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[steeeeee]

Yeah, sorry

 

[ScHlAuChi]

Oh come on, what the hell do you expect?
There are far too many good games available nowadays, so much so that not only is the gamer spoiled for choice, the amount of time a gamer has to give a game a fair shake has decreased greatly since even last gen.

Yep that is part of the problem, its getting closer to the Hollywood model - Blockbuster or bust.

More to the point, people play games like Haunted to chill out, switch off their brains, and kill some virtual splatterbags. They often do this to wind down after a heavy day of work or study, and don't want to think about things. ANY things. Thinking hurts, ScHlAuChi. You should know this, you're a programmer, aren't you?

Nope im a designer, but you see, there ARE already 100s of games out there for that, like KillingFloor, Left4Dead, Dead Island etc, so why does Haunted HAVE to be like this too? What happend to diversity?

So the average player, brain switched to neutral and Mountain Dew* in offhand, doesn't want to think about how to most efficiently use your obtuse melee system after a hard day of thinking - their head likely hurts enough as is.

Well really, how much more simple than "direction + action" can it be? Its a far cry from the complexity of a Bayonetta, Devil May Cry or God of War

They want to be taught what to do, and how and when to do it, at least once so that they can get the hang of it and it can become muscle memory. Just plain not telling the player that they can get different attacks by pressing [Evade] + [Melee] or [Sprint] + [Melee]

Oh come on, have people really degraded mentally that much that they cant figure out to press button 1 followed by button 2? How did they ever figure out that you can jump off yoshi while midair - they were never told about that in Super Mario World

just because you think the player is somehow psychic and can read your minds (or can be bothered to read the instructions before playing )

Yes thats more like it, there was a movelist in the menu - and there were hints during the load screen - just no one ever bothered to read that stuff, so its not like the player wasnt told

Thankfully, you've remedied that particular problem,

Yes, but if you read NeoGAF, its exactly the opposite what people are asking for, read the Skyward Sword thread where everyone complains that they get spoonfeed by the game - but if a game with very simple mechanics like Haunted DOESNT do it, people dont get it.
This shows that there is a disconnect between what people claim they want, and what they actually need and a dev should do.

but you still seem to not get the point - that games are meant to be fun. Games - hell, any programs or devices - are meant to serve the user, not the maker! Got it?**

Oh we do get it, but the problem is that not every game is fun for everyone, you cannot please all people. Each feature or game mechanic that you use can win or lose you customers - what is fun for one is shit for another. And its not like the customer is always right - for example we got tons of requests to add the possibility that you can crouch in the game, or that we should add a FPS camera - both things that make no sense at all!

I mean a perfect example is Demons/Dark Souls, the games dont tell you anything at all and they have more complex systems than Haunted. Its all about trying out and learning how to get better and advance. Would those games be any better if they were super easy and told you everything? I dont think so! The main problem is the one of perception - people expect Haunted to be a simple Zombie shooter, which it isnt

 

[subversus]

Yes, but if you read NeoGAF, its exactly the opposite what people are asking for, read the Skyward Sword thread where everyone complains that they get spoonfed by the game - but if a game with very simple mechanics like Haunted DOESNT do it, people dont get it.
This shows that there is a disconnect between what people claim they want, eventho in reality it shows that its absolutely needed.

I think you learned a very valuable lesson here.

 

[Dambrosi]

I think you learned a very valuable lesson here.

Indeed.

Thanks for the very in-depth reply, ScHlAuChi, and sorry for not replying before now. I'll address some of the points you've made.

Yep that is part of the problem, its getting closer to the Hollywood model - Blockbuster or bust.

Nope im a designer, but you see, there ARE already 100s of games out there for that, like Killing Floor, Left4Dead, Dead Island etc, so why does Haunted HAVE to be like this too? What happened to diversity?

But didn't you take Shadows Of The Damned as direct design inspiration for The Haunted?

Besides, every one of the games you mentioned above have their own twists on the splatterbag-splatting formula - KF and L4D are drastically different takes on the co-operative not!zombie shooter, and Dead Island is a slightly poorer first-person Dead Rising set in a tropical resort. The Haunted's main claim to fame is that it's "that indie game that's a bit like Res Evil 5", even though it really isn't. But that's beside the point; that point being "what are you doing to differentiate your game from every other not!zombie shooter/slicer out there?", because, when you step back and look at it from a consumer's POV, The Haunted looks just like every other not!zombie shooter/slicer out there, because at the end of the day, you're still shooting, slicing, and kicking not!zombies to re-death, just in third-person. And we already have Shadows Of The Damned for that.

