My recent non-public release of Wildhollow (v0.2) has received some very interesting feedback. First of all, many seem to enjoy the art and the writing. Yayness! That’s actually pretty damn cool – I’ve been freetting over whether or not I’m a moron for putting so much emphasis on dialogue in the game. My reasoning is sound: Spandex Force received praise for its humorous writing, so this time I’m concentrating on much more of that. But it is a bit of a gamble. The audio received some mixed comments, but the only thing I really have to change is the typewriter sound in the dialogues. I agree that it’s a tad anachronistic in a fantasy game…but on the other hand I’ve added heavy metal songs for the dramatic scenes as well. What can I say, I like contrasts!

Other than that there are three worrying tendencies in the feedback: the minigames suck (I’m fixing that), the animal management needs to be improved (I’m fixing that)…and I have a sneaky suspicion that some people feel that there’s not enough guidance in the quests.

I’m all for easy-to-play games that one can pick up instantly. But Wildhollow requires you to read a lot of dialogue and deduce what to do based on that. I’ve done my best to have “quest hints” for each stage of the quests and have characters repeat important bits of information if they’re relevant to a quest, but there still might be a lot of exploration required to solve some of the puzzles.

I’m still on the fence whether or not this is a good thing. My initial response is “It’s a good thing, dammit! It encourages immersion and makes the quests flow naturally rather than appear forced.” But yesterday I played Rise of the Argonauts and now I’m not so sure anymore…

I consider myself a casual gamer, and Rise of the Argonauts is a pretty casual action RPG. I click some buttons, and the dude runs around like a scorched ferret, cutting and clubbing people all over the place. I love it! Epic violence, beautifully performed, that requires almost no skill at all. I don’t have to spend hours to learn how to do weird combos – they simply appear out of nowhere!

But all is not well in ancient Greece… The game gives almost no indication as to what I need to do next. I can’t be arsed to read all the text in an action game – I’m playing the game to spear people on my enormous barbeque stick! But if I skip too much I end up with my hero standing around looking dumb, and me sitting there feeling even more dumb. “So… Uh… What? What do I have to do now? Do I have to talk to someone? Is there a list of active quests? I don’t know what to do!”

Now, Wildhollow and Rise of the Argonauts aren’t comparable at all. Not in the very least, and not only because RotA is a frigging multi-million production. My choice to rely on text in Wildhollow is a major part of the design – it’s an integral part of the game. RotA’s focus is on action, with text added on. In Wildhollow you can quickly click around to try out things or talk to people; in RotA you have to physically move your character between the scenic vistas to see if this was where you needed to go…and retrace your steps if not. But at its core, Wildhollow relies on the player to explore to proceed – just like RotA.

I’ve been toying with the idea of adding graphic indicators for whom to talk to next, but… That feels cheap. It breaks the immersion. And it just might make the puzzles too easy. Another approach might be to make conversations pop up more often – make some NPCs initiate conversations on their own. That’s probably a better approach, but I’m still not sure if that would work. What I want is to make a game that’s easy to play and follow, but still not ridiculously simple or lacking in immersion.

Any suggestions for good games I ought to play to get inspiration for how to solve my dilemma?

No one?

Not a single suggestion?

Man, you suck.

For those of you who haven’t kept up with the important events of the world lately, a game called King’s Bounty: The Legend has been released. It’s not only the best game of 2008 according to my very scientific measure – it’s the best game I’ve played for years! I’m currenty on my second play-through; normally I spend an hour or two trying out a game, but this incredibly addictive game has kept me occupied for ~30 + ~35 hours! Yes, that’s an immense amount of time. It could explain my lack of blogging of late, and the slow progress on Wildhollow.

The reason I’m playing the game through twice is twofold:

1. I played it on normal difficulty first, so I have to play it on hard as well – to see how much harder the tactical battles are.
2. It’s a bloody brilliant game!

King’s Bounty: The Legend is the spiritual successor to the old 1990 game King’s Bounty. I’m saying spiritual since it quite obviously has nothing to do with the original aside from some superficial details. Like the name. And the fact that it’s a tactical strategy RPG. As much as I love the original I must say that it never captivated me to the same degree that KB:TL has stolen my spare time, my free will and my soul.

