Between the past devlog and the current one, I have:
- Added some potion objects and sprites to the game
- Conducted some playtesting
- Added new minor elements like tweening the enabling of certain UI elements to fade in, and adding an exit game option, as well as a short enter and endgame sequence
Potions
As part of the primary mechanic of the game, I had to create a set of distinct potions that the player could see and identify in the environment. In doing so, I realised I would have to significantly lower my scope to meet my deadline.
I therefore stuck with the 4 potions I had available to me in the game, and worked the environment around specifically leading the player to identify these potions, as well as removing the elements in the framework for other future potions. Although I intend to expand on the final state of the game to include my original roster of potions once the deadline passes.
Playtesting
I built my project and sent it to some friends to do playtesting with simple goals. My goals were to:
- Evaluate player onboarding: Does the game teach the core mechanics well, can the player identify the trigger to open the bookcase, do they explore the environment.
- Evaluate trace efficacy: Do the players follow traces in the intended way to identify potions, do the players find links between traces that weren’t intended both those that do and don’t lead to the intended outcome of identification.]
The results were mixed, but tended positive, given the rudimentary state of the environmental trace design. Players were able to identify the entrance to the Alchemy Lab, but took some time in doing so, and could suggest more clarity in their original objective.
Some players explored the original room, even after knowing what to do, while others went straight for the Grimoire and didn’t return to the study.
Players usually identified the clear traces that I left, but some of the clues that were left went unidentified which led to 2 of the 4 potions being significantly harder to identify.
All in all, I need to make the original goal of the Study exploration clearer, as well as adding more peripheral information towards the potions that were harder to identify, as well as better evaluation how easy the first two potions were to identify.
New Elements
After playtesting, I identified some new issues with my setup that I wanted to address. The main two were the ability to leave the game, and increasing the importance in the players minds of the key moments of the game.
For the first, I wanted to keep the physical and diegetic feel of the game, that would help to strengthen the environment driven design. I made the door to the study the exit game trigger, with a popup to confirm.
In order for players to know this, I bound the most common exit game key Escape, to fade in a message on screen directing them to the study door. I will also likely add a secondary exit game trigger to the door, for when the game is completed, as I want the player to be able to leave the play space of their own volition once the game ends.
Next, I changed the elements of the game where I enabled and disabled objects to make them appear, and instead added simple tweens to them. Some of these were to make them feel more physical in the world, and others were to maximise the importance of a moment, by making it last a period of time rather than be instantaneous.
A key place where I did this is in the successful identification of potions, where the entry for the potion fades in now instead of being enabled as an element.
My final step should be to solidify the pace of the game, through playtesting and changes to the environment, and redress the issues with following certain traces that I mentioned through playtesting.