Modernising Games

Recently, Ron Gilbert wrote a post about how he and Gary Winnick are going about modernizing the classic point and click adventure for Thimbleweed Park.

How are we going to handle new and modern players? People who have never played an adventure game before? Are we going to hold their hand? Have a tutorial? IAP to buy your way past a puzzle? Is there going to be a hint system?

Obviously, Bodycheck is a slightly different game with very different expectations on it than Thimbleweed Park has. But those are good questions that I'd like to use as a jumping off point to provide some info as we move into the final weeks of making the game.

• There's no IAP in the game. It will sell for a flat fee.
• There's no detailed tutorial. I always prefer simply exploring the game systems myself, and games that handhold every button press drive me crazy. There is a screen that gives you the basics of playing, but it doesn't necessarily reveal everything.
• The game will launch at least in North America and Europe. Other territories to be confirmed.
• Compared to previous games in the fictional sports genre, as I'm calling it, Bodycheck is quite fast. It's certainly not turn-based. You don't have a huge amount of time to think. As a result, the game has been kept fairly streamlined.

For example, scoring is very straightforward, mostly because we don't want to have to explain it very much. Here's how it works:

• 3 points for scoring a goal from inside the D;
• 5 points for scoring a goal from outside the D;
• 7 points for completely knocking out an opponent -- this only happens if your player actually lands the knockout blow (physically or magically).

That's it. The points value for knocking out an opponent sounds like a lot, but it works pretty well because you don't always land the knockout blow, and it adds to the tension in the last seconds when you only have a slender lead...