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TOPIC (GAME DESIGN). +5 CURIOSITY. LOWERS PRODUCTIVITY BY 10% IF USED DURING WORK.
Posts
Craze
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Closehi my name is craze and i'm worried about item descriptions
So, I've been working on a project for a few months, right? I turn Karsuman's gameplay sketches into something functional. It's how we roll. But recently, it hit me: maybe my ability descriptions are too sterile?
I hate having to look up what something does, like if a skill that "changes with HP" is based on HP being full or at 0 or whatever. Etrian Odyssey and any game with a Luck stat does this to me alll the timmmme (although EO4 got a bit better at it). So, I started being fairly Magic-style with my descriptions, using keywords and being incredible sterile. For example, "Deals moderate Psionic attack damage and lightly debuffs Speed" certainly tells you what's going on. I'm not gonna include the exact numbers, because that's information overload and despite being anal about numbers in the background, I'm all about not making the player blow steam out their ears doing math on the fly. Still, "moderate" and "lightly" are commonly-used terms in the game so far, meaning "100% of stat" and "50% of stat".
But it's so boring. This is a game with a crazy alien princess whose raygun changes enemies into birds. Is "Inflicts Hex: Polymorph (The enemy is permanently changed into a special enemy that drops more loot.)" really what Rel needs to get her personality across?
After talking with Karsu and drafting some examples, we ultimately decided on using a more casual style. We still don't want to hide info from the player, but we don't want to make a goofy game have the dissonance of overly sterile descriptions.
Thus, instead of
Bull Rush - 6CD - Deals very high Steel attack damage. Has a chance to inflict Hex: Stun (You cannot act this turn) based on how high Ox's Health is. (At full Health, the chance is 60%.)
we're going with
Bull Rush - 6CD - Ox charges at the enemy with a powerful Steel attack that has a high chance to Stun, based on how full his Health is.
We're keeping a fairly sterile/definite description for equipment and passive abilities, but that's because they're more finnicky anyway.
So, what about you? Do you do loads of numbers and effects and keywords and all that? Do you just type up some words that hopefully make sense? Something inbetween? I'm curious, especially if you're making a very gameplay-oriented or very not-so-gameplay-oriented game.
So, I've been working on a project for a few months, right? I turn Karsuman's gameplay sketches into something functional. It's how we roll. But recently, it hit me: maybe my ability descriptions are too sterile?
I hate having to look up what something does, like if a skill that "changes with HP" is based on HP being full or at 0 or whatever. Etrian Odyssey and any game with a Luck stat does this to me alll the timmmme (although EO4 got a bit better at it). So, I started being fairly Magic-style with my descriptions, using keywords and being incredible sterile. For example, "Deals moderate Psionic attack damage and lightly debuffs Speed" certainly tells you what's going on. I'm not gonna include the exact numbers, because that's information overload and despite being anal about numbers in the background, I'm all about not making the player blow steam out their ears doing math on the fly. Still, "moderate" and "lightly" are commonly-used terms in the game so far, meaning "100% of stat" and "50% of stat".
But it's so boring. This is a game with a crazy alien princess whose raygun changes enemies into birds. Is "Inflicts Hex: Polymorph (The enemy is permanently changed into a special enemy that drops more loot.)" really what Rel needs to get her personality across?
After talking with Karsu and drafting some examples, we ultimately decided on using a more casual style. We still don't want to hide info from the player, but we don't want to make a goofy game have the dissonance of overly sterile descriptions.
Thus, instead of
Bull Rush - 6CD - Deals very high Steel attack damage. Has a chance to inflict Hex: Stun (You cannot act this turn) based on how high Ox's Health is. (At full Health, the chance is 60%.)
we're going with
Bull Rush - 6CD - Ox charges at the enemy with a powerful Steel attack that has a high chance to Stun, based on how full his Health is.
We're keeping a fairly sterile/definite description for equipment and passive abilities, but that's because they're more finnicky anyway.
So, what about you? Do you do loads of numbers and effects and keywords and all that? Do you just type up some words that hopefully make sense? Something inbetween? I'm curious, especially if you're making a very gameplay-oriented or very not-so-gameplay-oriented game.
