October Update: What Did Our First Alpha Test Teach Us?
[h2]Update Blog: What did Our First Alpha Test Teach Us?[/h2]
Well, it’s been a while since I’ve written a blog, and that’s because we’ve been very busy with our first alpha test. Overall, we got a ton of information that I believe will really help AotSS become the game it was designed to be. So, getting straight to the point, there are 4 things that we really took away from players, of which we'll dive into the first 2 points in more detail today.
1) The game needs to give more information to the player. Again and again, players wished that there were more tooltips, more popups, more everything to explain things.
2) The game systems need to be explained better. Similar to the above point, players had difficulty understanding some of the more esoteric systems like the claim system and trade.
3) The game needs to be more stable. As an evolving professional game developer, I fell into the trap of adding new features and hoping I would have time to fix any issues later. The good news is that I was able to fix over 120 bugs during the alpha. The bad news, of course, is that there were 120 bugs to find.
4) The Houses and Characters are important, but the game is about you. The primary conceit of AotSS is that it tells the story of you, a new Emperor, far from home, trying to rally your fading Empire against an existential threat. Players told us that they wanted more of that feeling in the game.
Let’s go over these points in more detail, and talk about our plan to address them.
The game needs to give more information to the player. After long-playing the game for dozens of turns, and reviewing the feedback from players, it is clear that much more information is needed for the player. This is on 3 levels, basically:
• What can I do right now (i.e. the screen that I’m on) and is it clear (and easy) to find?
• How are numbers/statuses/issues explained? How can I fix them, and do I have the information to do so?
• I want a compendium of information (i.e. planets, all systems, all military Forces, etc). Where can I get an overview of things?
As the game stands, we’re improving the first point but woefully behind the second and third. So to address the first point, we’re improving the flow of how you do things in the game. Currently, you can do Actions (with Characters) or Projects (with Planets/Systems), as well as interact with your Nexii and special Tactical Modes for things like sending your grand vizier to planets, commanding your military, etc. But currently things are very spread out and you have to go numerous places to do things in the game. So what we’re going to do is the following:
• Remove all Planet Projects. Planets in particular will be de-detailed in order to place the emphasis on systems and provinces (i.e. top down management). Instead, many Projects will be moved to the System level and the rest will be converted into Planetary Actions. They will be one-button Actions that cost 1 AP (Action Point) and a set number of materials/energy to do, but you won’t have to set them up like a Project, and many will be accessible from the system box on the System View.
• Emphasize working through your Primes. Each Prime is responsible for a specific part of your Empire (military, financial, science, intel, domestic) and should be worked through in order to accomplish things within the Empire. This will require a fairly extensive UI rework so stay tuned!
• Add One-Click Actions wherever possible. This means that if you want to, say, scout a planet or system, you will have a button right at that view that says ‘Scouting Options’ and from there you can either send a probe or a Scout Force to that system or planet. You will still see the required materials/energy but it will not cost ADM or Characters to enact. Below is an example of how that will work on the System View:
This is the updated System View. Here you can see an outpost, as well as several developed planets. Depending on the view mode, you will be able to directly command Planets and do things like scout, colonize, create an outpost, and abandon colony/outpost straight from this screen! Previously, you would need to select the planet, go to the Projects Screen, find the right category, and select the Project, and then find a Leader and Contributors to the Projects. As a new player, this sequence was not clear. Going forward, if we can show the player their options directly from a higher-level screen, we will!
Here is a System View of an unexploited System (meaning nothing has been built) Notice that you now get a description of the type of planet so that you can see whether it'd be worth it to Scout further with Probes (going forward, Scout Forces can only scout Planets to Medium Intel) but again, you can do it straight from this screen without ever having to enter Planet View. In addition, we have added a toggle that shows stellar information (what you see above) and system intel (what you see in the top pic) so that you can now see mineral, energy, bio, and planet traits even on a developed planet - something that you previously had to piece together from the Planet View, Overview Mode, and review the Regions.
Everything we do in the next several builds has to pass this basic question: Is it easier for the player to do it this way? If it isn't, it's getting scrapped or redesigned. We optimally want one-level functionality, two at the very most for complex interactions.
So that’s our plan for the first bullet point. The second (how are numbers/statuses/issues explained) will be accomplished with a combination of a redesign of the system and planet screens and through extensive, context-sensitive tooltips. For example, your yearly budget is generated through the sum of your Provinces’ Gross Products, which is derived from its Systems, which is itself derived from the system Planets. But did you know that there is an efficiency loss with each level of taxation collection? A tooltip on both the GPP Value on the main UI and information about the GPP on planet/system/province views showing how that value is derived is essential. Basically, any derived number on a main UI needs a specific tooltip explaining how that number is derived.
Finally, to the compendium. We have several quasi-compendium views (Character Nexus, Stellar Nexus) but they really don’t work in table form. In other words, I have no way to simply view all the planets in my empire, or my systems, or the uninhabited ones that might have the highest energy levels among the scouted planets. We will be adding expanded functionality to the Stellar Nexus that shows much more information about planets, systems, provinces, and constellations in sorted and tabbed table form.
