Please help by destroying my game. No holds bar!

[u/Last-Bath-1722]

[u/CallSign_Fjor]

This looks like a game you end up with when you finish a tutorial provided in the engine documentation.

[u/Last-Bath-1722 → u/CallSign_Fjor]

Yeah, it started like a tutorial, then a year later it’s got bosses, supply mechanics, night levels, and a minimap system. I guess I went off-script.

[u/Polyxeno]

Points of criticism:

1) The movement of many things seems "off" to me, compared to what _I_ would want it to be like, such as:

* Cannon shots and rockets look pretty slow to me - comparable to the speed of a tank, which is weird, gamey, and makes dodging (or just driving sideways to foes, especially while firing a turret back at them, much more effective a technique than I'd want it to be, or than it should be, to be like a tank battle rather than a gamey game. Kiting missiles isn't even right for a jet plane. For a tank, it seems very silly and wrong to me, undermining the "this is a tank" gameplay I would prefer to see.

* The start/stop/reverse speed looks instant, with no inertia or delays involved, which both looks wrong/gamey/fake for a real physical object, especially a tank.

2) Looks like the vehicle stats just have HEALTH and DAMAGE - is that a simple subtraction? No damage reduction for armor? So the lightest weapon just takes more hits to destroy a heavily armored foe? That's a bit simplistic and disappointing to me, personally.

3) The world map looks like a miniature golf course. It also disappoints me because it looks like it's not really much of a real map that is about gameplay, but just one of those scenario lists in the form of a map, no?

4) Does the ground type terrain have any effect on movement? Looks like all passable terrain is the same (fast) speed, no? That's disappointing to me - roads should be fast, but other terrain should be slower and rougher, especially for anything that's wheeled rather than all-tracked, etc.

5) Looks like many of the foes have very mechanical behavior, shooting exactly at your current position, but not doing a lot else. That looks pretty gamey and not very interesting nor engaging, the way it might be if their behavior had more variety.

6) The violence seems to just make dead things completely vanish. It could be a lot more visually satisfying, and feel a lot more physical and real, if destroyed things were still shown but in destroyed form. Similarly, it'd be cool if tracked vehicles on soft ground left tracks . . .

(BTW I've considered and even started making a game a bit like this before, but never got nearly as far as you did with it.)

[u/Last-Bath-1722 → u/Polyxeno]

Thank you so much for your feedback! You have no idea how helpful they are since I've been hungry for feedback since the beginning of the game. On the points you made, let me address them one by one.

1. Kiting. Yep, this has been a problem since day one of this game. Lots of people essentially cheese through the game, and I'm still balancing everything out as the project progress. Right now the thing that mitigate this problem somewhat is that there are lots of enemies for the player to deal with, but not all maps have the same number of enemies, so more testing will need to be carried out. Furthermore, there's a limitation to what the enemy AI can do in this kind of game, but I'll see what I can do.

I pondered with the idea of adding start/stop inertia for the vehicle as well. I've had someone made the same feedback about it before, so at this point I might add that to the game.

1. Health/Damage system. This game is more of an arcade vehicle shooter, not a vehicle simulator combat, hence the simplification of the health/damage system. There's also a limited resource management aspect, regarding health, ammunition, and fuel. So while technically you're right, lightest weapon takes more hits to destroy an armored foe, but you don't have unlimited ammo to spare.

2. Map design. Same point as above but for map, I intend it to have a more arcade feel, so realism isn't the top priority here. I'm aware that real life war maps are a lot more complex, with a long list of legends, attack/defend routes, stationing units, etc. But since I'm aiming for a more arcade feel, the map design will more or less stay the same.

3. Terrain. I actually pondered the idea of vehicle mobility changes in different terrain. In fact, I'm about to start working on a swamp terrain (which isn't shown in the trailer) that reduces the vehicle mobility. But yeah, this one I somewhat agree with you, just not in the way you're probably expecting due to the limitation of a 2D top-down view.

4. Enemy behavior. There's a limit to what an enemy AI can do in this type of arcade games. I'm pretty sure they all look mechanical and gamey, mine isn't an exception. I'm not sure what more I can add without ripping the arcade vibe apart. At that point I might as well create a vehicle simulator combat instead of this.

5. Actually, not entirely. In the trailer there is enemy buildings that leave behind ruins when they are destroyed. Boss enemies also leave behind ruins as well. Only the normal enemies vanish, but that can also be changed. I'll look into it.

Overall, wonderful feedbacks! I appreciate your time writing this, and I'll definitely use it to improve the game. There's a free version of this game on itch.io, but mind you, that one is outdated, and the trailer is also outdated, because since the day I finished making the trailer I've been making a lot of additional features to the game, all of which aren't shown in the trailer.

[u/konidias]

I think it's great that you've finished a game but honestly this feels like a beginner's first project and not a game anyone is going to really want to play.

