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tuyop
Sep 15, 2006

Every second that we're not growing BASIL is a second wasted

Fun Shoe
God I am getting murdered chronically in Frozen Synapse. This is embarrassing because I'm actually alright at real life tactics. Why can't I employ covering fire for my shotgun or grenade guys!?

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Ijuuin Enzan
Oct 28, 2006
More fun than dryer lint.

Unmature posted:

What are some good iOS point and click adventures? I see the first two Monkey Island games and Phoenix Wright on here. Searching "point and click" doesn't bring up much and the app store's definition of adventure game is pretty broad.

The Journey Down is rather lovely.

Kepa
Jul 23, 2011

My goal as a game developer is just to make gnome puns
urg I'm releasing a new game on the 24th urg. It's my procedurally generated Secret of Mana-y thing. Followup to Mage Gauntlet, but now it's super difficult, with randomly generated levels, 6 different characters all with different playstyles, etc. It's huge, took us 2+ years to make.

I'm going to put a code down here. Get the code if you have some free time, because I have some special conditions below.

RW6TY6LR63YY

Whoever gets it: If you get to the second area (past the first boss), let me know here and write some feedback. If it's meaningful feedback, good or bad, I'll then leave another code in here. And so on until either the game's out, or someone grabs a code and runs without saying anything.

Here's the website so you can see what you're getting into. I need to update the video and press kit though. Going slow because I'm sick right now.

ghosts on the moon
Apr 24, 2010

Kepa posted:

I'm going to put a code down here. Get the code if you have some free time, because I have some special conditions below.

RW6TY6LR63YY

Whoever gets it: If you get to the second area (past the first boss), let me know here and write some feedback. If it's meaningful feedback, good or bad, I'll then leave another code in here. And so on until either the game's out, or someone grabs a code and runs without saying anything.
Got this one!
Will let you know what I think (in this post) once I've had a chance to try it out!

EDIT: I'm still working on the first post-prologue boss (have died to him a few times), but I didn't want to keep everyone waiting.

This game is really quite good! From the prologue, I was expecting a more traditional action RPG progression: you are a guy, you go along, gradually increasing in power and skill, until you're able to get past the harder parts. Then I permadied. Huh! Was definitely not expecting that. Then I had classes to choose from! I'll admit I was thrown for a bit of a loop in that transition; I didn't really see how the prologue connected to the main game and puzzled for a moment how I might continue the prologue character's story, then how my new characters related to it. I'm still not super sure about that, but I suppose I'm over it.

I like how distinct the classes are from each other: each requires significantly different positioning, timing, and ability use, and what works really well for one will likely get you flattened with another. Great variety in that, and satisfying. Attacks are satisfying and consequential; the only little nitpick I have here is the digital d-pad (which is a bit squirrelly at times), but that's really unavoidable. I would love to play this with a SNES controller. The biggest difficulty I had, control-wise, was consistently placing my attacks. Too often I'd attack up when I meant to attack left or some other similar misdirection. I don't know if there's a way to address this. Auto-facing nearby enemies might do it, but then you get in the way of the player attempting to hit environmental objects during battle, which would likely be just as frustrating.

One other control issue I found frustrating was not being able to move while charging if I didn't have the energy necessary to perform a charged attack. This rooted me in place more times than I would have liked, and I think I would prefer it if moving simply cancelled my attempted charge (communicated by my character not flashing) and let me run around. The rooting feels like a punishment for not watching my energy bar at all times, which isn't all that much fun.

Hats! Hats are dumb and wonderful. I'm so glad you put them in and am always super stoked when I find a new one. And the "match to armor color" option is a nice piece of polish. Visually, the whole game is a pleasure. The only issue I had was knowing which terrain was passable and impassable in the goblin caves. It was all just so dark and samey.

Healing's pretty hard to come by, yes? I haven't yet found a healing potion. Walking by some red mushrooms, I was made hopeful by the fact that they cast a red glow onto my character, but soon found that it was purely aesthetic. Alas! I died soon afterwards.

Three more quick things: it would be nice to have a health bar displayed for the boss(es), buffs (or at least, statue-conferred buffs) don't persist between levels :(, and a main-screen map button would be nice (perhaps by tapping on the health/mana bars?).