Why is KB:TL so good, then? Read this Rock, Paper, Shotgun article and tell me that you don’t want to play the game! But, aside from all the general weirdness and strange Russian humor, it’s simply an amazingly good game. You have to play just another battle. You have to see just where the next quest will lead you. You have to collect just another magic rune. The first time I played the game I think I played for 16 hours straight! I haven’t done that since I was a wee whippersnapper!

If you decide to play the game (and you should) I have some sage advice:

• Start playing as a paladin.  Paladins are cool: they have good leadership (which enables you to have large armies) and good magic as well. They also start with the resurrection spell which will help you conserve armies. Later you may want to play mage or warrior too; the playing styles are pretty different and offers varied experiences. (After I’ve finished the game on hard with a mage I’m going for an impossible game with a warrior.)
• Don’t worry too much about money if you start at a lower (below hard) difficulty level. You will have more than a cool million gold pieces to spare toward the end of the game either way. Unless you plain suck.
• People say that you shouldn’t travel too much between continents because it costs game time. They say that you should learn how to play with the armies available on each continent instead. I say screw that: if you find a good army setup that works, play with it until something better comes along! If it means riding the boat a few times too many – so what! It’s just affecting your end game score.
• But on the other hand, if you’re interested in getting a good score you should not only follow the advice above – you should also learn how to not lose any armies in battles. (It’s entirely possible to complete the entire game without losing a single army, but it’s ludicrously time demanding.)
• Complete the king’s quests quickly! And when you acquire the rage box, get the first two rage spirits quickly! You’ll thank me later.
• You can sneak around! You don’t have to fight everything, and it’s often quite worthwhile to grab all goodies before you start slaughtering polar bears and dwarves.
• Read the official forums. There are some great hints there, and also inspiration for different ways to play the game. Not to mention some good ol’ fashioned Internet drama now and then.

Order King’s Bounty: The Legend now and thank me later! Or, as it may be, curse me for stealing your precious time. See if you can match my best accomplishment so far: defeating Karador at level 20 on hard. (It’s nothing special, but it wasn’t easy.)

Now sod off. I have to gain a few levels before I can tackle Haas’ Labyrinth and finally get to the last area of the game. Again.

As a wee kiddo I used to play a lot of adventure games. First text adventures like Scott Adams’ Pirate Adventure, and old Infocom classics. Then I got hold of Maniac Mansion for the C64, and I was completely hooked on graphical adventure games. Prior to playing that game I had only stayed up all night reading books (ah, Dumas, how your stories caused me to lose my well-needed beauty sleep!), but I vividly recall being physically unable to quit playing Maniac Mansion. The clock struck midnight, and I desperately tried to escape the prison. The clock struck 2 AM and found me finally figuring out that the rusty key opened the car’s trunk. And so on.

After that point, having to write text in an adventure game seemed like a giant step backwards to me. That’s probably why I never was a big fan of the Sierra adventure games. I’ve played my fair share of King’s, Police and Space Quest, but they never captivated me the same way that Lucasarts did with their magnificent opii. (Did you know that I’m trying to be ironic with my misuse of the word opii, and that the plural of opus is actually opuses or opera? And did you know that opii is the genitive form of opium in singular? Sweet mother of crap, I’m pretentious today!)

Still, I tried to enjoy Quest for Glory (or Hero’s Quest as I knew it) because I loved the idea of mixing an RPG with an adventure game. I never got very far, though; it was too cumbersome to type everything. So my fascination with the QfG series died in its cradle.

Boy, did I miss out.

Check this out. One guy is attempting to play all Quest for Glory games completely through, and is documenting it all on YouTube. (This is the very first one; he has over a hundred more clips.)

This has to be one of the coolest things ever. Evah! It’s thanks to his efforts that I’m rediscovering the QfG games, and its wonderfully witty punny humour. I don’t really do puns myself but I thoroughly appreciate reading the plethora of witticisms in the Quest games. “I forgot my Visa in the desert.” “We don’t take Dinar’s Club here.” …Just awful. In an awesome way.

