@@Alaabale Huge thank you! While l appreciate the sweet comment, funnily this still proves that: 1. Relevance (via Desire) - you like the content l make 2. Relevance (via Influence) - you’re probably invested into my content because you know you’ll get tips that help you and direction on how to improve your game. If there was a scenario where you had a friend that needed help, and you pointed them to this channel for that resolution, then a level of influence would’ve affected you on choosing this type of content. I’m just pointing these tactics out to further state why the examples discussed in the video, so thanks for your comment!
Personally the key part that usually gets me interested in most games are the character designs, then I look at other stuff like the world + story theme, and the game genre. Something I notice many indie devs fail to understand properly is the appeal of interesting characters... If somebody just makes a normal dude wearing a T-shirt for the protagonist... then I am likely not gonna wanna touch it with a 10 foot pole regardless of what folk may tell me about the gameplay. I'll list some examples of game franchises that hooked me on their characters. Sonic, YuGiOh, Zelda, Megaman Legends, Crash Bandicoot, Sly Cooper, FF7 PS1 version, Shantae, Digimon, Pokemon, Disgaea series, Hollow Knight... and you get the point. Anyways gotta admit I am a surreal character designer, and I understand not everybody cares about it much as me, but it is regardless true that flashy memorable characters can be a HUGE selling point that many devs oddly underestimate. BTW making concepts that are both unique & understandable is indeed very challenging, moreover I agree that reinforcing & exaggerating themes improves the concepts as you suggested. This reminds me of a little design study I been testing with some friends recently for personal reasons, I am curious if you will answer the same as most of them did. Which of the following ideas for a main character seems the most interesting to you with no extra context? #1: Drow or Elf Pirate. #2: Robot Pirate. #3: Dragon Pirate.
Love the content. I'd make a small amendment to your comments on directing attention. Where people first look is cultural and based on how their language is read. But also, i have no experience in those other cultures and English content has infected pretty much everything anyway.
@@xxaardvark You’re absolutely right and the safest way to approach this is moving up to down (its why the thumbnail has white and yellow highlights to draw your attention upwards, then continues to use bright colors below to lead downwards) Irrelevant of language, looking up naturally leads to looking down. Relevant to language, picking your horizon is indeed critical to great job on picking that up. Lastly, if you have no text, there was a study that was conducted that proves how left (for some odd reason) naturally gets more attention than right (which is why we see a lot of items ordered in a left to right fashion such as documents, why most default settings move from left to right, how menu items are placed, deals, etc.) And again, you can use lighting, contrast tricks, and exaggeration methods to lure the eyes in a specific direction before they start exploring everything else within the field. Regardless, l really like the language point-out. Great insight!
Well i think this video is about more character design and no game design (a part of the video mentioned a bit but still) but the video still interesting However if can be applicable can works in other topics only change something for the medium and voila can still aplicable
I thought My second Steam release was interesting. It's an adventure game with mini games called I'm Not Crazy. It's selling much less than My first game.