Thanks a lot for the preview! I will definitely keep playing and let you know of anything else that comes up (hopefully post-first boss).

ghosts on the moon fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Apr 18, 2014

Feenix
Mar 14, 2003
Sorry, guy.
Kepa: is this gonna support MFI?

Kepa
Jul 23, 2011

My goal as a game developer is just to make gnome puns

Feenix posted:

Kepa: is this gonna support MFI?

It will in the second update. We want to do a "best practices" implementation. Menu support and so on. Also we want people to try the touchscreen controls for awhile, so we're not in a huge hurry. ALSO we're hoping we can get controllers for free somehow haha.

MissMarple
Aug 26, 2008

:ms:

tuyop posted:

God I am getting murdered chronically in Frozen Synapse. This is embarrassing because I'm actually alright at real life tactics. Why can't I employ covering fire for my shotgun or grenade guys!?
Frozen Synapse' combat system is a little unintuitive in certain ways. For example, kneeling offers no advantage other than breaking line of sight behind low cover and there is a significant penalty to aim time immediately after switching stance. Once you understand it's "quirks" you will be able to better identify what are strong positions and which are weak, which as mentioned may not be intuitively obvious.

The other big factor is that numbers play a huge advantage. You are going to lose any 2 on 1; and so losing a single man is often inevitably fatal for the rest unless it helps you achieve an Objective. Losing without getting a single kill might feel like you got completely slaughtered; but if you lose the first man then it's a very common outcome. Games that come down to some kind of epic last man standing competition are rare; and if they do go that far unless it's an Objective game mode then the winner will be the one who gets bored last as in a 1 vs 1 you can adopt an unassailable position and just wait out the opposition.

On the original PC release I got into the Top 10 ranked players, and once you understand all the pieces it is an incredibly well made strategy game and complex moves are really fun. My biggest advice to begin with is learn the combat mechanics such that you could always force a draw/win from boredom in a 1 vs 1. Once you can do that, start working out how to use 2 units together at once to do much more complex moves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDY8IU0FCSo
An example of how 2 man teams can work together to do "the impossible". Red player has the stronger position, but their moves are predictable and basic and so I can do a more complex move to beat them.

Kepa
Jul 23, 2011

My goal as a game developer is just to make gnome puns

ghosts on the moon posted:


I like how distinct the classes are from each other: each requires significantly different positioning, timing, and ability use, and what works really well for one will likely get you flattened with another. Great variety in that, and satisfying. Attacks are satisfying and consequential; the only little nitpick I have here is the digital d-pad (which is a bit squirrelly at times), but that's really unavoidable. I would love to play this with a SNES controller. The biggest difficulty I had, control-wise, was consistently placing my attacks. Too often I'd attack up when I meant to attack left or some other similar misdirection. I don't know if there's a way to address this. Auto-facing nearby enemies might do it, but then you get in the way of the player attempting to hit environmental objects during battle, which would likely be just as frustrating.

One other control issue I found frustrating was not being able to move while charging if I didn't have the energy necessary to perform a charged attack. This rooted me in place more times than I would have liked, and I think I would prefer it if moving simply cancelled my attempted charge (communicated by my character not flashing) and let me run around. The rooting feels like a punishment for not watching my energy bar at all times, which isn't all that much fun.

Healing's pretty hard to come by, yes? I haven't yet found a healing potion. Walking by some red mushrooms, I was made hopeful by the fact that they cast a red glow onto my character, but soon found that it was purely aesthetic. Alas! I died soon afterwards.

Three more quick things: it would be nice to have a health bar displayed for the boss(es), buffs (or at least, statue-conferred buffs) don't persist between levels :(, and a main-screen map button would be nice (perhaps by tapping on the health/mana bars?).

We decided against autofacing, but made the hitboxes pretty wide. Really we're just hoping people get over the learning curve that the controls present. It's definitely there.

We went back and forth on the charge-up. We may do it so that you can run while charging, but charging no longer makes your energy go up faster...

Healing's hard to come by, by design. Healing potions exist but kind of suck unless you get the Gift for them, but even then they're kind of weak. It's all about reaching the downstairs.

Not sure on boss health bars. Maybe? Buffs should persist between levels, I agree. Will try to sneak that in the first update. Main screen map button: Maybe! Will discuss that.

tuyop
Sep 15, 2006

Every second that we're not growing BASIL is a second wasted

Fun Shoe

MissMarple posted:

Frozen Synapse' combat system is a little unintuitive in certain ways. For example, kneeling offers no advantage other than breaking line of sight behind low cover and there is a significant penalty to aim time immediately after switching stance. Once you understand it's "quirks" you will be able to better identify what are strong positions and which are weak, which as mentioned may not be intuitively obvious.

