Hello again Survivors!
In our posts over the past few weeks, we've covered most of the major things we wanted to test in the internal version 0.13.0.
There were a lot of other detailed changes, but since this is not a live release, this is all I can share for now...
The New Version's Test Points can be summarized as follows,
- Does the New Combat System, with the removal of "Grabbing/Caught" and redesign around “Ambush/Surrounded,” remain fun in "continuous play" as opposed to "single session?"
- Does the Character Customization through the "Memory Bond" Systemwork well with the revamped Combat System and does it add variety to the gameplay?
- Are the Newly Added 3 Characters compelling and do they work well with the "Memory Bonding" System?
- As the number of Characters grows, do the changes to the Character System and Weapon Systemsmake intuitive sense and help convey each Character's personality and increase the fun of the game?
- Does the Basic Meta-game LOOPof setting out with these Characters and collecting “Firewood” with a limited inventory in order to fuel “Embers” to counter “Corruption” work as intended?
Today I'm going to give you an overview of our test setting, our internal assessment of each test point, and our next steps.
The Setting and Context of the Test
The Maps used in the Test consisted of three Story Maps and four Farming Maps. After completing the two Story Maps based on the concept of "Entering Remore's Red-Light District", four Farming Maps and completing the "Dock" Story Map (which, for comparison, corresponds to the Stag Manor Map in the Current Version) you will have completed the Test Version.
Since the Narrative elements will be added after gameplay validation, the current version only includes a few simple elements to test the atmosphere, such as background settings for spatial design and "Journals written by NPCs”.
Since we were only testing internally, we didn't have a "Tutorial", but instead, we assumed that the "understanding of the changes" of Dev Team members who weren't directly involved in the content/system planning would be pretty similar to those who had only played the Early Access Version, and performed a kind of UX validation to see if the intended fun was intuitive and engaging...
After a basic screening of the members most directly responsible for the game design, we divided the team into three groups: those with high to low levels of understanding and involvement in the development of the changed game environment.
The First round of testing was done with members of the Team who were "aware of most of the logic for implementation," primarily programmers; the Second round of testing was done with members of the Dev Team who were "indirectly aware of some of the logic for presentation," such as narrative and UI designers; and the third round of testing was done with members of the Art Team who were only aware of the "big picture and goals" of the changes made after Early Access.
And... the results of the first round of testing were hopelessly(?) poor, because even from Team Members who understood the game logic, the feedback was mostly "This is so Hard and unreasonable that I Want to Give Up."
Test #1: An Unintentional Inferno of Difficulty, with UX Issues and Bugs Stacked on Top
I'll admit that when we first got feedback about the difficulty of the levels, we were a bit taken aback. That's because we thought the construction of the many Single-Maps, with the logic "make more enemies come out a lot, and let players kill a lot!" and with the removal of "Grabbing/Caught" and the introduction of "Ambush/Surrounded" the ground rules were much more player-favorable than in the Early Access version.
Based on feedback from those who played and analysis of recorded footage, we concluded that the biggest contributing factor to this issue was the unreasonableness of "Roamers" (Skulkers) on outdoor Farming Maps when they suddenly jumped out of the darkness from outside of players field of view and alerted a large group of enemies.
During our Single-Map testing, we ultimately introduced the "outdoor" concept, and two of the main ingredients to flesh out that theme were the presence of roaming creatures and windows. We wanted to create a play experience that communicates, "It's dangerous to end your turn outside where the Roamers were lurking, so look through the window to see what's going on inside and try to get in as best you can”.
However, there were three main factors that led to a different experience than intended for the Dev Members who tested,
- Depending on the TP's situation, there are times when ending a turn outside is unavoidable, and it's harsh to have a Roamer pop up unexpectedly and bring in a bunch of enemies that are virtually impossible to deal with.
- Skulkers have a newly introduced “Agility” Stat - i.e. they have increased Dodge Rate - and depending on the situation, they may not be able to perform the intended response (i.e. the character with the higher “Dexterity” Stat gets the kill) ...
- Also, the fact that "Skulkers have a high Agility stat" is communicated through the icon for the Defense type, which is not very prominent and hard to recognize.
We analyzed the causes, but the solutions weren't always immediately obvious, especially for the first issue, where there was a pretty strong split between "there's no tension if you can see all the threats ahead of time" and "we're making a game to make you feel tense and threatened, not to kill you".
The second and third issues are a result of the Character System overhaul in this release, but the first issue was a bit of a mystery, as the introduction of the Roamers was pretty much the same structure in the last Single Map test, so I was wondering why the negative feedback was only appearing now.
And scouring the feedback and implementation status of past versions to find the reason for the discrepancy was somewhat fruitless, as in the end... it was just a bug in the Roamer's patrol range.
The original intent was that the Roamer would move 3-5 spaces per turn in the direction they are facing, so in principle, there shouldn't be a situation where a player would be immediately recognized by a roamer outside of their line of sight.
However, in order to create a sense of "patrol" unlike regular mobs with random movement, a sort of "waypoint system" was introduced for the Roamers, where the command "move from waypoint A to B" would override the "limit travel" rule, resulting in a situation where a Roamer that was 8-10 spaces away would jump out and cause a mass alert situation.
The conversation between a programmer and a level designer after discovering this issue was so hilarious that everyone on the team cracked up, so I'm quoting it here.
- Programmer: "Oh, I thought getting to the waypoint was a priority?"
- Level Designer: "Yes, well it is, but I just wanted to set it as a destination!"
- Programmer: "Well, enemies jumping out of the dark is kind of cool, so I thought that’s what you were going for?!..."
- Level Designer: "...I... I'm not that crazy..."
Eventually, the Skulker was changed back to its original design intent of "slowly approaching and applying pressure, while reminding you that it's dangerous to end your turn outdoors".
We also thought about the lack of recognition of Evasion Rate and Armor Type, but we didn't fix it per se, as we felt that a Tutorial Guide popup would be helpful when you encounter a Skulker for the first time and later (similar to when you encounter a new type of creature in Early Access). We wanted to keep the concept of "fast movement" in the Skulker.
Instead, since “Hit Rate” is such an important piece of information, we revised the way it's presented in Tooltips so that Players can better recognize the fact that the Hit Rate is low even before issuing an Attack Command.
Additionally, considering that continuous play leads to a higher sense of fatigue compared to testing a Single Map, we have reduced the number of enemy spawns and increased the variance between "rooms with many enemies" and "rooms with fewer enemies" within the same map for better balance.
With these adjustments, we nervously requested a second test from the testers who gave the game a score of 2 out of 10 in the first test, as well as the original second test group (the narrative and UI design teams). So, were we able to receive feedback that the game has become "fun?”
The results of that test will be revealed next week!
REMORE