Great Trailer for a game

This is probably one of the best trailers I've seen for a video game at this time. It's even a zombie apocalypse type game which is sort of shocking to see the creators come up with such an amazing trailer when they are dealing with such a gimmicky type of game (as most new zombie game are, but this one may be different). The trailer is actually moving. Great music selection for what the creators were going for as well. Here's the video.

The forward and backward chronological portrayal of the trailer works really well with showing the viewer what happened and what is going to happen. It even makes the trailer more depressing since the viewer already knows what is going to happen. Like I said, one of the best game trailers that I've seen so far.

Fastest bicycling Event!

I never knew that the fastest bicycling event could be considered the slowest as well. The riders try to trip up each other before they reach the 200 meter mark. Its a mind game until they hit that 200 meter mark. It's interesting to watch, and it's crazy to think how much skill the riders must have to hold still as long as they do.

2011 Spring Semester GDC Playtest

No feedback from the track

While I was at GDC, I had some people playtest the game. Most of the feedback that we received was pretty standard feedback that we had received from previous playtests. There were some interesting comments though. Even though it seems obvious, we were told to have the arrows flash in the direction of where the player needs to go. This is a great idea and will definitely get into the game. It will probably not be in for beta, but definitely for gold.

The testers at GDC also wanted the track to give more feedback to the player, such as changing color when the player crashes into it. The road could also point the player in the right direction by having arrows pointing in the direction the player should be going. Testers at GDC were also having trouble with the sensitivity of the car especially with the flying aspect of the game. This issue has been known and is being worked on. In the end there will be a sensitivity setting in the menus so the player can choose how sensitive the controls are.

Also, just like from previous playtests, the testers wanted more tricks, and just more opportunities to do tricks. Testers also mentioned that the game world was too static, and our team is currently working on changing that. We are working on having moving objects in the background, moving obstacles on the track, and having obstacles land onto the track. Having a more lively world is the game team's goal for beta and we have made some good progress towards that goal.

2011 Spring Semester Playtest Session 4

For this playtest we wanted to know if testers wanted more to do in our game other than just driving around. As one might imagine, the testers unanimously said, "yes". So what we will be working towards is getting more obstacles into the game, and thanks to a team-on-one that we had the other day we know what our plan is for the beta milestone which is in 2 weeks.

Other than asking the question of testers wanting more we also received quite a bit of feedback from players on other issues in the game. I'll also be throwing in a few observations of my own into the mix as well.

First off, here's the new control scheme. There are slight variations from the ground and flight controls.


Testers didn't mention many issues with the control scheme, but I still feel that the controls may be a bit touchy to some players. The flight controls sensitivity still needs to be dampened. In fact, we just need a sensitivity setting in our menu options. This sensitivity issue has already been discussed, and the devs know about it. I just need to keep pestering them about it and they'll eventually add it in.

Flying needs to be faster

In addition, testers have been saying that the flying itself is too slow, and I agree with them. I've already had a playtest meeting with the team and we've come up with some ways to speed it up, such as having the boost mechanic speed the car up more when it's in flight. We also need more ways for the player to be able to cool off the heat meter while flying.

Other than flying, the car still needs a visual cue for when it is about to blow, whether this be done by the screen flashing red, or the car catching on fire. The car catching on fire would be a better effect, but the screen flashing would be easier to implement. Testers also wanted to have an 'auto-upright' feature. This feature would basically allow the player to hit one button and the car would upright itself if it was upside-down.

Another feature that is still missing is a system to direct the player back to the track if they fly off of it. Some testers are still getting disoriented when they are in the air. The textures on the road could fix this have having arrows on them that point in the direction that the player should be going. Creating a wrong-way sign would also help with this.

Testers were also wanting more tricks to do, but before our team can do this we need to solidify our trick system. Figure out what we need to do to actually make it feel apart of the game, such as having the ability to make combos of tricks and having a point system that the player can see. On top of the point system, we also need some sort of rating system for the tricks as well. All of this will help with integrating the trick system into the game, and making it more enjoyable for the player.

Curious Two Worlds 2 Review

I played the first Two Worlds and I enjoyed the combat in game, but that was about all that I enjoyed. Everything else was horrible, such as the AI pathing for just about everything in the game. Also, the random collision walls that your horse would hit while controlling him would usually cause the horse to stop completely or take a path you did not want to take. The storyline and dialogue horrible as well. Mayhap I go over there? Yeah, there were a lot of mayhaps and foresooths and the like in the dialogue and it didn't add anything to it. Though I suppose it did make it very comical.

Anyway, I came across a really interesting review about Two Worlds II. It personifies Two Worlds II as being a game trying to get a score from the reviewer, so the reviewer is essentially interviewing the game to figure out its score. It's a very interesting way to go about doing a review. Here's the link to check it out.

