The elements combined in the game are all cool and even though it is in it's early stages, it's fun. It will certainly be a success!
Now for the negatives:
1) The minesweeper part of the game, while cool (and I love minesweeper and have always hoped more games used that mechanic), feels very detaching from the rest of the game. At first I felt like I'm playing a cool inventory management spaceship roguelite, but after a while, I'm feeling that all I'm doing is the minesweeper part, over and over and over and over again.
The minesweeper part needs to be more interesting and less tediously repetitious and luck-based. Currently most clicks I make into it are not made based on reading the minesweeper ques, but rather randomly choosing over the possible choices, because first you have to make clicks in areas where you have no knowledge of what's there, after that, it takes a few clicks to get to the phase where you can actually start reading the minesweeper ques and once you find the energy, the next energy is usually so far away that you have to continue somewhere else entirely and start this process from the beginning. This makes for a lot of random clicks and not so many calculated ones. This paired with the fact that enemies benefit from each of these moves makes it feel like I'm not really doing any strategic or tactical choises and a roll of the die will decide how the battle will end.
Some ideas to draw inspiration from:
a) The minesweeper part needs to be harder so that the player will actually have to think about it. Sweeper part difficulty can be based on the difficulty level of the enemies.
b) Smaller, individual minesweeper maps for each enemy (size, difficulty and what kind of things it contains differing based on enemy), with the enemy taking their turn after one map has been either completed or failed (this might require either setting a number of allowed moves or by including mines that you have to avoid).
c) More variety in the items inside the minesweeper part.
d) Be very careful on maps that are not 'free areas', such as currently in the game with the pre-defined rooms. They effectively block the minesweeper from playing like a minesweeper.
2) The ? events are bland. I assume they have not really been developed yet and are more like placeholder events for later developement? Take a look at games like cobalt core and lonestar to see how the 'random events' can be made impactful without them being a throw of the dice.
Don't worry too much about what I say (everyone has different opinions about everything), you are doing a good job, keep on making the game you want to make!
Here are some ideas to draw inspiration from for ? events:
1) Instead of % chances for things in choices, some could simply be "choose 1 out of 2/3/4 things to happen or none at all" with the player getting what they are choosing. They could also be simple tradeoffs (lose X, gain Z) or things that impact the future (right now, I will give you X, but later I will collect Z from you) or (I will give you X now, but the next fight or boss fight will contain Z, that will make it harder).
2) Item / inventory manipulation
2a) Welding / integration service: Welds one item in your inventory to your ship, making it impossible to move, but gives it a bonus of some kind.
2b) Crazy construction yard: Allows you to expand your inventory by 4 slots, but also installs 3 immovable 1x1 "support beam" -items in random places in your inventory.
2c) Item exchange, choose one: give 1 item, receive 1 random item of the same type. give 1 attack item, receive 1 random attack item. give 1 shield item, receive 1 random shield item.
2d) Makeshift modification station, choose one: Give 2 items, one will receive a negative modification, the other will receive a positive modification. Or: Give 1 item, it will randomly receive either a positive or a negative modification.
3) Special items that cannot be gained any other way
3a) Broken down ship: Give a consumable item (for repairs) and gain radar item, that makes every 5th click on the minesweeper open a cross-shaped area instead of just a single cell.
3b) Ship ran out of energy: Get an empty battery that you can charge during combat. Once it is full, the next ? event allows you to give it back and receive 'charge capacitor' item that charges up by 1 every time a nearby item is used and once it hits 5, the next item nearby gets triggered twice when it is used and the charges go back to 0 (with twice the effect, for example a shield would be "up to 20" instead of "up to 10" with this effect).
3c) Derelict ship about to be swallowed up by a black hole, you have time to scavenge 1 thing out of it: A malfunctioning phase-shield, that completely blocks every 5th shot against you. A powerful weapon that uses 5 energy per shot, dealing 50 damage (I compared this to the 35 I could do with 5 energy with the items I had), but also 5 damage to you (that cannot be blocked by shields). An energy generator that generates energy from enemy bullets, giving you 1 energy for every 3 shots taken against you. A gigantic missile, that will automatically destroy the first wave of ships (or just 1 ship) in the next battle you go in.
Some other ideas that came to my mind:
There could be more interaction between items and the mindsweeper map, as that is where most of the playing happens. Basically items with a action that does something in the mindsweeper area, also with no energy cost but with a cooldown or a "1 time per refreshed minesweep map" or "X times per battle" type of limitation.
Some effects that there could be:
1) A larger area covered on a click (such as with the radar).
2) Rapid searching: More clicks before enemies get energy.
3) Forceful excavation: Clears a large area in one go (say a diamond shaped 4x4), but only gain a maximum of 1 energy from that area, others are lost.
