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[J-Snake]

I hope you learned the lesson here: close behind;)

on occasion I get a control issue where even lightly tapping leads me to move two squares in a direction, instead of just one.

Lightly tapping needs to be defined. If you tap it for 12 frames then it can happen that you catch the input for the next cell. The timing windows are that small at the speed you are moving but they are clean. Movement should be perfectly reproduceable once you take the grid-mechanics into account.

The game is running at 60 hz on 60+ hz screens. It will be slower on slower screens because I don't want to update twice in a row, this exact tapping thing will be affected in a negative way if I would do so.

[J-Snake]

@eyeliner: Your questions will be solved on their own, just play it

All of you forgot to tell the most important thing: Refresh rate of your screen

[eyeliner]

60Hz. Goes without telling, like your game, yes?

[eyeliner]

@eyeliner: Your questions will be solved on their own, just play it

60Hz. Goes without telling, like your game, yes?

Flickering text to explain the bomb stuff is aggravating.

Also, game's... Boring. Uninstalled, but best of luck to you. I just dislike these kind of games and mechanics that are not reasonably explained. I still can't understand why the ground falls, and having no way to explain how that happens, allowing me to play decently instead of anarchically and just looking for a way out, I decided this game is not for me.

And your explanation to a single issue I had is like saying, "you are too stupid, my game is great and has no problems".

Better improve on your social skills.

[J-Snake]

It is a basic and fundamental mechanic. It can be explained in 2 sentences.
Here you go:





Your attitude however will prevent you from mastering this game.

TrapThem is about deterministic "clockwork-perfection". The success of a plan is entirely up to you. The only random thing are the explosion-effects.

Pacman on the other hand is a fundamentally different play-philosophy. It is A.I.-driven (even when it is simple). It means the player is not supposed to know the exact working of enemy-movement-routines. By adding some clever randomness the enemies compose an opposing force you have to estimate and overcome.

[eyeliner]

And to understand a game I have to watch a video?

Your talk is lovely, poetic, almost... But sometimes you seem to forget that...

THIS IS A GAME

Players like me play things for fun and pass the time. I felt I was wasting my time playing this because from a layman perspective, things happen randomly without me being able to control the flow of things. 1234 to place colored bombs. What's the difference between them, if any?

I can drill an absurd number of columns, but all of a sudden the whole thing collapses without reason, killing me. Restart level. Over and over.

At least Boulder Dash "explains" things without a word, and a player can understand that the minute it happens. There's no need to watch a video.

It's me, man. I'm quite sure I'm alone in this lonely position of critique, but I have given my best to like the mechanics of your game.

And also, I don't ever mastered a game. I do not care about it. I just want to play a game without it becoming an obsession, but at least you are upfront and tell people your game is no joke, and I respect that. I am just not your target.

And I respect your position. It is as it is, and you didn't stray from your path. That's cool.

[J-Snake]

This is all there is to the block-mechanics:

1. Destructible stones tend to connect to each other.

2. A cut out block will fall down until it hits ground.

Every consequence is resulting from this rule.

TrapThem is a game with repercussions and consequences. That is the exact thing what makes a game interesting but I can understand that TrapThem is not for everyone.

[eyeliner]

One of these days I'll finally have peace in my damned life (having your friggin' house turned into a construction site is NOT good, people!), I promise to give your game a fair shot.

I just might have been a bit harsh. I see that.

[J-Snake]

Ok, so TrapThem's release is around the corner and I hope some of you guys are going to appreciate it.

I would like to share the bigger picture why TrapThem has been created:


In the long run one big goal of mine is to create a "metroid-rethought". It is an original game taking the roots of metroid but expanding them to its own thing. However I want  to add new mechanics and deeper repercussions to the game. In order to do that properly I decided to elaborately study the qualities of these mechanics in separate projects. One of them is TrapThem:

Here the focus is on new  block-mechanics. In contrast to the game Boulder Dash you now have the complete control about where the boulder will collapse, it is not pre-baked to certain locations. In addition the boulder is sticky and will connect to its neighbor-blocks when it is resting. It might sound hard to understand on the first read but once you take a glance at some footage you will see it is fairly intuitive.

