Bone Meal @devbonemeal-blog - Tumblr Blog

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Game RC Post Mortem

As a team our priorities shifted and our pipeline was reconstructed. Things we expected to be done. Either were ready and weren’t implemented. Or were implemented and needed to be reiterated on. Things were uneven, team members were hindered by outside circumstances. We also rescoped for indiecade. The primary focus before this milestone was trying to improve the two second puzzle rooms. Instead of updating artwork for rooms that were proven to not be successful in the playtest. Even though we needed a complete menu and title screen for the review copy, submitting to IndieCade lit a fire under our seats to polish levels, and technical back-end as well as some very submission specific work done. This pushed back the work on the title screen and credits screen and implementing art assets so by the time the build was due we were late on the goals of the review copy.

We know moving forward bugs and things we want to fix and be done by the final. We have made our scope a bit smaller for the deadlines in this class. So that we don’t over extend ourselves.

Beta Post Mortem

After alpha testing we redesigned the second levels to take out mechanics or enemies we decided to scrap. We also wanted to redesign things to take advantage of the mechanics we already had. The problem we came up against with the levels we designed after, was that the spaces we designed weren’t large enough to move around comfortably.

A lot of our feedback from the presentation was that we needed more art implemented. So the first level got more art put into it and we also moved some things around. We decided to redesign the graves so that they would give another clue to the shrine puzzle. We also worked on the art for the second level but that isn’t in our current build.

The boss room changed, there are pillars for the player to hide behind. The boss also has a second phase where they bleed and the blood functions the same as the “pits”. Where they hurt the player when they step in them. The boss room colors need to be changed so that the blood pools are more clear.

As for communication it is now been made apparent to team members that we need things days in advance and not last minute if they want to be implemented by the next class.

We are thinking of moving things the first level even more so that it flows more nicely.

Some of our stretch goals are, a lighting system and particle effects.

Alpha Playtest 1

Players noticed a lack of feedback that made it impossible ti make informed decisions. There are consistency issues that drag the game down.

Players like the gun most. Melee and dodging got mixed responses. With the melee slightly beating out dodge. Parry was by far the lowest , players mostly ignored this feature and most found it too clunky to use.

Almost all of the players liked the Boss the most. However they all felt it was missing something and not quite at it’s full potential. The other 2 enemies received very mixed results, likely dependent on the type of player. Generally, players felt the fisherman are too hard and the bats were unpredictable. Every player enjoyed the aesthetic and art of each enemy.

Players like the art and setting and want to know more about it. The biggest complaint were centered around clunky controls.. Seems like players want to respond quickly and precisely to what’s on screen. Bad collisions broke immersion, needs to be fixed asap.

We need to need to fix collisions, implement journal, improve responsiveness. Have puzzles working.

Mordley Greg: A Prototype Post-Mortem

During development of the initial concept and prototype of our game, we ran into numerous risks and challenges. The first challenge was creating the concept of the game itself. Although we did end up with a satisfactory concept, it took too long to get there. Additionally, we had two competing concepts. This ate up more time as we debated the pros and cons of both pitches.

The next hurdle we faced was time management. During the early part of development, we did not make the best use of class resources. Instead, we used that time to have meetings and discuss our game rather than develop it. Plus, multiple members in our group could only work on the project while in class. Troubles with our software took away even more class time and kept group members from working outside of class for longer.

The final challenge was one with our asset and communication pipelines. In the beginning we had a lot of trouble effectively communicating with each other outside of class. This made it difficult to coordinate asset creation, which led to some of the assets not being ready when they needed to be. Miscommunication also caused some of the members to do work that was not needed yet.