Devlog 12/3/2020 - Dylan Valev

These last 2 weeks of progress have been slower than most. There has only been quality of life changes both mechanically and visually implemented due to the feedback being the bulk of the work.

At AlphaFest we had a total of 6 playtesters. We opened up the survey with “How would you rank the feel of the doughpad ability/mechanic?”, an essential question because it is the crux of our game. The majority of the responses rated this mechanic favorably, telling us that our main mechanic was good to keep. When asked about the alternative doughpad, the playtesters also expressed being content with it, saying that they wouldn’t change it fundamentally and only recommended small tweaks to jump height.

Next was the aiming system, which has been a difficult system to have “feel right” throughout the weeks. Fortunately, the playtesters rated the aiming system favorably, once again reassuring us that our newest iteration of the system was good to keep.

Finally, we asked questions regarding the level design of the game. When asked whether the game mechanics complemented the level layout well, all of the responses said yes, however when it came to knowing what to do/the overall objective, people were slightly lost. To amend this we will polish the level layout to have more bottlenecks with signs and archways leading to different areas. This will make orientation more deliberate and clear.

For the next week our goal is to polish up the UI (replacing temporary sprites), adding textures to any un-textured objects, and final animations for characters, along with any other juice needed. Our biggest priority right now is implementing the gingerbread man/muffin man arc (which is now severely reduced in scope) to have a complete cohesive experience. Then the polish comes after.

Overall, we have decided to reduce the scope of the game for the class because we believe it is more important to complete an entire cohesive experience, regardless of game length and/or size.