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Guert
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« Reply #9 on: September 23, 2007, 09:47:00 AM » |
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Hello!
Here are some comments...
The presentation is effective but a bit too tame. You should post screenshots and artwork to sell the game. Anyone who stumbles on the website will know it's a turn-based browser game but won't see anything from it. In most cases, the potential player will click around and leave unless they find some images of the actial game...
I'd also make a big button for login in. make sure your players will know exactly where to go to start playing and, sinc ethe first step is logging in or signing up, you need to make it very clear to them. I suggest that you keep the top banner only for information, usch as the title of the game, how many players currently online, how many hours the player has spent playing, etc... I'd also add a menu on the left or across the banner to make sure we always know where to go to access the features.
In the profile page, I get to see my name, display name and email, a couple of lnks about donating, helping out but I can't seem to see where I must click to start playing... You have to make sure the player knows exactly where to go to play the game. The less step before reaching the game screen the better!
I picked characters randomly, I don't know if choosing a different look will affect the game... Is there a difference between the characters? Also, I find it a bit odd that my avatar has clothes and weapons when they don't really ahve anything... Perhaps you could have multiple version of the charcaters, the first one being in simple clothing or at least unarmed...
I notice that the drag and drop animation is bugged: When we finish a drag and drop, the icon goes back in the inactive list but then reappears in the active list...
Getting to the actual game area takes a long time. It's long enough so that most player will get discouraged before reaching the actual game. Try to find a way to make the new players acces the game area faster... For example, after I created my party, I clicked on a story link, which sent me to another page where someone tells me that I should train and get some money before leaving, clicked on the first link that indicates training then searched for a training link but fond nothing. Instead I had a link that told me I could hunt. Then, by clicking this link, I could begin to play. That's alot of steps for a player who just wants to see how it plays...
In-game, I felt the game was very laborious. Although it was relativly simple to control after a while, the game isn't very intuitve and is hard to pick up. I'd try to eliminate as much pop-ups as possible on the battlefield. Attacking an enemy, for example, could be simply clicking an icon of attack located with the currently acting character and then clicking on which character the action needs to be performed. So, for example, if I want my character "Gorgotronus the horrible" to attack "Generic MeatBag", I'd simply click an icon located with Gorgotronus stats and then click on Generic Meatbag.
I believe the numbers that appear on the ground when you move should be made clearer. Also, you could add an highlight to clear things up, or perhaps a grid...
I felt like the battles I had to take care of took forever. I didn't feel like I knew exactly what was going on. For instance, I slugged enemies a couple of time but the HP remained at 100% but the damage % changed. I'm not sure how but I knew it changed.
Also, on the right of the screen, instead of putting the stat changes, you should indicate what is going on in the round, like you are displaying at the bottom right part of the screen. At first I thought that I wasn't hitting the enemies at all, just making my melee skills rise.
I feel that the enemies should be very different than our characters at first to make sure there are no confusion. Perhaps, you could simply add an highlight or something on the characters that belong to us.
I stopped playing before the end of the battle. I felt like it took forever and I didn't know exactly what I was doing. First, there's information everywhere and I never know exactly where to look. Second, the arrow indicator for the movement felt like a sign to tell me on which space I could go even tho I could move in diagonals and other "crooked" path. Third, I had no clear information on if my characters were doing well or not. Fourth, it took too much time before I had the satisfaction of winning or at least have soemthing going my way in the game.
Well, the game's got potential but you should really focus on making teh experience easier to get into and a bit more user firendly at first. Try to make things a bit simpler and easier to pick up. You don't have to make the game less complicated in terms of rules, only make the way we control the characters simpler and make sure that we can see a clear result when we do something.
Perhaps a tutorial for your new players could really help since this game seems to have numerous layers...
Well, that's it for now, keep up the good job, I know working on a project like that isn't as easy as it seems, specialy if you are not working full time on it.
I think the key to your success would be to make this game more accessible to new players so you can get a bigger pool of potential helpers. Like I mentioned earlier, try to make the first page of the website more attractive to the new eyes viewing it.
Well, talk to you later and keep us noticed of new features and development!
Hope this helps you a bit!
Guert
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Developer