The other big factor is that numbers play a huge advantage. You are going to lose any 2 on 1; and so losing a single man is often inevitably fatal for the rest unless it helps you achieve an Objective. Losing without getting a single kill might feel like you got completely slaughtered; but if you lose the first man then it's a very common outcome. Games that come down to some kind of epic last man standing competition are rare; and if they do go that far unless it's an Objective game mode then the winner will be the one who gets bored last as in a 1 vs 1 you can adopt an unassailable position and just wait out the opposition.

On the original PC release I got into the Top 10 ranked players, and once you understand all the pieces it is an incredibly well made strategy game and complex moves are really fun. My biggest advice to begin with is learn the combat mechanics such that you could always force a draw/win from boredom in a 1 vs 1. Once you can do that, start working out how to use 2 units together at once to do much more complex moves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDY8IU0FCSo
An example of how 2 man teams can work together to do "the impossible". Red player has the stronger position, but their moves are predictable and basic and so I can do a more complex move to beat them.

Thanks for this. It seemed like the best bet for me the past few games that I won was to anticipate where a player would make use of key ground and close that off by destroying the cover or covering the open space with my gunners. There's really no way to influence where they point so it's hard to close with a shotgun or grenade guy. I also haven't figured out how to use deception well yet.

This is a pretty huge difference from real manoeuvre warfare tactics where you try to keep an enemy pinned so that you have the initiative, then use that to close with and destroy. There is an analogy to that initiative in the game, it's just not based on the same practices as real life. XCOM has a better implementation of suppression and closing space but also falls a bit short in other areas. Together they're really scratching my tactics itch.

Edit: so those $20 tank games, how do they deal with space, suppression and manoeuvre and stuff?

BigRed0427
Mar 23, 2007

There's no one I'd rather be than me.

Are there any good RPGs on the iOS with deep customization?

bad day
Mar 26, 2012

by VideoGames

Palooka posted:

Couple other releases today that look good (though I haven't had a chance to try them) :

Hitman : Go - $4.99
Chill turn based puzzle game where, oh yeah, you're the guy from Hitman assassinating people. Done in the visual style of a board game.
There's in-app purchasing, but as far as I've heard it's "pay for hints" and "pay to unlock levels immediately rather than getting enough stars to unlock them", Angry-Birds style, rather than anything required.
12 Minutes of Gameplay

Unpossible - $1.99
Super-Hexagon like gameplay, but in 3D landscape.
10 Minutes of Gameplay

Anyone had a chance to try these out yet?

Hitman Go is really fun - it's a puzzle game where each level has three objectives and you get stars for completing them. Usually one objective has to do with number of moves, another has to do with collecting an additional item. The graphics are great and gameplay is such that you can intuitively understand new elements without being having them explained to you. It starts getting more difficult after the first "box" and I can see it either being a game that gets way too hard to finish or one where you get way too good at it and run out of things to do.

Either way, I really like it. It's the sort of thing you might play casually while watching tv then realize you haven't been watching tv for half an hour.

Edit: rocks and tennis balls from the first box are replaced with disguises in the second. Haven't opened the third box but I would expect each to introduce a new element or two.

bad day fucked around with this message at 04:53 on Apr 19, 2014

ghosts on the moon
Apr 24, 2010

Kepa posted:

We decided against autofacing, but made the hitboxes pretty wide. Really we're just hoping people get over the learning curve that the controls present. It's definitely there.

We went back and forth on the charge-up. We may do it so that you can run while charging, but charging no longer makes your energy go up faster...

Healing's hard to come by, by design. Healing potions exist but kind of suck unless you get the Gift for them, but even then they're kind of weak. It's all about reaching the downstairs.

Not sure on boss health bars. Maybe? Buffs should persist between levels, I agree. Will try to sneak that in the first update. Main screen map button: Maybe! Will discuss that.

I just ran into a seemingly dead end level. First area, second floor. Where my character is standing looks like it might be passable to the right, but isn't.



EDIT: Aaaand I beat Humphrey! Running down a full stock of the warrior's shields really helped me out; I'm still fighting with the controls a little bit.

