Goon Game: Dev Diary (5/13/24)

I’ve encountered quite a pickle of a problem: I’m getting too good at my own game. I’ve now played it so many times in its current state that I can run circles around most of its challenges, so not only am I getting worse data, but I’m also not having fun playing my own game. So what needs to change? For starters, get someone other than me to test the damn game; and I have. Since my brother is back in town for the summer, I pestered him into testing, and just from that one test, we uncovered a major numbers issue, and the test map for the game doesn’t adequately incentivize the desired kind of play.

To tackle said issues in order. The numbers problem has been easily solved by setting a median and adjusting everything within +/- 10-20% of said median. Mainly in regards to HIT and AVO, as the previous numbers made it far too much of a gamble when trying to engage with anything; while this opens the door for a new problem regarding the challenge, the game is far fairer than before. The numbers change also allows me to create more challenging enemies down the line as it creates a larger shift from the median I’ve set. Essentially future-proofing the game to a degree and hopefully simplifying the creation of higher-tier enemies.

However, the testing problem is ongoing. One that can only be solved by reaching out to a larger community; while I have access to said communities, my own fears and social disparities hinder that progress. But these are simple problems with simple solutions, or so I keep telling myself. I merely need to ask if people are interested and provide them with the material to test. So, to that end, I will reach out to the community in question this Wednesday when I see them next; hopefully, I will not choke on that promise.

As for the rest of the game, things have continued a radical but necessary change I mentioned in sprint 7’s retrospective. Goon kits have been reworked and focused on their desired roles. Basic Cops have been raised to the new power floor, while Advanced Cops have been raised above it. Zolo’s command style has changed completely to better facilitate the Support type’s role as de-buffers. The type passives from DPS and Saboteur have also been reworked to more focus the former on critical damage and the latter on mobility. DPS has lost its conditional Penetrate clause in this exchange, and we are yet to see if that is a worthwhile sacrifice.

Further retooling for advanced goons has been moved back to the backlog as of today. This was done to give more focus to the map redesign and to allow for more testing to better understand the base form of each goon before mapping out their future iterations. This rework has now called into question the numbers in everything, and as things move along, those stat buffs may also need to change.

In short, I’ve reached the point in the game’s current lifespan where most of the leg work is done. Now, all that remains is the tweaking and the testing to fine-tune things before moving on to more advanced stages of development.