Meteor Miner Post-mortem
By Shannon Tetley
I'm finished with my asteroids game for now and I think it turned out pretty good. I put it together by following the tutorial I was given which taught me some new concepts and left me with a skeleton to work on. I expanded on it by adding random movement to the asteroids and by adding variables to them that determine there average speed and other traits like how much damage they do to the player. I think the biggest influence the textbook Game Design Workshop had on my design process was that it suggests that interesting choices are what make a good game and that players need to be challenged or those choices are meaningless (Fullerton). I tried to implement this idea by making the asteroids move at a random speed that is faster on average based on the asteroid size. I also added randomness by making the asteroids bounce off of the boundaries of the screen which also makes the game harder by concentrating the location of asteroids around the player.
Another concept that I leaned form T.Fulleton, was that play testing should be core to the design process (Fullerton). Knowing this I have been a lot more formal about how I've done play testing this time. I've used a template that was provided to me by the uni to create a questionnaire that players fill out after trying the game. I added to this template by including questions more relevant to my game that I though would elicit helpful feedback. My readings have taught me that I shouldn't be making games that are fun for me, I should make them fun for the audience. Playtesting is how I measure how fun the game is for my audience and is used to inform future iterations of the project. This testing has been very encouraging for me as players have a tendency to keep playing the game despite dying or achieving the main objective of the game.
Player Feedback
Some interesting insights where discovered through my play testing. I find it intriguing that despite having different issues with the game, the issues had some overlapping themes.
Generally speaking they said that:
The game was challenging and rewarding to defeat.
Some said that the asteroids where too fast.
The ones that could handle the speed didn't like the turning speed of the ship.
I suggested upgrades for the player ship which everyone agreed would be a good idea. Some testers even came up with this idea unprompted.
Some players died before realising they were losing hit points, others didn't notice they were dying till it was too late. Everyone agrees that it needs to be more obvious when your are taking hits.
My conclusions from this are that the game has some balance issues, some issues with the controls and issues getting feedback when events happen. I agree with them about the feedback when you lose hit points, its not obvious and it happens quickly. For the general game balance I think there are many options to fix this. I think simply changing the asteroid speed and frequency would alienate the less confident players. I could also fix the ship turning speed but being slow is a challenge in itself. Instead of addressing these issues individually I think the best option, as the players mentioned themselves, is to add an upgrade system to the game.
How would I change the game?
I would implement an upgrade system to the game by adding a store. I think that allowing the player to have a breather would help them out. Pausing the game to allow them to access a upgrades store would help in many ways. Simply pausing the game would allow them to rest and cope with what is happening. The can then make interesting decisions by buying upgrades that can help them deal with the challenges of the game. Is the ship turning too slow? Upgrade the turning speed. Are the asteroids too fast or numerous? Buy a slow down time machine, or buy a better gun to thin out the horde.
If I continue this project I would also add more feedback in general. Feedback for destroying asteroids to reward their success and feedback to warn them they are taking hits. Also I would add a title screen to invite them to play and improve the death scene I added.
A lot was learnt on this project particularly after playtesting. Now I know the basics of creating new scenes I'm going to start with the title screen for my next project as I think and introduction to a game can be quite important. Providing feedback to the player adds to their experience and ease of use for the game, I'll be sure to concentrate on including this for the next project.
References:
Fullerton, Tracy. Game Design Workshop. 3rd ed., A K Peters/CRC Press, 2014.
