Cool Random Facts About AVWW -- Help Us Explain This Game!

[zebramatt]

Hmm...

* Fast-paced 2D action with intertwined with a procedurally generated and endless world.

* Explore surreal landscapes and twisted interiors in an apocalyptic setting, finding supplies to augment your spellcasting or settlement along the way.

* Enhance your abilities and transfer your glyph from one person to the next, cultivating a community of warriors and explorers, or place all of your eggs into one basket and maximize the potential of a single character. Each time period offers survivors with different strengths.

IMO, these are pretty good, but I'm not sure we should mention the glyph, as someone who hasn't played the game won't know what that is. For the third one, maybe something like "Enhance your abilities, while cultivating a community of warriors and explorers. Or place all of your eggs into one basket and maximize the potential of a single character. Each time period offers survivors with different strengths."

Y'arrr.

[HellishFiend]

So... I'm not really sure.  It may be that we need to do both.  In our descriptive text, which it sounds like HellishFiend you would ignore, it might be that we need to sell the story/world/environment in the way that the second half life example attempts to.  But then when it comes to the bullet points, we might need to stick to some more concrete facts, such as what your objectives are and how in general you go about achieving them -- what kind of game even is this, some one new wonders? -- etc.

I like that idea. A short paragraph containing the descriptive text, followed by the "concrete" gameplay bullets. It could very well be that those with my "buying personality" skip straight to the bullets, and those that favor the descriptive type stuff would read the paragraph, and possibly the bullets afterwards. I can only really attest to my own buying personality, but I know that when I'm shopping indie titles, I typically purchase by the following factors (in order of priority):

- Is it on sale? (There are generally too many indie titles for me to look through them all, so I look at the ones that are on sale)
- Does the gameplay sound appealing? (I'll generally give the description/bullets about 20-30 seconds to grab my attention. If it does, I will fully peruse it before deciding whether to buy. If nothing about it grabs my attention in 20-30 seconds, I move on to the next title)
- Does it have good reviews? (if applicable. If no reviews are available, I may still purchase if it sounds good and the price is right)

Again, I stress that this is just my "buying personality", but I'm sure there are a lot of others out there that are the same. Besides, I'm a loyal Arcen customer so it could stand to reason that it would be a good idea to make sure the game info appeals to those like me, so that you can attract more loyal customers-to be. 

I look forward to contributing more ideas once I sink my teeth into the game.

[Amonchakad]

I believe that the level of attention given by Arcen to player suggestions/reviews is a huge selling point. I also bought AVWW despite not really liking it, and I keep giving it a try every 2-3 patches just due to the huge changes and polishes implemented on an almost daily basis. ( and I'm really liking the latest ones, keep it up   ).

...it's a pity you can't really put "devs are TOTALLY going to listen to your suggestions" on the game box, I doubt it would get the desired effect.

[Martyn van Buren]

I think there wants to be something about being free to set your own goals and achieve them with proper gameplay instead of grinding --- just as AIW is kind of RTS without crazy clicking, AVWW has RPG-like character growth without running around in a forest killing a hundred spiders.  I feel like there are enough people fed up with grinding for it to be worth advertising that the game is designed to avoid it.

[x4000]

That's a good point; I'll make sure to highlight that to Erik and see what he can come up with.

[zebramatt]

Now the difficulty's gone through an overhaul, it's definitely worth a brief note mentioning its suitability for players of all skill levels - with separate difficulty for combat and platforming.