong>We put a lot of time and effort into the whirlpool. \u00a0As the central mechanic and visual element on the screen, we wanted to get it right. \u00a0We’ve had great feedback that the controls felt pretty solid, and the physics were well received. \u00a0\"seamonster-below-the-surface\"What was interesting is that the original whirlpool had a clean, clear cut, unpixelated design. \u00a0What we found though, is that all that detail in motion made it incredibly hard to focus on the other details like where the player, coins, and enemies were located. \u00a0Instead we pixelated it, and stacked a partially transparent copy out of phase (at a slightly lower frame rate). \u00a0This allows us to get a background animation\u00a0that doesn’t repeat for much longer without the hit to download size.
\n <\/strong><\/p>\n

Deal or no Deal
\n <\/strong>We added a mechanic to let the player sacrifice a part of their score to escape death and get a chance to earn it back and then some. \u00a0The catch is that your score is held in chests of varying value and the one sacrificed is chosen at random. \u00a0I think it was well received among LD players because it was something a little different than the norm.<\/p>\n

<\/h2>\n

What\u00a0didn’t work<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Deal or no Deal
\n <\/strong>Outside of LD, we had a lot of feedback that the mechanic was sort of confusing. \u00a0In the middle of all the action, players were not intercepting the visual cues we had though would help explain what was happening to their coins. \u00a0A tutorial that would freeze the game and explain each part of the scoring as it becomes significant would probably have mitigated that.<\/p>\n

Dying Immediately
\n <\/strong>Due to the way the vortex physics were calculated, every time the game restarted, the ship would be rotated directly towards the monster and die if the player didn’t know to hold an arrow key before hand. \u00a0We didn’t notice during development because the adjustment became second nature. \u00a0:-\/ This was probably the source of most of the negative feedback received. \u00a0I finally hacked in a solution tonight as a post-compo bugfix.
\n <\/strong><\/p>\n

Game Over Dialog
\n <\/strong>This screen was re-purposed from an earlier iteration, and really should have been redesigned from scratch.\"game-over-sacrifice\"The red X was supposed to let you know you’d be sacrificing a chest, but instead indicated to players that they were not allowed to click it.<\/p>\n

The white text above posing the question about sacrificing was never noticed because it was so bland compared to the rest of the screen. \u00a0We found several players chose to lock in their score when it didn’t make sense, or would restart when it was safe to continue. \u00a0We should have had other eyes on the screen earlier in the process. \u00a0There was no time to fix it at the end.<\/p>\n

Mac Support
\n <\/strong>There were also a few random display bugs that I couldn’t track down since they seemed to only happen on Macs.<\/p>\n

<\/h2>\n

Workflow<\/h2>\n

Collaboration FTW
\n <\/strong>I’ve participated in LD before, but this was my first time working with an artist. \u00a0It was fantastic to be able to really focus on my strengths of design and programming and leave the art and sound to someone else. \u00a0I highly recommend it. \u00a0We used Google Drive to easily share assets. \u00a0It may have been overkill, but I also set up a Git repository for locking in each iteration of our design.
\n <\/strong><\/p>\n

\"simple-mind-map-pbp-boltzinteractive\"<\/a>

High-level mind map of rough gameplay elements<\/p><\/div>\n

Getting Organized<\/strong>
\n The biggest hang up for me in getting a game from idea to reality was\u00a0finding a way to capture and organize my thoughts. \u00a0I wanted something I could rapidly dump ideas into, but structured in a way that I could make sense of it still in a semi-sleep deprived state 47 hrs later. I finally stumbled upon XMind<\/a>, a free “mind mapping “tool and it made all the difference.<\/p>\n

<\/span>It allows you to very rapidly transcribe brainstorming sessions and logically group your ideas. \u00a0Then you can collapse, expand, and zoom around your idea making it far more manageable. \u00a0When you get that next amazing idea, but aren’t at a great breaking point to go hash it out, you can quickly capture a few bullet points near related features.<\/p>\n

Focus Like a Laser Beam<\/strong>
\n What this low-overhead organization really buys you is the ability to let 95% of the idea fall out of focus so you can really concentrate on the task at hand. \u00a0Our primary goal was to get something, anything playable. \u00a0Then we would iterate over that design and enhance game play based on what we learned work and didn’t. \u00a0Iterative design also gave our play testers \u00a0a chance to say “I wish this could…”. \u00a0We plugged this feedback right in to our mind map for a future iteration. \u00a0For example adding the monster, then later tentacles, then still later allowing them to move and adding the visual blending\u00a0effects.<\/p>\n