2011 Spring Semester Playtest Session 3

The crab claw you have to do with our old control scheme to utilize the roll mechanic

For this playtest we decided to try out a new control scheme. The reason for this is because we were trying to figure out a way to get the car roll mechanic to be used without doing a form of the crab claw on the controller.

So, instead of the roll buttons being on the bumpers we decided to move them to a state change type of control. The player would now have to hold the left trigger, and use the left joystick to utilize the car roll mechanic. Due to the left trigger being used for the state change we changed the gas and break buttons to 'A' and 'X' respectively on the 360 gamepad. Boosting was moved to the 'B' button, flying was moved to the 'Y' button, and jumping was moved to the left bumper.

Player feedback was unanimous in saying that the controls were horrible, they were ingrained with the idea that the triggers should be gas and break. Most racing games do this, but our team figured that since gas in our game is not pressure sensitive we could but it on a button instead of a trigger. We discovered that the trigger buttons are meant for the most important aspect of a game, and in our case it would be the gas a break abilities. So, we changed the control scheme and will be testing it again as soon as possible.

Controls have changed to the triggers being gas and break, the left bumper being the state change to use the roll mechanic and the left thumbstick to decide which way the car rolls. The car roll mechanic is very handy in tight turning situations as well. 'A' is now boost, 'X' is jump, and 'B' is flying.

Rather than having flying act like a jet fighting game, we need to change the camera to be able to keep the track in view at all times

Other than the control scheme players had issues with the flying camera. It needs to be a bit further from the player, and it should show where the player is going to land if the car is falling. Player's also wanted some sort of indicator to tell them where they need to go. Disorientation occurs when players are in the air for long periods of time, or just get turned around. Indicators to mitigate this could be arrows on the road telling the player where to go, or a HUD element that pops up whenever the player is not going in the right direction of the track.

We also still need to create a tutorial for the game. Right now there are issues with players not knowing what the car is able to do, and players will not read control schemes unless they're forced to. So, a level that teaches the player how to play the game needs to be created and it needs to be integrated into the game. They cannot bypass it.

Now that the issues have been mentioned, testers still enjoyed the game, and they liked the announcer and wanted more from him. So, the team has created more voice over for the announcer and it has been put into the game. We'll have to see how testers respond to the responses the announcer gives.

That's about it when it comes to playtesting for this week. The team is working on all the issues as diligently as possible. Thanks for reading, I'll be continuing to write up these playtests for the rest of this semester at DigiPen.

2011 Spring Semester Playtest Session 2

Playtesters are still receiving the game well. They had a lot of feedback for us this time, and some of it was issues that were not fully apparent to us, such as players not seeing where they are going to land when flying. This became very apparent when players were going off of huge drops offs and having no idea what is under them. Another issue that still needs to change is the warning for the heat meter when it fills up. It needs to be more apparent.

Camera issue in action. notice how there is no telling what's under you, if anything

Basically, there needs to be a hard hitting visual cue that pulls the player out of their focus of playing the game so they notice the meter. There are a ton of ways to get that visual cue, such as having the screen flash red, and changing the UI to get the players attention. We are current pursuing both avenues, and will hopefully have it up before our alpha presentation which is in the second week of February.

Other issues were that players really wanted the car to be able to drift. We've been receiving this feedback for a while now, and we hope to get it into the game at a later date.

One thing that has been surprising is that a dev car ability has become apart of the game. Previously we thought that it was just going to be something that devs would use until we found another solution, but it seems to be working very well. The dev car ability is simply allowing the car to do a barrel roll if the left or right bumper are hit on an Xbox 360 controller. This ability is infinite for now, meaning that one of the bumpers can be held and the car will continue to do barrel rolls until the button is released. This ability helps with flipping the car over if it ends up on its top.

Dev car ability in action, the car is grinding into the ground and thus receiving better "traction" to get around the turns

Playtesters also mentioned that the car should have more control when it slows down. Currently, players have less control over the car when it slows down. This has something to do with the physics in the game, and our physics programmer will start to work on this issue as soon as possible.

Another issue with the game is the level pieces. Currently, there are zero transition pieces between different types of road, such as half pipes and normal road pieces. This is an issue because visually the game looks unfinished, and players have a tendency to crash into areas where if there were transition pieces they would never crash into those areas.

Now that I've spoken of the issues in our game, here's some feedback that players said that was good about our game. Even though playtesters found the flying to be frustrating many said that "Flying is really cool". Many also felt that it was an integral part of the game.

Some of the playtesters gave us some great ideas to play around with as well, such as having the car's wings get brighter as the car moved faster, or have the booster doors pop open instead of slowly open to get the player's attention. Also, players wanted the car to do barrel rolls more quickly while it was in the air, more like how the car can barrel roll without the wings.