I'm excited to have unlocked a new class and a harder area, but I was initially a bit disappointed to find that I could only access that area with the class I beat the previous with. Thinking about it further, though, I think you've made the right choice. Cardinal Quest 2 let you access any unlocked act with any available character, and I definitely lost interest in it after I beat each act once with a different character. I think your game might have a bit more staying power in that it's less of a grind to repeat a section given how differently the classes play.

One little thing is that I'm not all that enthusiastic about are the persistent upgrades. They're there, and they offer a sense of progression beyond single runs, but apart from a few (e.g. introducing stun to the thief's moves), their effects are pretty marginal. The all-class ultimate ones sound more impactful, but I imagine those are endgame/mastery type unlocks. I'm going to refer to CQ2 again here, because I really liked its system of unlocks. In it, you could buy slight rearrangements of your starting loadout, only one of which you could select to take on a run. They facilitated different styles of play within a class, and offered a degree of customization to personal taste rather than a baseline improvement. I found that pretty compelling, and ended up unlocking most of them just for the variety.

Thanks again for the key! I'm definitely going to keep playing this for a while. Are you @rocketcatgames on Twitter? Further feedback might be better directed elsewhere than this thread.

Good luck with your launch!

ghosts on the moon fucked around with this message at 08:14 on Apr 19, 2014

Shwqa
Feb 13, 2012

BigRed0427 posted:

Are there any good RPGs on the iOS with deep customization?

I would say look towards the squaresoft games. The world ends with you, final fantasy tactics, and final fantasy 5 are all amazing games that can be played 4-5 ways before you run out of options. I also listed them in order of personal favorites, but I have spent over 40 hours on all of them.

tofes
Mar 31, 2011

#1 Milpitas Dave and Buster's superfan since 2013
I'm stuck on the last mission of Hitman Go and it's driving me nuts

Kepa
Jul 23, 2011

My goal as a game developer is just to make gnome puns

ghosts on the moon posted:

I just ran into a seemingly dead end level. First area, second floor. Where my character is standing looks like it might be passable to the right, but isn't.



EDIT: Aaaand I beat Humphrey! Running down a full stock of the warrior's shields really helped me out; I'm still fighting with the controls a little bit.

One little thing is that I'm not all that enthusiastic about are the persistent upgrades. They're there, and they offer a sense of progression beyond single runs, but apart from a few (e.g. introducing stun to the thief's moves), their effects are pretty marginal. The all-class ultimate ones sound more impactful, but I imagine those are endgame/mastery type unlocks. I'm going to refer to CQ2 again here, because I really liked its system of unlocks. In it, you could buy slight rearrangements of your starting loadout, only one of which you could select to take on a run. They facilitated different styles of play within a class, and offered a degree of customization to personal taste rather than a baseline improvement. I found that pretty compelling, and ended up unlocking most of them just for the variety.

Thanks again for the key! I'm definitely going to keep playing this for a while. Are you @rocketcatgames on Twitter? Further feedback might be better directed elsewhere than this thread.

Good luck with your launch!

Ok, fixed that entrance. Thankfully that's the only one with something wrong with it, so it's a rare bug and only in the first area of the game.

Persistent upgrades are pretty marginal by design. Just to give people some hope. There's some exceptions though, some of the upgrades are pretty good. The map isn't unlocked for all classes partially because then you'd end up skipping the story for all the classes, which is different for each one.

Next key. Same deal. If whoever grabs the below code beats the first boss as any character NOT INCLUDING the Warrior, then posts feedback, I'll post another code.

MXT9KLTAHR96

Superschaf
May 20, 2010

Kepa posted:

Next key. Same deal. If whoever grabs the below code beats the first boss as any character NOT INCLUDING the Warrior, then posts feedback, I'll post another code.

MXT9KLTAHR96

Got it, will post impressions soon.

Be Depressive
Jul 8, 2006
"The drawings of the girls are badly proportioned and borderline pedo material. But"

tofes posted:

I'm stuck on the last mission of Hitman Go and it's driving me nuts

This game is very fun. You do get guns and sniper rifles in later levels. I hope they add more content later because for a $6 game I'm burning through it pretty quickly. Great concept, perfect execution. Reminds me a lot of Wonderputt for some reason.