Now with new mechanics comes a new universe to explore, and that is what TrapThem sets out to do. By now I can confidently say the amount of variety and depth of play TrapThem can generate in a tiny space is astounding. In the end its valuable results will carry over to other bigger projects. Meanwhile I hope TrapThem gets the attention it deserves.

TrapThem is intended to be a complete game by release, from beginning to the end. Every finite gameplay detail has been spent a lot of attention. The gameplay will get pretty technical and demanding. Grow in its system, develop more and more ideas and techniques to solve the challenges.

[PompiPompi]

Game seems to have new and interesting mechanics.
The game kind of reminds me games from the 90s, not only because of the graphics and adlib like music but also because it requires a lot of patience.
It takes quite a few keys and menus and walls of texts until you reach the actual first level. I am not saying this is bad, but I think in mobile games(for instance) it doesn't take a lot of time until you can actually start playing the game.

I got bored after the second level. I am not represnting the common gamer since lately I rarely play games. But it's kind of boring to have the first X levels be very simple puzzle that teach you all the X mechanics.
It's worth to try and give a "real" level as soon as possible instead of making the player feel like he is in a class about your game.
I think you shouldn't be afraid to give a "head scratcher" right on the start.

That's about it from my short play.

[J-Snake]

I decided it is saver to introduce the rules of the game before offering the challenges.
If it is all that clear and easy then you can complete the tutorial in 5-10 minutes.

Since the game has a story something needs to be shown when you first start the game. It is a one time thing, after that you start the game right there.

[moi]

dat face when you beat guide the thief 

[J-Snake]

Regarding "shelter" I guess you were like "why didn't I think of that?" when you saw the elegant solution.

[moi]

I tried it initially, because I remembered it from the trailer, but it didn't work for some reason

[J-Snake]

You know the rules, it is all up to you.


Here is a review from an ambitious puzzle-enthusiast who has spent a fair amount on TrapThem:


"
This is a fantastically inventive puzzle game.
There really hasn't been made anything like it before.

The basic idea seems like an inversion of "Boulder Dash", which means the dig-able soil is not static but instead affected by gravity. As you play you will realize the immense possibilities of these mechanics. You will need to build complex structures to your aid, and demolish them in turn to murderous effect(because although the name is TrapThem, you mainly just SquishEm). One could say it puts "Red Faction's" "GeoMod" to shame, if the meagre graphics are ignored.

The stages are devided into 3 types: purely cerebral tasks, reaction tests and amalgamations of both; with the reaction tests at times being unattractive for pure puzzle-lovers.

I have played every stage and can account for the quality of their design. The game demands both creativity and intellect in great amounts(as well as finger-skills, which isn't as remarkable though). Gameplay doesn't go stale at any time, seemingly familiar looking challenges prove to be fresh just by means of a minor twist or added restrictions. Later stages will easily make you invest an hour at least, and a few are likely to make you despair for a while; but they all are solvable, I promise.
It needs to be said that overcoming these positively "impossible" preconditions will fill you with a deep sense of satisfaction; at one point when all the established core-techniques fail to solve the problem you will be led to utilize your environments in such ludicrous ways that you wouldn't deem them feasible in theory, you have to try.
This is something you cannot have with the wishy-washy "Portal" games for instance, which made "TrapThem" the more enjoyable experience for me.

So the game is majorly taxing, which is all a logic-enthusiast could wish for. But even more importantly, the game demonstrates a uniqueness highly uncommon today, it isn't derivative in the least.

"TrapThem" may be the greatest puzzle-sensation since "DROD"."

[Whiteclaws]

You know the rules, it is all up to you.


Here is a review from an ambitious puzzle-enthusiast who has spent a fair amount on TrapThem:


"
This is a fantastically inventive puzzle game.
There really hasn't been made anything like it before.