Which is fine. Don't get me wrong, I'm not criticizing you for that at all. I'm just wondering whether some other additional elements, such as, say, small puzzle sequences or some adventure elements, or even some Pac-Man-esque element of run-and-chase gameplay might have made The Haunted stand out more from the crowd, as it were. As it is, your game looks like only one other game out there, so it definitely has a niche, but I wonder if it could have been something more.

Well really, how much more simple than "direction + action" can it be? Its a far cry from the complexity of a Bayonetta, Devil May Cry or God of War

Sorry, but your game ain't no Bayonetta. But, you already knew that ;P

It doesn't really matter if the melee system is easy-mode enough for even a dog to master, it's having the opportunity to train and the need to use it during normal play. Look at how RE4 did it - melee was wholly context-sensitive, except for the knife, which was mostly used to bust open barrels, and during the odd boss-fight. Anyway, each and every melee attack had a purpose - the roundhouse kick cleared your path and did huge damage, the suplex was a super-cool finishing blow for most enemies, and you needed to use these moves to save precious ammo and progress. See? In RE4, melee was both easy to understand, awesome to behold, and necessary to proceed.

Alternatively, look at how DMC and Bayonetta did it - the systems they use may seem complex, but basically, their melee combat systems really do boil down to "direction + action", just like The Haunted does. Plenty of context-sensitive moves in Bayo's system, too. Nonetheless, both Bayo and DMC are built around their melee combat systems, which both use only two attack buttons, with more moves made available to the player through the use of "modifier" buttons, new weapons and abilities earned over time, one-button weapon-switching that allows the player to quickly and easily extend combos, you get the point. Everything is made easy to do and is drummed into the player's muscle memory through necessary repetition. After a while, switching weapons mid-combo while simultaneously juggling several enemies and evading attacks at the same time becomes, if not second nature, then at least eminently possible.

Or you could have just knocked off God Hand, and we would have all loved you. But something tells me that you still wanted your big, shooty guns in the game, and guns in God Hand would be sacrilege.

Oh come on, have people really degraded mentally that much that they cant figure out to press button 1 followed by button 2? How did they ever figure out that you can jump off Yoshi while midair - they were never told about that in Super Mario World

Many people didn't, not until they heard about doing it from friends or read Nintendo Power's tip section. Hell, many people still don't.

Again, it doesn't matter that it's simple - what matters is if the player can (or, more properly, needs to) get used to using it without having to think too hard about it. Necessity + Repetition = muscle memory, dude.

Yes that's more like it, there was a movelist in the menu - and there were hints during the load screen - just no one ever bothered to read that stuff, so its not like the player wasn't told

That's true, too, but even so...well, refer to the reply below.

Yes, but if you read NeoGAF, its exactly the opposite what people are asking for, read the Skyward Sword thread where everyone complains that they get spoonfed by the game - but if a game with very simple mechanics like Haunted DOESN'T do it, people dont get it.
This shows that there is a disconnect between what people claim they want, and what they actually need and a dev should do.

Very good. You seem to be getting it, ever so slowly. Besides, people were complaining about Skyward Sword's overbearing tutorials (which you could totally ignore, by the way! I bet they didn't even know that!) because it was a Nintendo game and the handholding made them feel condescended to, so they overreacted like only NeoGAF can. Pay the haters no mind.

Yes, the average gamer needs instruction, and what's the best way to teach someone a new way of doing things? Simple - kinesthetics. When they need to melee attack, tell 'em how, then let 'em try it for themselves, then MAKE THE TECHNIQUE NECESSARY. Hell, make a whole level around it if you seriously want to drum it into them! Start the player off without any weapons so that they HAVE TO use the melee system to merely survive until they find their first gun! There's nothing more tragic than an orphaned and unused gameplay mechanic, left to fester just because it wasn't needed to finish the game, like Orders in Valkyria Chronicles, or all the useless random loot you end up either hoarding or throwing away in typical wRPGs.

Oh we do get it, but the problem is that not every game is fun for everyone, you cannot please all people. Each feature or game mechanic that you use can win or lose you customers - what is fun for one is shit for another. And its not like the customer is always right - for example we got tons of requests to add the possibility that you can crouch in the game, or that we should add a FPS camera - both things that make no sense at all!

