I saw! Thank you so much for uploading it, and I'm glad you had a good time, despite it mostly not being the sort of good time I'm ultimately aiming for.
It was a bit hard to watch, since it highlights just how far I am from where I want to get, but I've got a lot of ideas for how to fix things, and more importantly where to prioritize, based on the feedback you guys have given me.
Hopefully I can have something more presentable for DD49. :)
I love ragdolls and watching them fly. I like how the roundhouse kick, the flying kick and the jumping kick feel. But man, let me see whats going on in the screen. I barely could see the ragdolls fly before they went too far away from the light and the camera was never close enough to the action. Waves mode can be won by roundhouse kicking alone, but I don't think you are interested in balance at this point. A god mode for testing stuff in wave mode could be fun. Also some non-kick heavy attacks.
It seems there's a lot of variation in how hard it is to see things in the game from person to person or screen to screen, so having some brightness, backlighting and camera behavior settings the player can customize are gonna be a priority for next demo build.
Seems a shitpost but you can evolve it in a real game:
On combat:
- Y, is intuitive;
- Standard melee punch is super shitty for multiple reasons: is not responsive at all; you need multiple punches to kill; you can't charge it; sometimes seems to miss altogether. You need some knockback on the enemies, otherwise they just pass you by. There are no reason (gameplaywise) for normal punches to exist, the meta is all heavy attacks.
- Because of standard punch, I've gone all heavy atks. Dive kick is very useful and fun, also jump heavy
I usually don't do suggestion because you are the designer, but I tell you: make the orb move, and the level is you following it through shitty situations. Its so obvious that maybe you already implemented it somewhere else.
Second suggestion, since punch is useless, make it somehow ranged. because, again, If you are in melee range you have no reason to not use an heavy attack.
I've personally found the punches to have some use - you can throw them out without changing your movement, and a staggered or stunned enemy can't trigger the game over - but yeah, they're not very useful. They do have knockback, though I guess if it wasn't noticeable while playing I probably need to make it stronger.
You're completely right about the orb; the plan is for it to move around while you try to keep it and yourself safe from the enemies.
I'm probably not gonna change the quick attack just yet - in my head they're gonna be situationally preferable to heavy attacks due to stuff that hasn't yet been implemented. Hopefully they'll find their niche once I have enemies actually trying to hit you back. While it's a bit beyond my design horizon, my current thinking is that ranged combat will take the shape of using enemy ragdolls to stun other enemies, or throwing weapons to do real damage.
Anyway, thank you for taking the time to try it out!
Gave it a go after seeing your post in the thread. Since all the visuals are WIP and you specified you're looking for feedback on the combat/controls/mechanics, I'll focus solely on that
>Does it (combat) feel responsive? Sortofkindof? Things like melee punching feel very bad. Even if that was the most powerful way to play, I just wouldn't do it since it looks and feels lame. There is barely any feedback to punches landing.
In comparison, smashing someone down to the floor with a well placed top-down heel kick feels very, very fun. I basically only did that and the roundhouse, which was also fun to pull off. In general, your ragdolls behave in a silly but satisfying way when they work. They look downright goofy and broken when they don't but it's WIP so no big deal. My suggestion would be to pick one or two combat moves and add details from start to finish. For instance, depending on the style you're going for, speedlines or something when the player's leg goes down. If it connects to the enemy, add some impact sound when the leg hits, then another when the enemy smashes into the ground. If you want to go more over the top, add smoke/air ripples circle things, cracks on the floor, blood, whatever
>Does it (combat) feel intuitive? Also depends. I would have never figured out the controls without the Help popup. But knowing the controls, I was able to play and had no issues. In many games, especially this DD, I can read the controls and know them, but playing the game I would instinctively reach another key because that's what my brain is used to (ex: playing the greek tower game Godfist, they have right click bound to pick up box. then to throw the box, you press right click. I always wanted to use leftclick, and I would do so then remember "oh shit, its actually right click, fuck"). I didn't have this issue here. While playing, the controls made sense and things behaved as they should.
Sometimes the collisions would fuckup and an enemy would react to a kick that either happened a bit ago, or not react to a kick they were hit by, or react to something that I felt was too far away. It's WIP so it's not a big deal, and it only happened 5% of the time so it didn't really impact the overall quality. Just means that it needs more polish.
Another tip would be to ease the difficulty curve more. The first wave should be like 2 enemies, then the next level you can start ramping things up, etc.
A modern masterpiece in the making , Oudemiai's Bloody Forever is a peek into the human psyche and shows us what the most powerful female protagonist could look like.
Comments
Here's a video from me:
https://mega.nz/file/eA1hlJpQ#5z2mEY7goOuwN2uCzR0j0PcxXjr3dBm3tvg1ChDgm8w
it sure was funny.
I saw! Thank you so much for uploading it, and I'm glad you had a good time, despite it mostly not being the sort of good time I'm ultimately aiming for.