The basic idea seems like an inversion of "Boulder Dash", which means the dig-able soil is not static but instead affected by gravity. As you play you will realize the immense possibilities of these mechanics. You will need to build complex structures to your aid, and demolish them in turn to murderous effect(because although the name is TrapThem, you mainly just SquishEm). One could say it puts "Red Faction's" "GeoMod" to shame, if the meagre graphics are ignored.

The stages are devided into 3 types: purely cerebral tasks, reaction tests and amalgamations of both; with the reaction tests at times being unattractive for pure puzzle-lovers.

I have played every stage and can account for the quality of their design. The game demands both creativity and intellect in great amounts(as well as finger-skills, which isn't as remarkable though). Gameplay doesn't go stale at any time, seemingly familiar looking challenges prove to be fresh just by means of a minor twist or added restrictions. Later stages will easily make you invest an hour at least, and a few are likely to make you despair for a while; but they all are solvable, I promise.
It needs to be said that overcoming these positively "impossible" preconditions will fill you with a deep sense of satisfaction; at one point when all the established core-techniques fail to solve the problem you will be led to utilize your environments in such ludicrous ways that you wouldn't deem them feasible in theory, you have to try.
This is something you cannot have with the wishy-washy "Portal" games for instance, which made "TrapThem" the more enjoyable experience for me.

So the game is majorly taxing, which is all a logic-enthusiast could wish for. But even more importantly, the game demonstrates a uniqueness highly uncommon today, it isn't derivative in the least.

"TrapThem" may be the greatest puzzle-sensation since "DROD"."

Come on man , Give it a small graphic revamp , it wouldn't hurt anyone !

[nikki]

I think it would be a good idea(tm) to compile your game for Linux too, it's XNA right?, shouldn't be too hard.

Because :
- I would like to play it and am on debian atm
- moreso: I suspect the combination not too spectacular graphics <-> complex and thought provoking gameplay would rub well in the GNU world ...

I also feel the demo would stay longer on my machine if it wasn't a 100MB program, those 76MB for 8 tracks.. is that uncompressed WAV or something ? I've used NVorbis to use Ogg in C# / openTK / mono is that an option for XNA also ?

anyway, will report again when I am back from holiday and have my win7 machine too.

oh and PS congrats on the release!

[sublinimal]

TrapThem feels like something I might catch a glimpse of in my dreams, forgetting the details come morning. Or like a lost DOS game that someone can vaguely remember playing and has spent a disproportionate amount of effort to recreate, though ending up with a whole different game. Indeed, perhaps TrapThem is ultimately more of an ideal than a destination that can be reached, unlike places such as:

• America
• Asia
• New Zealand
• And many more

Every level isn't the same, I like that you as a level designer have noticed this and sorted levels to shareware-esque episodes, so it feels like I'm playing many games instead of the same one. Clearly, you must have playtested EVERY LEVEL at least once. Their difficulty curve bounces around a lot, which is a refreshing change to well-designed games.

Some games treat you like a baby until level 15. Today, I come to you and say: Ich bin ein Big Boy!; big enough to play TrapThem. But not so big that I'd have to stand outside my house of dreams, because I wouldn't fit inside.

Yes sir, I would definitely watch Let's Plays of this.

[J-Snake]

How do you feel after this post?

[Meatsack]

This game deserves a bump.
Seriously.  I haven't been this challenged in ages.
I still haven't beaten it yet. (I have a life.  )
Maybe it's my old fingers that can't react fast enough in the speed challenge.
(Stuck on Ceiling Removal)
With the shortcuts into the Mixed area, there are 3 rooms that I'm still thinking on.
But I like the Puzzle route the best. 
No, I'm not done with it yet, but I like thinking on it. (No hints please!)

Overall, for an old puzzler, this game is quite refreshing.
I must agree with the other posters that there's nothing quite like it out there at the moment.
  Hat's off to J-Snake for his excellent puzzle crafting!