Javid
Oct 21, 2004

:jpmf:
The market in electrium has taken a hilarious poo poo today/recently.



Good time to max out your ships if you haven't already and didn't have it all tied up in electrium!

Daedalus Esquire
Mar 30, 2008
I've been stocking up on everything I can for profit later.

:Edit: also, now I just bid a penny on every stock. I still get a ton of them and often make anywhere from 150-500 on random companies. Percent profit wise you can't really beat it and your risk of loss is essentially nothing since even if 10 yield you nothing the company that got you $50 for a penny cancels it right out.

Daedalus Esquire fucked around with this message at 23:49 on Apr 19, 2014

quiggy
Aug 7, 2010

[in Russian] Oof.


Javid posted:

The market in electrium has taken a hilarious poo poo today/recently.



Good time to max out your ships if you haven't already and didn't have it all tied up in electrium!

I've lost over $20k in this loving crash :negative:

FlashBangBob
Jul 5, 2007

BLAM! Internet Found!
That's pretty cool. I put in the news events (although right now players can't see what the exact news event is) and the 15th one it rolled since it put it in place was a Great Depression roll (1 in a 1000 shot). It lasted awhile too.

BennyGsGhost
Jun 27, 2002

Low P/B or Bust
Pillbug

FlashBangBob posted:

That's pretty cool. I put in the news events (although right now players can't see what the exact news event is) and the 15th one it rolled since it put it in place was a Great Depression roll (1 in a 1000 shot). It lasted awhile too.

That's pretty cool but knowing that was possible would've been nice as I slowly bought up Electrium starting at $550 down to $475 (because I had only ever seen it trade before in a 500ish-650ish band). Also didn't realize there was a limit to the amount you could buy!

FlashBangBob
Jul 5, 2007

BLAM! Internet Found!

Ben Grahams Ghost posted:

That's pretty cool but knowing that was possible would've been nice as I slowly bought up Electrium starting at $550 down to $475 (because I had only ever seen it trade before in a 500ish-650ish band). Also didn't realize there was a limit to the amount you could buy!

The most recent update said: "The resource market is now MUCH more volatile, and less influenced by players". This should indicate that anything is possible. Granted there could have been a bull rush (the opposite of what happened today) and could have sent prices of Electrium from $350 to $900.

FlashBangBob fucked around with this message at 03:43 on Apr 20, 2014

BennyGsGhost
Jun 27, 2002

Low P/B or Bust
Pillbug

FlashBangBob posted:

The most recent update said: "The resource market is now MUCH more volatile, and less influenced by players". This should indicate that anything is possible.

Yeah in retrospect I suppose it does, and you mentioned it here too, I just didn't make the connection. Honestly I was probably more hurt by the limit on elec storage, since it reduced my ability to further drop my average cost per unit. But I get why you would limit the storage.

It's ok SPCO can recover from its 2nd - 13th fall, my board is fully backing my recovery plans: mine more space rock.

FlashBangBob
Jul 5, 2007

BLAM! Internet Found!

Ben Grahams Ghost posted:

Yeah in retrospect I suppose it does, and you mentioned it here too, I just didn't make the connection.

I should at least elaborate, not that it truly helps since you don't know what event is forthcoming, but news events come in two forms: Instant Resource Drops/Gains (most common) and Slow, Global Resource Gains/Losses.

Instant resource drops/gains are like that of a company in the real stock markets announcing news. Something happened unexpectedly and the price adjusted instantly to that news. This news only affects one resource. This is most common and has happened a few times (albeit none drastically (2-5% is the norm))

Slow, Global resource gains/losses are much larger macro events that affect all resources the same. These compare to like "housing bubble burst". All resources are impacted, and they are all impacted at the same rate. This is what happened tonight. (Markets lost around 50% tonight)

The reason why I haven't coded in the current news into the game quite yet is because the latter is too easy to make adjustments to. "Oh, the universe is in a recession? Okay let me just sell all my poo poo now and watch it burn". I'm still humming if I even leave in the global events.

Tempura Wizard
Sep 15, 2006

spending all
spending
spending all my time

theblackw0lf posted:

Playing Heartstone on the iPad just makes me want an IOS version of Netrunner :(

My thoughts exactly. Two months after release they'd find a Tempura Wizard corpse in the apartment, firmly clutching an iPad. It's hard to work or buy food when you're busy running on servers.

