BrickyPlay
Community Forums/Showcase/BrickyPlay
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| I'd like to announce the coming of my latest puzzle game called "BrickyPlay" You can download it here Now I got a few things, I'd like to ask of you. I tried to find some way to get the money problem solved, but did not get much help from companies doing amateur games to help, only a few advises, as some wanted to see me sell it well before they sell it. Problem is how can I best accept credit cards. If you can get me some sites billing the credit cards (or semiliar paying methods) for me (preferably from the Netherlands, but the US is also fine) I'd be grateful. Second, the game is yet in English and Dutch (as those are the only languages I speak fluently), if you like to make a translation in a language I don't know, then please do so. You can find the files with all the text the game contains in the "Lang" folder of the game, and I do believe experienced programmers like you won't have any trouble in figuring out how the language files work. And of course tell me what you think of the concept. It's a simple concept, but I got the feeling it can be pretty addictive nevertheless. The game is practically finished, but if you got any advices for improovement, I'd like to hear it. So far my questions. I hope you like this simple game ;) |
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| Erm, you're linking to geocities.com! Pertaining to the credit card/money question (and without seeing the game so I'm *not* knocking it), I personally wouldn't entrust my credit card details to anyone who uses geocities - its a haven for warez-munkies and porn-mongers. I'd recommend sorting out some proper web hosting at least. |
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| hahahah |
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| Oops.... The link is fixed. It should work now! |
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| Please lose the bizarre patterned background. The screenshot on that page is eye-grating. |
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| I get your point. I can replace that background if that's the only point of criticism you have. |
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| I'll try it later, but ShareIt is a good transaction partner, and www.blitzhosts.com offer some very cheap hosting ( only for Blitz projects ) if you're short on cash and need somewhere to host from. ( It's not my site and I get nothing out of it. I do have a site there though. ) |
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| "if that's the only point of criticism you have" For now; I haven't tried the game yet. But just looking at the screenshot I can tell that the background needs to be simplified (possibly to a solid color) for a couple reasons. One, the busy contrast interferes with one's ability to see the important stuff (ie. it's hard to distinguish the blocks,) Two, that background is pretty ugly. |
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| You will probably have to tweak this game significantly in order for it to sell well, so you should probably worry about that before you worry about how to handle online purchases. I definitely suggest BMT Micro, though, for when you start selling. |
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| Downloading now... in the mean time I would do a little research http://www.gamehouse.com http://www.popcap.com http://www.realarcade.com See what those games look like, most look very simple with bold colours... thats what players seems too like... give'em what they like. ;) |
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| I didn't like it at all. Too much mousework involved, irritating "in your face" sound effects (particularly the one when you try to scroll left/right and a block hits the edge of the screen). I didn't even get past the first level - not because its difficult, but because it was so incredibly tedious. The later levels *might* be better; unfortunately I quickly lost the will to find out. I agree with what Michael said - make the game sellable before you worry about WHERE you're going to sell it. I don't think many would pay for this as it stands. |
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| Thanks to all for your replies. I'M short on time now, but I'll come back later to go into deeper detail about what I need to say now. Still thanks anyway ;) |
