My friend says that this game will not work as an arcade and it is nearly frustrating. So I want to know the flaws of my game. pls note that this is just the beta of the game and if you guys feel that it should be completed I will make the full version of the game else I'll have to scrap it down.

http://www.2shared.com/file/A1ZAGl43/Space_Void_final_v3.html

This friend of mine is named Dan who used to be here in this forum but I guess you know that.

Initial thoughts having played the game:

• The ships movement feels very sluggish. It does not feel natural in terms of movement. The meteors travel faster than the ship can turn to meet them so you are less able to destroy meteors in order to gain a shield than I would like - plus the speed of escape means you have little time to move out of the way.
  

• The mechanic of your ship running out fuel (I assume) and thus stuck in the mud only able to rotate is also annoying esp. with regard the rotation speed being so slow to meet meteors etc.
  

• Enemies can appear out of nowhere (i.e. inside the gameplay field) - I particularly don't like this aspect as one it means you are concentrating on learning the spawn pattern almost immediately which breaks immersion. Moreover having any enemy spawn right next to you with the ship's movement as it is at the moment, feels like you are doomed with no real chance - again leading to the "I must learn the pattern in order to live" and thus killing the immersion.
  

• The weapon seems to either run out of ammo or overheat (not really sure which it is tbh - lack of labels) -- the ammo-related container does not refill in quiet moments leaving you in the situation of not conserving your last few shots of ammunition but rather expending your ammunition totally in order to get the bar refilled. That period of refill is somewhat lengthy in time which places pressure in terms of managing the resource but given that you do not have that many shots to begin with it makes any sort of resource management annoying rather than clever.
  

• The size of the models compared to the field of play seems a little cramped -- a larger field of play would be more comfortable.
  

• Overall the resource management system for fuel and weapons is way too limited as in your pool of resources is too small to consider conservation as a reasonable form of gameplay.
  

• Also you cannot fire whilst rotating and moving forward at same time which seems to be more of a bug then deliberate design.
  

I hope this feedback helps. Kudos to you on having a playable game though. I wouldn't mind playing it again as you get the game more tuned.

edit: I would also prefer a semi-automatic gun as opposed to a full automatic i.e. space bar tapped for each bullet -- full automatic expends way to fast when you have very limited ammunition capability i.e. 1 sec to empty 2 secs to reload is a dynamic by where I spend the majority of my time without a defense -- a compromise of having 3 shot bursts might also work.

Initial thoughts having played the game:

• The ships movement feels very sluggish. It does not feel natural in terms of movement. The meteors travel faster than the ship can turn to meet them so you are less able to destroy meteors in order to gain a shield than I would like - plus the speed of escape means you have little time to move out of the way.
  

• The mechanic of your ship running out fuel (I assume) and thus stuck in the mud only able to rotate is also annoying esp. with regard the rotation speed being so slow to meet meteors etc.
  

• Enemies can appear out of nowhere (i.e. inside the gameplay field) - I particularly don't like this aspect as one it means you are concentrating on learning the spawn pattern almost immediately which breaks immersion. Moreover having any enemy spawn right next to you with the ship's movement as it is at the moment, feels like you are doomed with no real chance - again leading to the "I must learn the pattern in order to live" and thus killing the immersion.
  

• The weapon seems to either run out of ammo or overheat (not really sure which it is tbh - lack of labels) -- the ammo-related container does not refill in quiet moments leaving you in the situation of not conserving your last few shots of ammunition but rather expending your ammunition totally in order to get the bar refilled. That period of refill is somewhat lengthy in time which places pressure in terms of managing the resource but given that you do not have that many shots to begin with it makes any sort of resource management annoying rather than clever.
  

• The size of the models compared to the field of play seems a little cramped -- a larger field of play would be more comfortable.
  

• Overall the resource management system for fuel and weapons is way too limited as in your pool of resources is too small to consider conservation as a reasonable form of gameplay.
  

• Also you cannot fire whilst rotating and moving forward at same time which seems to be more of a bug then deliberate design.
  

I hope this feedback helps. Kudos to you on having a playable game though. I wouldn't mind playing it again as you get the game more tuned.

edit: I would also prefer a semi-automatic gun as opposed to a full automatic i.e. space bar tapped for each bullet -- full automatic expends way to fast when you have very limited ammunition capability i.e. 1 sec to empty 2 secs to reload is a dynamic by where I spend the majority of my time without a defense -- a compromise of having 3 shot bursts might also work.


So if I fix the issues you named except the 2nd point you mentioned(since its important for the game mechanic to make it unique), does this game have a chance?

So if I fix the issues you named except the 2nd point you mentioned(since its important for the game mechanic to make it unique), does this game have a chance?

The way you are framing the question doesn't really leave any answer than yes.

One other point I forgot to mention -- the starting position (at game entry) for my ship had it facing downwards requiring my first action to be to rotate the ship around in order to face the oncoming enemy - would be better started facing forwards.

I understand your game mechanic of resource management -- I just think you need a little more in terms of resource depth - you do not really have enough fuel to do much beyond a small burn. I do think that if you had refills on weapons and fuel during quiet moments and having your penalty time delays sink in when people overconsume their resources that gameplay utilising resource strategy would be more viable.

What you should not do is simply throw the game away in my opinion. I would recommend you complete it for a vast number of reasons not the least of which in a future employment possibility you have a demonstrable proof of completing a game.

Lastly -- Don't simply jump on changing everything I talked about -- get more feedback in this thread -- the fact that I had so much to say does not make me right and moreover other people might like the mechanics that I had issues with.

Bluntly, I don't know how it would do as an arcade game -- not really my field of strength. Which is why you need more feedback than simply what I have said so far.

Edits: Grammatical

Okay I'll take you advice. But before that does anyone else have any comments of the game before I can start working on it?

Anyone here? I need to atleast understand what Stormynature was trying to say about the game since he has used a bit of high grammar...Not that I don't know the whole points he wrote but some of them at least like the resource thing.

Ah you should have told me to make the points more easily read. I am sorry. I will rewrite them shortly for you but am caught up in a conference at the moment.

My opinion on ship movement
The ship turns too slowly
The ship moves forward too slowly

?
My opinion on the enemies
Don't make enemies appear in the middle of the screen - they should come from one of the sides or top or bottom.
?

My opinion on the gun
The gun does not have enough bullets and fires too fast
When you are not firing - the ammunition (bullets) should slowly fill up automatically
?

My opinion on the fuel
There is not enough fuel.
Fuel should slowly fill up automatically when not being used.
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My opinion on the game screen size
I would like it to be bigger
?

Things to fix
When the game first starts the ship is facing backwards - You should make it face forwards.
You cannot fire your weapon if you are using two arrow direction keys ? and ? at the same time.


I hope this makes everything clearer

Now that makes it much better. Thanks I'll work on the points.

This is a lot better thanks. But what do you mean by fuel?