On to opportunity 2!
The game systems need to be explained better. What this basically means is that we need a better tutorial and in-game help system. We do have a good in-game Encyclopedia, but it needs to be expanded with pictures/video, and we need to build off the systems that we have in-game. So here are the changes we’ll be making with the next few builds:
• Streamlining the guided tutorial greatly. An overriding piece of feedback we got was the ‘handhold’ tutorial was too long, too boring and too ineffective at what it was supposed to do; i.e. introduce the player to the basic concepts of the game. As a result, we’re going to shorten it considerably and limit it to the main concepts (like Power/AP) and the UI.
• The guided game was a success, and we’re going to keep that, but expand it (it will eventually have 5 chapters) to cover all of the game systems. We’re also going to add…
• Guided Tutorial Popups. We started this system in previous versions of AotSS, where your Grand Vizier would pop up whenever you entered a new screen or system and explain it briefly, but we ditched it when we added the full tutorial. After feedback, we’re going to reintroduce this system in conjunction with the guided game. That way, the player will get an experience like this:
o They are supposed to add a Character to their Circle of Trust, so they have to find an appropriate character with a certain Power and improve their relationship to at least Allies.
o When they open the Character Nexus (which will be a subtask), they will get a popup similar to the guided tutorial with overlays showing what to click and how this particular screen works, so that they get a small guided experience WHEN THEY NEED IT IN THE GAME. This is key and should alleviate the ‘firehose’ feeling a lot of players got.
o Once they review the mini-guide, it will not popup again unless they click on an icon on the window to replay it.
o For smaller screens, there won’t be ‘guided’ tutorials but simply text boxes explaining what you are seeing right now. You will just have to close the window to proceed.
• Larger concepts will have more extensive encyclopedia help. As an example, the trade system is quite detailed and complex under the hood, but a combination of poor UI showing what is happening and a lack of explanation left most players unable to fully grasp its intricacies. So the Encyclopedia will have a broad category for each major system, say ‘TRADE SYSTEM’ from where players will be able to access different aspects of that system, say ‘TRADE ZONES’ and see a short video or picture explaining that concept. In this way, players can self-teach themselves or review more detailed information about concepts. Concepts that will get this treatment will be Trade, Economy, Science, Military, Claims and Exploiting Planets, Projects, Actions, and Plots and Intel.
Well, this has already grown quite long so I’ll end it here. I’ll post a follow-up blog shortly reviewing the next 2 points. If you’ve made it this far, thanks… and you know we have a plan!!
-Steve
Well, it’s been a while since I’ve written a blog, and that’s because we’ve been very busy with our first alpha test. Overall, we got a ton of information that I believe will really help AotSS become the game it was designed to be. So, getting straight to the point, there are 4 things that we really took away from players, of which we'll dive into the first 2 points in more detail today.
1) The game needs to give more information to the player. Again and again, players wished that there were more tooltips, more popups, more everything to explain things.
2) The game systems need to be explained better. Similar to the above point, players had difficulty understanding some of the more esoteric systems like the claim system and trade.
3) The game needs to be more stable. As an evolving professional game developer, I fell into the trap of adding new features and hoping I would have time to fix any issues later. The good news is that I was able to fix over 120 bugs during the alpha. The bad news, of course, is that there were 120 bugs to find.
4) The Houses and Characters are important, but the game is about you. The primary conceit of AotSS is that it tells the story of you, a new Emperor, far from home, trying to rally your fading Empire against an existential threat. Players told us that they wanted more of that feeling in the game.
Let’s go over these points in more detail, and talk about our plan to address them.
The game needs to give more information to the player. After long-playing the game for dozens of turns, and reviewing the feedback from players, it is clear that much more information is needed for the player. This is on 3 levels, basically:
• What can I do right now (i.e. the screen that I’m on) and is it clear (and easy) to find?
• How are numbers/statuses/issues explained? How can I fix them, and do I have the information to do so?
• I want a compendium of information (i.e. planets, all systems, all military Forces, etc). Where can I get an overview of things?
As the game stands, we’re improving the first point but woefully behind the second and third. So to address the first point, we’re improving the flow of how you do things in the game. Currently, you can do Actions (with Characters) or Projects (with Planets/Systems), as well as interact with your Nexii and special Tactical Modes for things like sending your grand vizier to planets, commanding your military, etc. But currently things are very spread out and you have to go numerous places to do things in the game. So what we’re going to do is the following:
• Remove all Planet Projects. Planets in particular will be de-detailed in order to place the emphasis on systems and provinces (i.e. top down management). Instead, many Projects will be moved to the System level and the rest will be converted into Planetary Actions. They will be one-button Actions that cost 1 AP (Action Point) and a set number of materials/energy to do, but you won’t have to set them up like a Project, and many will be accessible from the system box on the System View.
• Emphasize working through your Primes. Each Prime is responsible for a specific part of your Empire (military, financial, science, intel, domestic) and should be worked through in order to accomplish things within the Empire. This will require a fairly extensive UI rework so stay tuned!
