Hi brawlers
I'm K. A., the Community Manager here at Milky Tea and I'd like to welcome you to our second Behind the Brawl dev blog. For this one I've sat down with Scott, one of our designers, and asked him to take us through the development of a weapon in HyperBrawl. There are quite a few things to consider during this process, so fair warning; this post is quite long. Grab your popcorn and let's jump in!
Weapons in HyperBrawl
One of the main features in HyperBrawl is the weapons. Alongside selecting a hero, which offer their own attributes, players can select a weapon to take into the match with them. Each weapon gives players a unique ability to assist them in the game, so picking the right weapon for the right situation can make all the difference.
When it comes to designing a new weapon for HyperBrawl, we have figured out a nice process for making sure weapons are as fun, exciting, and as balanced as they can be.
Our first step, as with most design work, is to brainstorm a list of weapons which we think would be cool. This first stage is always very open, creative, and at this point no idea is a bad idea. From this initial brainstorm we will have several ideas which we will further discuss, and rate based on numerous considerations.
Considerations in creating a new weapon
Does it make sense in the game world?
Luckily with HyperBrawl, the game world is incredibly diverse and spans an entire universe, with tons of different cultural references. Because of this, most weapon types could potentially make sense in the game.
That being said, all the weapons in the game share a similar aesthetic style. This is to make weapons more immediately recognisable to the player. We experimented with more bespoke styles earlier on in the development, but we found it ended up being much more confusing for players.
Before we begin putting the weapon in the game, we concept up ideas for how the weapon will look in the game world, both up close, and from the player’s camera. If we find the weapon isn’t recognisable or often gets lost in the action, we will look at redesigning the visuals, or potentially scrapping the idea entirely.
Does it work with existing mechanics in the game?
In HyperBrawl, all weapons have a single use (e.g. the player presses a single button to use the weapon). Therefore, we wouldn’t want to introduce a weapon which requires holding down two buttons for example.
We need to ensure new weapons don’t disrupt the main pillars of the game’s design or require us to change how other mechanics work drastically. Ideally the implementation of one weapon doesn't require us to change every other weapon to keep the weapon balance in place.
Will the weapon be easy to balance?
Whenever we prototype a new weapon, chances are that it will be overpowered or underpowered in some way. This is okay though, because most of the time it can be resolved quite easily. That being said, if we test a weapon for a long time, and it continues to be unbalanced it may be easier to just remove the weapon from the game. Unfortunately not everything is as good in practice as it may have been on paper.
Might there be any online issues?
As HyperBrawl is a fast-paced competitive online multiplayer game, we need to ensure any new weapons we create are reasonably simple to network, and we need to be sure it won’t create any issues in an online match.
As an example, we had a bug with the Mine Mortar early in development, where the targeted player couldn't see the mine, and on their screen they just randomly blew up by something they couldn't see. It wasn’t the most balanced experience to say the least. Fortunately we were able to quickly identify and fix the issue, so now you can blow up your opponents without worry!
Is the weapon fun for both the user and the victim?
It’s obvious that we want weapons to be fun for the player who is using them – they should feel exciting and rewarding when used, especially when used successfully. At the same time, it should be quite fun for the victim of the weapon. This may sound strange, but the player who is targeted by the weapon should have the ability to counter it, and if they do get hit by it, it shouldn’t frustrate them too much.
One example of this is an old weapon which used to be in the game; The Reverse Potion. This weapon was a grenade which reversed a player's controls if they were hit by it. This was an interesting idea on paper, and it was very useful for the player using it. Unfortunately it was extremely frustrating for the player who was hit by it, as their character was essentially uncontrollable for about 10 seconds - which is about three times as long as a knock out. During early tests we found that matches using the Reverse Potion left players feeling frustrated and annoyed, so it was ultimately removed.
Balancing our weapons
We recently ran a closed PC beta for HyperBrawl Tournament and received some great feedback from our players. Thanks again for that!
One reason for our beta tests is to spot issues with balancing we may otherwise not notice. Once many players enter the arena, new strategies and playstyles emerge naturally which is awesome to see, but occasionally these can cause balance issues and become frustrating for other players.
One of these issues was the Sentry Shield, which turned out to be quite overpowered. Let's look at weapon balancing with a focus on this particular weapon.
How the Sentry Shield currently works
Here’s how the Sentry Shield worked in the most recent closed beta:
- It is placed directly in front of the player and spawns a large barrier.
- When the barrier is hit by the ball or a player, it’s reduced 50% in size. If it is hit once more, it will disappear.
- If placed correctly players can block two shots with the shield.
The problem
During the closed beta, more and more players would make sure to equip the shield on at least one hero, and whenever it was ready to use (around every 20 seconds) they would place it directly in their own goal. This eventually became the meta during the beta, and a ton of players always had a shield in their goal for most of their matches.
This frustrated opponents as it felt like quite a cheap tactic, and by the time two shots were blocked, the player would soon be able to place another shield. It took a lot of the intensity out of the game, which obviously wasn’t great.
The potential solutions
There are several options we’re considering in terms of balancing the Sentry Shield:
- Increase the cooldown timer. A simple fix; longer cooldowns = less shields uptime. However, this probably wouldn’t solve the main issue, which is being able to place the shield in your goal to stop players from scoring so often.
- Stop the shield from being placed in the goal area. This is difficult because of the visual feedback that may be required. If a player tries to place the shield in the goal area, what happens? This would be a great fix, because it would create more interesting situations where players wouldn’t be able to directly block the goal, but still cause their opponent to shoot from different angles and use HyperCurve.
- Reduce the shield’s “health” by 50%. Players can still make that one key block if they use the shield well.
- Add a set duration to the Shield. The shield could be used in the same way, but only for a limited time, making players much more cautious about when and how they use it.
So, now what?
With all these options in mind, we need to ensure the shield remains balanced in comparison to the rest of the weapons in the game.
- It needs to remain fun to use, while providing interesting and useful strategical opportunities.
- It should remain powerful and useful for players, but opponents should always have a way to counter the weapon.
- Weapons should be balanced enough that none feel completely essential to each match as this will make gameplay less diverse and interesting.
We’re testing the options above, and possibly some more in-game currently. We’re hoping to get a much-improved shield in the game for future beta tests.
That's all, folks!
That's it for our second dev blog for HyperBrawl Tournament. Thanks to Scott for giving us some valuable time and thank you, dear reader, for making it this far! You're still here, right?
Anyway, please do let us know your thoughts, and if there are any particular aspects of game development you would like to learn more about. We've got a lot more dev blogs planned, so please do keep providing us with feedback and suggestions for what you'd like to see next.
Also, if you've got any questions or thoughts on any of the above, do let us know. Do you perhaps have other suggestions for how we could adjust the shield? Or a cool idea for an awesome weapon we could add in the future? Let us know!
As always, we'd love to talk to you on Twitter or Discord, which are two great places to stay up-to-date on everything HyperBrawl. Hope to see you there!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/591760/HyperBrawl_Tournament/
Finally, be sure to wishlist HyperBrawl Tournament right here on Steam if you're looking forward to launch later this year. It really helps us to get the game out there, so we can create some heated competition online (and on the leaderboards)!
See you in the arena!