ANN: feedback wanted for Circuitris

[bcman]

:cool: :cool: Hello,

Here's a link to my game, Circuitris. It's a -tris game, yes, but it's got a unique flavor of gameplay that sets it apart. It's not finished; I hope everyone can take a second to play it and tell me how to make it btter.

This is the link: http://www.exegame.com/circuitris.zip

This is a screenshot: http://www.exegame.com/cir2.jpg

Thanks

-bc

[BruceC]

I'm the author of this, had to get a different handle.

I realize a game like this that counts on beating scores to keep people going is worthless without a high score table, and that is the next big addition I plan to make.

I'm not in love with the plain flat colors on the placed pieces, even though flat colors are nice because I can brighten or darken them without the need for alpha blending or other graphical fanciness. If you've got any ideas on how to spruce up the look of the board, I'm all ears.

I've obviously gone with an electrical theme, which I think integrates well with the gameplay. If you can see any obvious ways to enhance or make better use of that theme, please let me know.

Thanks for your time.

[Sunshine]

well, let me start out by saying that I loved tetris and was bad-ass at the original version.

Taking that into account your game seems to have all the elements of a game, and while they are bolted together, it doesn't seem to make a game.

Kinda like Frankenstein, a person, yes, but somthing is just a [I]little off ;)

Things I didn't like:
>> The upgrades you earn while playing happen so fast that they are annoying.
>> The upgrades do not affect gameplay to any real extent.
>> The upgrades are all very similar, and can be undone too easily.
>> The game is just too easy, I finally quit due to realizing ways to play forever.
>> Needs more cool things like the fuse.
>> When the pieces fall after a completed circuit it makes it too easy, because it completes all the other circuits for you.
>> Graphics need a little polish.
>> There needs to be some reward for placing the pieces in to the places the tetris peices would go into. [Rather than just lining them across the screen]


Things I liked:
>> Cool 'Theme'
>> I liked the end electrical effect.
>> I like tetris.

Not to bad, but needs a few minior tweaks in graphics and sound, considerable work on the upgrades and gameplay, and drastic chanegs in the rules system to make it harder and more complex.

I realize its very early but still kinda cool.
Good luck. :)

[BruceC]

Taking that into account your game seems to have all the elements of a game, and while they are bolted together, it doesn't seem to make a game.

That's interesting. Can you pinpoint at all what seems to be missing?


Kinda like Frankenstein, a person, yes, but somthing is just a little off ;)


The Frankengame. I like that title.


Things I didn't like:
>> The upgrades you earn while playing happen so fast that they are annoying.


One thing I know needs tuning is the upgrade/penalty timescales. I had them turned up for testing actually. They're not supposed to come so often.


>> The upgrades do not affect gameplay to any real extent.


Well, they affect the parameters of the game, and some of those are random factors. I'm wondering if it's not obvious enough. The biggest things right now are what I call the 'color coherency' factors. Two values affect how many solid blocks of color you'll see. As these reduce and pieces get more mixed up in colors, the game gets decidedly more difficult (for me, but I didn't beat the original Tetris).


>> The upgrades are all very similar, and can be undone too easily.


I do have plans for more upgrades.


>> The game is just too easy, I finally quit due to realizing ways to play forever.


If you let the game get to the point where the pieces all have mixed up colors (less solid colors), it plays much more slowly. Speaking of colors, did you choose to play with more of them? There's a maximum of five, and playing with four or more is quite a challenge, particularly as the pieces become less solid. I am wondering if I did not make this more challenging path clear enough to new players.


>> Needs more cool things like the fuse.


Like I said above, adding more bonuses is on my list of stuff to do.


>> When the pieces fall after a completed circuit it makes it too easy, because it completes all the other circuits for you.


Were you getting them by accident? I always have to plan for them. I did it this way so that you could plan and place for the chain reactions. As you play with more colors, you can build bigger chains too. It's VERY rewarding to get a three circuits chained together, and I plan on making the higher chain multipliers exponential rather than linear (so that a three-chain becomes an 8x bonus, etc.).


>> Graphics need a little polish.


Yep.


>> There needs to be some reward for placing the pieces in to the places the tetris peices would go into. [Rather than just lining them across the screen]


Not sure exactly what you're speaking of here.


I realize its very early but still kinda cool.
Good luck. :)

Thanks for looking at it and thanks for the feedback.

[Sunshine]

There's a maximum of five, and playing with four or more is quite a challenge

I think it should be mandatory to get all five colors and get a certain number of circuits with them, that would be more of a challange.


As it is there is no point to even line the blocks up at all, you dont even have to fit the pieces together. All you do it just put them next to each other across the screen.

Another thing you can do to get easy points is to lay pieces across the bottom of the board all one color except the last piece, then lay a layer of the second color on top of those. etc,etc then finally put the last piece from the first row into place.

I think your on the right track but there's still some holes in the plot.
Try getting rid of some of the upgrades you got now, and replace them with more radical ones. Like 20 seconds of randomly generated blocks[non-tetris shapes], 1 block that has hidden colors till placed, Blast away the bottom row of blocks, get a few single blocks of random colors, or condense the whole stack down as if you had gotten a circuit.

Just some ideas,
good luck :)