I mean a perfect example is Demons/Dark Souls, the games don't tell you anything at all and they have more complex systems than Haunted. Its all about trying out and learning how to get better and advance. Would those games be any better if they were super easy and told you everything? I don't think so! The main problem is the one of perception - people expect Haunted to be a simple Zombie shooter, which it isn't

Err...somehow, I'm getting the impression that you think your game is something it isn't. Not even you could sanely claim that The Haunted is this magnificent grand opus of digital artistry, narrative and industrial design - it's just a fun, self-contained level-based splatterbag-shoot/slicer with a nicely grisly aeshetic, an arcade game with online co-op and very few pretensions to being anything else. That's what drew me to the game in the first place, so please don't take that as an insult!

Oh, and please don't use Demon's Souls as an example here. Believe me, at first only the most hardcore RPG players bought that game on the promise of a proper third-person King's Field, and when they found that the game offered so much more than that, they fell in love with it and started waxing soliloquy about it on any forums that would listen, including our very own NeoGAF. All the good word eventually made DS a cult hit, made Namco take notice, made Sony kick themselves, and the rest is history.

*WALL OF TEXT INCOMING MAN THE LIFEBOATS*

My point is, Demon's Souls would never have seen the sales success it did if it were not for the most hardcore of RPG fans singing its praises everywhere they could. And it didn't get all that praise by trying to be something it wasn't - it's a deceptively simple game, a dungeon crawler built around a nuanced combat system and a deliberate, careful approach to fixed, predictable enemy encounters. And repetition. Oh gods, you repeat your actions a lot in this game. You re-kill and backtrack and repeat entire levels over again, but it never feels dull or a waste of time, because every time you venture from the relative safety of the Nexus into the drab, oppressive and magnificent ruins of Boletaria, you're getting a little better. You're gathering more souls, taking more useful loot, becoming more skilled at fighting and using magics, gaining more power with each visit to the lovely Maiden with eyes occluded by wax. Every time you touch the Demon inside her, you get a little better, and you can feel it as you play. Slowly but surely, the player is turned from a pathetic serf to an accomplished warrior, in an organic process of learning through repetition, through practical application, through absolute necessity - through kinesthetics, "teaching by doing". It's been this way since Pac-Man, since Space Invaders. Learn by doing, or die. That's progress.

Or, at least that's how it should work, right? Bullshit. You know as well as I do that at least 97% of DS players consulted a walkthrough or wiki online while playing the game, if only to better understand some of the systems used in the game, like fusing Demons' Souls with certain weapons, or using them to create new magics, and so on. I'd wager that almost nobody - especially on GAF - has finished the game (or its spiritual sequel) without some form of online help, whether that be a wiki entry or a friendly Blue Phantom during a boss fight. There's no shame in that. Everyone needs a helping hand once in a while.

Hey, even Pac-Man and Space Invaders had on-screen instructions.

 

[ScHlAuChi]

But didn't you take Shadows Of The Damned as direct design inspiration for The Haunted?

Haunted was already in development for 2 years when Shadows of the Damned was announced

when you step back and look at it from a consumer's POV, The Haunted looks just like every other not!zombie shooter/slicer out there, because at the end of the day, you're still shooting, slicing, and kicking not!zombies to re-death, just in third-person. And we already have Shadows Of The Damned for that.

Yep that was the problem, they were just way faster than us due to having the money and people

Which is fine. Don't get me wrong, I'm not criticizing you for that at all.

I'm just wondering whether some other additional elements, such as, say, small puzzle sequences or some adventure elements, or even some Pac-Man-esque element of run-and-chase gameplay might have made The Haunted stand out more from the crowd, as it were. As it is, your game looks like only one other game out there, so it definitely has a niche, but I wonder if it could have been something more.[/QUOTE]
The reality is, we had all this kind of stuff planned, but if the publisher sets a release date that cant move, you have no other choice but to concentrate on the basics.
We will try to add as many of those originally planned elements into the console version (and PC too via patches of course) - it all comes down to how much time we have.
Also feel free to critizise, its part of the design process, its interesting to do these discussions.

Sorry, but your game ain't no Bayonetta. But, you already knew that ;P

Of course it isnt, Haunted would look way different if we had a budget of 10 million and 100+ people working on it Haunted was never meant to be more than a simple arcade game, for having a budget of 0 and only 5 people it didnt turn out too bad.

