Hi there,

This week we made our final steps towards our first sprint. After last week, we learned that we still had to make some changes to our prototype. The controls were not user friendly and our small level didn't give us a realistic testing field. So we decided to switch it up.

Gameplay

We identified that the controls were too difficult for our type of game. Having to aim twice in a short amount of time to grab and throw a box is a bit too hard with a controller, it required a lot of practice.  However, with a mouse and keyboard, this was a lot easier to do. But this does not fit the type of game we have in mind. We want our game to be a couch co-op that can be played casually, without having to worry about the game being too difficult. 

We eventually came to the conclusion that we had to remove one of the aiming systems. Launching the box was the most important part for us, so we revamped our grabbing mechanic. Instead of having to aim and shoot at the box to grab it, you can now simply click r1 to pick up the nearest box to the player. After this, you can shoot it like you used too in the old system. This made the game a lot more smooth and fast-phased, which is exactly what we wanted.

This raised a new question though, can the player grab boxes through walls? Well, at first we thought it would be a cool idea and make our game even more chaotic. But after some testing, we realised that it was a bit weird, it didn't feel natural. So we scrapped this plan.

LevelDesign

Last week's level did not satisfy our needs. We needed a better playground to test out our mechanics and to have an idea of what our moving camera would look like. We iterated over a circular and linear design. The circular design would go in laps, the players would be able to choose how many laps they wanted and the level would change a bit with each new round. The linear design would be a lot simpler, it would just have a start and an end. And the game would have a fixed time.

While the circular idea seemed cool, it would bring a lot of work along the way. We concluded that it was not in the scope of our project.  So after some iterations on the linear design in vertical and horizontal movements, we came up with this nice prototype level.

Next week

Next week we will leave the prototyping phase and start working on the real deal. 

Cya then!

-The Extendo-Brawl team