I plan on taking at most 3 months (hopefully less) for the next release, and aside from an overhaul of the battle command/skill/items interface, the next release will attempt to cover the following topics:When you release the next demo, will it be the same area all over again, or will you release another part of the game as the next demo?
Correct! Yeah, if you had 4 skills with the old menu system then it would take anywhere from 3-5 key presses to get to targeting. Not to mention you have to pay attention to where your cursor is at. The benefit of not having to focus your attention on the menu UI should be pretty big on its own.So if I get that right, I could set, say, Distracting shot to be the button combination left - left - enter (because you have to confirm who you're going to attack)? Sweet, that'd save a ton of time and make the game a great deal more enjoyable. Regenerating SP is also a bonus. Looking forward to the next release.
So now we can focus our attention on the things on screen that really matterCorrect! Yeah, if you had 4 skills with the old menu system then it would take anywhere from 3-5 key presses to get to targeting. Not to mention you have to pay attention to where your cursor is at. The benefit of not having to focus your attention on the menu UI should be pretty big on its own.
It ends after a boss fight (you'll know, as there's a screen to let you know). Note that there are also a couple of different "endings". There's a post on the Patreon that details how to avoid that bug (When does the demo actually end? Found the code and dude says to go to a panel. I assume the panel is in the starting zone in the north where there is this square that has a blue coloured sides. Also, one of the laser gates where the bunch of switches will lead to a crash with some file missing when u run into it. This is for the leftmost laser gate though. The right side doesnt seem to do this.
The targeting thing is a known issue and is something I'm going to play with to see what works best. I think what is happening is that since the enemy battler's sprite disappears and becomes attached to the enemy stats window, it re-orders the enemy list and the grabber gets pushed to the front.Hm, an action-button interface could work. Basically, it would be going towards the "minigame" direction, simplifying the inputs so they're more reaction-friendly.
Concerns I'd still have:
- I think v0.01 had targeting behavior where target defaulted to previous, unless one of your characters was grabbed, when it defaults to the grabbing NPC instead.
This got occasionally confusing, as you wanted to finish off an injured enemy, but because his pal had just gotten a grab in, your target would switch over.
Can't think of a good fix, other than simply taking out the "targeting prioritizes grabbers" rule entirely, to keep the system more predictable...
-The v0.01 struggle input was alternating L/R, which encouraged blind button mashing for speed. Since arrow keys now drive actions, that might cause issues.
Consider switching struggle to randomly-selected arrows, so that players need to pay attention to the screen and react, and they can't keep mashing.
You might also need to add a quarter-second "dead input" window at the end of a struggle session, so that any keypresses meant for the struggle don't accidentally drive actions instead.
- You're still going to have the issue that struggling blocks actions from the other character.
Can't see a good way out of that, though, short of implementing a full-blown gambit system to drive autonomous actions...
I'll recommend not being too preemptive in judging the battle system quite yet. There's a list about a page long of things left to be implemented, including cooldowns for enemy H skills and an actual AI targeting algorithm. It was discussed in this thread before V0.01 came out that getting pinned in an H attack cycle would be very possible in that release.Played it a bit and the game has potential to be really good but the Restrain/Knockdown loops and "live turn based" combat really kill it. Traditional turn based with set restrain durations would of been better imo.
It was the additional reward for the $15 patrons. It's going to get updated with each release. If you're interested in the one from the last release let me know and I'll PM you the details.Eromomancer, I just checked the Tumblr and saw the post about the PDF. Is that something you will be sending out soon? If I'm reading into it correctly, will there be a PDF for each release?
Or was that just simply an update about the PDF and the images that will be included in it for part one because you will be sending out the whole thing upon the game's release? However far down the road that is.
Check in the uppermost folder of the RAR. There should be a PDF file called "Malise and the Machine - Illustrations and Designs V0_01".Oh I was at the $15 level because I was interested in the PDF so I was wondering if that was something you would be sending out soon.
I kind of have a feeling a bunch of people flew by it and missed it. I'll probably include something about it in my next post, hah. I also think next time I'll label it differently so people know it's in there.Holy shit I'm blind. God that is embarrassing.