Lowering the difficulty without removing the fun
Hello! I spent the last two weeks chipping away at my giant list of visual effect tasks but the end is in sight. I found some time to make a few gameplay improvements too, such as rebalancing the lower difficulty modes to make them as fun as the harder modes.
More visual changes
I redrew the chickens’ bombs to be way bigger, and I gave them some dotted lines so it’s a bit easier to see where they are in 3D space. The blob shadows underneath bombs and characters are much darker now too, and they’ve got slightly softer edges than before:
I made the impact when an enemy hits a wall feel a bit heavier, by adding a brief delay before the explosion. Here it is in slow motion:
Treasure chests and exploding barrels felt a bit too static before, so they bounce now. I gave the player’s step animation a bit of a bounce too while I was at it:
You can see all of the new visuals in action here, in a couple of extremely hectic new rooms I added to arcade mode:
It can be hard to follow everything that’s happening in that video; those are two very difficult rooms on very hard mode after all. So let’s talk about the easier difficulty modes instead.
Lowering the difficulty without removing the fun
When watching people playtest my prototype recently, one of the biggest issues I spotted was that the lower difficulty modes simply weren't as fun as very hard mode.
There are lots of ways to take a difficult game and make it easier, and one of the ways I'd chosen to balance my game’s easier modes was by spawning fewer enemies. Unfortunately, one of the best things in the game is sending an enemy flying into a crowd and destroying them all at once, and you didn't get to do that when there were barely any enemies on the screen in the first place.
So I cranked up the enemy count on all of the easier difficulty modes, giving them just as many enemies as very hard mode. The game now simply limits many of those enemies will act aggressively at once.
For example, in this easy mode screenshot, only the cat at the top of the screen and the slime closest to me are actively trying to move towards me. All the other enemies with grayed out state names are just wandering around, and they'll only attack me if I get close to them:
Easy mode currently allows up to two enemies to be aggressive at once, normal mode allows four, hard mode allows seven, and very hard mode has no limit. The game tries to share those aggressive enemy slots between different types of enemies, instead of just letting a bunch of melee enemies chase you around while all the long-range enemies ignore you.
Here it is in action:
I’m so relieved that this seems to be working okay. Now people will be able to experience the joy of using a hammer to launch a clockwork robot animal into five other clockwork robot animals, even if they’re not playing the game on very hard mode.
Two new old blog posts
While I was moving some old files over to my new phone last weekend, I found a couple of old rough drafts from 2020 that I thought were worth cleaning up and putting on my blog. So if you've ever wanted some tips on how to fix issues with your game's controls or some five year old balance suggestions for a fighting game, go check them out!
I’m back on Twitch
I haven't been able to stream on my Twitch channel in a while, in part due to being too shy to draw visual effects in front of an audience and in part due to my internet having severe upload speed issues since last week.
My internet just got fixed today, and as I'm mostly programming again I don't feel to shy to stream my work either. To makes things even better, my friend NomnomNami designed and drew a new pngtuber character for me!
I cannot begin to express how much I love this character. You'll probably see me streaming much more in the coming weeks, just so I get to look at her more. Feel free to say hi if you see me streaming!
It’s the Guildford Games Festival
There’s currently a Steam sale for games made in the town where I live, so you can save 50% on Chessplosion and Ducky’s Delivery Service until Monday!
There’s an in-person event tomorrow too, and I’m currently trying to decide whether or not I should watch the keynote speech by my old boss Peter Molyneux while I’m there. I have to admit I’m leaning towards no right now…
Anything else?
I have once again remembered how wild Duel Savior / Xross Scramble looks in motion. Low budget 2000s Japanese 2D action games will never cease to inspire me. Maybe one day I will be brave enough to add this much hitstop to my game...
Speaking of cool-looking games, I'm in love with the name entry screen of Comic Road for the PC-FX. It's unbelievably charming!
I've been on an art documentary kick recently. I found Never Get Tired: The Bomb the Music Industry! Story and shitty kickflips' sparkle on raven video essay to be super inspiring, so check them out if you like making art or hearing about other people who make art.
I liked this essay on transphobia and transwomanhood too, but it's pretty heavy, especially the first paragraph. For something much lighter, I couldn't stop giggling at this silly edit of the dinner scene from Heat.
That’s all I’ve been up to recently. I hope you have a great couple of weeks and I’ll see you next time!