CRUNCH TIME
It’s just over a month until GHOST MISSION is released and I’m deep into bug fixes and overall game refinement based off beta testing. The beta period has been successful thus far and has thankfully yielded fewer technical glitches than I expected – always a plus when the main task should be ensuring that gameplay is the way you want it as opposed to fixing small things that break immersion. The last thing I want to be working on at this stage is collision issues or the player walking through walls when I should be balancing boss fights and ensuring the game’s themes come across as intended.
A few notable accomplishments and changes to the launch build:
Mouse wheel weapon selection is now a thing…I truly, truly do not get how that went unnoticed for so long. I have vague memories of wanting to include it back in 2020 and discovering that it’s not as easy as “wheel down means next weapon”. Regardless, it’s in the game now and should make gameplay – and boss fights in particular – more fluid.
Level 4’s boss, Poison, has undergone a few big balance changes. His fight sequence already changed between alpha and beta builds, but beta testing showed he was difficult to defeat due to a mixture of a very low vulnerability period and an overall lack of player resources. Notes on player strategy to defeat him were interesting as well, because it mostly came down to cheesing his movement – not an intentional design choice.
Level 6 has landmines and their entire section exists to both create tension and change the game’s rhythm a bit (and they also thematically fit the boss). Testing showed that the section was a nice change of pace, and that “death-by-landmine” is hysterical in action, but also gets frustrating due to sprite precision in navigating the mine field and unwittingly setting them off. One solution tested was having a gadget that shows the player where landmines are in a narrow window, but it felt wonky to only have that feature in one area of the game. In the end, landmines are now visible to the player longer than they previously were and are destructible via player and enemy projectiles as opposed to just player touch. It’s an additional option in the player’s repertoire if they’re impatient, but you do risk losing needed ammunition and alerting enemies with explosions. Win-win.
One set of easter eggs is being heralded and everyone seems to want them expanded upon. It’s low on my to-do list, but I’m going to try…
VR Missions are now included in the game as unlockable extra content. The first five are unlocked from the start of the game with five more available based on player performance in the campaign. Each VR mission has its own set of goals and is meant to be more of a concentrated challenge outside of the story. Balancing for these is currently underway.
Added a few contextual hints to better communicate gameplay direction in a few places. Some of these are graphical (visually connecting door locks to their locking mechanisms) and some via dialogue box (you can do XYZ thing in XYZ circumstance).
There are plenty of other changes, mostly small ones, but two comments were made to me on the beta build that stood out and reminded me why I’m doing this in the first place:
“Honestly, man, I’m really enjoying it. There’s still some rough patches but I’m actually having fun now.”
“It’s giving me sensations I haven’t felt since I first played Metal Gear. Obviously, it’s Metal Gear inspired, and the gameplay is faster and doesn’t match up 1-1 which is fine, it’s doing its own thing and I like that…but I got a sense of accomplishment after beating a hard boss in an old school way, and that’s awesome.”
I bring those comments up because they put things into perspective for me. In the previous dev log, I wrote about keeping my release expectations low and in accordance with industry trends surrounding indie games and solo-dev work. I’ve gone out of my way to stay in that mindset, but I’ve also stumbled across testimonials and data sets in the last few weeks which make the entire prospect of solo dev work depressing. The statistics usually show that very few people will play your first game, fewer people will like it, and a large chunk of digital indie-game purchases from first time devs end in refunds. None of that is inspiring and in some ways it feels masochistic to put yourself through any of it.
I want people to play GHOST MISSION and I want them to enjoy the experience. Most of all, I want the game’s themes to shine. Putting such a large chunk of my creativity and energy into this project and knowing that the general gaming public can be utterly brutal in reception is terrifying, though in some ways it’s scarier to think that no one even cares. All artistic outlet coincides with some sense of vulnerability and personal exposure, as if to say this is what I have to offer, is it worth anything to you?
With that vulnerability in mind, it was an incredible feeling to get those comments from the beta test. GHOST MISSION isn’t for everyone, but it wasn’t meant to be either. I wanted to make a game that I, myself, wanted to play and explore ideas I thought were important. I thought that if I wanted those things, someone else probably would too. So far, that seems to be the case.
I’m still not expecting a massive release, a high player-count, or breaking even on the (meager) investment I’ve put into this project, but if GHOST MISSION can connect with the people looking for it, I’ll die happy.
For now, though, I have a lot of work left to do.
Until next time…
-Kevin
Burn Below