AubreyTheBard
1801
I can't really give an answer, only sympathy. X) I'm facing the same worry with my own project, especially for equipment. I'm using a system whereby weapons provide a percentage multiplier to a character's damage stats rather than simply adding to them, but RM2K3's shop system isn't set up to communicate that, so I figure I'll have to put the info into the item descriptions, which means not a lot of room for flavor text. Of course, I could always put the detailed info in the game manual, but that has the problem you mention about having to stop and look elsewhere...and conversely I could put the flavor text in the manual. Actually I'd definitely put both in the manual, it's just a question of which to emphasize in-game. :P
Housekeeping
3571
I like to keep the flavor text on one line and the useful information on the second, e.g.:
Insult
Target an enemy's feelings.
Stun the target for one turn.
Sometimes the effects will spill into the first line; if that's the case, I'll just make the flavor text a bit more concise. It's a balancing act, but I tend to favor giving the specific effect over an elaborate description. For your example, I would have reworded it like this:
Bull Rush
Ox charges the enemy.
6CD; Steel; Powerful; Stun rate increases as Ox's health decreases.
I might make the first line more elaborate if the space is willing. Like, if you're keeping your game pretty light (and I assume Ox is some sort of bull man), I might write: "Ox slams his beefy body into the enemy." Or, if it's a more serious game, I'd try to pull from the lore; if he's a specific kind of soldier, for instance, this might be a technique that came from his training--that kind of thing. Too, if this is first person combat where you don't see your characters perform the actions, your descriptions are your opportunity to give life to animations; just seeing an impact effect doesn't convey exactly what's going on, so it's important that you give a clear image to the player. The clearer the better, space considering. Instead of just charging, Ox might "charge shield-first into the enemy" or "Hook the enemy with his horns and fling them aside."
Descriptions in general can be another opportunity for characterization and world building--I'd keep that in mind and do what you can in the space you've got.
Insult
Target an enemy's feelings.
Stun the target for one turn.
Sometimes the effects will spill into the first line; if that's the case, I'll just make the flavor text a bit more concise. It's a balancing act, but I tend to favor giving the specific effect over an elaborate description. For your example, I would have reworded it like this:
Bull Rush
Ox charges the enemy.
6CD; Steel; Powerful; Stun rate increases as Ox's health decreases.
I might make the first line more elaborate if the space is willing. Like, if you're keeping your game pretty light (and I assume Ox is some sort of bull man), I might write: "Ox slams his beefy body into the enemy." Or, if it's a more serious game, I'd try to pull from the lore; if he's a specific kind of soldier, for instance, this might be a technique that came from his training--that kind of thing. Too, if this is first person combat where you don't see your characters perform the actions, your descriptions are your opportunity to give life to animations; just seeing an impact effect doesn't convey exactly what's going on, so it's important that you give a clear image to the player. The clearer the better, space considering. Instead of just charging, Ox might "charge shield-first into the enemy" or "Hook the enemy with his horns and fling them aside."
Descriptions in general can be another opportunity for characterization and world building--I'd keep that in mind and do what you can in the space you've got.
What is numbers?
The numbers will flash on the screen to give them a decent idea of how strong or weak an attack is - they can gauge by their default attack whether it's stronger or not.
What really matters is when there's a chance to inflict an effect. They should at least know there's some change to hit something. Numbers are decent for this, but if you can describe the chances without using them, all for the better.
Slim, slight, reduced, minimal, very little... There are thesauruses out there that exist for this sole reason~
it helps to use the same terminology for the same sort of amount.
Slim chance of inflicting poison
slim chance of hitting the enemy
minor damage
minor health restored
major, minor, middling,
Break up the language into thirds or fourths.
0 - 20% - miniscule, tiny, very slim
21 - 40% - small, minor, reduced
41 - 60% - middling, decent, medium
61 - 80% - good, fair, likely
81 - 99% - great, major, high
100% - surety, full, all
The numbers will flash on the screen to give them a decent idea of how strong or weak an attack is - they can gauge by their default attack whether it's stronger or not.
