How much do you calculate?

[Ja Karta]

(02-03-2013 06:54 AM)ElPared Wrote:  Outwitters is supposed to be designed for the casual gamer, and casual gamers don't want to have to take notes to figure out where enemies might be.

Very True.
Casual players (and non-casual) measure reward by time put in. If you want to play 10 games and feel like you're penalized for not watching and taking notes it's discouraging. Certainly not rewarding. (I saw this as someone who is a neuroscientist by training.)


2 Issues:
1) Confusion
2) Implementation


re: 1) Make it an OPTION. You can keep the normal replays. It's actually smart for first time players. But most people who play much will get into the game for tactics. Hence you want to make it easy to play (rather than watch) the game and hence the option for LKP (Last Known Position).
I would recommend a tool tip that pops up after the 15th game or so that mentions the option; so people are aware of the option, but not overwhelmed by it when first learning the game.

re: 2) Implementation is actually relatively trivial from a programming and design standpoint. (Changing a large program is never entirely trivial, but this isn't bad.)
From a programming standpoint you just keep track of last seen position of units in FoW and their current state at the time (whether they had moved.) Also same for spawns (state, not location obviously )

From a design standpoint all you do is a grey overlay (or other darkned overlay/background) on squares in FoW. You then show last known positions of units and spawn along with their state (whether they had moved or not). Bam. That's it.

It would look just like an OSN with regard to style, with the addition of darkned/non-darkened units indicating whether they had moved when you last saw them (the system that is already in use). The only thing not covered by this is barrier spawning and parentage.
Ignore it. That's fine. People can always watch the replay in those few instances where that matters.


(To reply to someone's question about e.g. a Mobi could move a unit after it was in the FoW. Yes. Of course. It's a display of information at your disposal. Not of the enemy unit positions, per se.)

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(02-03-2013 07:01 AM)TheGoldenGriffin Wrote:  This game will get complicated if you add too much stuff. It isn't that hard to watch a replay of 1 turn.

Please don't take offense if I suggest that you're young. No offense meant.
A large percentage of gamers are older. If it takes me 1 minute to watch replays for 15 turns in a day: that's 15 minutes that I'm anxious about wasting my time. As people get older their time dwindles and the number of ways to spend it expands.

30 turns is half an hour. You'll be hard pressed to get me (and many, many people my age and up [30+]) to sustainably waste half an hour watching replays for very long...

Time efficiency is key to game's success. Even "time wasters" constantly let you interact or engage.