Aside from praising the game though, there were a few issues I noticed.
-On the slash vs stab debate: At first I didn't see much use for the stab, due to the advantages of the slash. This seemed a little off balance as such, and I thought the stab damage should be slightly increased to offset the advantages of the slash. After getting the glove item though(sorry, the name slipped my mind), it seemed more balanced as I had to start managing the (stamina?) resource to use other equipment. I assume as one obtains more items, stamina management becomes more apparent, and as such, it seems balanced to me. It could be something to keep in mind if the balance seems off in the future though.
Yeah part of this stems from the fact that although the demo is meant to represent a late-gamish level, we for sure can't expect the player to be acquainted with combat and the mechanics to the degree they would actually be at that point, and also, we can't just pile 20 tiles and modifiers on their back which they had no way of appreciating out of the gate. For this reason, we mostly gave the player the most basic and straightforward tools, and these mainly don't use mana. You are right in thinking that mana-management will become ever more important as the player gets more tools that use it, and there may even be a gradual shift from mainly melee to mainly ranged, as happened in the course of LoZ.
-The mini-boss of the dungeon was a welcome challenge, unlike most bosses. Figuring out how to beat it was enjoyable, but when it got to the second stage(shells bouncing around), I ran into a problem of spending to much time dodging the shells, and died at a few times before giving up and just tanking it. I did want to beat the boss correctly, but the shells were always to close. Basically, the difficulty seemed just a little to high for me to not take the cheap path. A solution to this would be to make the floor area of the mini-boss one or two tiles taller, so that the shells aren't always so close. This breathing room might make it to easy, so the mini-bosses health could be slightly increased to compensate. Additionally this would help prevent players from tanking the boss.
Yeah this is another of those demo balance things in some sense; in the actual game, circumstances won't allow tanking that enemy to be nearly as viable as it currently is; we had to give the player a lot more health to take the edge off the difficulty, and to simulate the effect of having things like restorative potions or other health mechanics later on. Our style with boss design sort of puts emphasis on constaining the player's space, although there are definitely viable ways to avoid any kind of damage in that fight. Most notably, you could stand at 9 O'clock and do upward swipes at the shells as they come around.
-Upon receiving the glove thing, I noticed a slight glitch. When the menu opened to show the item, it remained on the map screen where I had it, and didn't pop-up the item description until I manually switched to the equip screen. I assume that it is meant to open the menu, and go to the equip screen when a piece of equipment is received.
Yeah... will have to look into that
Part of going to a larger pool of players / testers is that things which either rarely happen, or were not recognized when they happened earlier tend to come up!
-On the equip screen, it shows "press X for info"(in not so many words). However to view an items info, I had to press the A button.
On the list to be fixed too!
-For the main boss, I just want to say I very much enjoyed the fight. A small thing I noticed though was that the boss dealt collision damage to me after I had killed it. This might just be a minor thing, or even intentional, but it's a difficult enough boss that if someone died after killing it due to this, they might think it's an unfair enough death that they won't even go back to see if the boss is dead before quitting the game.
Also on list!
Overall, this game looks fantastic, and I very much look forward to seeing more of it. Keep up the great work!
As an aside, I think these articles would be beneficial to you.
-Discusses the hidden movement systems in Zelda 1, and how it made the 4-way movement feel better.
http://troygilbert.com/deconstructing-zelda/movement-mechanics/Hadn't seen that one, but it is a good article! We were familiar with the nuances of Zelda 1 movement, and how nifty it is. We actually gave that system a try in our case, since a lot of the combat design is similar to Zelda 1, but visually the up to half tile jumps that can happen when you align to a new axis were a bit jarring with the level of visual fidelity we have; we ended up going with something that was closer to LTTP; you you hit a corner just slightly, the Character controller will move you sideways quickly as you are trying to pass it.
Yeah, have read this one a few times! It is also a fantastic article. I especially agree with the idea of using the early part of each region as sort of common space for traveling through the map. I think this is one of the major features of the world design that Minish cap seemed to ignore.
Thanks for all of the great feedback!
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