What really matters is when there's a chance to inflict an effect. They should at least know there's some change to hit something. Numbers are decent for this, but if you can describe the chances without using them, all for the better.
Slim, slight, reduced, minimal, very little... There are thesauruses out there that exist for this sole reason~
it helps to use the same terminology for the same sort of amount.
Slim chance of inflicting poison
slim chance of hitting the enemy
minor damage
minor health restored
major, minor, middling,
Break up the language into thirds or fourths.
0 - 20% - miniscule, tiny, very slim
21 - 40% - small, minor, reduced
41 - 60% - middling, decent, medium
61 - 80% - good, fair, likely
81 - 99% - great, major, high
100% - surety, full, all
see, i think that breaking it down into fifths like that is more confusing than just giving the numbers -- especially if you're developing for multiple languages (not that many people here are, but still). too many words is too many words.
as a side-note, i do use low/moderate/high/very high as relative, with moderate as a basic attack ;V
housekeeping: personality is definitely part of the reason for our shift, although our abilities are kinda crazy and would rarely fit on a single line. still, injecting a bit more flavor is part of our reason for changing, yeah.
(also ox is a ~18yo farmhand.)
aubrey, that reminds me of old rpgs, haha. could be fun to have a pdf open alongside a game, maybe.
as a side-note, i do use low/moderate/high/very high as relative, with moderate as a basic attack ;V
housekeeping: personality is definitely part of the reason for our shift, although our abilities are kinda crazy and would rarely fit on a single line. still, injecting a bit more flavor is part of our reason for changing, yeah.
(also ox is a ~18yo farmhand.)
aubrey, that reminds me of old rpgs, haha. could be fun to have a pdf open alongside a game, maybe.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
As someone with a purely text-based game, how much "flavor text" to include is a very serious concern to me.
At several points in my game's history I've gone through every skill in the game and improved the help text for all of them. The player has to manually pull this help text up, it doesn't appear automatically every time they use the skill, so I'm free to make it as long as I like.
What we ended up doing was creating two help files. One of them is an overview of an entire class, with short, succint descriptions. If the player types "help thief" they get a list of all thief skills, which looks like this:
However, they can also get detailed info about a specific skill, which goes into far greater detail. That looks like this:
So, obviously, that's extremely detailed. It doesn't tell how much damage the skill does, but it goes into a lot of detail about what the damage is based on. I feel like this is extremely important in this game, because the player has to choose stats when they level up and choose where to invest their AP, and those choices are irreversable. In a JRPG where the player gained all their skills and stats automatically, or in a game where the player could reallocate all of their stats and AP for free any time they wanted, I would feel a lot less concerned about needing to give out so much detail.
Also, to respond to Liberty:
Of the two things that can be displayed in the text - damage and flavor - I feel like only the former actually needs to be known before using the skill. Nothing against flavor, but I think it makes sense to put flavor in the skill's animation and information in the text description, rather than the other way around.
Of course, this might be harder in a first-person Dragon Warrior style RPG where you can't actually see what your characters are doing. A distinct advantage of third-person combat.
At several points in my game's history I've gone through every skill in the game and improved the help text for all of them. The player has to manually pull this help text up, it doesn't appear automatically every time they use the skill, so I'm free to make it as long as I like.
What we ended up doing was creating two help files. One of them is an overview of an entire class, with short, succint descriptions. If the player types "help thief" they get a list of all thief skills, which looks like this:
* Flee ------------ Base AP: 100
Disengage from combat with all enemies.
* Lucky Seven ----- Base AP: 180
Deals highly random damage to the target; more if you're lucky.
* Steal ----------- Base AP: 800
Steal a combat item that thieves can use. Can hold one item at a time.
Different types of enemies are more likely to carry different items.
* Toss ------------ Base AP: 500
Uses a combat item stolen with Steal.
* Steal Equipment - Base AP: 800
Steal equipment from a monster. You must have learned about the
equipment from Tantalus, and only certain monsters have equipment.
Otherwise you will steal a chemist item. See also: help tantalus
* Steal Coins ----- Base AP: 600
Steal gold coins from an enemy. 30 second cooldown.
