#turn based

[itslarigaming]

Nintendo DS: Radiant Historia, 2010

[someguyart]

Yu Narukami

[bodhrancomedy]

Wait, wait, not only is Expedition 33 funny and heartbreaking and beautifully designed, but it’s also turn-based??

Did someone reach into my brain for this, 👀

[airjemsfandump]

Taishakuten : Would you fall in love with me again if you knew all I've done? Asura: Tf you mean??? When I literally retconned history for you???? What do you think I wouldn't do????

[lvlupmike]

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.

[askagamedev]

Following up on your suggestion to build prototypes. I have a bit of an idea of a turn-based battle system prototype I want to test, or at least curious about. Should I build a prototype of it to completion? Because I feel like making a turn-based battle system is a lot more complex and time consuming than something like a platforming game.

You shouldn't build prototypes to completion, you should build prototypes to the minimum viable product. Completion is what full production is for. Prototyping exists to prove that the concept can work at all. This means you don't need to build every possible option, you only need a small number of options to prove that the mechanic is interesting when trying it out. Usually you want to set up maybe 2-3 possible results for each "variable" so that you can get different combinatoric results from each playthrough, and then you see how the experience feels.

A turn-based battle system is actually easier to prototype in many regards than a platformer. Platforming games must handle things in real time, which means you need to do some actual programming. It might be fairly basic code, but it has to handle things like moving, jumping, physics, and timing in real time. For a turn-based system, you don't need any programming - you can actually build a prototype with paper, cards, and dice. Decide your turn order, design your determination with the math, and then design your potential results. Since nothing must handled real time, you can do it all in paper and see how it plays almost immediately. And, since you don't need to rewrite code to change things, you can make changes immediately to see how things play.

Keep things simple. Get something working. Make it as simple and small in scope as possible. You don't need all the options, just 2-3 for each to prove that it works. The most important thing is to see how the game feels. Is it doing what you expected? If not, what isn't working? See what is working, try to fix the stuff that isn't, and try again. Repeat this process as quickly as you can, then start bringing in other playtesters to see how they engage with the prototype and how they think it feels. Once you get something you've proven is good, then you can start building it in an actual game.

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[b-3nthehedgehog]

Follow up to the Griefer multiplying post from a week ago

[torofan01]

"turn based is too slow for me!!" dont care this is the way my ancestors fought wars