Hmm. Yeah, that issue came up when I showed someone else the game. I believe those earlier levels I actually didn't fill out the square, and I had only antitarget "auras" and normal targets. I think I can demonstrate how the x's act more easily by changing level 4. Thank you for playing my game! Was it good? Was it remotely okay?
I think the puzzles are pretty cool, and I'm intrigued to explore the mechanics. I love puzzle games that trust the user to discover interactions, but I think a few of the levels I've encountered so far end up making the solution space large enough that figuring out what the new mechanic does is quite daunting.
For example, Popsicle Stick appears to be introducing a new type of wall block in the top right, but a similar level without that addition would already be quite fiddly to solve. What ends up happening is that it's tricky to even get the blocks into position to explore what that new block might do — I still don't know! — and I'm simultaneously wondering if it's not actually a new block but just a design element that's not part of the solution at all. In the end I figured out how to solve it by moving the blocks around each other, but I still don't know what that red square in the wall was supposed to do, if anything.
Compare this to something like Bonfire Peaks, where new mechanics are often introduced with a level that contains a very small solution space based on what you already know, so you realise quickly that the level is going to be impossible unless you there's a new interaction you've not considered, and then the level design is constrained enough that the possible-but-not-previously-considered interactions are limited. Once you know the mechanic exists and what it is, the game then starts riffing on it and complexifying it.
There are a lot of cool ideas in your game so far and I want to work my way through it, but the introductions of mechanics are acting like roadblocks at the moment.
Here. I've modified "Hatred" to give a demonstration of X shapes, and cleared out the levels of as many unused square objects on the walls that I can find. I may need to add a level before "Hatred" in the future, but this should make the game better
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I'm baffled by the red X introduced on level 4 — I cannot seem to work out from context what the win condition is supposed to be..I just figured it out — but I think that the level that introduces the mechanic is maybe not the most effective communicator of the mechanic
Hmm. Yeah, that issue came up when I showed someone else the game. I believe those earlier levels I actually didn't fill out the square, and I had only antitarget "auras" and normal targets. I think I can demonstrate how the x's act more easily by changing level 4.
Thank you for playing my game! Was it good? Was it remotely okay?
I think the puzzles are pretty cool, and I'm intrigued to explore the mechanics. I love puzzle games that trust the user to discover interactions, but I think a few of the levels I've encountered so far end up making the solution space large enough that figuring out what the new mechanic does is quite daunting.
For example, Popsicle Stick appears to be introducing a new type of wall block in the top right, but a similar level without that addition would already be quite fiddly to solve. What ends up happening is that it's tricky to even get the blocks into position to explore what that new block might do — I still don't know! — and I'm simultaneously wondering if it's not actually a new block but just a design element that's not part of the solution at all. In the end I figured out how to solve it by moving the blocks around each other, but I still don't know what that red square in the wall was supposed to do, if anything.
Compare this to something like Bonfire Peaks, where new mechanics are often introduced with a level that contains a very small solution space based on what you already know, so you realise quickly that the level is going to be impossible unless you there's a new interaction you've not considered, and then the level design is constrained enough that the possible-but-not-previously-considered interactions are limited. Once you know the mechanic exists and what it is, the game then starts riffing on it and complexifying it.
There are a lot of cool ideas in your game so far and I want to work my way through it, but the introductions of mechanics are acting like roadblocks at the moment.
I think I will remove those things on the walls. They were an idea I scrapped, and they don't change gameplay anyways.
Here. I've modified "Hatred" to give a demonstration of X shapes, and cleared out the levels of as many unused square objects on the walls that I can find. I may need to add a level before "Hatred" in the future, but this should make the game better