Requirements: Job Level 10
* Coin Toss ------- Base AP: 800
Throw coins stolen with Steal Coins, dealing raw damage to a target.
Requirements: Job Level 10
However, they can also get detailed info about a specific skill, which goes into far greater detail. That looks like this:
Ability Lucky Seven
Job: Thief
Base AP cost: 180
Usage: use theft luckyseven [at target]
Target: One Enemy
Stat Influence: Agi, Attack
Level Effect: Increases Damage
Lucky Seven does highly random damage by sending a rainbow-colored
beam at the enemy. Attack power for this skill is based on agility,
regardless of what type of weapon you have equipped; your weapon is
treated like an agility-based weapon.
So, obviously, that's extremely detailed. It doesn't tell how much damage the skill does, but it goes into a lot of detail about what the damage is based on. I feel like this is extremely important in this game, because the player has to choose stats when they level up and choose where to invest their AP, and those choices are irreversable. In a JRPG where the player gained all their skills and stats automatically, or in a game where the player could reallocate all of their stats and AP for free any time they wanted, I would feel a lot less concerned about needing to give out so much detail.
Also, to respond to Liberty:
author=LibertyYou could easily make the same argument about the skill's flavor. The animation flashes on screen when you use it, so there's no reason to describe it in text as well. (Also, the skill has a name which makes a flavor description somewhat redundant.)
The numbers will flash on the screen to give them a decent idea of how strong or weak an attack is - they can gauge by their default attack whether it's stronger or not.
Of the two things that can be displayed in the text - damage and flavor - I feel like only the former actually needs to be known before using the skill. Nothing against flavor, but I think it makes sense to put flavor in the skill's animation and information in the text description, rather than the other way around.
Of course, this might be harder in a first-person Dragon Warrior style RPG where you can't actually see what your characters are doing. A distinct advantage of third-person combat.
Gredge109
4151
Bull Rush - 6CD - Ox charges at the enemy with a powerful Steel attack that has a high chance to Stun, based on how full his Health is.
I've never thought of this before, but I really like it.
These are some of the things I think about before I make a new project. I make sure I come up with a solid system that I will use throughout the entire game, and development wise, I establish it early enough so I don't have to change things later. Say you find an item, the event will look something like this:
Play SE: Cursor 2
Add Item: Potion
Text: \>Found \(symbol)Potion!
And I make sure that's consistent. The player will heal that Cursor 2 sound and know that it brings good tidings.
I'm gameplay heavy and I love working with the battle formula. In fact, designing monsters and making battles are some of the most enjoyable parts of game development to me (my current game demo has some of this, but I've learned even more since then, and I work with a much different formula for my side project).
One of the things I really like are small numbers. To me they're easy to work with, and a lot of fun. It also makes skills pretty straight forward, allowing you to customize them however you like. They're even easy for the player to digest. And if they can digest a little of these small numbers, then they can manage even more at once! There's a great article on this site which helped me with this: I forgot the author, but they typed up a whole recommended system which, when applied with a bit of your own custom tweaking, leads to a pretty phenomenal battle formula.
So I look at my skills and I come up with a system that I'm going to use throughout the entire game. So my fire spell will read:
Name: Scorch
Description: (FIRE, +2) Scorch your enemy with fire with a chance to inflict a burn!
What it does: FIRE damage, a base of 2 in addition to the player's Magic Attack, and has a chance to inflict a burn. If you'll notice, I didn't put the burn in the parenthesis. The reason for this, is because an NPC can explain it to a player early on how Fire Ice Earth and Thunder work. What I do is I have an NPC or otherwise (somehow worked into the story) that explains these things to the player.
So there's a few things I want them to know off the start: Fire is weak to Ice, but strong to Earth. Ice is weak to Earth, but strong to Fire. Earth is weak to Fire, but strong to Ice. Then there's Thunder, which is not really weak or strong to anything, it just is.
