These notes where taken while playing though the game.
You'll just have to guess where I was while writing based on context.
Tutorial walls are nice.
Pitfalls that force a reset are generally a bad thing. In game design you should avoid
forcing reset unless necessary. Allow the player to backtrack for example.
The indicator for the zoom module is a bit too subtle. When its recharged it should
provide an audio feedback to the player to let them know its ready again. The line on
the body is good for visual though.
The spikes are a bit too high up for that first encounter with them. In design players
know that spikes are bad, but the zoom module still hurts you unless you jump. Lowering
the spikes a little more in the first room gives the player more incentive to jump first.
Also this is a leap of faith since the player can't see where he/she is going which is bad
for design.
Warning the player of spikes with writing on the wall is okay, but it would have been better to
either allow the player to lower the camera down to show the spikes or to lower it for them for
a better view. Another leap of faith here. Ah I died here because I didn't press the button.
It blends in too much with the background. A little contrast works wonders here.
More leaps of faith, or in this case a safe fall, then immediately a death fall.
The player should only die if its the players fault, but because he/she couldn't see
where to go. Hiding the button in a leap of faith also violates this rule.
Nothing bad with this room. It teachs the new mechanic in a closed environment with no
surprises. Good one here.
Oh this is a big problem. As far as I could tell there was no instruction on how to
change modules. I had to bash the keyboard until I found out it was the arrow keys
which are generally used for alternate movement. Using 1, 2, 3 keys to change or
any other key to cycle would have been better.
Oh, now we have the sign to tell me how to choose. The only reason this was a problem
is that by default when starting a new level the module automatically was set to
zoom. It would have been better to show how to switch modules immediately after aquiring
the second one. Level design-wise this level was pretty solid. The leap of faith was
the right kind of leap since it was obvious it was the only way to go.
This stage is find so far, Its a little annoying to have to wait for the recharge of the
leap module. If its going to be used so frequently why have a delay at all? There a leap of
death here as well at a pit fall if you go the wrong way.
Opps. I wanted to see what was in the pit. I guess I will never see what freedom is like.
Ugh, this ringing noise is getting annoying. The base jump is completely worthless. I
can't even jump past my height. Oooooh. Shrinkage nice. What happens if I.... I get stuck in
the wall. Shrinking again stucks me more! Oh no! Okay I'm forced out somehow. You should
just kill the player if this happens, leads to less bugs and its the good kind of killing
the player. I think there's another pitfall if you don't get the shrinkage module. Again
pitfalls are bad.
Okay so you can violate the cooldown rule by shrinking and the using another ability. This
is inconsistant since you can't do this with any other ability. The wall says trust me.
I assume freedom meant death or something.
Neat to have branching paths.
I think I got the evil path? Due to how slow the recharge rate, I don't want to try for the
other ending. Providing a post victory option to go back to somewhere before the branching
path would solve this.
Overall it was a pretty neat. If you most of the problems with level design was issues with controlling
the camera and pitfalls.
So far the game is great but I did notice a bug when I fell into a pit of spikes and only took one damage and then was allowed to sit there without taking any additional damage.
Leave a comment
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.