These last days I’ve seen quite a few articles on the ‘net mentioning MySpace’s recent “Data Availability” program which will make them share data with, among others, Yahoo and Twitter. This revelation is often mentioned alongside DataPortability, a framework for combining information from different social networking sites. I’m all for solutions like this; I love the thought of having data being accessible from everywhere (as long as it’s in a controlled manner). Not that I see much point in it, myself – I can easily add what’s needed manually to the few social networking sites I’m active on. But I love the idea.

One problem is that this is yet another attempt at creating an open standard that can be used by anyone and everyone. I’m sure that DataPortability thinks that it’s special and unique and brings something new into the disarrayed online world…but I’m also sure that OpenSocial feels the same way, just as FriendFeed and who knows how many others. Looking at DataPortability’s FAQ page it seems that they are aware of the problem of constantly re-inventing new standards; they want to use existing standards effectively instead. …But in a controlled manner. According to their recommendations. …Which sounds like they are trying to impose a standard, after all. One good thing about DataPortability is the fact that they won’t try to make a centralized storage point for all data – unlike FriendFeed, which sounds like utter bollocks.

Anyway, good luck to all of them, and I’m not stupid enough to look a gift horse in the mouth: if DataPortability (or some other standard) becomes a wide-spread way of sharing data I’ll definitely look into how I could use it in upcoming projects. For example…Spandex Force 2. I could imagine some cool uses such as importing personal information into the game, accessing photos that can be converted into an in-game avatar pic, or sharing pictures of impressive victories. Amongst other things.

I suspect that this could even be used for cross-game character data. It’s the old utopian dream that fanboys have yearned about for years and years: imagine that you’re playing an RPG and that you’re pretty fond of Mr. Fagball (as your character might be called). Then you want to play another RPG – or even a game of a completely different genre – and you could now have the option of using Mr. Fagball in that game as well! Yayness! Of course, it would probably work like utter crap if it was implemented badly, but I could imagine that static character traits could be shared even though game-specific data isn’t.

For example, if Mr. Fagball is a character in an RPG his STR stat might be at 16. Even if this would be possible to translate into strength in a strategy game, it might be completely ludicrous – the strategy game could become totally broken. However, if the RPG game stored information about Mr. Fagball’s pot-bellied appearance, that could (possibly) be of use in the strategy game as well. Like a cross-platform Mii. Except that this sharing wouldn’t have to stop at mere appearance; if data was gathered through social sites as well, personal information could be utilized by the game in order to make an uncannily scary experience.

“Give it up, Moop-Gleez! Your evil plans are brought to an end!”
“So, Mr. Fagball… You have come to destroy me? I think not – I know your weakness! You made out with Patrick’s sister last weekend, and if you don’t throw down your sword right now I’ll e-mail him and tell!”
“NOOOOO!”

PopCap, developer and publisher of casual hit games such as Bejeweled, Peggle and Bookworm Adventures, have funded a study that shows that playing casual games relieves stress and improves your mood. Maybe I’m just a tad cynical, but my initial response to that is a raised eyebrow and a “no excrement” look on my face. I’m not really surprised that playing a cute casual game results in joy and less stress. Isn’t that pretty much the whole point?

And wait a second… This study was funded by PopCap? Hm… If I were a bit more cynical I would almost suspect that the study is intended to point out the obvious, and that they’re doing this purely for PR reasons. Especially since the games mentioned are - wait for it - Bejeweled 2, Peggle and Bookworm Adventures. But that couldn’t be the case, could it?

Also, I really don’t think there’s enough data present in the press release or in the slides accompanying it. It’s little things, like the following snippet:

In all cases, the changes in stress levels and mood were measured in comparison to a control group that experienced a Web-based activity similar in physical and mental nature to the game-playing groups.

Exactly what Web-based activity was this? And how can they assert that it’s similar in physical and mental nature? A similar mental nature would be something intended to stimulate positively, like…um…a game. Which would mean that they played a web game instead of a downloadable game? And how exactly are they confirming that the physical natures are the same? Playing a game is a much more involved experience for me than just, for example, browsing the net; even if they per definition both involve moving the mouse and sitting on my ass, the physical experiences are subtly different.

