From Chris: Help creating tutorials, please!

[x4000]

Hey folks,

I'll keep this brief. The TLDR is that I have too much to do right now, and I'm trying to balance all that. Tutorials are a critical component for the game, but something I'm struggling with mightily.

I made the tutorials for the first AI War, but I don't want to do something so lengthy this time, and I don't feel confident in my ability to judge what people can pick up from tooltips and context versus what they need to be taught in an explicit tutorial.

I have no problem developing the new tutorial SYSTEM, which will power any user-created tutorials or scenarios people care to make. But the idea of using that system to actually create a tutorial of my own just fills me with this feeling of dread, and that whatever I do won't be good enough as well as being a huge  time sink in terms of designing it and testing it and responding to testing feedback.

In an ideal world, if there are interested folks I'd love for this to be a group effort. If there are people who want to just outline small tutorials of their own, with what's on each planet, what the goals and text are at each stage, and so on, then that is something I could turn into actual tutorials. Having other people then test and kind of debug the flow and clarity of those experiences would be good.

I don't really have a desire for one giant monolithic tutorial. Our system now allows for any number of them, with them even being able to be categorized. So some of these could just be a situation focused on a particular advanced topic, or some minor faction. These don't need to be five hour affairs to play, and in fact I think it's better if they're not.

I think for some of them it might actually be fun if they were like challenge scenarios that do teach you but are also hard to win. For new players, those might be interesting bite sized things to jump on at first.

I can build the engine for all this, and all it will take is xml work (no coding) for anyone to make a tutorial after that. But beyond that I'd like to focus on bug fixes, game flow, control improvements, finishing graphical things, and a list of other stuff.

This is oddly both my top priority (tutorials) and the thing I desperately don't want to work on. Aside from the tutorial creation engine, thar part is fun and I feel equipped to do that. Any help out of this paradox would be welcome, even if that's just designing a scenario via text.

Thanks everyone!

[I-KP]

Personally, I find YouTube tutorials for complicated games the most educational - even to the point of in-game links to 'official' tutorial vids. Every Paradox grand strategy game for example benefits, nay, relies on a similar approach.

[zeusalmighty]

I think for some of them it might actually be fun if they were like challenge scenarios that do teach you but are also hard to win. For new players, those might be interesting bite sized things to jump on at first.

I think this is important. Tutorials don't sound fun, they sound like work. Starting scenarios that focus on a specific area of the game and encourage strategic planning are important, but they need to have an incentive to prioritize those. Maybe completing these scenarios can award things to include in the main game? (My best example would be including a "Custom" starting flagship, but locking certain units behind rewards to be found in-game or from completing starting scenarios)

But scenarios could focus on different, important parts of the game. Here is a couple:
1) Survive the Horde--Goal: Prepare for and Survive the CPA. 5 planet snake; players start with 2 planets and can take up to the 4 (if resourceful). After X mintues, AI unleashes massive Exo Strike at your HW. Survive the wave for victory. This scenario would have GCAs to encompass all variable turret/static d. options to encourage different layouts, energy still being a limiting factor. The lesson is the importance of protecting your HW and the value of expendable buffer planets.
2) Unleash the Beast--Goal: Kill 5 conduits spread throughout the galaxy to unleash the Nancaust on the AI HW without incurring X total AIP (or Death!). 10 planet concentric; AI HW in middle, players on perimter. Each conduit raises AIP by a lot, triggering an impossible counter-attack if taken without going after AIP reducers spread throughout galaxy. Players start with raid fleets to carry out objective and can take planets but AIP costs are punishing. The lesson here is the importance of balancing AIP reduction without going over AIP thresholds prematurely. The ending is a nice climactic finish, unleashing the friendly nanocaust to win all out

Scenarios like this would be short, engaging, and instructional--throw in a reward to the main game to make these even more enticing

[kasnavada]

Personally, I find YouTube tutorials for complicated games the most educational - even to the point of in-game links to 'official' tutorial vids. Every Paradox grand strategy game for example benefits, nay, relies on a similar approach.

This.

That said, are you sure about what you're proposing here ? In-game tutorial & scenarios & so on are great - but depending on how far you go (and you sound like going quite far), your tutorial system becomes a system which enables modders to script a campaign. Which inherently enables others to create tutorials too. I like the idea a lot, but am I understanding this well ?


What I thought about tutorials in AI War II would be something similar to Endless Space II or Stellaris (if I remember the tutorials well, as it's been a while). Create a notification when clicking for the first time on an object or a tab. The notification can then be clicked, which opens a small text with videos gif / images, depending on the complexity of what is to be explained. The idea being that you can get basic info on anything in 30 seconds, or just right click away the notification.

