[Dev Note] Puzzling Times?!

Greetings, Survivors!

Since sharing our concerns last week, we have been going over your feedback to determine what is essential and exploring the best solutions for those issues.

Today, we would like to share how we see the issue that many of you have pointed out - that the game feels less like a Tactical RPG and more like a puzzle game. After sharing our thoughts we’d love to get your perspective and feedback.



The “Tile Puzzle,” where you need to push and pull on a grid-based system and utilize the attack range of weapons, is one of the key gameplay identities. Gameplay here involves considering actions such as pushing with a shoulder bash, using grappling hooks, barricades, bursting Blisters to damage enemies or finding ways to avoid the Skulker's counterattacks.

When we received the feedback that "it feels like a puzzle game," we wondered, "Should we just accept that many people don't like the core gameplay, and if so, what can we do about it?".

However, after more thoroughly checking opinions, it seemed that the issue was not with the core fun mentioned above but rather that “this game is like a puzzle where the developer has set a solution, making it impossible to progress if you don't find it,” in other words, "the solutions feel limited.”

We believe this problem ultimately stems from the linear structure and the small number of stages.

1. Each main stage assumes that you have already learned the concepts introduced in the previous stages and introduces new concepts to increase the fun.
   
2. If you cannot immediately grasp and fully utilize a concept, you will repeatedly die and retry since you are forced back to the checkpoint upon death.
   
3. However, there are no “sub-stages” where you can learn the rules of the game through trial and error.
   

For example, in the case of the “Blister,” we have prepared some “solutions.” Using the most basic starting weapon, the “Wooden Pitchfork,” you can push and burst the Blister at a distance of one tile. If there is another enemy right behind the Blister, you can stay safe by pushing or grappling away. Weapons such as the “Shovel,” can be used to push other creatures into the Blister. We have prepared these solutions according to our own interpretation.

Furthermore, the decision to not to use resources like WP/TP when changing weapons was intended to allow for the free use of these various solutions in diverse situations. Since there is a certain degree of randomness in the situation each time enemies sound the alarm, it is challenging to have a “developer-prescribed solution” at a specific moment.



However, based on observations since the start of Early Access, it was clear that in order to utilize these “free solutions,” players needed to grasp the rules of the game, skills of all characters, and weapons thoroughly. The point at which players' understanding of the game reached the intended level was at least around the 4th stage, “Barracks,” or the next stage, “Grocery Store.”

In essence, players who faced excessive pressure without sufficient time to become familiar with the game felt that the experience was more akin to a “Twenty Questions puzzle” rather than a tactical game where “various solutions” could be freely employed.

Therefore, in our analysis, maintaining the pressure of features such as the Infested like the “Blister” and the pursuit design of main stages, while placing intermediate difficulty maps between the current ones, could be a good approach. These maps would serve as a kind of “choice” for players.



Not only would there be an increase in the volume of the game, but players would also be given time to become more familiar with the game mechanics. This would allow them to understand the “various solutions” more effectively.

Of course, we do not want these “intermediate stages” to be seen as either an “easygoing area” or, conversely, as “boring stages essential for growth.” Unlike the main stages that require a kind of “comprehensive game understanding,” we believe that designing tactical levels that clearly demand “one or two specific mechanisms” would be a better direction.

Furthermore, since applying such solutions is practically challenging in the current linear map creation method, resolving the issue of “linear structure” mentioned in the previous post is considered a prerequisite task for addressing this problem.

[h3]In conclusion…[/h3]
Throughout development, we set and tested these hypotheses within the team. However, since players have pointed out these issues in Early Access, we believe it's essential to directly ask whether our interpretation of the problem is correct.

By doing so, we aim to reduce the risk of our focus heading in the wrong direction and seek opinions on potential issues in other directions that we may not have considered.

While we said we would provide details about short-term update plans, we find this matter as crucial as linearity and so decided to organize our thoughts on this topic first.

The build incorporating the short-term update content is currently undergoing QA to ensure stability. If there are any important questions like today’s issue next week, we'll address that first. Otherwise, we plan to provide a detailed explanation of the update content.

Thanks as always!