But seriously, the study was interesting and confirmed my intuitive belief that games help me relax. And there’s probably loads more information in the actual paper for those who wish to check up details about the study. That wouldn’t be me, though – I prefer to complain.

Either way, go casual games for making us all relaxed and happy! Now I feel like playing some Magic Farm.

Recently I wrote a little rant in which I complained about hidden object games. “They’re linear,” I grumbled, “and dull and static and they make no sense!” I went on to analyze the genre a little and came up with a hypothesis: I hate hidden object games for two reasons:

1. They’re too dull and you end up spending too long on a single static screen.
2. They’re too linear and don’t allow for experimentation and exploration.

Well, after playing Dream Chronicles 2 I have to revise my theory somewhat. I’d never played the first game, and I don’t think I will…but I’ll definitely keep an eye out for the third part whenever it arrives, ’cause DC2 was actually fun! *Gasp shock*

This is Dream Chronicles 1, but really, does it matter? It’s just here to give you a picture to look at, so you don’t get bored halfway.

Yes, the game is pretty much a hidden object game. Yes, the game features lots of static screens where you have to find the objects in order to proceed. But, and this is a big but, there’s a small amount of exploration involved and the storyline actually makes a little sense! The story isn’t groundbreaking in any way: your husband and daughter have been captured by the queen of the fairies, and it’s up to you to first escape the fairy prison, then find help in the mortal realm, and finally rescue your hubby plus daughter. Nothing new there, but there’s good pacing, and there are optional minigames that reveal even more of the story.

The biggest benefit of the storyline is that the whole fairy setting makes the puzzles and object searching somewhat more plausible, though. Fairies are notorious for being nasty critters who play mindgames and mess up people in various cruel and unusual ways. It makes perfect sense that, in order to battle a fairy queen, the player has to face a number of diabolical puzzles! I can’t say the same for Cate West and a bunch of other hidden object games I’ve played, so this definitely makes DC2 more bearable in comparison.

But the best thing about the game is probably that it doesn’t feel like a hidden object game. It’s not until you’ve passed a number of puzzles that you slowly get the sinking suspicion that you’re indeed playing something hidden-ish. “Heeey, wait a minute! I’m clicking around the screen looking for bits and pieces! Isn’t this…”

When I realized what I was doing I still kept going though, because there’s a major design choice that makes DC2 different from the other hidden object games: there is not a single timer in the entire game. Seriously, there is not a single static screen where you’re faced with an hourglass and a ridiculously large number of minutes you have in order to find a ridiculously large number of irrelevant objects. The game is completely un-timed which makes it tolerable even to me. And – thank Dog – there’s no penalty for clicking around wildly either.

Granted, those two facts make the game easier. But I would rather play an easy game that I’m actually interested in completing, than a 30-hour long game that makes me frustrated, annoyed and bored at every turn. Go, KatGames, go! Keep up the good work!

Hat-trick! I haven’t been blogging much lately, but today it’s the third day in a row! And I have a very interesting topic to bring up: hidden object games, and why I hate them.

First things first: hidden object is a genre that give you a screen cluttered with items, and it’s up to you to find all the correct ones within a certain time limit. That’s it. Seriously, that’s it…and still, people love these games. A few days ago I tried a number of popular titles such as Cate West: Can’t Remember the Rest of the Name, and Big City Adventure: Sydney, Australia. I had tried a number of these games about a year ago, and expected that a lot had changed. But no, it’s still almost the exact same gameplay. The presentation was brilliant, but the gameplay didn’t fascinate me at all.

Okay, I have to admit that there have been some changes: today’s games often feature heaps and heaps of different kinds of minigames in between the find-the-object screens, and these minigames are often very fun and exciting. Unlike the main screens.