Now these elements all do different things: Fire will inflict a burn, Ice will lower physical resistance, and Thunder will low magic resistance. Earth, however, tends to be your large, sweeping area effects which hit multiple enemies, yet flying enemies are immune. If it sounds rather complex, it's because it is, but my goal is to explain this to the player and make it clear and simple enough so that they understand it from the beginning and remember a few key facts about these elements. And here's what they have to remember: Fire > Earth > Ice > Fire. Fire burns, ice chills, thunder weakens, earth sweeps.
By doing this I can save time explaining my skill descriptions. When the player goes on to gain a new skill, they immediately will refer back to what they learned, and less description is necessary: whenever the player sees the word FIRE in a description, they'll know that 1. it's weak to ice, 2. it has a base damage of 2 + their Magic Attack, and 3. it can inflict a burn.
This saves a lot of description space, and prevents you from having to constantly add more words to your skill descriptions the more complex they become. Let's take a look at another skill.
Name: Lightning Bolt
Description: (THNDR, +3, PARA) A shocking blast of thunder which has a chance to paralyze the enemy!
I mentioned in an another topic how it's a good idea to explain abbreviations early on, so when you start throwing out words like PARA and THNDR, they know they stand for Paralyze and Thunder. Now this Lightning Bolt spell seems pretty straightforward, yet the player knows several intricate details about it: they know that 1. the element is Thunder which means it's not weak to anything, 2. it does a base damage of 3 along with their Magic Attack, 3. it will weaken the enemy to future magic attacks, and 4. it has a chance (likely 50/50) to paralyze the enemy.
That's an awful lot to remember out of that short of a description! But the player will be able to recall these details if you let them mull it over early on in the game. So ultimately my goal is to give them a starting point to understanding how the different spells work in a game, and then I go from there. Saves a lot of time worrying about skills down the road.
Have you considered including both an in-depth description that the player can find out about at their own leisure in the game and a quick flavor description in battle?
It's just that my overall gripe with obscuring the numbers is that they can potentially hide information that may, in fact, be crucial to exploit to help you win a game.
It could just be me, though, I used to be into competitive battling with Pokemon, and the amount of additional information that each attack contained was actually vital to know for you to win.
Then again, I understand how long, number-based descriptions can look colorless and potentially confusing for players. Maybe a possible solution is to keep your skills simple enough so that you don't have to be transparent in the first place? It may not be what you are going for, but that would help if you are trying to reach a non-number savvy crowd.
It's just that my overall gripe with obscuring the numbers is that they can potentially hide information that may, in fact, be crucial to exploit to help you win a game.
It could just be me, though, I used to be into competitive battling with Pokemon, and the amount of additional information that each attack contained was actually vital to know for you to win.
Then again, I understand how long, number-based descriptions can look colorless and potentially confusing for players. Maybe a possible solution is to keep your skills simple enough so that you don't have to be transparent in the first place? It may not be what you are going for, but that would help if you are trying to reach a non-number savvy crowd.
Ratty524
Then again, I understand how long, number-based descriptions can look colorless and potentially confusing for players. Maybe a possible solution is to keep your skills simple enough so that you don't have to be transparent in the first place? It may not be what you are going for, but that would help if you are trying to reach a non-number savvy crowd.
If this is aimed at me: it's a roguelike, so... not for the light of heart, necessarily, although we are planning on having plenty of customization/ez moad options for people who just want to collect karsu's art.
Having simple skills isn't an option for karsuman.... amazingly, he's not as bad as he used to be.
Grand Slam - Summons the superhero Miguel the Mighty. Upon his entrance he deals significant Melee damage to an enemy. He remains on the battlefield attacking a random enemy for significant Melee damage whenever Iris takes an action, as long as she has sufficient MP and the number* does not reach zero. If Iris dies while Grand Slam remains in effect, Iris is restored to 25% of her total HP instead and Grand Slam is cancelled. Grand Slam has an upkeep cost in addition to its normal MP cost.
*the game had a mechanic called "the number."
Corfaisus
"It's frustrating because - as much as Corf is otherwise an irredeemable person - his 2k/3 mapping is on point." ~ psy_wombats
7874
It's all about making it fit in the box for me. If I know that I'm going to have weapons with X stats and Y abilities, I'm going to crunch each bit of information down to its absolute minimum in order for the player to have all the information they need to make a purchase/choice, hence how I came up with the mess I have now.
