Things I would do diferently now I've seen people play Clot!
If you haven't played the game you can find the link to download and rate here:
Play and Rate CLOT!
I've been giving my game to friends, watching some streamers play it and also reading the feedback here on the website and I took note of some things I would do different, now that it actually has had some playtesting, that I might add if/when I revisit this in the near future.
Changes I would make based on player feedback:
- Adding a short tutorial in game
- Giving enemy tells/wind-ups
- Adding more ways to chain blocks together
- Changing the dash so it connects better with the blocks
- Borrowing more from the puzzle connect three genre
- Power ups or drops to change up the runs and allow the player even more strategies
- Preventing enemies from spawning too close to the player and providing an indicator to know where they come from
Addressing these changes
First of all I did add this little gif to the LD page but reading through some of the comments it wasn't immediately obvious what you had to do and how you would do it.
It seems for most people the biggest issue was the difficulty of the game that was facilitated by its sometimes unfair nature, to fix that I've written some of the ideas provided by the players that I think will really help making it feel like your fault when you loose, all the time, every time. (adding obvious attack tells, indicating enemy position and better spawns)
Other than this some people also pointed out how it was unsure if it wanted to be an arena shooter or a puzzle game and that it should lean more towards one side effectively making it more fun and challenging. This point makes a lot of sense since when I started I did not have the concept completely lined up. To fix this, I feel like I can take a lot from other match three type puzzle games and try and get some of that satisfying complex strategy that fans of that genre crave.(more ways to match, chain reactions and so on)
Conclusion
Finally I think I would really like to revisit this game some time soon, fix some of these problems and add more content to make Clot! What I would like it to be. All in all this has been, to me, a very successful first LDjam and I look forward to do one again in the future. If you are so kind to play and rate Clot! And leave some feedback, I would be immensely thankful.