4) Efficient excavation: Finding an energy will give you X shield. Or finding an energy will 'ping' the area around the energy and reveal it.
5) Excavation drone: Reveals 1 random spot on the minesweeper map every X turns.
6) Rare mineral item (some item that uses a rare mineral instead of energy to use, with a very small storage capacity, maybe 1 or 2?): The item has it's own effect when activated, but having it will add a rare mineral to a random place in the minesweep map (1 per refresh?) that the player can find, but the map will still refresh after finding the energies, so it will not always be found.
Some of the descriptions are confusing :( The compact shields don't stack in the way you described. I'll put your comment in my list to fix the description.
There is some bug with the debris: In infinity level 3, a spaceship left "debris" with health 100. On my next shot, the debris disappeared but the bullets still got blocked by the now remaining void.
So, I just played through the game, and I loved it! Here are my initial thoughts, and I'll probably add another comment at some point once I've tried it a few more times. Also, I know this game is very early in development, all of this is meant as constructive criticism because I am already having a blast with this game.
-The podracers hitting on the second turn feels kind of unfair, since you are relying entirely on getting lucky and hitting energy on your first click to armor up in time. Forced damage in and of itself is not the worst, but when it's forced damage that can be avoided based on luck it feels kind of bad.
-The scanner that shows all the 1s is waaaay too strong. Once I got my hands on it I would almost never miss a click. I don't know that I have any good recommendations for how to rebalance it though, and I think that kind of mechanic does add a lot to the game. Also on the topic of the scanner, the 1s are extremelt hard to see on the ice maps because the blues are really similar in color.
-The energy economy is thrown way off because of the energy amplifier and the mining drill. My first run I had three drills and an energy amplifier, so I could usually get my scanner up turn 2 or 3 and then get about 8 energy each turn. At the same time, those items are some of the things that made the gameplay feel best. I firmly believe that those should be some sort of upgrade rather than random item drops, either in an ftl-style ship upgrade screen or as post-boss upgrades like in monster train. I also think you should probably start with two clicks, rather than just one, because it makes the game feel so much better.
-As mentioned by Retromation in his video, there is definitely an issue where stalling and healing to full every fight is the optimal play. You also are heavily incentivised to stall to full energy before starting the next wave. I don't know if the correct answer is having the enemies scale over time, or simply limiting the number of heals you can do per combat, but I do think that this should be addressed somehow.
This game is already great, and has so much potential. I look forward to playing more of it and seeing where it goes from here. Congrats on the amazing work!
During my second run I ran into the batteries that keep charge between runs, and while it's a fun mechanic it feeds into the whole stalling the fight problem. I am a few hops away from the boss and I am starting every fight with 25 energy, making everything quite trivial.
Edit: also, it leads to the scanner always being on turn 1.
Thanks for the great suggestions! I'm planning on changing how the battery works, instead of keeping the charge, it will give x (5?) amount of energy at the beginning of each battle. I also want the enemies to "run away" if they can't hit the player. I don't want people to feel like they need to grind.
Also... did you really get those items in the screenshot or is that edited? That is a very strong inventory.
Not sure if this would be too far from your plan for this game, but I like the idea of opening cells being your energy source, and mines are possible self-damage?
That way, energy is more consistent (maybe directly related to the numbers on clues you find, and inflate energy values on everything to balance?), and also opens up possible self-damage builds. Sorry if this is a lot of ideas at once!
I'll keep it how it is for now. It would be to much of a change. But I does make me think... I'm looking for way to interact with the mining board in different ways and there could be items that change things.
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The elements combined in the game are all cool and even though it is in it's early stages, it's fun. It will certainly be a success!
Now for the negatives:
1) The minesweeper part of the game, while cool (and I love minesweeper and have always hoped more games used that mechanic), feels very detaching from the rest of the game. At first I felt like I'm playing a cool inventory management spaceship roguelite, but after a while, I'm feeling that all I'm doing is the minesweeper part, over and over and over and over again.
The minesweeper part needs to be more interesting and less tediously repetitious and luck-based. Currently most clicks I make into it are not made based on reading the minesweeper ques, but rather randomly choosing over the possible choices, because first you have to make clicks in areas where you have no knowledge of what's there, after that, it takes a few clicks to get to the phase where you can actually start reading the minesweeper ques and once you find the energy, the next energy is usually so far away that you have to continue somewhere else entirely and start this process from the beginning. This makes for a lot of random clicks and not so many calculated ones. This paired with the fact that enemies benefit from each of these moves makes it feel like I'm not really doing any strategic or tactical choises and a roll of the die will decide how the battle will end.
