Rats Of The Maze - Play and give feedback.

JamesBoucher

Please let me know what you think. It has tens levels and gets harder as you go.

quantumsheep

Hey!
I really liked this - those pesky rats! (etc etc).

Couple of points:

There seems to be some movement/animation issue, in that your tank doesn't always turn right away to the direction it's facing.

The HUD needs a little clarification - I have no idea what the numbers at the top of the screen are!

Other than that, it's coming along nicely

Hope that helps,

QS

JamesBoucher

Thanks... I will put some titles over the HUD elements. I will look at the movement issue also. I new about these two items, but put it out anyway. I also have a problem reseting the game. I have it fixed but can't upload it.

I've tried to upload a fix but it hangs on Contacting Server. This gets a little old. I tried three times to get the game uploaded, and I've tried three times to get the update loaded.

Any help from GameSalad on why I can't update my game please.

JamesBoucher

Fixed the restart variable problems. Fixed the movement issue. Added labels to the HUD. Please try and give me more feedback. Please.

JamesBoucher

What I really like to find out is if this type of game will work with GameSalad and the IPhone. In level ten you could have 25 actors moving around at the same time. That's not even counting the shooting that will be going on. I'm afraid that performance would suck.

JamesBoucher

Come on people help me out here. I see its been played 25 times, so give me some feedback.

The only feedback so far is from Quantumsheep (THANKS).

Like, dislike, fun, boring, changes, etc...

quantumsheep

Some more thoughts:

When you press start you're presented with some options. Nice.

If I select something, say 'Red' for tank colour, then press return to main screen and THEN press Start again, the options *appear* to have been reset.

They haven't. Your choices are still the same (i.e. Tank colour red) but the selection boxes have been reset to their original position. You can tell because the selection boxes are back to their start positions and you cannot select what you wanted (i.e. Tank colour red) until you choose another colour instead.

Same happens if you play the game again after Game Over.

Hope that's clear-ish.

Control wise, I'm still seeing some errors in movement and shooting. Consider having the player rotate the tank left and right and pressing up for forward movement. This would also help in fighting off rats as I could rotate the tank to the angle needed to shoot them if they are being tricky. It may also solve the 'shooting in wrong direction' issue when moving.

What controls are you going to use for the iphone version?

The HUD display is better than before for sure, but it still doesn't stand out enough to be very useful. Consider colouring the labels (score, lives etc) a more prominent colour - Red is good.

(Edit - having got to level 2, the borders are red, and this would affect the visibility of the HUD. Consider putting a background strip where the HUD appears to always give a colour contrast to the data being shown)

Additionally, why not put in a pause button? It's very simple to do - just put in a non-scrolling button that changes scene (make sure you click 'preserve current scene) to a 'pause' screen. Then, put a button to return you to the scene based on the level you're on (I think you already track the level you're on, so this should be a five minute job!).

While on the Pause screen, why not put some of the HUD elements in there to make it more of a 'status' screen. This screen could show the following info:

Level:
Factories Destroyed:
Remaining Factories:
Rats Destroyed:

This means these elements can be removed from the main game's HUD, leaving LIVES, SCORE, TIME and HEALTH, which can be spread out a bit and made more prominent.

Under health maybe have a small graphic of your tank with 'xlives' under it. So if you had two lives, it would have a pic of the tank and x2 under the health bar. This would help associate your lives with your health. Put 'Time' in the centre top of the screen, and 'score' in the top left.

Gameplay wise I'm finding that rats don't always die when they go over a trap.

Some of your variables are not being reset - I'm currently playing it at -234 seconds on the timer.

Consider allowing the player to restart the level they just died on. Having played through to level 2, and then dying, I couldn't be bothered going through the whole of level one again just to play level 2. This is a personal thing with me - I'm averse to having to earn the right to play later levels I've already got to all over again! You could even have on the start screen a new option - start from level X - with X being the last screen you were on.

Right - that should be enough to keep you busy!

Hope it helps - really liking the game so far!

Cheers,

QS

JamesBoucher

Thank for the feedback. I will make alot of the changes (if not all). Tshirtbooth, sorry I did not give feedback on any of your games. I did play one of your games (find the difference one), and I like it. It's a simple, but fun game. I've not played anyother games in GameSalad. I will try to be more helpfull to others as they release their games.

JamesBoucher

Updates to Game

I made it so you do not have to hold the spacebar to fire. It fires ever time you hit the spacebar.

Traps will trap one rat at a time - ever time.

Reset game attributes should work when going back to MAIN by hitting the RETURN. This is done at START and GAME OVER screens.

I will work on HUD and tank control next.

rdcube

Hi JB,
It's a great game. I've played it a couple of times, only made it through a couple of levels.
The only constructive criticism I'll make is as tshirtbooth said, work on your graphics so the border doesn't show. Are you using png?

Also, I'm wondering, how did you accomplish this? Meaning, how did you learn the position of the tank and the aim to stay in the correct position?

I'm having a very hard time figuring out how to move my character by clicking on up,down,left & right and using the space bar to shoot. I would like to do something similar to yours. You just became my hero...besides QS and tshirtbooth

I followed the cave adventure template and got it to move, but every time I fire on any direction and turn around, the missile tries to go to the new direction (it does the same on the template). as an example, I move right and fire missile...then, I turn left and the missile turns and goes left. same issue for up and down. I haven't found a shoot and move instructions on the wiki either or a sample I can download to follow and learn.

I like game salad, I've followed since may, but barely until now I had time to sit and play with 0.5 beta.

I created a text attribute called 'direction'. All I do on every event is change the attribute to 'left,right,up,down' and reset to 'still' when is not moving, however, I do need to be able to fire when it's still on any direction...again, you just accomplish what I've been trying to learn in a couple of weeks.

Any feedback (screenshots, links) from anybody will surely be appreciated.

I'm gonna try to be a little more involved here on the forums and hope to provide feedback to all.

JamesBoucher

Just set a direction attribute and change it on the arrows for that actor. Also on that same actor have a rule that fires the direction of that attribute.

rdcube

I got it now. The deal was that I followed the template and the rules are on each actor to move.
I just move the rules to the main actor and got it to work. I don't know if it's the best way, but at least the missile stays on the correction direction.

Thanks!

JamesBoucher

Fixed a couple of other items based on suggestion.

Changed the HUD and added a pause button at the bottom left of the screen.
Fixed some of the images (Need to fix more).
Fixed problem with time reset.

I would also like to know if anyone has made it thru all ten levels? How many lives did it take? What was your score? Of course any bugs or suggestion to improve the game.

I've made it thru on four lives and scored 3911.

JamesBoucher

I was wonder what the farthest level anyone has made it to? Is the game to easy or to hard. Do I need to add more?