There's only 5 more characters available to me for this description. It literally cannot get tighter than that. One more element would push it off the page.
There's only 5 more characters available to me for this description. It literally cannot get tighter than that. One more element would push it off the page.
LightningLord2
230
I feel that interesting effects are just as nice to read as flavor text, so you don't need to try and squeeze flavor description in if the skill already has an effect so impressive or fun that that alone makes it enjoyable to use. However, there's rare cases in which making the description more flavourful makes it easier to understand, such as this card in Magic the Gathering:
Which one do you think is more understandable?
author=Raging River, printed Text
When you attack, non-flying defending creatures must be divided as opponent wishes between the left and right sides of the River. You then choose on which side of the River to place each attacking creature, and attacking creatures can only be blocked by flying creatures or those on the same side of the River.
author=Raging River, official Errata
Whenever one or more creatures you control attack, each defending player divides all creatures without flying he or she controls into a "left" pile and a "right" pile. Then, for each attacking creature you control, choose "left" or "right." That creature can't be blocked this combat except by creatures with flying and creatures in a pile with the chosen label.
Which one do you think is more understandable?
Well, yeah. Cards like Raging River and Chains of Mephistopheles are both insane, whether with Oracle text or not.
gredge, if you don't want to worry about changing things later, just use a common event, even if it's to summon a simple sound. you can also put the item's id in a variable or something and then call up a common event that can be adjusted for all chests, including the "obtained!" message.
Also, that elemental stuff is what I mean by "keywords." I use that term a lot, but it's what you're talking about -- a term that you explain to the player elsewhere, but allows them to instantly pick up on an effect or consequence. they're definitely useful!
gredge, if you don't want to worry about changing things later, just use a common event, even if it's to summon a simple sound. you can also put the item's id in a variable or something and then call up a common event that can be adjusted for all chests, including the "obtained!" message.
Also, that elemental stuff is what I mean by "keywords." I use that term a lot, but it's what you're talking about -- a term that you explain to the player elsewhere, but allows them to instantly pick up on an effect or consequence. they're definitely useful!
Gredge109
4151
author=Craze
gredge, if you don't want to worry about changing things later, just use a common event, even if it's to summon a simple sound. you can also put the item's id in a variable or something and then call up a common event that can be adjusted for all chests, including the "obtained!" message.
Also, that elemental stuff is what I mean by "keywords." I use that term a lot, but it's what you're talking about -- a term that you explain to the player elsewhere, but allows them to instantly pick up on an effect or consequence. they're definitely useful!
You just blew my mind! I never thought about using a common event for item acquisition, that's brilliant. Going to save me a ton of time in the future!
Antilurker77
871
I don't think number overload is as big as a problem as you make it out to be. If Blizzard can put proc rates in their tooltips, you're probably fine. I disagree about moderate and lightly communicating effects well. Players will probably assume different values and end up having to poke around anyway.
Would it be possible to put estimated damage and healing values directly in the description? I actually think that makes things more clear than keywords.
Personally, I would probably write it like this:
Bull Rush - 6CD - Ox charges at enemy, dealing XXX Steel attack damage. Has up to a 60% chance to stun, based on how high Ox's HP is.
Would it be possible to put estimated damage and healing values directly in the description? I actually think that makes things more clear than keywords.
Personally, I would probably write it like this:
Bull Rush - 6CD - Ox charges at enemy, dealing XXX Steel attack damage. Has up to a 60% chance to stun, based on how high Ox's HP is.
I put all the important stuff first, then crack a joke or something after that.
Attack
In this particular game, you learn new skills by using your old ones. Multiple skills can usually be earned from one skill, so there are multiple use states listed. Skills can also disappear forever or upgrade depending on number of uses, so the Used status of the skill comes first and is color coded. After that, the actual effect. Since most of my skills serve a simple function, I try to make it look better by including some color/symbols. Lastly, I put some flavor. Since this will probably only be read once, I put it last.