Back to my dislike of these find-the-object screens. At first I thought that it was a fluke that these games did well, but it seems pretty proven that people love this style of game; and the point was driven home to me just when I was getting fed up with Abra Academy: Returning Cast after 15 minutes. I’m paraphrasing the conversation that occurred:

“Sweet mother of f-ck! I’m so bored at this game! I’m uninstalling this right now!”
“Hey, what’re you playing? Let me see.”
*Click click*
“Okay, are you done now? Seen enough?”
“Wait a sec…”
*Click click click click*
“Come on! I’m bored! I want to do something else!”
“No, wait! I have to finish this level!”
*Click click click…*

To my amazement I saw someone get instantly hooked by the game I was bored to tears with!

I started thinking about why I don’t like the gameplay, and I think it can be summed up in two things:

1. I really really don’t like spending too much time just looking at a single screen.
2. Too linear. I get very annoyed when I have to find ten random objects for no apparent reason. Adding a thin story on top of the game doesn’t help; I don’t see a reason why I can’t pick up any other similar objects, or try different things to find out which objects I really need. I think it smells too much of someone ordering me what to do, when I want to decide the best path for myself.

Now, time for an interlude. My new game, with the working name Wildhollow, will be a sim/management/adventure game where the main goal is to breed exciting (and valuable) new breeds of animals that you can sell. However, in order to do so you need to bring new genetic material to your stock. That’s where the adventuring aspects enter.

At first I thought of something along the lines of Harvest Moon. You’d breed animals and, once you have young animals, you could bring them along to travel the world and expose them to various mutagens give them new characteristics by magical means. This would be how you evolve your stock and eventually breed the most valuable animals. But I soon dropped that idea; it sounds pretty far-fetched to carry around your animals, and it would cost a lot to make everything animated like that.

Instead, the current game design revolves around static screens. You have a world map where new locations will be revealed continuously; at first you may only see your farm where you can watch your animals run around and play, and a nearby town where you can buy new goods, talk to people, or find items that are lying around. Talking to people and finding the correct items will eventually lead to other places, and the world will expand to show more people and items and even more locations. This is quite obviously derived from adventure games.

But all of the sudden something struck me: one thing that you always do in an adventure game is to look for items half-hidden in the background. Just like in the hidden object games. It may be an obvious connection to you, but for me it was slight shock realizing that a genre I love share features with a genre I cannot stand.

And the irony grows even more: just the other week I was asked if I’m pondering a hidden object game for my next project. “Not at all!” I replied. ….But I probably will end up with some hidden objects in my game. It kind of annoys me to think that when Wildhollow is finished there’s bound to be people comparing it to hidden object games, even though the inspiration comes from completely different places.

Since I’ve issued yet another press release regarding Spandex Force I might as well show it here as well. This regards the awesome Spandex Force photo contest that I’ve announced!

The actual press release follows:

To celebrate the upcoming release of the superhero-themed puzzle RPG Spandex Force, independent game developer KarjaSoft have announced a heroic photo contest.

Bring out your halloween costume and submit a photo of yourself dressed up as a superhero! Five copies of Spandex Force will be given to the funniest, most original and overall best entries. Extra credit will be given for inventive superhero names and an amusing background story for the hero. For more information and a couple of inspirational example photos, go to:

http://www.spandexforce.com/contest.php

“I couldn’t find any disgustingly tight spandex for the example photos,” laments Miro Karjalainen, owner of KarjaSoft. “But you can see me pose as Prince Harming and the Dubious Desperado at least.”

The last day to submit an entry is February 14, and winners will be announced on February 16.

Spandex Force is a tongue-in-cheek puzzle game with RPG elements, available for Windows and Mac. For screenshots and downloads of the beta version of Spandex Force, visit:

http://www.spandexforce.com

Come on - send me a picture at contest@karjasoft.com!

I’m sure you’re dying to know how people have reacted to the Spandex Force beta which was released recently. I sure am, at least! Or, I would be if I didn’t already know.

Overall, I must say that I’m pleased with the reception. I’ve received positive feedback, and people do seem to enjoy the game. Sales from the game’s webpage are up to what Sheeplings sold during six months; granted, I poured more into this second game, but it’s still going better than I thought. I wonder what will happen when I announce the proper release in a little while, along with a photo contest! (Intrigued? You should be. Stay tuned for more information!)