• Add One-Click Actions wherever possible. This means that if you want to, say, scout a planet or system, you will have a button right at that view that says ‘Scouting Options’ and from there you can either send a probe or a Scout Force to that system or planet. You will still see the required materials/energy but it will not cost ADM or Characters to enact. Below is an example of how that will work on the System View:
This is the updated System View. Here you can see an outpost, as well as several developed planets. Depending on the view mode, you will be able to directly command Planets and do things like scout, colonize, create an outpost, and abandon colony/outpost straight from this screen! Previously, you would need to select the planet, go to the Projects Screen, find the right category, and select the Project, and then find a Leader and Contributors to the Projects. As a new player, this sequence was not clear. Going forward, if we can show the player their options directly from a higher-level screen, we will!
Here is a System View of an unexploited System (meaning nothing has been built) Notice that you now get a description of the type of planet so that you can see whether it'd be worth it to Scout further with Probes (going forward, Scout Forces can only scout Planets to Medium Intel) but again, you can do it straight from this screen without ever having to enter Planet View. In addition, we have added a toggle that shows stellar information (what you see above) and system intel (what you see in the top pic) so that you can now see mineral, energy, bio, and planet traits even on a developed planet - something that you previously had to piece together from the Planet View, Overview Mode, and review the Regions.
Everything we do in the next several builds has to pass this basic question: Is it easier for the player to do it this way? If it isn't, it's getting scrapped or redesigned. We optimally want one-level functionality, two at the very most for complex interactions.
So that’s our plan for the first bullet point. The second (how are numbers/statuses/issues explained) will be accomplished with a combination of a redesign of the system and planet screens and through extensive, context-sensitive tooltips. For example, your yearly budget is generated through the sum of your Provinces’ Gross Products, which is derived from its Systems, which is itself derived from the system Planets. But did you know that there is an efficiency loss with each level of taxation collection? A tooltip on both the GPP Value on the main UI and information about the GPP on planet/system/province views showing how that value is derived is essential. Basically, any derived number on a main UI needs a specific tooltip explaining how that number is derived.
Finally, to the compendium. We have several quasi-compendium views (Character Nexus, Stellar Nexus) but they really don’t work in table form. In other words, I have no way to simply view all the planets in my empire, or my systems, or the uninhabited ones that might have the highest energy levels among the scouted planets. We will be adding expanded functionality to the Stellar Nexus that shows much more information about planets, systems, provinces, and constellations in sorted and tabbed table form.
On to opportunity 2!
The game systems need to be explained better. What this basically means is that we need a better tutorial and in-game help system. We do have a good in-game Encyclopedia, but it needs to be expanded with pictures/video, and we need to build off the systems that we have in-game. So here are the changes we’ll be making with the next few builds:
• Streamlining the guided tutorial greatly. An overriding piece of feedback we got was the ‘handhold’ tutorial was too long, too boring and too ineffective at what it was supposed to do; i.e. introduce the player to the basic concepts of the game. As a result, we’re going to shorten it considerably and limit it to the main concepts (like Power/AP) and the UI.
• The guided game was a success, and we’re going to keep that, but expand it (it will eventually have 5 chapters) to cover all of the game systems. We’re also going to add…
• Guided Tutorial Popups. We started this system in previous versions of AotSS, where your Grand Vizier would pop up whenever you entered a new screen or system and explain it briefly, but we ditched it when we added the full tutorial. After feedback, we’re going to reintroduce this system in conjunction with the guided game. That way, the player will get an experience like this:
o They are supposed to add a Character to their Circle of Trust, so they have to find an appropriate character with a certain Power and improve their relationship to at least Allies.
o When they open the Character Nexus (which will be a subtask), they will get a popup similar to the guided tutorial with overlays showing what to click and how this particular screen works, so that they get a small guided experience WHEN THEY NEED IT IN THE GAME. This is key and should alleviate the ‘firehose’ feeling a lot of players got.
o Once they review the mini-guide, it will not popup again unless they click on an icon on the window to replay it.
o For smaller screens, there won’t be ‘guided’ tutorials but simply text boxes explaining what you are seeing right now. You will just have to close the window to proceed.
• Larger concepts will have more extensive encyclopedia help. As an example, the trade system is quite detailed and complex under the hood, but a combination of poor UI showing what is happening and a lack of explanation left most players unable to fully grasp its intricacies. So the Encyclopedia will have a broad category for each major system, say ‘TRADE SYSTEM’ from where players will be able to access different aspects of that system, say ‘TRADE ZONES’ and see a short video or picture explaining that concept. In this way, players can self-teach themselves or review more detailed information about concepts. Concepts that will get this treatment will be Trade, Economy, Science, Military, Claims and Exploiting Planets, Projects, Actions, and Plots and Intel.
Well, this has already grown quite long so I’ll end it here. I’ll post a follow-up blog shortly reviewing the next 2 points. If you’ve made it this far, thanks… and you know we have a plan!!
-Steve