Our Trick To A Solid Indie Game Intro | Devlog #22

[@NeverEngineDev]

I have been wondering lately if I've just gotten worse at caring about games, but the point you made about getting players into the action and playing and over time incorporating more story beats into it is really the thing I've been missing! A great and insightful video as always!

[@alvin_row]

I love these! The way you put effort into reworking on such fundamental aspects of the game is really inspiring, as it can often feel discouraging to tackle challenges that I've already put a lot of time into, even more when I know that I've already "failed" at them at least once. Gamedev is 99% iteration though, and these last two videos serve as a good reminder. So thanks!

[@OandCoGames]

Well said. Iteration is key I think.

[@timbitsdev]

Can’t wait to try part two

[@kingwrightdev]

Played the demo and the teleportation mechanic is a lot of fun! Its simple yet unique and leaves a lot of room for skill. Easy to learn, hard to master. Bravo!

[@OandCoGames]

Thank you kindly!

[@Zaluuk]

2:35 I'd love for games to have a setting for disabling the story part of the game, so I can enjoy the gameplay more.

[@nicooftheforest]

Pet a ⍰

[@OandCoGames]

hmmm like a speedrun mode...

[@sherekhangamedev]

You got something there.

[@maxelized]

Can't agree more with this change

[@sherekhangamedev]

Good decision, the first 30 minutes, or even 10 are Key. By the way, I wanted to ask something I notice, is there a reason why the speech bubbles don't have the names of the NPCs? Because it happens to me, I see a lot of interesting NPCs, I want to know or remember them and I'm bad at remembering names. It's also a habit that happens in my job, since I work with a lot of NPCs with mmorpgs, and we usually use labeling for the names in the chat boxes so that people remember them too. Don't take it as a suggestion Jordan, it's just me and my bad memory, apart from that they are different game genres, but I wanted to know if there is a design decision in it. Thanks and keep rocking hard and loud!

[@OandCoGames]

Yeah, we don't have a strong reason for not including their names. Certainly something for us to consider..

[@JAMPLEYDEV]

looking cool, dude.

[@ivyjuicegames]

Really like the way you are talking. so chill

[@Wh4I3]

chapter 2 feels kinda like its in the spirit realm

[@Whatthetrash]

Does GameMaker work well for you all? In all the videos you post it seems to run fine, but when I tried it, it was painfully slow. Like click and wait several beats before the window would open type slow. I have a 1070TI and Core I7 10700K. I'd think that would be fast enough. Hmm... >_

[@OandCoGames]

It works well enough but I do wish it loaded the game faster. It takes my machine about 8-10 seconds each time after the very first build.

[@Whatthetrash]

@@OandCoGames Ah, alright. That sounds okay. Mine was taking about 3 *minutes* per build. Which is just... not workable. Good to hear yours is much better.

[@shachartzin5405]

Really nice progress. I'm actually having hard times with my introduction tutorial as well. Also 2:32 Oh god, I wish I could enjoy SANABI. I will gladly pay full price for a 30 min tight gameplay experience, without all that unnecessary dialogue. Those animations were terrific but let me play the gameeeee

[@OandCoGames]

Right?? I love Sanabi's gameplay.. but the cutscenes are just so excessive..

[@shachartzin5405]

​@@OandCoGamesI quit about 45 min after I realized it's not going to change after the tutorial. I was really looking for someone online to mention this but everyone is busy speaking in it's praise.. I'm glad for them, indie team and all, I just wish I could enjoy it too.

[@evolgenius1150]

I think I see a little Gris and Sword&Sworcery vibes in there

[@OandCoGames]

Oooo huge praise! Thank you!

[@catinanincrediblyfancyhat572]

Unrelated, but the graphics are so pretty!

[@OandCoGames]

Thanks :)

[@Anerisian]

I wondering if this stop-and-go ghost mechanic is fun. At least in the sections you showed, it seems to break the flow quite a bit. Just make sure you don’t have a blindspot there.

[@OandCoGames]

Yeah, we've play this a lot and people seem to really like it. The core mechanic scored us 10th out of nearly 6,000 entries in GMTK Jam 2021 when we first game up with this game's idea.

[@Anerisian]

@@OandCoGames All good. You could for example maintain momentum, or add a bit etc. :)

[@husklyman]

2:52 you know the floor and the crystal have very similar colors right? It makes them a bit harder to notice...

[@OandCoGames]

Yeah good point. Might warrant a different color for that zone specifically

[@BananaBotanists]

Pet a Gatorsquirrel

[@OandCoGames]

*gatorsquirrel

[@nicooftheforest]

Pet a Gatorsquirrel

[@bupperdupper8873]

​@@nicooftheforest*gatorsquirrel

[@ooooggll]

What's happening with these comments..? Anyways, I have one small piece of feedback to add here. (the youtube comments section probably isn't the best place for it, but I'm doing it anyways). I like the fact that there are the smaller speech bubbles for smaller conversations, but I think they're maybe overused. They're good for conversations with only a few lines back and forth, but anything more than that should probably be in the bigger dialog box, in my opinion. The way that small speech bubbles center text above their character's head makes it a bit hard to follow when the line gets too long, since it's constantly typing while also sliding to the left.

[@nicooftheforest]

and it's not like you'll need any extra space so it makes sense to have the big dialog box the only problem is that they'll have to draw and animate every single character that has any dialog

[@OandCoGames]

Yeah, it's the scope of having to animate every NPC in high-res that's daunting.

[@ooooggll]

@@OandCoGames That makes sense. And I'd definitely rather be able to talk to all the random NPCs than only the important ones.

[@bupperdupper8873]

Pet a raccoon

[@nicooftheforest]

Pet a raccoon

[@OandCoGames]

what is happening

[@ycapslock13]

pet a Duck

[@OandCoGames]

Who are you...

[@nicooftheforest]

pet a Duck

[@Juke172]

So was the story part boring or why you needed to add more gameplay? I didn't quite get what was the problem here. Maybe you are trying to fix the problem wrong way? Many games introduce story right at the start, but of course as a player you usually skip it or don't care at that point. I understand that. Maybe you could ease-in to the story by small conversations here and there throughout the journey and not put too much conversations in one location, unless those are totally optional content. Main storyline could easily start right from the start. Like for example reason to go to the town area. Like adding motivation for player to keep going and wanting to know more about the story and be part of it.

[@OandCoGames]

Pacing is really what we're concerned with. I think the story is really strong, but a lot of the story of chapter 1 is loaded into the village - which is designed to be more relaxed and explorable for players looking to dig into the story more. We do have conversations woven into gameplay, and there's a 20-second cutscene at the beginning to set the stage. But before, it was just weird giving players 5 minutes of tutorials, then another 10 minutes of calm gameplay before they get back into the platforming they learned about 10 minutes prior.

[@nicooftheforest]

@@OandCoGames I really agree with this change. it just felt off to learn about everything and then just get right into the story for so long.

[@SweetTea14]

Pet sweet tea

[@nicooftheforest]

Pet sweet tea

[@OandCoGames]

what is happening

[@nicooftheforest]

pet a Jeremy

[@nicooftheforest]

pet a Jeremy

[@OandCoGames]

what is happening