It doesn't really matter if the melee system is easy-mode enough for even a dog to master, it's having the opportunity to train and the need to use it during normal play. Look at how RE4 did it - melee was wholly context-sensitive, except for the knife, which was mostly used to bust open barrels, and during the odd boss-fight. Anyway, each and every melee attack had a purpose - the roundhouse kick cleared your path and did huge damage, the suplex was a super-cool finishing blow for most enemies, and you needed to use these moves to save precious ammo and progress. See? In RE4, melee was both easy to understand, awesome to behold, and necessary to proceed.

Of course, but RE4 is a singleplayer game where its alot easier to slowly introduce the player, no such luck in an arena shooter. There is different uses for different moves in Haunted too - just not as much as in RE4.

Everything is made easy to do and is drummed into the player's muscle memory through necessary repetition.[/I] After a while, switching weapons mid-combo while simultaneously juggling several enemies and evading attacks at the same time becomes, if not second nature, then at least eminently possible.

Its the same with Haunted, but the problem was we didnt hammer it into ppl enough

Or you could have just knocked off God Hand, and we would have all loved you. But something tells me that you still wanted your big, shooty guns in the game, and guns in God Hand would be sacrilege.

I wouldnt have minded to do that as i love that game, but you need a huge amount of animations for all the moves which wasnt feasable. The other problem is that we would have left out PCGamers, as a game like Godhand is not really suited for keyboard at all.
Apart from that you also have the problem that shooters just seem to sell more nowadays. And finally - Godhand had guns, like the rocket-launcher, eventho it was rare.

Very good. You seem to be getting it, ever so slowly. Besides, people were complaining about Skyward Sword's overbearing tutorials (which you could totally ignore, by the way! I bet they didn't even know that!) because it was a Nintendo game and the handholding made them feel condescended to, so they overreacted like only NeoGAF can. Pay the haters no mind.

Its not that easy - fans/haters are usually the hardcore players who drive opinions, so just ignoring them isnt too smart

Yes, the average gamer needs instruction, and what's the best way to teach someone a new way of doing things? Simple - kinesthetics. When they need to melee attack, tell 'em how, then let 'em try it for themselves, then MAKE THE TECHNIQUE NECESSARY. Hell, make a whole level around it if you seriously want to drum it into them! Start the player off without any weapons so that they HAVE TO use the melee system to merely survive until they find their first gun! There's nothing more tragic than an orphaned and unused gameplay mechanic, left to fester just because it wasn't needed to finish the game, like Orders in Valkyria Chronicles, or all the useless random loot you end up either hoarding or throwing away in typical wRPGs.

Yes i know about all that, and its all relatively easy to do in a SP game, but how do you do that in a MP arena game is a whole different story. We wouldnt have that problem at all if we had made a SP game (which we couldnt make because of time/money and teamsize)

Err...somehow, I'm getting the impression that you think your game is something it isn't. Not even you could sanely claim that The Haunted is this magnificent grand opus of digital artistry, narrative and industrial design - it's just a fun, self-contained level-based splatterbag-shoot/slicer with a nicely grisly aeshetic, an arcade game with online co-op and very few pretensions to being anything else. That's what drew me to the game in the first place, so please don't take that as an insult!

I never claimed its more But it is still abit more complex than your average shooter or games like L4D and KF. Im pretty sure that if we were just a shooter we wouldnt have any of those problems as EVERYONE knows how to play a shooter.

Oh, and please don't use Demon's Souls as an example here. Believe me, at first only the most hardcore RPG players bought that game on the promise of a proper third-person King's Field, and when they found that the game offered so much more than that, they fell in love with it and started waxing soliloquy about it on any forums that would listen, including our very own NeoGAF. All the good word eventually made DS a cult hit, made Namco take notice, made Sony kick themselves, and the rest is history.

I was one of those singing the praise

Slowly but surely, the player is turned from a pathetic serf to an accomplished warrior, in an organic process of learning through repetition, through practical application, through absolute necessity - through kinesthetics, "teaching by doing". It's been this way since Pac-Man, since Space Invaders. Learn by doing, or die. That's progress.