Back on what I-KIP said, a series of a dozen 1-2 minute clips explaining various points of the game would probably take days - it's manageable by volunteers too. However, you do need someone with some equipment and good speaking skills (sorry, but I'd be out completely as no one will understand my singapore / malaysian / tv series english with my native French accent). You could possibly get a "pro" or semi-pro streamer to do them, or to make a 30 minute video explaining the basics. You could then use the above mentioned notification idea to start reading the videos to players, or just place them in the tutorial section as-is. Or in the current "how to play" section. The notification idea could also just "read" the data you've already compiled in the "how to play" section (which would require some refining).


So... sorry for asking - I don't want to make you doubt or anything - but what do you want to do ?


PS: If you're ok with walls of text, an "official" steam guide before the game launches would go a long way too. It's not a IG tutorial, but I think it would be nice to have as a small bonus. You could then link it link it as the "official" newbie documentation, in the game description, as a sticky in the forum, and possibly in game too. I'm not sure if there is a rule preventing game makers from making their own guides, but now that I say this I don't remember never seeing a game dev write guides.

In any case, I'd volunteer to write a steam guide, doubly so if you or badger validated it and made it "official". If anyone else wants to do it, or if you want anyone else to do it, fine by me.

[x4000]

Well, in the game itself there is a "basic wiki" of sorts, under the How To Play section.  It has things broken out by topic and topics grouped into categories.  It's not a full guide that includes pictures and wiki-style crosslinks, though, and it also doesn't have any search capabilities.

I certainly would love to have some official guides around, and videos as well.  I haven't played any PC strategy games of this depth by other developers in quite a while, and in the past it was always a matter of having in-game playable tutorials of some sort.  Usually in the form of a boring campaign I'd skip.

That's part of what turns me off about creating this sort of thing, is it doesn't seem like fun to play.  And yes, it would be a full scripting thing (sort of) for the game, which is pretty hefty.  You guys understood the core idea properly.  But if it isn't appealing to you, then it's DEFINITELY not the sort of thing that appeals to me, either.

---

Embedding youtube videos into the game itself (ability to play back youtube videos without clicking out of the game) would definitely be one thing I could do, or it could just be links to youtube.  Some people seem to find watching videos to be annoying, but for those people I'm hoping that the How To Play section of the game would be sufficient instead.

Maybe the How To Play section just needs to be renamed to Tutorials / In-Game Wiki, and then start including some video links in there. I could make a basic introductory "let's play with the developer for the very start of the game," although my voice isn't exactly professional voiceover quality.  Other people could also make them, and I'd be happy to link to those, as well as to things like Steam Guides.

All of that sounds a lot more palatable to me, and a lot more doable in the sort of timeframe that exists at the moment.

[RocketAssistedPuffin]

I don't really want to do tutorials, and I think I might have issues getting the right points across, but if necessary I can try it. If nothing else I'd free up some time.

Videos are definitely not possible. I don't have the equipment, and I'm a monotone speaker.

[BadgerBadger]

I don't like in-game tutorials because they just give the mechanics of gameplay, but not the mindset of how an expert things. I much prefer video tutorials of people actually playing.

 Imagine the difference between someone telling you how chess pieces move and a grandmaster explaining how they choose which move to play. It's easy to figure out the mechanics, much harder to understand what the right thought process is.

[Draco18s]

I loath video tutorials.

I do not want to sit around watching someone else play a game. It isn't fun, I don't get what I need from it, and I can't easily go back and reference something later (I have to skip through looking for the right spot, and when the game looks the same all the time, finding that spot is hard, meaning I end up watching ALL of the tutorial all over again!)

And it gets worse when the game updates. Now all those tutorials are worthless and wrong.

[x4000]

@Puffin: I don't need you to create any videos, it's all good.  But if you have any savegames that have a good "teachable moment" in them or can think of savegames of that sort, then I could definitely do with a collection of those.

@Baddger: I agree on in-game tutorials for games like this, in terms of why I don't like them.  And the written tutorials that are in the game are meant to give the mindset for that reason.  With something like a Zelda game, or even Three Houses, those have integrated tutorials because they give you new mechanics as you play through a linear experience.  I can't think of any sandbox games that really do that, unless they have a progression component to them (GTA 5 is a sandbox but also a linear story where things unlock).

@Draco: I hear you on not wanting to watch other people play.  For that reason, keeping them short is I think important.  And keeping the text ones.  Plus keeping each video to a specific topic, versus one long rambly 2-hour video LP. As far as game updates go, keeping the tutorials smaller and more focused in this way should also help on that front.

[Sounds]

Of late my tendency is to ignore tutorials as the 'fun' seems to be thrown out the window in favour of a too dry and sterile explanation of specific mechanics. The only time I look at them is when I'm struggling with the interface, and even then I usually don't find much value and end up looking for 'let's play clips'.

