Right, so I'll use your points as an opportunity to shed light on the kind of direction I'm going in with this game.
- Show me a number when I hit the enemies. I usually think showing numbers where none are needed is annoying but in the case it might be useful. If I can see that my attacks are doing more damage the more points I put into Strength, it would make me feel that I am getting stronger even though mechanically I still need two hits to kill things. But you have a pretty clean design right now so I'm betting you don't want a bunch of numbers on the screen.
This is not a game about raising numbers. When numbers are displayed in such a manner they become much more significant, and I do not want them to be significant. Yes it's good for the player to know they're getting stronger, but after someone has been at the game for a while they'll certainly know that raising strength has an effect. And yes, I also simply do not wish to clutter up the screen with that kind of noise. I'm going for more environment, less interface fat.
- Make the flies drop after every 9 enemies killed and increase the effectiveness of each level. This way when I put a fly into Strength I know that it makes a big difference. This would be my preferred method but there are obviously a few drawbacks. I don't know how many flies it takes for the other stats to be useful so I don't know if a fly every 9 enemies would make sense for Toughness and the others. Also, I already feel like I don't want to fight the enemies because they are difficult and the threat outweighs the reward, but I want to risk it because I know that they always drop flies. If you went with this method I don't know if I would ever kill another enemy ever again.
I'd rather keep leveling up via small increments. For one, the wasp is not the only enemy that will ever be in the game. There will be more all which come with varying health values. I also want to keep the levelup system relatively low risk. This encourages the player to experiment and try leveling up new things, or at least makes it a much less costly decision. This will be more important once more things the level up are introduced. One point in agility for the hell of it? Eh sure why not. Making flies abundant ensures this. Furthermore the consistency of killing something and getting an immediate levelup reward is intended. For killing something you are directly rewarded every time.
You said that you want the difficulty in there, and in your original post you used the word "scary" to describe the environment. Based on these and the way the character moves (he's fairly nimble and he can drop very high but he is terrible at fighting the enemies) I get the impression that escaping the enemies is just as viable a solution, and could actually feel more rewarding for the player. So here are my suggestions:
My use of "scary" was mostly referring to the theme/environment, but fair enough if the wasps scare you too. Yes, escaping is viable. However, as I start adding an ever-increasing difficulty curve as you go through levels it will not be such a simple decision. You get by the enemies, yes, but at the cost of losing potential levelups, which you might need to survive the greater challenges ahead.
- Increase the effectiveness of levelling up a stat a little bit (so say it takes 3 flies to kill those enemies in one hit instead of 9) and make it random whether or not an enemy drops a fly. Let's say a fly drops 33% of the time. On average, it will still take 9 enemy kills to level up my Strength a significant amount but if I'm lucky it will only take 3 enemy kills. Finding 3 flies that sometimes drop feels like a more attainable goal than finding 9 flies that always drop, so I feel more willing to engage in combat instead of running. Also, since I'll be taking damage a lot if I keep fighting monsters, if I'm UNlucky and it takes more than 9 enemy kills, I'm going to be very tense. Each successive enemy after the 9th will be more and more scary because I will have less and less health each time.
I want the tension to emerge from facing the player with a direct, difficult challenge; enemies. That's what the game is about, going through the levels and fighting enemies. Leveling up is secondary, it serves to provide a means of improvement(of which there will be difficult choices to be made), but improvement only to facilitate the fighting of enemies further and increase the depth and complexity of engagements. Hinging the player's growth upon probability is inscrupulous, such a thing only leads to frustration and unfair deaths.(deaths caused by the system failing, not by the player failing)
- Put some flies out in the open as rewards for tricky platforming segments. Not many, just a few. If you tweak it so that I feel like the flies are valuable, seeing a fly out in the open will make me feel great. I would prioritize getting the fly over fighting the enemies. If a fly was valuable enough, I would dodge all the enemies and grab the fly, then open up my stats menu to make myself stronger before engaging them in combat. That would let me use my character's natural advantage (nimbleness) to overcome his natural disadvantage (combat) and I think that would be very fun and rewarding.
Here's a good place to state that the lizard has no disadvantage in combat, you just suck at playing as him. Also, more combat maneuvers will be added in the future, so don't think the current dynamics of combat are locked in.
This game isn't about platforming. It's about engaging enemies. Rewarding the player for menial things like making a pixel-precise jump only dilutes the game from its focus and distracts from the overall goal.
These are all subjective opinions, of course. I'm just stating my opinion. I still think it's a cool-looking game and whether or not you use my ideas I'll be following it's progress. =]
Cool! I'm really glad you're interested in my game, and I hope you'll enjoy it even more in the future.(as, you know, it becomes something more tangible)
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