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| Here I am now, with a little more time. I'll try it later, but ShareIt is a good transaction partner, and www.blitzhosts.com offer some very cheap hosting ( only for Blitz projects ) if you're short on cash and need somewhere to host from. ( It's not my site and I get nothing out of it. I do have a site there though. ) Thanks a lot. That information was really useful. And Blitz hosts only being for Blitz projects is no problem. The game is coded in Blitz :) You will probably have to tweak this game significantly in order for it to sell well This is pretty vague to me. First of all the word "tweak" is unknown to me (English is NOT my first language), but I guess you mean I have to make significant changes to the game. But that doesn't say much, and basically anything could be changed. Do you have any points about WHAT to change? See what those games look like, most look very simple with bold colours... thats what players seems too like... give'em what they like. ;) Basically that's what I like as a player as well, and I always try to create something I would like to play (If you don't like your own games how's somebody else supposed to like it). And I like simple natured puzzlegames, and that's what I wanted BrickyPlay to be. I may be making diffrent screenshots of easier levels ;) Too much mousework involved Strange comment. I mean, it's the only input device that is really useful for a game in this fashion. In fact, most puzzle games of this style are mouse only (for the reason stated above). irritating "in your face" sound effects (particularly the one when you try to scroll left/right and a block hits the edge of the screen) Want me to build in a feature to turn the sound effects off? I agree with what Michael said - make the game sellable before you worry about WHERE you're going to sell it. I don't think many would pay for this as it stands. I already spoke with people who would DEFINATELY buy this game once it comes out. And that makes opinions pretty diffrent. I could even get a publisher to believe it COULD sell well, but they wanted to wait before taking it on. You never know how well it sells before the selling begins, but until that time I need things in pretty much detail about how to make it sellable. I got the suggestion to get rid of one of the backgrounds (or at least that screenshot), complaints about the sound (for which I can make a feature to turn it off), those are the most significant advices I got so far. Any more advices? |
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| My point was, it will probably take more than just taking out a background and an option to disable the sound to make the game sell well. It just isn't fun, and I don't see how you could keep the same mechanics and make it fun. |
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| I guess that's your opinion, but I heard some people elsewhere who actually love this game. "Just isn't fun" can be diffrent per person. Still thanks for your time to try out this game. |
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| OK, how about a list, then. 1) I won't go into the graphics, but I will say that they are unprofessional and unlikely to 'wow' any players. Shareware games *can* sell with graphics like this, though. 2) I don't see exactly how you can have load times as long as you do. They should be just about instant, and anything over 3 seconds or so is an annoyance, especially in a game as simple as this. 3) The menu has keyboard control while the game uses mouse control. 4) The background in the menu is completely and utterly annoying. Use a full screen image instead. 5) Your Terms of Service as completely laughable. Leave them out. 6) Never, ever refer to yourself as "Tricrokra", and you will probably want to leave out your full name (instead only leaving the name of your company) as well. 7) The loading screen is big, bloated and uninteresting, and the splash screen at the start containing text should definitely not be there. 8) The game doesn't instantly hook the player, mostly because the game board is WAY too big. The board shouldn't even be that big on any insane difficulty mode. It should start out at about 4x4 and then work up. 9) You don't state your price from within the game. 10) You don't push the full version at all - you don't state its benefits, and that is what you are selling. 12) There is no purchase option, only a link to your web site. 13) Your web site is extremely cumbersome to navigate. 14) There is no score, or sense of reward on completing a level or any small tasks. This is IMPERATIVE to making a puzzle game enjoyable. 15) The sound effects are completely and utterly pathetic. I would definitely turn them off - but then the game would be soundless! 16) The download size is excessive to say the least. It's bigger than my Juno Nemesis, which contains lots of sound effects, music, graphics etc. ~2.5mb isn't *bad*, but I can hardly see why it has to be as big as it is. 17) The game isn't difficult enough at the start - and it doesn't accelerate in difficulty nearly fast enough to compensate for good players. 18) The game flat out crashes when you run it from the link on the desktop. 19) You haven't gotten a proper icon for your game - it *really* doesn't suit it. 20) You shouldn't use a password system for saving games. People that forget their passwords or lose them will lose all incentive to play. |
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| That was kind of off the top of my head, so I could be more specific if you wanted. I could probably list a lot more if I were to play it more. Which I won't. |