I do put numbers in my descriptions, but thinking on it, specific numbers probably aren't the best way of getting power across. I think it works in the game this description appears in though.
I'm a little anal-retentive about descriptions - I fiddled with this one alot until I was pleased. -1HP to -3HP still feels a bit odd.
Attack
In this particular game, you learn new skills by using your old ones. Multiple skills can usually be earned from one skill, so there are multiple use states listed. Skills can also disappear forever or upgrade depending on number of uses, so the Used status of the skill comes first and is color coded. After that, the actual effect. Since most of my skills serve a simple function, I try to make it look better by including some color/symbols. Lastly, I put some flavor. Since this will probably only be read once, I put it last.
I do put numbers in my descriptions, but thinking on it, specific numbers probably aren't the best way of getting power across. I think it works in the game this description appears in though.
I'm a little anal-retentive about descriptions - I fiddled with this one alot until I was pleased. -1HP to -3HP still feels a bit odd.
I wonder, what do players read first when reading a description in a typical default VX ace window?
Since this information is typically displayed at the top of the screen, do people usually start their eyes at the bottom lines, and then to the top, for instance? If so, that should influence how we order information on these descriptions.
Since this information is typically displayed at the top of the screen, do people usually start their eyes at the bottom lines, and then to the top, for instance? If so, that should influence how we order information on these descriptions.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Wait, if it's dealing -1 damage, does that mean it heals the enemy?
Yea, I think about this stuff a bit. I think it makes sense to go as casual as you can for your particular game. Bull Rush sounds like a very specifically-tuned skill, and players will never intuit "at full HP this has a 60% chance" but if they don't need to know those numbers specifically, that's fine. If the player gets the feeling from Bull Rush that "having high HP makes this way more effective", that's enough - and you can use the rest of the description for fluff.
For Bossgame, I'm adding a few choice words to each attack to match the user's personality, and the rest of the description is used to describe the attack. For example:
Patience
Lily waits patiently for an opening, gaining SP over three turns.
(Shield Icon) 10x3
Overload
Anna explodes with energy, dealing high damage to a target but disarming
herself for a turn. (Sword Icon) 18
Jab
Hoodie jabs an enemy, dealing light damage and preparing himself for
a powerful Cross. (Sword Icon) 5
I really like displaying the easy stuff like "base power" or "base healing" with an icon + number combo. It takes up a very small amount of space and I have the feeling that most people will figure out what it means really quickly!
In addition, some of the abilities I'm adding character text to, something like "Get behind me!" or "Yes, go go go!", etc. when they use the skill, as just another way to have the characters show a little personality.
(At some point I'm going to write a small article about how Undertale manages to sneak these bits of character personality in everywhere. It's just enough here and there to give you a vision of the character, even if they don't have a big role.)
For Bossgame, I'm adding a few choice words to each attack to match the user's personality, and the rest of the description is used to describe the attack. For example:
Patience
Lily waits patiently for an opening, gaining SP over three turns.
(Shield Icon) 10x3
Overload
Anna explodes with energy, dealing high damage to a target but disarming
herself for a turn. (Sword Icon) 18
Jab
Hoodie jabs an enemy, dealing light damage and preparing himself for
a powerful Cross. (Sword Icon) 5
I really like displaying the easy stuff like "base power" or "base healing" with an icon + number combo. It takes up a very small amount of space and I have the feeling that most people will figure out what it means really quickly!
In addition, some of the abilities I'm adding character text to, something like "Get behind me!" or "Yes, go go go!", etc. when they use the skill, as just another way to have the characters show a little personality.
(At some point I'm going to write a small article about how Undertale manages to sneak these bits of character personality in everywhere. It's just enough here and there to give you a vision of the character, even if they don't have a big role.)
@LockeZ Yeah, the negative numbers feel weird and might be a bit confusing! It's supposed to be damage not healing for the enemy.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
I would change it to "Deals 1-3 base damage to an enemy." Or if the HP part is important (for example, if half your attacks deal HP damage and the other half deal armor damage) then "Deals 1-3 base damage to an enemy's HP."