Other positive notes include that the game is mentioned on Gamershell, IGN, Gamespy and other news sites. Still no whisper about it on Gamespot, despite a press release I sent there, but maybe that will change after the real release. Other places have also picked up news about the game; for example Lesbian Gamers and Gay Gamer. Hmm… I wonder if it has something to do with the spandex?

As for feedback, most of what I’ve received comes from forums and e-mails. I won’t toot my own horn, but the concept seems to work very well, and the variation in the minigames works its magic for most people. But – as always – there’s just no pleasing everybody. Here is a list of user reviews, and Spandex Force has received both praise and scorn. And speaking of more scorn, here’s a scathing review from Rock, Paper, Shotgun. I was initially crushed until I started analysing the complaints and compared them to the positive feedback I’ve received. I’m first to admit that my game isn’t as “good” (subjective term of course) as Puzzle Quest; I don’t have the budget or the time for that amount of polish. But I’m not competing directly against Puzzle Quest either - I’m targeting another set of customers. Sure, there’s some overlap – myself for example! I like both casual games and hardcore RPGs. But while Puzzle Quest is aimed at the RPG crowd, my intention is to bring something exciting to the casual crowd instead.

I doubt that this is obvious, though, so I think I’ll have to be prepared for some bad reviews coming up comparing Spandex Force unfavourably to Puzzle Quest.

Back to more positive things, I received a request for a Linux version of the game, and I figured that it shouldn’t be much of a problem. True enough, I’ve done some initial testing and I think I can get it to run on Ubuntu at least. I’ll probably only support Ubuntu, and then have a “see if it works for you – good if it does” clause for other distributions. There’s no way I’m going to offer support for multiple distributions – Linux is simply too problematic. I don’t think I’ll actually gain much from having a Linux version either, but it’s a good learning experience at least. Incidentally, the person asking for a Linux version also mentioned that this game would fit well on Nintendo DS, and even supplied a hint about a publisher working with DS. I’ll see how the game is received after the release, but hey – who knows. Thinking about playing my own game on a DS almost makes me come. Not that you wanted to know that. And not that it’ll happen. But it sure would be nice…

Anyway, I’m feeling positive about the upcoming release. I’ve optimized the game a little, sorted out a Mac bug, received many suggestions for improvements, and the game is slowly coming together properly. The biggest thing left is to playtest the game thoroughly and balance it even more. I really hope people will be pleased about the game’s length – I anticipate that it’s well over 8 hours game play in it, and quite possibly more along the lines of dozens of hours. That may sound cool to you, but for me it sounds like damn hard work, playing through the whole game….again….and again.

The title is from my press release announcing that Spandex Force is officially in beta stage now. It’s been noted that this press release seems slightly confused. “Okay, the game is in beta and they [that is, I] would like to hear comments and suggestions what to do before the final release… But the game itself doesn’t mention much about being in beta state, and you can buy the game! What’s up with this?”

Well… I think the terminology has gotten a bit confused, and I’ve been forced to apply the beta label without much thought. First of all, I was only releasing test builds up to 0.4; people tested it and gave feedback. Not much more to that. But after 0.4 I decided to set up the order page, since a few people had expressed interest in purchasing the game. But lo and behold! It appears that when I accepted affiliates for Sheeplings I’d unthinkingly allowed some people to be affiliates for all my games – which meant that Spandex Force became available for them to sell as well!

One thing led to another, and before I knew it I was receiving traffic from a few sites; quite a few downloads in fact. That’s when I decided to release 0.5 – an in-between release that’s fully playable and corrects most issues - and decided to call it the official beta. I didn’t want people to believe that 0.4 or 0.5 was the final version of the game, so I decided to make a press release to state that there will come a newer version later. But of course, the game itself doesn’t care much about what label I’ve put on it – it just happily states its version number.

So I guess people who expected the game to be more opaque about being in “alpha,” “beta” or “final” are a tad confused.

Either way, the game is both in beta and for sale; I don’t see a conflict there. It’s playable and enjoyable to the end as it is, and those who buy the game now get the current full version as well as the final release once it’s done!