We want your cool steam achievement ideas

This week we've been working on stuff for the steam page and polishing the game.

After going through a few more playtesters the 50 levels we have now are well playtested. I've started working with the steam api so if you have ideas for cool achievements, now is the time to share.

 

Changelog

Edited levels (50 are now well playtested).

Fixed not being able to select the rotation sensitivity slider in scenes other than the one you changed the manual rotation toggle in.

Updated some of the smaller letters.

Reduced launcher volume.

Increased minimum zoom. Reduced zooming out.

Reduced final block influence on the camera.

Added attached jump particles.

Added a select sound for joysticks and keyboard input.

You can now go slightly off screen without resetting the level.

Changed arrow look and shade.

Increased block collision particles.

Blocks that are far off screen now play a particle effect on the edge of the screen.

Started working with the steam api.

A History of Game Difficulty in Spectrum Break

Ease of Controls

When I first started the game, the idea was there, but the average player had difficulty with the rotation controls I initially had on by default. Those are still an option in game for people who want that challenge, but after several months of testing new control schemes for player rotation I managed to automate the player rotation enough that the rotation controls are defaulted to being off. This is the latest prototype I've released.

 

Some games are literally built by having unintuitive control schemes, but if that isn't the core of your game, we generally want as few buttons/keys involved as possible so the average player can pick up the game, but to have those few buttons enable deep/precise techniques. The best way to explain it is to just watch Mark Brown explain versatile verbs. I removed rotation controls, but a lot of what you could do before is still possible just out of the jump button. You can wall jump, and push stuff around still, and jumping still pushes the block you jumped off away from you.

As a general rule, you either want to commit to the difficulty of the controls being the core of the game, or to commit to the other half and get the difficulty of the game to not come from the controls at all.

 

Level Difficulty

My level difficulty has gone up and down, hitting both extremes along the way. After playing my own game for a year and a half almost every day, I've gotten incredibly good at it. I can basically speedrun the entire 2.5 hour game in 20 minutes, which makes testing with friends and family the only true way to know how challenging a level is or how long the game actually takes to beat.

When I started the difficulty sort of came half from the controls, and I had to add a bunch of simple levels early on to give the player time to get used to them, but as I automated the rotation controls, the player's learning speed improved dramatically and many of those early levels weren't necessary. Luckily nothing in level design is ever wasted, as I took some of the better parts of those levels and used them to strengthen the others.

There are lots of guides out there to teaching a new player through gameplay, which is what I do throughout the game, but there isn't a lot of guides for turning average players into veterans. Now that I'm nearing the end of the game I get to make truly challenging levels, but as someone who's played a lot of my game, I can tell you it can be hard to not have that itchy trigger finger to accidentally make super hardcore stuff instead of continuing a difficulty curve until the player is ready. This is why testing the game with friends and local developers is the core of my game development practice.

Generally I make levels with a purpose, many of which start out with less options to win than people expect of my game. Then I sand off the edges as I watch people come up with interesting ways to beat the level I hadn't thought of. So often levels start out smaller with a few extremely challenging areas, but as the level takes mold from player testing it tends to grow and the difficulty is more spread out.

 

Difficulty vs Punishment

Difficulty is not the same as punishment. As a general note, if you want to induce tension you must have punishment for failure, which thrills some players. If you wish to have no tension you must have no punishment for failure for a pure funhouse style game. Most games are somewhere in between. Both punishing games and non punishing games can be engaging. My game has a 0.25s respawn time and the music doesn't reset. I want you to get right back into the game with little punishment. However in a similar vein, the later levels are larger, and when you lose a larger level you lose more progress. I've seen some of the later levels induce a lot of tension. This is intentional, as the later levels are meant to be a challenge you should feel good for mastering.

 

Summary

Right now, I'm hoping to hit a good mix. The game start relatively easy, but the challenge curves upwards towards the end of the game. If you are interested in using those old manual rotation controls then you are in luck, as an option for those controls is still in the game settings and there is some crazy stuff you can pull off with it.

I'm now working on Spectrum Break Full Time!

Great news! I now work on Spectrum Break full time. There are no distractions now.

For the past 3 weeks I have been testing and making levels. Level 36+ are massive compared to some of the earlier ones (including the prototype levels) so they take quite some time to make. You can see some of them above as I needed screenshots for the store page when it is ready. We've begun working on the trailer now. When that's done we'll be ready to announce release dates.

A few days ago I had a friend playtest the game while I watched and it took him over 2 and a half hours to beat the game. Considering he's played the game before things are looking good in terms of content.

My winter break was relaxing. I spent some time with family and friends, played the games I didn't have time for this year, and finally have enough saved up to work on the game full time. As stressful as things can be trying to get everything ready, I can't ignore how well everything seems to be going. It's awesome.

 

Changelog

7 levels added. Level count is now 50 (45 are well playtested).

Added slants to shaped blocks.

Added new arrow block sounds.

Removed the static from the credits music.

Increased menu font size.

Removed odd lines that were visible on the A and R blocks.

Slightly reduced the respawn time and initial look time.

You can now jump on the attachment lines of attached blocks.

The camera now checks if any blocks are on screen once every 2s, and attempts to change the view to keep at least one unlit block on screen.

Removed right thumbstick and D-pad input due to windows 7 input bug (unity bug).

Secrets are now always revealed. They are still a challenge to collect.

If speedrun mode is enabled the credits will show session time, and the number of secrets collected this session. These counts are reset when you enter the main menu, and become active when you enter any level from the main menu.

Reduced the player move sound.

When a secret is hit, the pie chart at the top right gains a red tint.

Increased the stand up rate of the player.

Happy Holidays

Hey, It's been 3 weeks and I have not been idle. With the first 35 levels done I have switched to making levels for another block type and adding polish features. It feels pretty good to have most of the game release ready.

With this update my to-do list has started to shorten, and a lot of the polishing is done. The main menu looks awesome. It's just about levels, APIs, testing, and releasing now, with the exception of the odd new feature I come up with. I have a few I may add.

The steam page is in progress. Now that the visuals have gotten a final tune up I can finally make the final screenshots and videos for the store pages. A lot of people have been asking about the release date. I do not have one yet, but I believe 4-5 months is a good bet. I want to be patient and release a complete game.

 

Changelog

43 levels playable so far (8 of which need more testing). 35 are 100% done.

Increased the default amount of falling stars for PC.

The print screen key now saves a screenshot to your desktop.

The main menu and credit backgrounds now change like a rave party. This game is a rave party after all.

The main menu now utilizes all types of background particles.

Replaced the block count with a glowing pie chart.

Added main menu music and new launcher sounds.

Fixed the main menu reducing the volume more than normal when changed through the settings menu.

Improved the player body slightly and added a red glow.

Replaced the old player surf board and improved the jet particles.

Added glow to the menu and the level complete texts.

Added secrets counter to the credits.

Added the zoom key images to the pause menu.

 

 
 
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