Would You Consider Re-spawning The Hydral Ship?

[Teal_Blue]

I'm not sure this would work, or if it simply opens too many problems, so i thought i would ask if re-spawning your player ship (making the player more of a player than a character in the game) if it would lengthen, or make for different or deeper strategy plays? Without simply failing and having to start over, having the player step back and pick up the pieces and continue might be interesting? Or penalize the player for each failure, say remove all built up credit and have the player just lose ground, even serious ground, but still have the overall same issues and problems and mature environment of a game still around them.

Instead of scrapping that and going back to starting over at the beginning again.

Thoughts?

-Teal

[Cinth]

Dead? Load premission save and try again.  Save more often in general.  Especially early on when learning

I don't think there has been a strategy game I've ever played where I didn't have to go back and figure out what I could do different or better (not just savesuming to get perfect results).

If you're having an issue with something in particular, maybe you can ask the other testers

[Penumbra]

Have you heard of Karateka? It was a game on the Apple II and recently remade with modern graphics. You play as a prince trying to save the princess. He is young and not very strong, so the game is quite difficult. However, if you die, you don't just get another life. A different, stronger character takes the prince's place. There are three different player characters in total, each "easier" than the last. This serves to automatically adjust the difficulty as you play, at the expense of the ending. since the princess likes the prince most of all, you can only get the best ending by playing perfectly.

To bring this on topic, instead of penalizing the player on death by ending the game outright, you could let them continue where they left off, or even with a slight boost. You could have two or three tiers of achievements as the carrot to play better. This would allow people who are overwhelmed by the game to make progress, with tons of room for improvement and less frustration.

[Misery]

I think that the idea is that the player is supposed to withdraw from the fight, if defeat seems likely.  Judging this is part of the intended gameplay, I think.  You're not really supposed to fight it out to the bitter end... just do your best to run away.  It's typically not that difficult to do, particularly if you have something like cloak or afterburner.

[x4000]

I think that the idea is that the player is supposed to withdraw from the fight, if defeat seems likely.  Judging this is part of the intended gameplay, I think.  You're not really supposed to fight it out to the bitter end... just do your best to run away.  It's typically not that difficult to do, particularly if you have something like cloak or afterburner.

Right.

[Teal_Blue]

@Cinth, I think you are right,  saving more often would help a lot. Thanks for the suggestion, it may make all the difference.

@Penumbra, Thank you for your beautiful story of Karateka, It was very interesting and I think it would really fit well in TLF rather than simply starting over, but I don't think it really will happen. But it was a beautiful thought. Thank you.

[x4000]

Also, it actually autosaves before every battle, so if you forget to save then there is always that to go back to.

[Teal_Blue]

Thanks Chris, i really should have thought of that. Looks like the game is coming together very well... just touch ups from here. Thanks for the note back.

-Teal

[x4000]

My pleasure!  Thanks for bringing up things you think of, as always.  Even if we've already got the bases covered, it's always a better idea to check than to assume we do.