IMPORTANT
Hi everyone
Now that the game's been out for a while I have been given the chance to gain some proper feedback from the community and surprisingly, a lot of players are a tad above the target audience I noticed, which in turn, comes with a slew of negative, yet useful feedback. I received complaints regarding controls, movement and game design for instance which I do feel carry some weight.
Regarding the older player base and their reactions my own first reaction was changing the description on the store page to include an age recommendation to hopefully further avoid confusion. However, you may have judged from reading the news post Headline I have a lot more planned for this little kitty game.
As with all my projects I care a lot about them and the people who choose to give my games a try. I've been accused by a few people of asset flipping and just carelessly throwing assets into the mix without any rhyme or reason. The thing is that I myself believe there's a lot more potential for Gilbert and I think some people feel that too and therefore judge the game more strictly.
So what am I trying to say then? Well as you most likely guessed by now, I am going to overhaul the entire game. This means completely re-doing the player character and its moves and move-set. Gilbert and company will get new and improved abilities.
Right now I implemented a double jump and You can only dash while jumping for instance. But that's far from all. The way Gilbert moves and plays has been completely been revamped and so has the camera system. The camera turns depending on Gilbert's angle and there's a dedicated camera reset button.
Gilbert plays and moves a lot more like Mario, who has been the major inspiration during this overhaul, and with this I believe everyone will be able to control him without any real issues. Gilbert can now also jump slightly higher if you keep holding down the jump button as well.
Play with Gilbert 1.5
Right now I am working towards "Play with Gilbert 1.5". A version of the game which will completely remove the old player character yet remain all the old levels and gameplay elements. Other changes may also occur but in general the main focus is on the player character.
Ultimately I will be working towards a "Play with Gilbert 2.0" version of the game. This version will have all new revamped gameplay elements, and new levels and content.
The game's price will also be adjusted according to the changes but will be kept in line. I'm not turning this into a full fledged triple A experience yet with all the new changes I have planned, the game will become much more then it is today.
I'll be going over the majority of the planned changes below:
From The Ground Up
I have a much stronger design vision then when I first started and a lot more new ideas that I want to implement. In order to achieve all this it means most of the game will have to be re-build from the ground up.
The player character, the levels, etc. Luckily I should be able to keep using other existing elements, such as the music player, etc. I will keep most existing NPC AI systems but might heavily alter them when/where needed.
However, I also require a lot of new systems for what I have in mind for the new Play with Gilbert game. These will tap into adding more gameplay elements for instance.
Another addition will be a more clear visual presentation to help guide the player to where they need to go. This is done in a way very similar to Mirror's Edge and how they used Red for instance to visually guide the player. However in Gilbert it'll be much more obvious and much less based on quick reflexes, obviously.
Gameplay
While the spirit of the old PwG game will be still around, a lot more focus and effort will be put into the the level design. Each level will completely re-made and you can expect a LOT of changes. The aim is to keep an open world approach but have segments within these new levels that are more traditional and build around a simple challenge through exploration. This means a lot more platforming and thinking trying to get to a certain fishy for instance.
All the citizens and other inhabitants will now get their own living area depending on which level you're in and I am prototyping level streaming so that I may be able to remove load-times in-between level transitions.
Kittens
The kittens Themselves will also be given a treatment. One of my initial ideas was to give the kittens a lot more personality and I think that's been hugely absent and not given the best treatment. Even with the customization options. So a lot more effort will be put into that as well.
Think of expressions through thought bubbles or something similar. Having individual names, etc. I'm not sure yet how extensive the new changes will be regarding this, but expect something to be done with this.
Character Movement / Controls
As I said a lot before already, Gilbert and Co. have a whole new move-set. The game in its current state plays nothing like the old one and I'm not even done.
I want to add a wall-jump ability and am looking into object interaction where Gilbert can pick up stuff using his mouth. I haven't prototyped these ideas yet but they're in the works.
Along with this is a whole new updated camera system to further make the game so much more fun to play. Both young and old should now be able to play the game properly without having to swap control schemes.
I have more ideas to further make use of the player camera, but you'll have to see what that means.
When?
Obviously all of this requires time. I am also working on my main project which will be released this year so I can't promise a solid timeline. However, I will roll out updates that will affect the old game, introducing updated core elements, such as the new character component.
This will offer a look into the future of the game. The first update should come out not too long from now and will introduce the new character controls.
For now this it!
Take care and thank you for your support.
Joure