It was a bit hard to watch, since it highlights just how far I am from where I want to get, but I've got a lot of ideas for how to fix things, and more importantly where to prioritize, based on the feedback you guys have given me.
Hopefully I can have something more presentable for DD49. :)
I'm glad it's helpful. Put feedback to good use. See you next DD
Played some waves and in the playground
I love ragdolls and watching them fly. I like how the roundhouse kick, the flying kick and the jumping kick feel. But man, let me see whats going on in the screen. I barely could see the ragdolls fly before they went too far away from the light and the camera was never close enough to the action. Waves mode can be won by roundhouse kicking alone, but I don't think you are interested in balance at this point. A god mode for testing stuff in wave mode could be fun. Also some non-kick heavy attacks.
This was dumb fun, I had an enjoyable time.
Thank you for playing!
It seems there's a lot of variation in how hard it is to see things in the game from person to person or screen to screen, so having some brightness, backlighting and camera behavior settings the player can customize are gonna be a priority for next demo build.
Seems a shitpost but you can evolve it in a real game:
On combat:
- Y, is intuitive;
- Standard melee punch is super shitty for multiple reasons: is not responsive at all; you need multiple punches to kill; you can't charge it; sometimes seems to miss altogether. You need some knockback on the enemies, otherwise they just pass you by. There are no reason (gameplaywise) for normal punches to exist, the meta is all heavy attacks.
- Because of standard punch, I've gone all heavy atks. Dive kick is very useful and fun, also jump heavy
I usually don't do suggestion because you are the designer, but I tell you: make the orb move, and the level is you following it through shitty situations. Its so obvious that maybe you already implemented it somewhere else.
Second suggestion, since punch is useless, make it somehow ranged. because, again, If you are in melee range you have no reason to not use an heavy attack.
I've personally found the punches to have some use - you can throw them out without changing your movement, and a staggered or stunned enemy can't trigger the game over - but yeah, they're not very useful. They do have knockback, though I guess if it wasn't noticeable while playing I probably need to make it stronger.
You're completely right about the orb; the plan is for it to move around while you try to keep it and yourself safe from the enemies.
I'm probably not gonna change the quick attack just yet - in my head they're gonna be situationally preferable to heavy attacks due to stuff that hasn't yet been implemented. Hopefully they'll find their niche once I have enemies actually trying to hit you back. While it's a bit beyond my design horizon, my current thinking is that ranged combat will take the shape of using enemy ragdolls to stun other enemies, or throwing weapons to do real damage.
Anyway, thank you for taking the time to try it out!
Gave it a go after seeing your post in the thread. Since all the visuals are WIP and you specified you're looking for feedback on the combat/controls/mechanics, I'll focus solely on that
>Does it (combat) feel responsive?
Sortofkindof? Things like melee punching feel very bad. Even if that was the most powerful way to play, I just wouldn't do it since it looks and feels lame. There is barely any feedback to punches landing.
In comparison, smashing someone down to the floor with a well placed top-down heel kick feels very, very fun. I basically only did that and the roundhouse, which was also fun to pull off. In general, your ragdolls behave in a silly but satisfying way when they work. They look downright goofy and broken when they don't but it's WIP so no big deal. My suggestion would be to pick one or two combat moves and add details from start to finish. For instance, depending on the style you're going for, speedlines or something when the player's leg goes down. If it connects to the enemy, add some impact sound when the leg hits, then another when the enemy smashes into the ground. If you want to go more over the top, add smoke/air ripples circle things, cracks on the floor, blood, whatever
>Does it (combat) feel intuitive?
Also depends. I would have never figured out the controls without the Help popup. But knowing the controls, I was able to play and had no issues. In many games, especially this DD, I can read the controls and know them, but playing the game I would instinctively reach another key because that's what my brain is used to (ex: playing the greek tower game Godfist, they have right click bound to pick up box. then to throw the box, you press right click. I always wanted to use leftclick, and I would do so then remember "oh shit, its actually right click, fuck"). I didn't have this issue here. While playing, the controls made sense and things behaved as they should.
Sometimes the collisions would fuckup and an enemy would react to a kick that either happened a bit ago, or not react to a kick they were hit by, or react to something that I felt was too far away. It's WIP so it's not a big deal, and it only happened 5% of the time so it didn't really impact the overall quality. Just means that it needs more polish.
Another tip would be to ease the difficulty curve more. The first wave should be like 2 enemies, then the next level you can start ramping things up, etc.
Keep it up, hope to see you next DD
It’s goofy. A bit too dark for my liking; shadows are harsh. Camera feels weird but it’s hard to describe how or why.
The camera and lighting are definitely works in progress. I'll keep tweaking 'em.
Ragdolls are fun, and butt drop attack is the best.
A modern masterpiece in the making , Oudemiai's Bloody Forever is a peek into the human psyche and shows us what the most powerful female protagonist could look like.
Well, you're not telling me it's completely unplayable, so that's better than I expected. Thanks for giving it a shot :)