@@Joomsan Could you pin-point what made it interesting? Based off of what was discussed here, there are a plethora of layers we can observe to see what works and what doesn’t. That being said, let’s break it down into a few steps. 1. Was this game relevant (ie important to the player?) Respectfully, breaking it down: “I’m Not Crazy” may struggle to make the player feel like they should be involved in the first place because the presentation showcases a lack of desire (muted colors, lack of sound design in the trailer, empty terrain, capsule art doesn’t showcase strong character design, and the description is generic) In other words, it’s probably hard for someone to look at this and like this unless they’re a fan of the puzzles/mini-games you demonstrated in the trailer. If we make it relevant to them via necessity, then we ask, “how does this game provide value to those who want mini-game-esk mechanics and/or who like simple styles, etc.” and again, the presentation is probably what holds it back from attaining that attention. Then, 2. What about the game makes me want to play it as soon as possible? This is where the compulsion tactics discussed in the video were used. The problem is again - respectfully - I’m Not Crazy’s presentation doesn’t provide much in this area. Now on the comparative hand, your game Endustry, is VERY Interesting It involves players who like builders/auto-battling, the title is unique, and what you’ve showcased in screenshots + trailers can help paint a better picture of what’s to come (and it looks challenging with a lot of tools the player can use to fend off the enemy) Here, if you asked the same question of desire + necessity and applied it to Endustry, you’d have more solid answers than I’m Not Crazy. Also, Endustry uses some of the compulsion tactics discussed. Polarity: the word “End” and “Industry” usually don’t go together and it has a nice ring to it. Exaggeration: the property you choose to design around was *quantity* which is appealing when you seem a bunch of factions fight a bunch of enemies on your screen. By comparison, Endustry interest is higher than I’m Not Crazy which directly correlates to its sale performance. TL;DR - I hope you can see why the structure of bringing relevancy first (and then building it up with compulsion techniques) can help provide a better insight on what makes something objectively more interesting. So now the question is: Can you correct, optimize, and/or improve I’m Not Crazy’s presentation to get better results? Consider the worksheet attached in the link of the description to see where you can tackle the main flaws. I hope this helped, goodluck!
@EdwardLabarcaDev Thank you for taking your time to answer me. Honestly I think I'm Not Crazy is a weird game with mini games and thought that would be good enough. I enjoy games that are a bit irrational. Endustry had potential and I've been thinking of making a similiar game. Reason why I don't update it is that it was poorly made and it needs a lot more content and would be easier to just make it Grom scratch. It was hard to answer because I'm on My phone lol.
I just saw your game page on Steam. And as a player, not a developer, I think you could lore players more if there was a story and dialogue (written). Maybe you do have dialogue and story in your game, but the screenshots don’t show it. Seeing a story or a mystery unfold as I play the mini games and progress through the game would feel like a compelling incentive. Wish you all the best!
Nah I clicked on the video because I like your videos
@@Alaabale Huge thank you! While l appreciate the sweet comment, funnily this still proves that:
1. Relevance (via Desire) - you like the content l make
2. Relevance (via Influence) - you’re probably invested into my content because you know you’ll get tips that help you and direction on how to improve your game. If there was a scenario where you had a friend that needed help, and you pointed them to this channel for that resolution, then a level of influence would’ve affected you
on choosing this type of content.
I’m just pointing these tactics out to further state why the examples discussed in the video, so thanks for your comment!
Personally the key part that usually gets me interested in most games are the character designs, then I look at other stuff like the world + story theme, and the game genre. Something I notice many indie devs fail to understand properly is the appeal of interesting characters... If somebody just makes a normal dude wearing a T-shirt for the protagonist... then I am likely not gonna wanna touch it with a 10 foot pole regardless of what folk may tell me about the gameplay.
I'll list some examples of game franchises that hooked me on their characters. Sonic, YuGiOh, Zelda, Megaman Legends, Crash Bandicoot, Sly Cooper, FF7 PS1 version, Shantae, Digimon, Pokemon, Disgaea series, Hollow Knight... and you get the point. Anyways gotta admit I am a surreal character designer, and I understand not everybody cares about it much as me, but it is regardless true that flashy memorable characters can be a HUGE selling point that many devs oddly underestimate.
BTW making concepts that are both unique & understandable is indeed very challenging, moreover I agree that reinforcing & exaggerating themes improves the concepts as you suggested. This reminds me of a little design study I been testing with some friends recently for personal reasons, I am curious if you will answer the same as most of them did. Which of the following ideas for a main character seems the most interesting to you with no extra context? #1: Drow or Elf Pirate. #2: Robot Pirate. #3: Dragon Pirate.
Love the content. I'd make a small amendment to your comments on directing attention.
Where people first look is cultural and based on how their language is read. But also, i have no experience in those other cultures and English content has infected pretty much everything anyway.