BennyGsGhost
Jun 27, 2002

Low P/B or Bust
Pillbug

FlashBangBob posted:

I should at least elaborate, not that it truly helps since you don't know what event is forthcoming, but news events come in two forms: Instant Resource Drops/Gains (most common) and Slow, Global Resource Gains/Losses.

Instant resource drops/gains are like that of a company in the real stock markets announcing news. Something happened unexpectedly and the price adjusted instantly to that news. This news only affects one resource. This is most common and has happened a few times (albeit none drastically (2-5% is the norm))

Slow, Global resource gains/losses are much larger macro events that affect all resources the same. These compare to like "housing bubble burst". All resources are impacted, and they are all impacted at the same rate. This is what happened tonight. (Markets lost around 50% tonight)

The reason why I haven't coded in the current news into the game quite yet is because the latter is too easy to make adjustments to. "Oh, the universe is in a recession? Okay let me just sell all my poo poo now and watch it burn". I'm still humming if I even leave in the global events.

For what it's worth, I like the idea of having both types of "events" possible - it keeps the market dynamic, and creates opportunities for those who happen to be sitting on a huge pile of cash to skyrocket. As for the news, that's tough - because there isn't nuance to interpret, and the market is now limited in its response to players (because without nuance response to any news item is gonna be obvious). In the normal market I can read the news and notice that a plant exploded in, say, Oregon or something. I can then check and see how bad the damage was. If I find the potato crop was significantly harmed, I'm gonna sell any stock I have in companies that depend on potatoes as fast as possible (and buy stock in companies that do soil rehabilitation or sell recovery equipment in that area or whatever).

In the game obviously that won't work. On the other hand, having a witty news story regarding the cause of x material dropping (or gaining) might make it more fun even though it won't make sense to trade off that news.

Anyway it's pretty fun the way it is - even gritting my teeth through massive losses.

pixaal
Jan 8, 2004

All ice cream is now for all beings, no matter how many legs.


Yeah the key difference between a game and real life is in the game an ore cannot go out of business, a stock can (a player). But for that to behave correctly we need limited ship slots and multiple valid ways to fill up your ship slots to make money that rely on each other.

Sudden solar system wide cooling might cause lava miners to be less effective and ice miners to be more effective, where T2 variants of them (these don't exist) are unaffected but it disrupts the entire chain. Ideally for this to work you'd need some middle produce that space rock can be turned into that cannot be traded that another ship type takes in.

Copper is always valuable so is gold and silver, their price changes but its usually always up. The market is like buying metals, its a bit volatile for that but hey its a game. In the long run unless things can go to a long term high (months) as long as you figure out the base line for something you can buy low sell high pretty easy.

FlashBangBob
Jul 5, 2007

BLAM! Internet Found!

pixaal posted:

As long as you figure out the base line for something you can buy low sell high pretty easy.

This is the largest concern of mine. What I don't want to have is people become long term investors in the resource markets -- its just not fun. They are basically saying, well poo poo the price can't go much lower (and it probably can't) so they just buy up everything as much as they can and then wait... and wait until prices eventually come back around (law of averages). But during this time, they are doing nothing but checking prices and seeing if they are coming close to profit line. This is not engaging.

Instead, I want people to day trade, and actually find some adrenaline off of gambling with the resources. Its been very difficult to create that artificially. The only idea that comes to mind is a forced-selling situation where people are forced to sell resources. But it hits a lot of dead ends in my mind.

FlashBangBob fucked around with this message at 04:50 on Apr 20, 2014

xian
Jan 21, 2001

Lipstick Apathy
Just wanted to give a shoutout to kepa for a really cool idea w/r/t codes and feedback, and rue the fact that I went to sleep at 350 last night.

Also, unpossible is great. Anyone who likes twitchy hi score stuff should check it out. Just got the half ultra today and I was pumped!