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| A constructive list Michael! Here's a review for you Tricroka. Upon navigating to the site, I was greeted by geocities popups and a link that led to Quake3. While Quake3 is impressive, it's clearly not yours. Pushing on with determination, I found another link hidden along the side which enabled me to download your demo. Upon installing, the installer brings up some terms and conditions in a weird large text: Terms of Usage 1. BrickyPlay is puzzle game created by Tricrokra. Tricrokra is Jeroen Petrus Broks, born Jun 19, 1975, in Breda, the Netherlands. JBC Soft, is Tricrokra's programming handle used for productions he programmed with or without other crewmembers. 2. The demo version of BrickyPlay is free for distrubtion, as long as the other terms in this document are not violated in any way. The full version of BrickyPlay may not be distributed without Tricrokra's permission 3. BrickyPlay is meant for Entertainment only. Nothing related to BrickyPlay may be sold, without Tricrokra's permission. (Under selling I do not only count in charge of money. Charging in the form of goods or services is also prohibited). When including the demo version BrickyPlay on a ShareWare CD-ROM, only the costs of creating the CD-ROM may be charged. 4. Translations. In the LANG\ directory of BrickyPlay you can see the Language files. You are free to use those files to translate the game in your language, and you are free to distrubute those translated files, as long as no form of charge (as described in paragraph 3) is in order. 5. Puzzle Editor. People who have the license to run the full version are also licenced to use the puzzle editor. Basically you own copyright to your puzzles however, the puzzles may only be distrubuted free of any form of charge. 6. Disclaimer I hereby disclaim all sorts of warranties. When any product created by Tricrokra damages your software, hardware or anything else, there's no way to claim it, not even when Tricrokra is aware of the possibilities of such damages. Not agreeing to that rule in any way, makes that running BrickyPlay is strictly forbidden. (I however have taken great care of BrickyPlay. I don't deem any damage possible, and BrickyPlay was scanned for all known virusses before its release). 7. Nothing of the BrickyPlay package may be modified in any sort of way except for the Language files and of course the puzzles you create yourself using the puzzle editor. 8. None of the included files may be decoded, decompiled, disssassembeld or whatever. 9. Tricrokra keeps the right to change these rules or to take in license to use or distrubute this software without obligation to give up reasons for it. 10. When you don't agree with any of these terms using this software is strictly forbidden and then you are required to remove it immediatly. And when you do agree I hope you have as much fun playing BrickyPlay as I had creating it for you ;) I didn't intend to blurt out laughing, but needless to say it is incoherent and rambling. It doesn't matter if English isn't your first language. Make an effort if you intend to sell it to English speaking people. Find someone or an EULA you can use. This is just rambling and any court would probably let a warez user off on the basis that it's dense and confusing. Onto loading the game... It took longer to get into the game than loading Unreal Tournament 2004 -and- playing the level. So you need to do something about that. I took a look inside your source folder and it appears you've packed up your media. Perhaps you're clearing the media after loading each one? if it's by terabit then there's tips. The main menu: butt ugly and without scheme. I suggest that you make it entirely menu driven with large blocky colourful buttons to be used with the mouse. Help screen is unhelpful because it doesn't even tell you how to navigate the help screen let alone anything else. A rethink is needed there. It also has a disturbing lack of timing, running too fast or too slow. Onto the game... Visually I quite liked it. The mandlebrot fractal in the background wasn't too imposing and actually looked rather pleasent. Your control method truely sucks though, with the user having to travel the mouse all the way over to the other side even if they make a mistake. A TERRIBLE control method. To fix this, I suggest you have a row and column drag system. This means all the user needs to do is click any row or any column, then hold the mouse down and drag either left or right or up and down. The mouse will lock to that AXIS and then allow free dragging along that axis. It's intuitive and you can pretty much control it with the mouse WITHOUT any of that silly clicking the arrow business. Thanks to your current control method, I completely lost the desire to play any further and quit the game. I hope you will sum up the points I've made because I know that deep down in here, there IS a GOOD little puzzle game - you do need to make it a lot more friendly to play though. |