@@xxaardvark You’re absolutely right and the safest way to approach this is moving up to down (its why the thumbnail has white and yellow highlights to draw your attention upwards, then continues to use bright colors below to lead downwards)
Irrelevant of language, looking up naturally leads to looking down.
Relevant to language, picking your horizon is indeed critical to great job on picking that up.
Lastly, if you have no text, there was a study that was conducted that proves how left (for some odd reason) naturally gets more attention than right (which is why we see a lot of items ordered in a left to right fashion such as documents, why most default settings move from left to right, how menu items are placed, deals, etc.)
And again, you can use lighting, contrast tricks, and exaggeration methods to lure the eyes in a specific direction before they start exploring everything else within the field.
Regardless, l really like the language point-out. Great insight!
Well i think this video is about more character design and no game design (a part of the video mentioned a bit but still) but the video still interesting
However if can be applicable can works in other topics only change something for the medium and voila can still aplicable
I thought My second Steam release was interesting. It's an adventure game with mini games called I'm Not Crazy. It's selling much less than My first game.
@@Joomsan Could you pin-point what made it interesting? Based off of what was discussed here, there are a plethora of layers we can observe to see what works and what doesn’t. That being said, let’s break it down into a few steps.
1. Was this game relevant (ie important to the player?)
Respectfully, breaking it down:
“I’m Not Crazy” may struggle to make the player feel like they should be involved in the first place because the presentation showcases a lack of desire (muted colors, lack of sound design in the trailer, empty terrain, capsule art doesn’t showcase strong character design, and the description is generic)
In other words, it’s probably hard for someone to look at this and like this unless they’re a fan of the puzzles/mini-games you demonstrated in the trailer.
If we make it relevant to them via necessity, then we ask, “how does this game provide value to those who want mini-game-esk mechanics and/or who like simple styles, etc.” and again, the presentation is probably what holds it back from attaining that attention.
Then,
2. What about the game makes me want to play it as soon as possible?
This is where the compulsion tactics discussed in the video were used. The problem is again - respectfully - I’m Not Crazy’s presentation doesn’t provide much in this area.
Now on the comparative hand, your game Endustry, is VERY Interesting
It involves players who like builders/auto-battling, the title is unique, and what you’ve showcased in screenshots + trailers can help paint a better picture of what’s to come (and it looks challenging with a lot of tools the player can use to fend off the enemy)
Here, if you asked the same question of desire + necessity and applied it to Endustry, you’d have more solid answers than I’m Not Crazy. Also, Endustry uses some of the compulsion tactics discussed.
Polarity: the word “End” and “Industry” usually don’t go together and it has a nice ring to it.
Exaggeration: the property you choose to design around was *quantity* which is appealing when you seem a bunch of factions fight a bunch of enemies on your screen.
By comparison, Endustry interest is higher than I’m Not Crazy which directly correlates to its sale performance.
TL;DR -
I hope you can see why the structure of bringing relevancy first (and then building it up with compulsion techniques) can help provide a better insight on what makes something objectively more interesting.
So now the question is:
Can you correct, optimize, and/or improve I’m Not Crazy’s presentation to get better results? Consider the worksheet attached in the link of the description to see where you can tackle the main flaws.
I hope this helped, goodluck!
@EdwardLabarcaDev Thank you for taking your time to answer me. Honestly I think I'm Not Crazy is a weird game with mini games and thought that would be good enough. I enjoy games that are a bit irrational.
Endustry had potential and I've been thinking of making a similiar game. Reason why I don't update it is that it was poorly made and it needs a lot more content and would be easier to just make it Grom scratch.
It was hard to answer because I'm on My phone lol.
I just saw your game page on Steam. And as a player, not a developer, I think you could lore players more if there was a story and dialogue (written). Maybe you do have dialogue and story in your game, but the screenshots don’t show it. Seeing a story or a mystery unfold as I play the mini games and progress through the game would feel like a compelling incentive.
Wish you all the best!
@@meemdizerThanks, I need to add some more pics cause the game actually has some dialogues and a very vague story.