Daedalus Esquire
Mar 30, 2008
My biggest problem with day trading is that I bought a lot of resources at a price that hasn't been seen since the first or second day the game existed. I assumed that the day zero prices would sort of be the "average" of the expected range from whatever your equation is to calculate, instead the resource I blindly picked as my major investment has just dropped and I feel it's totally arbitrary. Looking at ships, the ranges of finding every resource average out to even if you have equal numbers of each ship (lava/ice). I get you don't want the market to be gameable or too dependent on users flooding or buying up a market, but I'm essentially playing spin the wheel. I can't see news, I can't see historical prices, I can't even see an all time high/low to make an educated guess. I'm guessing blindly, on orange, green, blue, or grey, and I that would be fine except for the fact you are trying to tell me that it's a market.
Markets are (supposed to be) rational on the fundamental level. Price is a function of actually completed trades, everyone sets their buy and sell prices, and when two people find a price that fulfills both their requirements, a trade occurs and the price updates to that value. If there is bunch of a scarce resource I can have a standing minimum to sell, or a standing maximum to buy.

The way the game makes the market feel is that it's non-existent. It's like if everyone could ONLY buy from or sell to a government or central agency and they basically set arbitrary prices. I know you said the game needed to work if only 1 person ever played it, so I get why it's structured like that, but we just have nothing to go on. I might as well download a roulette or craps app because I don't have a way to make an educated guess. The real stock market may be a gamble, but I can still see the news, I can still see history, and most importantly, I can understand that even with historical data or watching a stock trend up or downward, it isn't actually an indicator of future performance.

I guess the biggest issue is I'm essentially forced to guess and don't have any tools to add education to that guess. If I buy a resource speculatively, I basically have to babysit the game in hopes of catching a higher value which is unreasonable as I am an employed adult. The solution for this for the stock trading I do in real life is that I can make a standing order, say to sell all my shares when the price reaches a value I decided gives me profit. By knowing the news surrounding the stock, it's 52 week hi/low values, and what I purchased it for, I can say "this is a likely to occur price that will not make me lose money," set the value, and when it hits the number it resolves. I'm now MORE likely to make another trade because I didn't miss the window just because I'm not dedicating my life to being a broker. In regards to the game, I would buy and sell resources more if when I checked the game, it wasn't always a flat price or dropping market. Maybe the market goes up, but I've rarely seen it, and I've certainly never seen at least two of the resources at their "original price."

Tl;dr: our trading options are so simple we can't day trade unless we sit there with our app open all day. The current market feels like a slot machine, not a market with "rules" because every player is essentially blind and deaf. You really should consider throwing us a bone on the data front, because as it stands, the average person is going to be risk averse.

Kepa
Jul 23, 2011

My goal as a game developer is just to make gnome puns

xian posted:

Just wanted to give a shoutout to kepa for a really cool idea w/r/t codes and feedback, and rue the fact that I went to sleep at 350 last night.

Also, unpossible is great. Anyone who likes twitchy hi score stuff should check it out. Just got the half ultra today and I was pumped!

Unpossible more like funpossible.

The Code Contest is going even better in the Toucharcade forum version.

http://forums.toucharcade.com/showpost.php?p=3203687&postcount=695

Toucharcade Forum Member coolpepper43 posted:

I have been playing this game for at least 9 hours. I have gotten to the boss a few times. I have been grinding like crazy to level up. My entire family is completely pissed off at me because I am supposed to do something with them and I'm ruining everything. I can write you a very good review and I will buy at least 5 more dollars of your games. I can't let everyone down but this game is turning my life into a nightmare. Please please please let the next person go.
For the love of god please.

I'm pretty sure this will be my favorite review of Wayward Souls.

Javid
Oct 21, 2004

:jpmf:
The problem with not offering an ingame reason for the prices to randomly tank is people are going to see their net worth plummet for no reason and just delete the thing. Getting stomped by an event you weren't able to see coming or do anything about isn't fun.

There were upsides to the giant crash, namely shipbuilding being really cheap and people being able to buy massive amounts of everything to sell later. Unless, of course, you tied up all your loose funds in electrium at its pre-update low, in which case this depression is just a giant "gently caress you".

BennyGsGhost
Jun 27, 2002

Low P/B or Bust
Pillbug

Daedalus Esquire posted:

My biggest problem with day trading is that I bought a lot of resources at a price that hasn't been seen since the first or second day the game existed. I assumed that the day zero prices would sort of be the "average" of the expected range from whatever your equation is to calculate, instead the resource I blindly picked as my major investment has just dropped and I feel it's totally arbitrary. Looking at ships, the ranges of finding every resource average out to even if you have equal numbers of each ship (lava/ice). I get you don't want the market to be gameable or too dependent on users flooding or buying up a market, but I'm essentially playing spin the wheel. I can't see news, I can't see historical prices, I can't even see an all time high/low to make an educated guess. I'm guessing blindly, on orange, green, blue, or grey, and I that would be fine except for the fact you are trying to tell me that it's a market.
Markets are (supposed to be) rational on the fundamental level. Price is a function of actually completed trades, everyone sets their buy and sell prices, and when two people find a price that fulfills both their requirements, a trade occurs and the price updates to that value. If there is bunch of a scarce resource I can have a standing minimum to sell, or a standing maximum to buy.