Some ideas to draw inspiration from:
a) The minesweeper part needs to be harder so that the player will actually have to think about it. Sweeper part difficulty can be based on the difficulty level of the enemies.
b) Smaller, individual minesweeper maps for each enemy (size, difficulty and what kind of things it contains differing based on enemy), with the enemy taking their turn after one map has been either completed or failed (this might require either setting a number of allowed moves or by including mines that you have to avoid).
c) More variety in the items inside the minesweeper part.
d) Be very careful on maps that are not 'free areas', such as currently in the game with the pre-defined rooms. They effectively block the minesweeper from playing like a minesweeper.
2) The ? events are bland. I assume they have not really been developed yet and are more like placeholder events for later developement? Take a look at games like cobalt core and lonestar to see how the 'random events' can be made impactful without them being a throw of the dice.
Thanks for the feedback!
You gave me some good ideas. ex: Instead of just energy/health orb in the mining area, there could be shield and things that damage the enemy.
I'll look into those games. I'm not very good at story telling and the ? events are actually the developed one...
Don't worry too much about what I say (everyone has different opinions about everything), you are doing a good job, keep on making the game you want to make!
Here are some ideas to draw inspiration from for ? events:
1) Instead of % chances for things in choices, some could simply be "choose 1 out of 2/3/4 things to happen or none at all" with the player getting what they are choosing. They could also be simple tradeoffs (lose X, gain Z) or things that impact the future (right now, I will give you X, but later I will collect Z from you) or (I will give you X now, but the next fight or boss fight will contain Z, that will make it harder).
2) Item / inventory manipulation
2a) Welding / integration service: Welds one item in your inventory to your ship, making it impossible to move, but gives it a bonus of some kind.
2b) Crazy construction yard: Allows you to expand your inventory by 4 slots, but also installs 3 immovable 1x1 "support beam" -items in random places in your inventory.
2c) Item exchange, choose one: give 1 item, receive 1 random item of the same type. give 1 attack item, receive 1 random attack item. give 1 shield item, receive 1 random shield item.
2d) Makeshift modification station, choose one: Give 2 items, one will receive a negative modification, the other will receive a positive modification. Or: Give 1 item, it will randomly receive either a positive or a negative modification.
3) Special items that cannot be gained any other way
3a) Broken down ship: Give a consumable item (for repairs) and gain radar item, that makes every 5th click on the minesweeper open a cross-shaped area instead of just a single cell.
3b) Ship ran out of energy: Get an empty battery that you can charge during combat. Once it is full, the next ? event allows you to give it back and receive 'charge capacitor' item that charges up by 1 every time a nearby item is used and once it hits 5, the next item nearby gets triggered twice when it is used and the charges go back to 0 (with twice the effect, for example a shield would be "up to 20" instead of "up to 10" with this effect).
3c) Derelict ship about to be swallowed up by a black hole, you have time to scavenge 1 thing out of it: A malfunctioning phase-shield, that completely blocks every 5th shot against you. A powerful weapon that uses 5 energy per shot, dealing 50 damage (I compared this to the 35 I could do with 5 energy with the items I had), but also 5 damage to you (that cannot be blocked by shields). An energy generator that generates energy from enemy bullets, giving you 1 energy for every 3 shots taken against you. A gigantic missile, that will automatically destroy the first wave of ships (or just 1 ship) in the next battle you go in.
Some other ideas that came to my mind:
There could be more interaction between items and the mindsweeper map, as that is where most of the playing happens. Basically items with a action that does something in the mindsweeper area, also with no energy cost but with a cooldown or a "1 time per refreshed minesweep map" or "X times per battle" type of limitation.
Some effects that there could be:
1) A larger area covered on a click (such as with the radar).
2) Rapid searching: More clicks before enemies get energy.
3) Forceful excavation: Clears a large area in one go (say a diamond shaped 4x4), but only gain a maximum of 1 energy from that area, others are lost.
4) Efficient excavation: Finding an energy will give you X shield. Or finding an energy will 'ping' the area around the energy and reveal it.
5) Excavation drone: Reveals 1 random spot on the minesweeper map every X turns.
6) Rare mineral item (some item that uses a rare mineral instead of energy to use, with a very small storage capacity, maybe 1 or 2?): The item has it's own effect when activated, but having it will add a rare mineral to a random place in the minesweep map (1 per refresh?) that the player can find, but the map will still refresh after finding the energies, so it will not always be found.
I was in a low ideas phase and your comment is making my brain go wild :) Thanks!
Here's a video of me playing the game
I have two "compact shields" that say "stacks with similar mods". But they do not stack and if I activate them both, the shield still remainds at 10.
