I've played Misfire for around an hour and a half and so far, have had a lot of fun with it. In its current state, however, i gave it 3 stars out of 5. why? Because I genuinely see the potential in this game and want to give the developer the incentive to iron out the kinks and pour his passion into making it the best it can be. There is an emerging audience for this game, and from what I see, the core foundation is set.
First of all, what I liked about the game...
- The Presentation: This game screams style and attitude, from the chevron art style reminiscing of the Burnout games (+10 respect for the screen cracking effects), to the menacing music that plays in the main menu and the cinematics. The vibe that it sets for you being a participant in an underground demolition derby tournament is solid, while still not taking itself too seriously
- The Visuals: While far from perfect at this stage, the vehicle designs are one thing I really like. The vehicle proportions are realistic but have the slightly exaggerated proportions of something from an arcade racer of this genre. The levels, while needing a lot of polish, are each visually distinct, with a creative setting and a distinguishable theme and color palette.
- The Gameplay Loop: It's fast paced, hectic, and repeatedly spikes your dopamine. Landing heavy hits on opponent cars feel satisfying, even more so when the takedown cutscenes (which are very well implemented) give you a cinematic shot of your rival flying through the air in a fireball. Even when you crash or get killed, the respawn times are nearly instant, as are the level reload times. Thankfully, even if you do wreck due to some janky behavior, it's not too much of a nuisance, as you can jump right back into the action, further complemented by the fact that most matches last no more than 2-3 minutes.
Now, for the suggestions and the things I didn't like. Please note that the intention of sharing the following to point the developer on specific issues that, when addressed, would skyrocket the game's fun factor.
- Add an option to drive with the arrow keys. WASD is fine, but some players like me are more used to driving right handed.
- There is a glitch where if you press esc to pause the game while the takedown cutscene is active, the game does not pause.
- There is a glitch where if you pause the game while the level intro cutscene is active, it messes up the race countdown, and all the AI vehicles start coming after the player while the player is still sitting in the 3-2-1 GO! sequence.
- Each car accelerates way too fast. Like an RC car rather than a 3000+ lb death machine. This is worsened by the fact that each car turns like an RC car as well. There's no feeling of weight. The cars need to have more mass and inertia.
- Cars (especially the high speed rated ones) are very twitchy and borderline uncontrollable at high speeds. They need more Y-inertia, or more angular drag
- Cars currently dont have any distinguishable handling characteristics, i.e. they all feel the same, but addressing the first two issues will make addressing this one easier, I think
- I don't like how almost every car on the map instantly comes baying for you, and only you, at 200mph the second the match starts. Half of the cars die in the first minute of the match anyway, so try having AI drivers fight amongst each other occasionally
- This is a personal preference but, I'd like to see the scratched paint FX (though it looks really nice) disabled on each car, until it starts getting beat up in game. I want to spawn into the arena with a brand new, shiny car, and watch it get smashed into a pile of smoldering metal.
- Add more sound effects, specifically for the UI (i.e button clicks, and the 3-2-1 GO! sequence), taking down rivals, and when the player is at low health. I can imagine this easily fitting an industrial soundscape theme for the UI effects.
- Increase the engine sounds of the cars, they're a bit too quiet at the moment.
- Some level geometry, like the brick walls in the Skyscraper level, or the bombs in the Temple level, can cause massive lag spikes.
- This is a personal preference, but consider slightly toning down the motion blur. With how fast and twitchy the cars are, it makes high speed driving very challenging
- Increase the size of the marker/health bar of each rival so you can see them from a farther away.
- Add some kind of notification for content unlocks (vehicles, tracks, etc.)
Those are my thoughts for the current state of the game, please forgive me for the wall of text. I genuinely want to see this game succeed, especially with the amount of effort and love that has been put in so far, and I will for sure improve my rating if the suggestions above are addressed. Best of luck with this project 32bit_bailey, I'm excited for the future of this game!