Hey everyone ! I'm a bit late, but i'm here. I asked some of you to share me the games they made in order to write this review. And after playing, i noticed they had some interesting tutorial issues and i decided to choose it as the main theme of this article. So there we go !
Before reading
What i write is based on my own experience, as a former student, as a gamer, as a game developer. My goal is to help people to notice things thanks to what i share here, not to mock or roast game makers. The three games i played are good games already, but in my opinion, they can be improved in some ways, and it's what you will read here.
Mythicard
I'm happy that i chose this game. It revealed the most stupid things possible that you can't imagine when you are not a newcomer in that kind of games.
Mythicard is a auto card game. You have to choose good cards, then they automatically fight depending on the order you placed them on the board.
First of all : i think the "Start" button looks like the Youtube logo, so i believed the tutorial was a video. Yep
Now what can we say about the tutorial ? It is well explained, it asks one action at once and after the tutorial i clearly felt ready to play. But while i was following the tutorial, i asked myself one question, i guess a lot of card players never ask : what the heck the symbols on the card mean ? All these gems ? No one told me. So I understood the mechanics, but not the cards !
For the needs of this article i had to replay the tutorial, and the first text says "First of all you need to know how to play a card". I think it's wrong, i think i have to know what a card is before (screenshot 1)
But overall it's a good explanation of the mechanics.
Also, i missed a lot of feedbacks. Your player just started the game, you really have to drive his eye to where it has to look. When the game asked me to press "Play" i was "ok, but where is Play ?" then i noticed it was on the top of the screen. Make all of this shining, sparkling, so the player immediately see what you ask him to do. It will help the player to find his way. And do this for everything.
The Play button
The Level up button
The board
The cards you ask to sell / store (there is an arrow, but it's not enough, i tried to sell the wrong cards)
Of course, sometimes you can consider that it is easy to see, but as a completely newcomer (i never played that kind of games before) it could have made my experience more fluid.
And in the same order : when objects cover others for an action, make the one under reacting when it's ok to drop the item. I say that for Chest and Sell zones. You can also add some more sparks on the amount of money when the action is using it so you can notice it has changed.
Be sure that all the informations the player has to know are really clear and you will have an amazing tutorial for a game that will looks really easy to play.
Nightmare Fishing Tournament 2020
To be frank, i didn't know what to expect when i selected this game. I chose it because i had good time on fishing games so i wanted to give it a try. And the surprise was good !
But i had to deserve it it took me a few tries to understand what the game was asking me to do ! So i will tell you my mistakes and explain how they can be avoided.
First of all, i wanted to drive my boat in 4 directions. I was really confused for moving only sideway ! I think that adding two arrows on each side of the boat can help the player to not try to drive like me in the middle of the lake. It can be a good time to display the controls for moving as well
Then, i started to fish, the explanations were good, i set up my hook then... i was completely lost. I expected to throw the line far in the lake, but it was only falling in my boat (screenshot 2) It really needs to be clear that the line is sinking and that everything is good. Maybe adding metrics about the line in the GUI so you can see it's sinking and it's not in the boat.
By a weird move i made, it finally worked and i was watching my trap sinking in the water. Then everything was fine, and i caught my first fish (screenshot 3) Now to be honnest, i'm a patient guy and i wanted to write this review so i had reasons to insist, it will not be the case for all players. You have to be sure that the player knows what he is doing. For example : showing the process about how to fish in this game. When it was time to swim in the lake, i was surprised by what the game was asking me, but i was also in a urge because my fish was trapped and i didn't want to lose it. So if you prepare the player about the steps he will have to do, it will not be surprised and appreciate the time to fight !
One more thing : on the 3rd screenshot, you can see there is still the tutorial displayed. It's because i moved faster than the tutorial so the game was still expecting me to follow it.
Overall, the tutorial was not bad, but it wasn't fitting my expectations so i lost myself between what the game was, and what i wanted him to let me do. The best improvement here is to tell the players clearly how things will works then you are sure he won't try more than what the game is made for.
And i love the intro scene , even if i'm not a big fan of showing a big menu at the first seconds of the game, the plot and the character are very cool and it set the ambiance instantly. Very good !
Something Ate My Alien
Walking and digging, it is what this game is about. And also it's about a ransom, but we will talk about it later
This tutorial is good. Like REALLY good.
It is so well integrated to the story that you don't notice you are in a tutorial
One action, one explanation
A good rythm between dialogues and mechanics
It's nice really. You are not afraid to show monstruous quantity of texts to be sure everything is understandable and it paid off. But it paid off thanks to the story, because most of the time, it's a big risk to do that, because text are often boring. Here it was well made due to the integration to the story and the good balance with the dialogues. When the game let me go, i didn't feel any transition, like if i was born for this job.
But i won't let you leave without some advice because some improvement can still be made.
One really common mistake : when you give an information only based on a color, it means colorblind will be only blind. And i'm colorblind. So the easiest way to correct this is to add icons, at least for the blocks you can dig.
Also, i have some problems with the jetpack. The flames are tiny. Why ? I'm here to fly. It has to be big ! I want all this fuel burning in this wild environment . In fact i say that because the first times i didn't understand how i was flying. Then i noticed the little tiny flames. I think it's an important information so making it a little bigger is important so you can see easily the difference between on and off time.
And the other thing about this jetpack is the energy bar. It's impossible to see it where it is placed. You are focusing on the center of the screen, you can't look on the far top left to check how much fuel you have left. Everything should be concentrated in the center of the screen, with the fuel bar on the side on the jetpack, displayed only when you use it.
And a last thing : the story. It surprised me because it's the first time i see a game where you don't work for yourself. I mean : if you crash your spaceship somewhere, you work to repair it. Here a random guy comes and ask you a ransom, and you have to work for him if you want to be free. It means that the main goal of the game is to please someone else, it's an original turn. But when i noticed that it broke a little my engagement in the game because i was thinking that what i was doing what not very useful, as it was not directed for myself.
But my exploration needs and the fact that i want to fight this big dragon keep me interested ! It is a very good job !
Conclusion
I hope you found useful informations here. I'll repeat it but i wrote this article in order to improve games, not to put down the moral of the makers.
All the games were good and i'll continue to play them for sure.
What you have to remember of this article is that nothing of what i said is true. It's only my point of view, from the little time i played these games, and coming from my experience. This article is here to help you to find ideas, not for giving you solutions. There are no rules but the ones you want to follow for your game, so never trust me. If you found something you want to keep for your game, i'll be glad, but i'm not writing the tutorial law. Experiment, try new stuff, and enjoy what you do !
Thanks everyone ! <3
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