Some of the descriptions are confusing :( The compact shields don't stack in the way you described. I'll put your comment in my list to fix the description.
There is some bug with the debris: In infinity level 3, a spaceship left "debris" with health 100. On my next shot, the debris disappeared but the bullets still got blocked by the now remaining void.
Thanks for the info, I'll look into it. Do you remember if there were any other enemies while this happen or were you able to continue the game?
There were two other enemies behind the debris and I could not continue the game.
Space Order Mine Gameplay
I keep getting this error when trying to play the game. Does anyone know how to solve this?
Which browser are you using?
I'm not sure as I'm using the Itch app
I never tried the app. I did some change, it should work now. You might have to update/re-install the game.
It works now, Thank you :)
I watched the game on Retromation and it looks very promising.
Here are my tips to fix the current issues:
gl
You gave me some pretty good ideas, thanks!
So, I just played through the game, and I loved it! Here are my initial thoughts, and I'll probably add another comment at some point once I've tried it a few more times. Also, I know this game is very early in development, all of this is meant as constructive criticism because I am already having a blast with this game.
-The podracers hitting on the second turn feels kind of unfair, since you are relying entirely on getting lucky and hitting energy on your first click to armor up in time. Forced damage in and of itself is not the worst, but when it's forced damage that can be avoided based on luck it feels kind of bad.
-The scanner that shows all the 1s is waaaay too strong. Once I got my hands on it I would almost never miss a click. I don't know that I have any good recommendations for how to rebalance it though, and I think that kind of mechanic does add a lot to the game. Also on the topic of the scanner, the 1s are extremelt hard to see on the ice maps because the blues are really similar in color.
-The energy economy is thrown way off because of the energy amplifier and the mining drill. My first run I had three drills and an energy amplifier, so I could usually get my scanner up turn 2 or 3 and then get about 8 energy each turn. At the same time, those items are some of the things that made the gameplay feel best. I firmly believe that those should be some sort of upgrade rather than random item drops, either in an ftl-style ship upgrade screen or as post-boss upgrades like in monster train. I also think you should probably start with two clicks, rather than just one, because it makes the game feel so much better.
-As mentioned by Retromation in his video, there is definitely an issue where stalling and healing to full every fight is the optimal play. You also are heavily incentivised to stall to full energy before starting the next wave. I don't know if the correct answer is having the enemies scale over time, or simply limiting the number of heals you can do per combat, but I do think that this should be addressed somehow.
This game is already great, and has so much potential. I look forward to playing more of it and seeing where it goes from here. Congrats on the amazing work!
During my second run I ran into the batteries that keep charge between runs, and while it's a fun mechanic it feeds into the whole stalling the fight problem. I am a few hops away from the boss and I am starting every fight with 25 energy, making everything quite trivial.
Edit: also, it leads to the scanner always being on turn 1.
Edit 2:
Thanks for the great suggestions! I'm planning on changing how the battery works, instead of keeping the charge, it will give x (5?) amount of energy at the beginning of each battle. I also want the enemies to "run away" if they can't hit the player. I don't want people to feel like they need to grind.
Also... did you really get those items in the screenshot or is that edited? That is a very strong inventory.
Sorry for the late reply, that was indeed the inventory I had after the boss (I got a drill from the last fight iirc).
Unfourtunately I can use only 5 components max, even if I have 6 or more components in the "backpack".
There should be a scrollbar maybe it's not visible enough.
reminds me a bit of Backpack Hero
You are right, I really like Backpack Hero and Peglin.
Very fun, wish it was longer/infinite
Thanks! I have more content in the work but I didn't think of an infinite mode, maybe that could be a good option.
very nice concept indeed :D keep up the good work ! there should be a hard mode where the enemies plays at their own pace
Hey, this is a cool prototype, are you still working on it?
Yes I am :) I'm currently working on adding content (bigger map, more enemies, more items).
Cool! Please keep me posted :D
Took me a while to realize I was supposed to find the bombs, not isolate them, but I got the hang of it.
I just took a note of this, I'll try to make it more obvious. I can understand people are used to isolate the bombs.
Not sure if this would be too far from your plan for this game, but I like the idea of opening cells being your energy source, and mines are possible self-damage?
That way, energy is more consistent (maybe directly related to the numbers on clues you find, and inflate energy values on everything to balance?), and also opens up possible self-damage builds. Sorry if this is a lot of ideas at once!
I like the idea of a self-damage build.
I'll keep it how it is for now. It would be to much of a change. But I does make me think... I'm looking for way to interact with the mining board in different ways and there could be items that change things.
Yup, me too! :P
I'll probably have to put some sort of tutorial.
or simply flash on screen at the start of the first stages: Capture the bombs!!!
That would be clear :)