Initial reactions

[Delve]

Very nice. The graphics could use some cleanup, as they don't seem to mesh as well as the DoP graphics. Especially the menus but there's plenty of time for cosmetics.
Two small things, in the bestiary the keyboard arrows should turn the models, and holding down either the keys or the onscreen buttons should provide a continuous scroll.
In the keybindings menu there's a 'skill screen' option that defaulted blank. But unless I'm mistaken that would be the same screen you get for hitting 'C', no? Either way, it should either be removed if redundant, or given a default binding.
I only had a short play and wasn't looking too hard for flaws. I enjoyed it quite a bit, I like the Mario-esque use of instant powerups that you can essentialy queue up and use at will. Hoarders like me will have some adjusting to do. Was it just me, or does Rage seem to spawn rather more often than the rest? Of course, I've only played the first level once yet so it's probably just me. I assume the kill drops are randomized, are the barrel drops randomized, hand crafted, or a bit of both? I couldn't quite tell.

Some quick bullets:

• Temporary skill ups - good
• Completely abstract loot - good, reminds me of Bard's Tale
• Communist character progression - Good (despite my teminology! ) but it needs a reset option since some classes will doubtless play better with more emphasis on a specific feature
• Bonus point awards - good, I think an awards log would be pretty cool too, just some basic counters to indicate how many times you've achieved each award on a particular level

In what spare time I have I'll try and do some more useful testing

[Shadow]

Originally Posted by Delve

Was it just me, or does Rage seem to spawn rather more often than the rest? Of course, I've only played the first level once yet so it's probably just me.

Different powerups do have different spawn rates. Rage is in the common group so you will probably see it more often than some of the other powerups.

Originally Posted by Delve

I assume the kill drops are randomized, are the barrel drops randomized, hand crafted, or a bit of both? I couldn't quite tell.

The kill drops are all random. The barrel and chest drops can be either. If the level designer places an item or items next to the chest, the chest will spawn just those items. Otherwise, it is random.

[Delve]

Ah, that explains rage. And a bit of both for chest/barrel drops too, which is good. Are the kill drops random by creature type? Just curious.

I like the bestiary (my earlier comment about continuous rotation was faulty, but I'd still like to utilize the keyboard arrows as well ). I really like the fact that it plays the creature's standard vocalization when selected. Tres cool.

When I went to bed last night I had 3 points I wanted to talk about. Let's see if I can remember them all...
First, I can't get anywhere near the gold score in the first level. I must suck

Second, I like the awards and the bonus score systems. I wonder if it's possible to implement a scorecard to track applicable awards and bonuses by class and stage. In other words, keep track of the fact that I met the Peasant award requirements 5 times with Kivi in the first stage. Some awards don't make sense in this context of course (gem collecting for instance). I also think it's an awful lot of int juggling for what may be little percieved value.

Third, damage doesn't seem to scale well. I went into the first stage with an offense of 1 (with Kivi), and got (very!) lucky with weapon and skill drops. By the end I had an offense of 6 but I still couldn't one-hit the lowly trifling skeletons with any certainty. Maybe 50-70% were one-hits, and the rest took two. Zombies did seem rather easier to kill, taking 2-4 hits on average, but the scaling just felt off for such a dramatic increase in the offense stat. Is this intended, or some emergent quirk of the algorithm?

Three more things I found this morning. In the Fallen Giant stage there's a goblin fire thrower at the end of the stage, but it didn't register in my bestiary, which I found odd.
There's a typo in the dark elf description, it should be throne rather than thrown.
Finally, if you crash out of the game during the tutorial (I haven't tried exiting via the menu, I had to crash out) when you start it up with that same player again the popup tutorial boxes never trigger. It's probably a rare circumstance, but still something of a bug. Starting a new player and running the tut still works fine though.

All around, a nice solid game. It's not DoP, and that's great. There's plenty of imagination going on out there and I'm happy to see such a dramatic repurposing of the DoP engine. It bodes well for more future inovations. It may not be my favorite style, and there seems to be some of that sentiment elsewhere as well, but it's still fun and its fast pace is good for clearing the cobwebs out when I get sick of staring at Metro2 guidelines.

And I promise I'll start properly trying to break it soon. The new is slowly wearing off.

[Shadow]

Originally Posted by Delve

Are the kill drops random by creature type? Just curious.

Not really by type, but champions/uniques will drop more items on average.

Originally Posted by Delve

Third, damage doesn't seem to scale well. I went into the first stage with an offense of 1 (with Kivi), and got (very!) lucky with weapon and skill drops. By the end I had an offense of 6 but I still couldn't one-hit the lowly trifling skeletons with any certainty. Maybe 50-70% were one-hits, and the rest took two. Zombies did seem rather easier to kill, taking 2-4 hits on average, but the scaling just felt off for such a dramatic increase in the offense stat. Is this intended, or some emergent quirk of the algorithm?

Yes and no. We can't let you progress too fast since you get permanent points between adventures also. I'll look at it though.

Originally Posted by Delve

Three more things I found this morning. In the Fallen Giant stage there's a goblin fire thrower at the end of the stage, but it didn't register in my bestiary, which I found odd.

He's really not when fire throwers are introduced, just kind of a sneak preview.

Originally Posted by Delve

All around, a nice solid game. It's not DoP, and that's great. There's plenty of imagination going on out there and I'm happy to see such a dramatic repurposing of the DoP engine. It bodes well for more future inovations. It may not be my favorite style, and there seems to be some of that sentiment elsewhere as well, but it's still fun and its fast pace is good for clearing the cobwebs out when I get sick of staring at Metro2 guidelines.

That's what I'm going for. Any game we release with a new name should play pretty differently than anything else that we have shipped. I don't want any of our games to be too close to each other.

However, when we create an expansion or sequel type of game, it will be much similar in style to the original. For those games, we will always keep the core gameplay (like covenants and random, dynamic world for DoP). We will attempt to make it better of course and have some new innovations, but we won't stray too far from the original.

[Delve]

Originally Posted by Shadow

Yes and no. We can't let you progress too fast since you get permanent points between adventures also. I'll look at it though.

I can understand that. But I got 5 points through sheer luck dumped into offense. And it only lasted for the one adventure. I didn't really feel like I was getting full use of them.

Originally Posted by Shadow

He's really not when fire throwers are introduced, just kind of a sneak preview.

I understand. They're introduced in the next stage, but it still feels wierd. Probably because that's the first time that happens. Every creature up to that point appeared in the bestiary in the stage they were first seen in.

Originally Posted by Shadow

That's what I'm going for. Any game we release with a new name should play pretty differently than anything else that we have shipped. I don't want any of our games to be too close to each other.

However, when we create an expansion or sequel type of game, it will be much similar in style to the original. For those games, we will always keep the core gameplay (like covenants and random, dynamic world for DoP). We will attempt to make it better of course and have some new innovations, but we won't stray too far from the original.

I think that's absolutely the best way to do it. I don't deny that much improvement of the form has risen from the absolute glut of FPS shooters. But it's out of hand when everything a company produces is a retread with some minor improvements and a different graphic set.