The way the game makes the market feel is that it's non-existent. It's like if everyone could ONLY buy from or sell to a government or central agency and they basically set arbitrary prices. I know you said the game needed to work if only 1 person ever played it, so I get why it's structured like that, but we just have nothing to go on. I might as well download a roulette or craps app because I don't have a way to make an educated guess. The real stock market may be a gamble, but I can still see the news, I can still see history, and most importantly, I can understand that even with historical data or watching a stock trend up or downward, it isn't actually an indicator of future performance.

I guess the biggest issue is I'm essentially forced to guess and don't have any tools to add education to that guess. If I buy a resource speculatively, I basically have to babysit the game in hopes of catching a higher value which is unreasonable as I am an employed adult. The solution for this for the stock trading I do in real life is that I can make a standing order, say to sell all my shares when the price reaches a value I decided gives me profit. By knowing the news surrounding the stock, it's 52 week hi/low values, and what I purchased it for, I can say "this is a likely to occur price that will not make me lose money," set the value, and when it hits the number it resolves. I'm now MORE likely to make another trade because I didn't miss the window just because I'm not dedicating my life to being a broker. In regards to the game, I would buy and sell resources more if when I checked the game, it wasn't always a flat price or dropping market. Maybe the market goes up, but I've rarely seen it, and I've certainly never seen at least two of the resources at their "original price."

Tl;dr: our trading options are so simple we can't day trade unless we sit there with our app open all day. The current market feels like a slot machine, not a market with "rules" because every player is essentially blind and deaf. You really should consider throwing us a bone on the data front, because as it stands, the average person is going to be risk averse.

I agree with all of this, although a good question would be how many players will be approaching the game with a fairly strong investment strategy vs a "lets buy and sell wheeee!" approach. I do agree re: the information, just buying and selling stuff in a vacuum is not engaging. I want to see some piece of news and think "man, that's really bad for x material but could create strong demand for y material" and therefore sell off x and buy y. I don't have to be right about that every time, or it doesn't have to always work out the way I guessed it would, but there needs to somehow be the illusion of control.

Uberskooper
Apr 30, 2007
Skoops up goood
Whoever has the game now needs to hurry up so that Kepa will post the next code.

BigRed0427
Mar 23, 2007

There's no one I'd rather be than me.

Ben Grahams Ghost posted:

I agree with all of this, although a good question would be how many players will be approaching the game with a fairly strong investment strategy vs a "lets buy and sell wheeee!" approach. I do agree re: the information, just buying and selling stuff in a vacuum is not engaging. I want to see some piece of news and think "man, that's really bad for x material but could create strong demand for y material" and therefore sell off x and buy y. I don't have to be right about that every time, or it doesn't have to always work out the way I guessed it would, but there needs to somehow be the illusion of control.

What game is this?

Yngwie Mangosteen
Aug 23, 2007

BigRed0427 posted:

What game is this?

Goon-made game Electrium.

xian
Jan 21, 2001

Lipstick Apathy
Hah, Kepa that's amazing. I missed the TA forums because for some reason (blame it on heartbleed) I can't log in over there. Also the probability of getting a code over here is > than over there. Or Unpossible will carry me till wednesday.

xian fucked around with this message at 08:04 on Apr 20, 2014

Synthbuttrange
May 6, 2007

Ascendency is currently free. http://appshopper.com/games/ascendancy

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lionlegs
Feb 16, 2005
Ask me about my lego spheres!

Unmature posted:

What are some good iOS point and click adventures? I see the first two Monkey Island games and Phoenix Wright on here. Searching "point and click" doesn't bring up much and the app store's definition of adventure game is pretty broad.

Machinarium is great, and works really well on an iPad. Probably the best adventure game I've played on iOS (even though it's a PC port).

Also, Hector: Badge of Carnage is a really good series of iOS-original adventure games. Very humour driven.

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