The reason why i mentioned Demons Souls was because i thought the same approach would work for Haunted too, as people slowly learn that shooting isnt everything, so they would try other ways - but they didnt - they kept shooting

Or, at least that's how it should work, right? Bullshit. You know as well as I do that at least 97% of DS players consulted a walkthrough or wiki online while playing the game, if only to better understand some of the systems used in the game, like fusing Demons' Souls with certain weapons, or using them to create new magics, and so on. I'd wager that almost nobody - especially on GAF - has finished the game (or its spiritual sequel) without some form of online help, whether that be a wiki entry or a friendly Blue Phantom during a boss fight. There's no shame in that. Everyone needs a helping hand once in a while. Hey, even Pac-Man and Space Invaders had on-screen instructions.

Thats true actually, i played through both Demon games without help the first time, but i guess the old times where people figured out stuff themselves is over

 

[Dambrosi]

Thanks again for the in-depth reply. I'm really stoked that you would deign to answer all my points so succinctly! So, I'll do you the same courtesy.

Haunted was already in development for 2 years when Shadows of the Damned was announced

...what, really? Wow. I guess that means Mikami really does have ninjas in his service.

Seriously, I find it very odd (and somewhat cool) that two games from different countries, by different creative teams and companies, with different budgets and startup times and development structures...could look so similar. Could it be because of Unreal Engine? Did Shadows even use UE3? I forget.

Yep that was the problem, they were just way faster than us due to having the money and people

The reality is, we had all this kind of stuff planned, but if the publisher sets a release date that cant move, you have no other choice but to concentrate on the basics.
We will try to add as many of those originally planned elements into the console version (and PC too via patches of course) - it all comes down to how much time we have.
Also feel free to critizise, its part of the design process, its interesting to do these discussions.

Oh well, feel free to save those ideas for next time. Especially the whole Pac-Man thing, could be interesting in an online MP setting.

Of course it isn't, Haunted would look way different if we had a budget of 10 million and 100+ people working on it Haunted was never meant to be more than a simple arcade game, for having a budget of 0 and only 5 people it didn't turn out too bad.

Glad to hear it.

Of course, but RE4 is a singleplayer game where its a lot easier to slowly introduce the player, no such luck in an arena shooter. There is different uses for different moves in Haunted too - just not as much as in RE4.

Its the same with Haunted, but the problem was we didn't hammer it into ppl enough

I see your point about this being an online MP, but then, if you really wanted the melee system to be used more, then you need to make it necessary for the player to use it during normal play. You could have tried severely limiting the amount of weapons/ammo the player can carry, or limit the ammo drops more severely than you did, or made reloading much slower. Left without the choice of lazily relying on autofire to solve their demon infestation problem, they might have tried to find some more...creative ways to deal with the horde. Ta-daa, a fully featured set of punches and kicks were there from the start, just waiting for the player to run out of ammo and have to use them! Yippee, the player is saved!

I wouldnt have minded to do that as i love that game, but you need a huge amount of animations for all the moves which wasn't feasible. The other problem is that we would have left out PC gamers, as a game like Godhand is not really suited for keyboard at all.
Apart from that you also have the problem that shooters just seem to sell more nowadays. And finally - Godhand had guns, like the rocket-launcher, even tho it was rare.

Are you kidding? There's a button for every move you could imagine! Hell, that previous sentence could've been a 42-hit combo! GALACTIC!

LOL, not really. But I did forget about the rocket launcher, or at least I tried to.

It's not that easy - fans/haters are usually the hardcore players who drive opinions, so just ignoring them isn't too smart

They say that nobody ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the audience. That's not really fair, but that doesn't mean it isn't partially true.

It's important to separate the more valid opinions from the mindless idolatry/venom, though. Although it's true that everyone has their own agenda, in general it's better to ignore the gushing praise of genre fan

Spoiler

boy

s with nothing constructive to say just as much as the searing hatred of those who would despise your work, no matter what. Figuring out the difference between constructive criticism and subtle trolling is sometimes a fine art, especially on the Internet.

Also remember that most people lack the linguistic skills to articulate their ideas, and even more don't know what they really want. It's up to you to translate their confused babbling into something resembling logic.

Yes i know about all that, and its all relatively easy to do in a SP game, but how do you do that in a MP arena game is a whole different story. We wouldnt have that problem at all if we had made a SP game (which we couldnt make because of time/money and teamsize)

I never claimed its more But it is still a bit more complex than your average shooter or games like L4D and KF. I'm pretty sure that if we were just a shooter we wouldn't have any of those problems as EVERYONE knows how to play a shooter.