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| Strange comment. I mean, it's the only input device that is really useful for a game in this fashion. In fact, most puzzle games of this style are mouse only (for the reason stated above). The point I was getting at, is that all the controls are arranged around the outer edge of the screen. Where mouse-controlled games are concerned, all clickable icons should be kept somewhere in close proximity to each other. Want me to build in a feature to turn the sound effects off? I'd rather you changed them to something more suitable. A game with no sound is as bad as a game with poor sound. I already spoke with people who would DEFINATELY buy this game once it comes out. People here say that all the time. How many of them do you think actually do it?I don't really disagree with anything Michael has said, except maybe number 20. I kind of like password systems myself. But to single out one point he made regarding the terms of service. I didn't read it all (who does?), but I have to say that the first page (the one with your date of birth and everything on) did bring a smile to my face. Nobody cares where and when you were born! Something like this would suit you better. You may have to adapt parts of it to suit your needs: <PRODUCT> - PRODUCT LICENSE INFORMATION NOTICE TO USERS: CAREFULLY READ THE FOLLOWING LEGAL AGREEMENT. USE OF THE SOFTWARE PROVIDED WITH THIS AGREEMENT (THE "SOFTWARE") CONSTITUTES YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF THESE TERMS. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS AGREEMENT, DO NOT INSTALL AND/OR USE THIS SOFTWARE. USER'S USE OF THIS SOFTWARE IS CONDITIONED UPON COMPLIANCE BY USER WITH THE TERMS OF THIS AGREEMENT. 1. LICENSE GRANT. <COMPANY> grants you a license to use one copy of the version of this SOFTWARE on any one system for as many licenses as you purchase. "You" means the company, entity or individual whose funds are used to pay the license fee. "Use" means storing, loading, installing, executing or displaying the SOFTWARE. You may not modify the SOFTWARE or disable any licensing or control features of the SOFTWARE except as an intended part of the SOFTWARE's programming features. When you first obtain a copy of the SOFTWARE, you are granted an evaluation period of not more than 30 days, after which time you must pay for the SOFTWARE according to the terms and prices discussed in the SOFTWARE's documentation, or you must remove the SOFTWARE from your system. This license is not transferable to any other system, or to another organization or individual. You are expected to use the SOFTWARE on your system and to thoroughly evaluate its usefulness and functionality before making a purchase. This "try before you buy" approach is the ultimate guarantee that the SOFTWARE will perform to your satisfaction; therefore, you understand and agree that there is no refund policy for any purchase of the SOFTWARE. 2. OWNERSHIP. The SOFTWARE is owned and copyrighted by <COMPANY>. Your license confers no title or ownership in the SOFTWARE and should not be construed as a sale of any right in the SOFTWARE . 3. COPYRIGHT. The SOFTWARE is protected by Copyright law and international treaty provisions. You acknowledge that no title to the intellectual property in the SOFTWARE is transferred to you. You further acknowledge that title and full ownership rights to the SOFTWARE will remain the exclusive property of <COMPANY> and you will not acquire any rights to the SOFTWARE except as expressly set forth in this license. You agree that any copies of the SOFTWARE will contain the same proprietary notices which appear on and in the SOFTWARE. 4. REVERSE ENGINEERING. You agree that you will not attempt to reverse compile, modify, translate, or disassemble the SOFTWARE in whole or in part. 5. NO OTHER WARRANTIES. <COMPANY> DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE SOFTWARE IS ERROR FREE. <COMPANY> DISCLAIMS ALL OTHER WARRANTIES WITH RESPECT TO THE SOFTWARE, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT OF THIRD PARTY RIGHTS. SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OF IMPLIED WARRANTIES OR LIMITATIONS ON HOW LONG AN IMPLIED WARRANTY MAY LAST, OR THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, SO THE ABOVE LIMITATIONS OR EXCLUSIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU. THIS WARRANTY GIVES YOU SPECIFIC LEGAL RIGHTS AND YOU MAY ALSO HAVE OTHER RIGHTS WHICH VARY FROM JURISDICTION TO JURISDICTION. 6. SEVERABILITY. In the event of invalidity of any provision of this license, the parties agree that such invalidity shall not affect the validity of the remaining portions of this license. 7. NO LIABILITY FOR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES. IN NO EVENT SHALL <COMPANY> OR ITS SUPPLIERS BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY CONSEQUENTIAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR INDIRECT DAMAGES OF ANY KIND ARISING OUT OF THE DELIVERY, PERFORMANCE OR USE OF THE SOFTWARE, EVEN IF <COMPANY> HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. IN NO EVENT WILL <COMPANY>' LIABILITY FOR ANY CLAIM, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, TORT OR ANY OTHER THEORY OF LIABILITY, EXCEED THE LICENSE FEE PAID BY YOU, IF ANY. 8. ENTIRE AGREEMENT. This is the entire agreement between you and <COMPANY> which supersedes any prior agreement or understanding, whether written or oral, relating to the subject matter of this license. |