The tutorial approach I've enjoyed most recently is the approach done in Stellaris' and (similarly) in Total War: WH1&2. Breaking it down, the essence of their approach is to learn through gameplay objectives. For both games, they're offered as:
 - A series of interface control 'how tos'
 - Thematic objectives teaching core concepts.

The highlight is the thematic objectives. TWWH provides them through the campaign and Stellaris embeds them through event triggers as the game progresses.

What I think AI War shares with these two games is it allows for a non-linear approach to decision making based on strategic objectives. Not saying you need to create a campaign or an elaborate set of objective based event triggers, but  this is where the fun is.

Here are a few musings on what's required:
1- Embed the learning experience in-game - drop the idea of separate tutorials outside the game
2- Provide embed context sensitive links to an official wiki / youtube in-game.
3- Make a link to the launch screen to the wiki home page and provide a tutorial sections that point to how-tos, youtube clips, etc.
4- Provide a series of gameplay objectives triggered at early to mid game or whenever it is required to explain a new concept only available after some event occurred
 
How does that sound?

[Asteroid]

From the project management point of view, doesn't implementing the tutorial mean a feature freeze, otherwise a lot of coding and writing will be invested to explain things that keep changing?
That, or everyone commits to updating the tutorials whenever they change something. It's a bit like maintaining unit tests... and unit tests are broken right now.

The highlight is the thematic objectives. TWWH provides them through the campaign and Stellaris embeds them through event triggers as the game progresses.

What I think AI War shares with these two games is it allows for a non-linear approach to decision making based on strategic objectives. Not saying you need to create a campaign or an elaborate set of objective based event triggers, but  this is where the fun is.

Here are a few musings on what's required:
1- Embed the learning experience in-game - drop the idea of separate tutorials outside the game
2- Provide embed context sensitive links to an official wiki / youtube in-game.
3- Make a link to the launch screen to the wiki home page and provide a tutorial sections that point to how-tos, youtube clips, etc.
4- Provide a series of gameplay objectives triggered at early to mid game or whenever it is required to explain a new concept only available after some event occurred
 
How does that sound?

Sounds good to me . Great actually.
X4: Foundation is an example of a procedural sandbox game that incorporates tutorials in this fashion. I wouldn't say they have a model implementation, but the idea is there - they find an opportune moment, will actually spawn stuff in the game world as needed, and teach you a single mechanic.

For AI War 2 some kind of control over the global game state would be useful to implement this kind of stuff, so the AI is nice and leaves you some space by withdrawing the Warden/Hunter fleets from the area while you complete your objective, for instance.

[kasnavada]

I loath video tutorials.

I don't think any of us suggested this as the only means of explaining the game. But let's play are now essential to making a game succeed.

Most games I buy now have someone officially streaming the game for the first days after launch.

And yes, I see huge value for this, even if I'm supposed to be one of the older people that don't like it (I'm 37).

[Asteroid]

Adding another idea to the pile: advisor icons. I think Simcity-like goofy permanent advisors that actually tell you stuff are not that popular these days, but Civ IV-VI sometimes have icons next to actions you can take. These recommend good hexes you could build your city on, techs you could research to go down the religious/economic/military path, buildings you could go for (for each path), and so on.

Just having icons like that over recommended planets or capturables you should take, or buildings you should put down, could help new players tremendously.

[I-KP]

I love having a good wiki on hand for complex games; easily the best way to quickly learn about one specific thing. The trouble with the AI War 2 wiki is that it's not limited to just AI War 2 and most searches return AIW:FC results, which could lead to epic levels of confusion on the part of the uninitiated.

[Draco18s]

I loath video tutorials.

I don't think any of us suggested this as the only means of explaining the game. But let's play are now essential to making a game succeed.

Lets Plays are not tutorials. They're a different means of consuming the game's content. I have nothing against Lets Plays (other than not enjoying them myself).

But what I mean is this:
(not going to boot up NS2 to find the video that they actually link to from within their tutorials section, so I'll just grab a likely looking one off Youtube)
Watch this (13min) and now tell me:

Do you know how to wall climb? Are you good at it? Can you pull off a ceiling jump?

No?

Great. Neither can I. And its absolutely 100% essential that you do otherwise alt-F4 because you're going to get shot up by the marines in about 4 seconds and get zero evolution points which you need at least 50 of to play any of the other aliens.

THAT is what I hate about video tutorials. You can't actually TRY anything, get a feel for the controls, or have your attention directed to where it needs to be. Instead its an info dump ("you can walk on walls") and then you get thrown into a LIVE multiplayer game with EXPERIENCED players and expected to not suck (because no other play modes exist).