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Thoughts of a Deceased Crawler

  • Craze
  • 11/03/2011 11:18 AM
  • 3639 views
So, guys: if a similar game to Edifice were to be made, what would make it shine? I don't care if you played this version or not (don't, it's buggy as all hell), although you can certain base your opinions on it.

Is the bosses, the general enemies, the loot, the characters, the ____ that makes you want to play? What drives you away from games like this?

I am the curious.

Posts

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It's minor, but I personally prefer first person battle systems. Other than that I like it.
For this particular game, I found that just too much was thrown at me at once. The learning curve was too high for me too get into it.
I hope you're not abandoning Edifice because somebody wrote a nitpicky review of the demo. (Of a demo! You know this community is too obsessed with reviews when even demos aren't safe from it) From what I've played, it looks solid to me.

That said, what drives me away is slow-paced, complex, big-party battles being thrown at me from the start. I prefer conventional roguelikes to begin with, where the emphasis is on exploration and looting rather than long combat sequences (I'm sort of developing a roguelike myself along those veins). Things should start out fast-paced and simple. Instead of tons of party members from the start, make new party members be recruited as the player locates them. Instead of battles with many enemies, just one enemy at a time until you get deeper into the dungeon.
Craze
why would i heal when i could equip a morningstar
15150
flowerthief
I hope you're not abandoning Edifice because somebody wrote a nitpicky review of the demo. (Of a demo! You know this community is too obsessed with reviews when even demos aren't safe from it) From what I've played, it looks solid to me.

That said, what drives me away is slow-paced, complex, big-party battles being thrown at me from the start. I prefer conventional roguelikes to begin with, where the emphasis is on exploration and looting rather than long combat sequences (I'm sort of developing a roguelike myself along those veins). Things should start out fast-paced and simple. Instead of tons of party members from the start, make new party members be recruited as the player locates them. Instead of battles with many enemies, just one enemy at a time until you get deeper into the dungeon.

I understand what you and kentona are saying, although the solution to fixing it wouldn't work, I think. (I think a lot.)

As for giving up Edifice - the core is so buggy at this point that it's not worth it, especially since I'd have to renovate the shitty skill system. The chances of a re-remake are fairly high, however, with a focus on a smooth introduction.
This would be a fun topic for a longer discussion, but if I had to boil down my personal opinion on what would make a dungeon crawler fun:

1. Easy to Learn, Hard to Master - Limit the number of stats and 3 or 4 or so, and make their effects obvious and easy to work with. When faced with too many options it makes player choices too hard and also boxes the dev into 'averaging' them out so characters aren't too gimped

2. Fast combat - longer fights can be fun, but when normal encounters are as length as a boss fight, it gets old fast, something you can't afford with a crawler

3. Toys and time to use them - skills or weapons or customization that I can play around with freely and not fear gimping my characters... and enough of it to be interesting without being overwhelming or fluffy due to all the options given

4. Loot and reasons to use it - Why does the player care what's in the chest? Money? Items? Weapons/Armor? Besides the items, give players simple ways to use them like a crafting or customization system

5. Interesting - A story or advancing areas, any elements that make the player want to go down just 'one more level' or 'just finish this area' to gain more items, see more funny dialogue, meet new members, etc

This is just a rough 'checklist' I came up with from my own experiences and preferences, ping me if you want to discuss it sometime, I rarely get to talk about user functionality. : )
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
fuck you finish this game it is amazing

edit: oh shit i meant to review this ages ago. time really flies.
I personally think the idea behind Edifice is one of the most entertaining I've come across in RM games. Making battle-centric games interesting to me is a feat and you pulled that off, at least with the beta version that I played and vomited pages of notes about. I guess "story" would be an easy and cheap shot.. But it's not so much about story at all, more about a sense of linearity (and I certainly don't mean gameplay linearity)... Because (I suppose) human minds are geared toward following a linear story, we are after-all a species that communicates through linear narrative and find that sort of thing engaging.

That said, a game about starting at the bottom of a huge edifice and ascending it is inherently a linear narrative within itself, however I think it could perhaps just do with a little more window dressing and artifice (although I sort of liked the "OK - GO!" setup of Edifice if I'm honest.)

It's kinda hard to critique where Edifice went wrong because those criticisms would amount to a negation of the entire concept on which it appears to work (and in my opinion it really does work, at least for 16 floors or so). The no healing, the plethora of disposable heroes, the sense of resource management and decision making that actually matters are all what made this game engaging so, "don't stray too far from the formula" would be my advice.

I guess one thing that was missing from Edifice was a sense of mystery. The way you get loot, the way you engage battles etc.. It all became very "known" very early. Sure, the fun was in managing to scrape by but after a few runs it's does sadly start to become a little bit "been there, done that" (aside of course from the floor randomization which is a brilliant feature). I guess if there were things to discover and uncover in the huge tower aside from battles and some loot then you'd be onto something really engaging (my only thoughts here would be things like SIDE QUESTS, minigames, ARCANE SECRET KNOWLEDGE about the game world and the scenario in which the heroes find themselves, secret areas off-shooting from hidden entrances on floors, maybe NPCs who inhabit the edifice who you keep bumping into or who appear and then dart away until many floors later when their presence is explained.. I dunno.. Stuff like that) :>
Craze
why would i heal when i could equip a morningstar
15150
What you guys are saying seems to basically be "please mix Diablocide and Edifice for great justice."

I'll respond more later (I have papers to grade ;_;) but I'm surprised at how interesting and thought-out these responses are. Lots to think about!
I got turned off Edifice early and can think of a couple main reasons.

1. Like kentona and flowerthief said, lots of information about lots of party members to absorb at the start. I feel a little weird about this because the exact same criticism was leveled at the last thing I worked on, and like you I don't necessarily see an answer. Maybe segregating into first-run vs. new game+ modes, where a first run introduces things and new game+ throws it all at you? I'd be happy to hear any great ideas.

2. I don't really like having to explicitly choose "no, you can't possibly do anything useful this turn" as much as ended up happening, between party randomizers and starting skills' cooldowns. It slowed things down a lot.
P.S: Please do keep us posted on what's happening with this, what you're planning or whatever it will become.
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