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| Nice constructive reply GFK, I hope he uses that EULA. I would actually remove having icons and have an intuitive drag system though. |
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| I hereby disclaim all sorts of warranties. When any product created by Tricrokra damages your software, hardware or anything else, there's no way to claim it ROFLMFAO! I'd never have installed it if i'd bothered to read that far. That tells me it *IS* going to bust my PC! |
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| To fix this, I suggest you have a row and column drag system. This means all the user needs to do is click any row or any column, then hold the mouse down and drag either left or right or up and down. The mouse will lock to that AXIS and then allow free dragging along that axis. It's intuitive and you can pretty much control it with the mouse WITHOUT any of that silly clicking the arrow business. Yes, yes, yes, yes, *YES*! |
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| Er, yes. Splendid idea. |
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| 1) I won't go into the graphics, but I will say that they are unprofessional and unlikely to 'wow' any players. Shareware games *can* sell with graphics like this, though. I used simple graphics on purpose indeed. I don't think a game of this fashion needs more, and for Shareware it all it's needs. 2) I don't see exactly how you can have load times as long as you do. They should be just about instant, and anything over 3 seconds or so is an annoyance, especially in a game as simple as this. That is something I may sort out in updates. The backgrounds are the evil ones here. The encryption engine used for that isn't that fast. I'm considering to try it out with Terabit's packer. 3) The menu has keyboard control while the game uses mouse control. Good one. I mustn't be so damn lazy. I'll fix that up. 4) The background in the menu is completely and utterly annoying. Use a full screen image instead. Hmmm... That could be an idea, but such images are not my forte, so I solved it this way. I could give it a thought if I can get somebody to design a good picture. 5) Your Terms of Service as completely laughable. Leave them out. What exactly is so funny about it. 6) Never, ever refer to yourself as "Tricrokra", and you will probably want to leave out your full name (instead only leaving the name of your company) as well. Trust me, I was never intended to explore the internet as "Tricrokra", but that name made me famous (that and much other things). My company name is not fully protected (yet), and therefore I use those names to make sure nobody can ever try to rid my products my stealing my names. 7) The loading screen is big, bloated and uninteresting, and the splash screen at the start containing text should definitely not be there. The loading screen was supposed to be as simple as possible, in order to surpres the loading times. The "splash" screen is more a leftover from debugging routines. I can remove the text or prevent it from being in the screen too long. The screen itself however is something Blitz does automaticly, so I cannot get rid of it for 100%. 98% should do... 8) The game doesn't instantly hook the player, mostly because the game board is WAY too big. The board shouldn't even be that big on any insane difficulty mode. It should start out at about 4x4 and then work up. That's exactly the opposite from the criticism I got from the 1.0 version (never released and written in the good old DOS era). There I got the criticism that the boards were way to small. I had to pick a size to work with in the end, because the size is always to be put into discussion. 9) You don't state your price from within the game. That's because the price is not yet decided. That will be done once the actual full version is released, but for that I need to get the transaction partners in order. 10) You don't push the full version at all - you don't state its benefits, and that is what you are selling. I should check out the site for that once again. 12) There is no purchase option, only a link to your web site. Will be there once the full version is released (when I have a good transaction partner). 13) Your web site is extremely cumbersome to navigate. The link only leads to a fraction of the website. In fact, I only placed that code there to keep Geocities satisfied. 14) There is no score, or sense of reward on completing a level or any small tasks. This is IMPERATIVE to making a puzzle game enjoyable. I personally didn't think it would suit THIS type of game. And is that the key to make this game enjoyable. In "Lemmings" or "Clockwiser" to name a few commercial puzzle games, I also didn't miss the score. But who is me. You're not the first to suggest this. 15) The sound effects are completely and utterly pathetic. I would definitely turn them off - but then the game would be soundless! Do you know a place when I can find better ones? 16) The download size is excessive to say the least. It's bigger than my Juno Nemesis, which contains lots of sound effects, music, graphics etc. ~2.5mb isn't *bad*, but I can hardly see why it has to be as big as it is. I don't know where the evil one lie to make the size *big*, as I have written more complex games with smaller sizes. But I do think the size is acceptable. 