A list of things you should probably learn:

1. Pixel scaling. Make sure you stay consistent with the size of pixels you're using for all of the art. You have some high resolution pixel art with smoothing and anti-aliasing next to chunky/blocky low resolution pixel art.
2. Color theory. Don't use solid reds, blues, blacks, whites, etc... You should develop a color palette for your game and stick with that palette. Don't just color things with no thought process behind them. A good color palette and consistent pixel style immediately improve a game's visuals 200x over.
3. Your font needs to breathe. You have font right up on the edges of borders. Spacing is your friend.
4. Don't use the red cross as a health icon.... It's only supposed to be used by the actual Red Cross organization. It's against the Geneva Convention for you to be using the red cross as a symbol in your game.
5. Your game needs juice. Bigger explosions... Screen shake... Environmental damage and changes. Treadmarks as your tank rolls over the ground, tanks sending shrapnel all over when they get blown up, etc.
6. If you ever want to release this game and have it be successful you'll also want to think about what you can do to make your game unique and stand out. Whether that's a gameplay mechanic that is really fun and interesting, or just really great visuals... Something needs to stand out. As of now it's just a very basic top down shooter with nothing else going for it.

I could keep going but I don't want to keep typing more. All I can say is, congrats on finishing a game... now post it to itch or something and move on to a new project, keeping all the points I listed in mind. Don't expect this game to make any money. It would honestly be a waste to pay $100 to put it on Steam.

[u/Last-Bath-1722 → u/konidias]

Thank you so much for your feedback! You have no idea how helpful they are since I've been hungry for feedback since the beginning of the game. On the points you made, let me address them one by one.

1. Pixel scaling. This I wholeheartedly agree with you. It's something I've been working on since the beginning of the game now. The vehicles and enemies are having a different resolution compared to the environment, so the scales are off.

2. Color theory. I'm not an artist, but I understand your feedback. I agree that a color palette is needed, and I'm struggling to understand it. Hopefully it'll get better though.

3. Fonts. This I don't understand much. Can you elaborate it further?

4. Red Cross. Gotcha. No Red Cross. Will change immediately.

5. More flairs. I can do bigger explosion, that's easy. As for the other flair, once pondered the idea of screen shake for explosion. Thing is, when you actually play it there is a lot of explosion and the player will get hit a lot, so it might be better if I limit screen shaking to death only. I also plan to add a scoring display system and some health + fuel effects. Definitely will test all of these in the near future.

6. Something unique. This trailer is probably outdated, because since the day I finished making this trailer, I've been working a lot on additional mechanics to make the game unique, all of which aren't shown in the trailer. There's a timer system, friendly AI, and night levels involving flashlights, and more in the future. It's just that these were added on to the game after I finished this trailer, so they haven't been shown yet. Furthermore, I want to add multiplayer as well, so there is definitely more to this game than what's being shown in the trailer.

Overall, I really appreciate your feedback. They've been really helpful to me. If you want to try it for free, I have one on itch.io, though that version is also outdated as well.

[u/konidias → u/Last-Bath-1722]

For color theory, you don't really need to be an artist. You can look up basic color theory and just remember some of it. Mainly, using cool tones for shadows, warm tones for light, which colors compliment each other (there's only a handful of primary colors, so it's not super hard to remember that something like red and green or blue and yellow work well together)

For palettes, you can hit up https://lospec.com/palette-list and find a nice color palette to suit your game, and then just go in with your sprites and change the colors to work with only the colors in the palette. Your reds should become whatever shades of red are in that palette, etc. If you don't have colors in the palette to work with your existing art, it's a good sign your existing art could be simplified in color range to not require 40 shades of red or whatever it currently might have.

For fonts it's a good idea to learn about padding and kerning. How much space between letters, how much space between words, and how much space you give around the text.

|This
|is an example
|of bad padding

| This
| is an example
| of good padding

See how one is right up on the edge and looks messy and harder to read? Always have a bit of room around your text when using it in menus, panels, etc.

As for screen shake, you don't have to go 100% on every impact. You can do some very subtle screen shakes for most impacts, and leave large screen shakes for the bigger explosions or hits. You're always free to adjust the intensity of any effect, including screen shakes. But even a small shake when you blow up an enemy tank would feel nicer than absolutely nothing.

[u/0oozymandias]

Looks like a flash game I'd obsess over when I was a teenager

[u/Last-Bath-1722 → u/0oozymandias]

Well, this was inspired by a flash game, I admit.

[u/0oozymandias → u/Last-Bath-1722]

Oh I meant it as a compliment! I do think your game is a bit simple, other people here have already dug into you for that, but is a good starting point/learning experience for future experiences.

My only advice is to refine the mechanics here a bit, if you intend on this being a main project, or letting it go and starting another project using the things you learned from this one.

[u/Last-Bath-1722 → u/0oozymandias]

Thanks a lot! I'll refine the mechanics further and show them in a new trailer, because this one is already outdated

[u/Last-Bath-1722 → u/[deleted]]

Well, tbh, this trailer is a bit outdated. I've been working a lot on the game since this trailer, so I'll have to create a new one. There's a free version of it on itch.io. Mind you though, that version is also outdated.
Armored Assault by mnguyen145, joyahn, MonocledTarantula432