Battle Systems

Despite the lack of updates lately, I have been working away, though not in the way of finishing the game.  This time off time was spent well.  I was playing other games around the genre I'm working on.  (And also looking at similar genres for ideas.)  It helped me to not go down the road of several ideas I had for revamping a current battle system I'm working on.  I realized a lot of those systems would create games I would dislike.

You see, I'm a very specific type of video game lover.  I like a battle system that either a) doesn't make me think or b) that doesn't make me think too hard or c) rewards me if I do think hard about something.

Translation:  I'm a lazy game player when it comes to battle systems.  I loved all the older games partially because repetitively grinding levels in old RPGs was a terrible chore.  But I often found I had great zen moments while doing so.  Older games made it rewarding to grind.  Newer games rarely get the ability to grind right.

Etrian Odyssey, for example.  A great game, made for people who loved the old first person maze-runing RPGs, like the long-running Wizardry series.  But not for people like me. The only thing I ever got out of the NES Wizardy is that you should have a party of ninjas, and that you should run if you're ever attacked by a band of ninjas.

Ninjas don't like girls named Daniela

A battle system has a lot to do with whether you are trying to create an immersive gaming experience (which means an immersive battle system, in most cases) or an immersive story.  Immersive battle system games don't often have very good stories. Or rather, they aren't scored equally with the story.

On the other hand, story based games also always get lower marks in everything but the story.  And it's sad to say that more people want an immersive system, rather than an immersive story.  To me, this translates as a) the gamer market is changing and b) video game developers are doing a bad job of presenting story elements c) not enough energy is being put into story elements and the writing of video games.

I am trying to create an immersive story experience, that plays like a game.  Partially because that's my preference, and partially because I think it's a fun genre to attempt for my first game.  (How foolish I was to think I could finish it so easily, without any help whatsoever.  Alas.)

So, in summation, when creating video games, think about first and foremost what kind of gamer you're building a game for.  The FPS gamer (ie. you better have good graphics) or the story gamer (ie. you better pull them in and make them believe it.)

Worrying about game design

Spent 4 hours today reading game design documents, watching videos from studios like Wolfire Games and looking at their impressive community numbers.

Mostly concerned about how I'm going to reconcile the art I have and the game elements.

Programmer and I are thinking about the future of our battle system, which right now is not quite working the way I wanted it to.  It's good, it's even a bit fun, but it's not as strategic as I'd hoped it would be.  Granted, it's based on an RPS mechanic, so I'm not sure what I expected.  =/

Going to be setting up a a game document for the programmer so we can do some slightly more advanced menu systems for the game. 

Battle System

Had a bit of a breakthrough on the battle system today.  It's a pretty simple system, based on a RPS mechanic, but after watching several reviews of other iPhone games and seeing the ones that get the best reviews, it's clear that I was lacking something in the battle system.


All good battle systems for casual games have a sense of progression.  (Scrap that:  all good games in general have a progressive battle system.)  The problem I had with my battle system is that it didn't have any easy to implement progression that added small changes to the battle system.  I had toyed with having some skill-based mechanics (ie. hand-eye coordination required mechanics) in each of the battle, but I decided a) that's lame b) everyone else has really beat that particular horse to death and c) this game is story, strategy and decision based.  I don't want to throw in random crap like hit all the right buttons and get a grand slam kinda thing.

The main issue I'm facing now is how much health to give each character.  Do I give each character in battle their own health bar, or do I have one energy bar for the whole team?  I'm really tempted to use a team energy bar, but maybe that's too restricting.