17) The game isn't difficult enough at the start - and it doesn't accelerate in difficulty nearly fast enough to compensate for good players. I wanted to start as easy as possible, to get people to know the rules of the game. Balancing out the difficulty is always hard, but there are some hard ones in there, trust me. 18) The game flat out crashes when you run it from the link on the desktop. It does? Strange. I'll try to find out how that happens. 19) You haven't gotten a proper icon for your game - it *really* doesn't suit it. Ideas for a better one? 20) You shouldn't use a password system for saving games. People that forget their passwords or lose them will lose all incentive to play. Okay, savegames a better idea then? |
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| You aren't going to change the game much at all, are you? |
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| Onto loading the game... It took longer to get into the game than loading Unreal Tournament 2004 -and- playing the level. So you need to do something about that. I took a look inside your source folder and it appears you've packed up your media. Perhaps you're clearing the media after loading each one? if it's by terabit then there's tips. None of terabit's routines have been used, but I am considering it. The base is the same though. The temp files are removed after EVERYTHING is loaded. I hope Terabit's can make this faster, but the main reason for me not to use Terabit's packer was because it misses vital featues. At least for me. Visually I quite liked it. The mandlebrot fractal in the background wasn't too imposing and actually looked rather pleasent. Your control method truely sucks though, with the user having to travel the mouse all the way over to the other side even if they make a mistake. A TERRIBLE control method. Drag & drop? Hmmm, I gotta say that method has never been used before by me in any production (never needed it so far), but I'll take it into consideration. I hope you will sum up the points I've made because I know that deep down in here, there IS a GOOD little puzzle game - you do need to make it a lot more friendly to play though. I'm glad you see it that way. I'll try add a friendlier method of controlling, next to the controls it already has. I have a few ideas, but I need to see how to work them out. I'd rather you changed them to something more suitable. A game with no sound is as bad as a game with poor sound. Suggetions where I can get better? I don't really disagree with anything Michael has said, except maybe number 20. I kind of like password systems myself. But to single out one point he made regarding the terms of service. I didn't read it all (who does?), but I have to say that the first page (the one with your date of birth and everything on) did bring a smile to my face. Nobody cares where and when you were born! My birthplace was merely put in there because I found out that there are people having EXACT the same name as I do, and spelled the same (I mean my real name, not "Tricrokra"), this was the only way to make sure we got the right person. It was a silly method, but it should work. Something like this would suit you better. You may have to adapt parts of it to suit your needs: I'll need to time to dig that through, but thanks... I don't really disagree with anything Michael has said, except maybe number 20. I kind of like password systems myself. That's personal. The chose for passwords or savegames is for me always pending on the type of game. I'm normally not fond of passwords myself, but I found it better for this game. For "The Fairy Tale" I would DEFINATELY not use passwords (that's an RPG, in case you didn't know). Nice constructive reply GFK, I hope he uses that EULA. I would actually remove having icons and have an intuitive drag system though. Roger! I'm not sure about dragging, but I think I found an alternative that should also do the trick. I think I found in here a lot of valuable points to put on the drawing board (as I always call it). |
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| Good luck! |
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| 5) Your Terms of Service as completely laughable. Leave them out. What exactly is so funny about it. The spelling and the general abuse of the English language. |
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| That is something I may sort out in updates. The backgrounds are the evil ones here. The encryption engine used for that isn't that fast. I'm considering to try it out with Terabit's packer. You encrypted the backgrounds? PARANOIAFor the terms of use I think you can do with stating that it's yours, that it may not be altered and that you can pass on the unaltered demo. See everything Michael said, especially board size, load time and difficulty. |
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