Just because it's actually a bit more complex than your average shooter doesn't mean that, to the player, it isn't Just Another Shooter. So they shift their brains to neutral and treat it like Just Another Shooter, not knowing or even caring about your game's "complexity". You need to show them that they can do this cool shit! More than that, you need to show them why they should!

I was one of those singing the praise

The reason why i mentioned Demons Souls was because i thought the same approach would work for Haunted too, as people slowly learn that shooting isn't everything, so they would try other ways - but they didn't - they kept shooting

That's because they weren't given any reason to stop shooting. That's the rub - why should the player use risky, close-range melee attacks when they can just keep on shoot-'n'-strafing, with no real consequences for doing so? Give the player a reason to use them, tell them how to use them, and they will use them. Like using the shield to defend in DS. Simple.

That's true actually, I played through both Demon games without help the first time, but I guess the old times where people figured out stuff themselves is over

That's the price of mainstream semi-acceptance - games lose their "specialness" and become Just Another Entertainment Choice.

Y'know what? We're too hardcore for this world. Let's go make a pixel-art platformer for XBL Indie Games.

 

[ScHlAuChi]

...what, really? Wow. I guess that means Mikami really does have ninjas in his service.

100+ people can certainly do more and faster work than 5

Seriously, I find it very odd (and somewhat cool) that two games from different countries, by different creative teams and companies, with different budgets and startup times and development structures...could look so similar. Could it be because of Unreal Engine? Did Shadows even use UE3? I forget.

Yep Shadows did use UE3, and its not that surprising that it looks similar, after all Mikamis games were my inspiration

Oh well, feel free to save those ideas for next time. Especially the whole Pac-Man thing, could be interesting in an online MP setting.

Yeah we will see what we can do about that.

I see your point about this being an online MP, but then, if you really wanted the melee system to be used more, then you need to make it necessary for the player to use it during normal play. You could have tried severely limiting the amount of weapons/ammo the player can carry, or limit the ammo drops more severely than you did, or made reloading much slower.

We tried all that, but people complained like crazy, so it was a no go

Left without the choice of lazily relying on autofire to solve their demon infestation problem, they might have tried to find some more...creative ways to deal with the horde. Ta-daa, a fully featured set of punches and kicks were there from the start, just waiting for the player to run out of ammo and have to use them! Yippee, the player is saved!

The problem was that ppl didnt do that, when they ran out of ammo, they didnt use melee, no they ran away or tried bunny hopping

Are you kidding? There's a button for every move you could imagine! Hell, that previous sentence could've been a 42-hit combo! GALACTIC!

I dont know, i cant play Godhand with keyboard, especially the constant evading that you do with RightStick Up on pad is quite hard for me to do on KB. It just plays way better on pad for me

LOL, not really. But I did forget about the rocket launcher, or at least I tried to.

Thanks to that rocketlauncher i actually got the idea to mix Godhand with guns

They say that nobody ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the audience. That's not really fair, but that doesn't mean it isn't partially true.

Seems like it

It's important to separate the more valid opinions from the mindless idolatry/venom, though. Although it's true that everyone has their own agenda, in general it's better to ignore the gushing praise of genre fanboys with nothing constructive to say just as much as the searing hatred of those who would despise your work, no matter what. Figuring out the difference between constructive criticism and subtle trolling is sometimes a fine art, especially on the Internet. Also remember that most people lack the linguistic skills to articulate their ideas, and even more don't know what they really want. It's up to you to translate their confused babbling into something resembling logic.

Yep that is the hard part But you always reach a point where you have to decide if you stick with your design choice or change it, and that will win or lose players. Im pretty sure that without the melee system we probably would have more players. But then Haunted´s unique identity would be lost.

Just because it's actually a bit more complex than your average shooter doesn't mean that, to the player, it isn't Just Another Shooter. So they shift their brains to neutral and treat it like Just Another Shooter, not knowing or even caring about your game's "complexity". You need to show them that they can do this cool shit! More than that, you need to show them why they should!

Yep thats one of the things we will work on.

That's because they weren't given any reason to stop shooting. That's the rub - why should the player use risky, close-range melee attacks when they can just keep on shoot-'n'-strafing, with no real consequences for doing so? Give the player a reason to use them, tell them how to use them, and they will use them. Like using the shield to defend in DS. Simple.

Thats easier said than done as its very situation dependent - shooting is very good for distance and melee for close-range - having the armored enemies right away wouldnt teach them this lesson.

That's the price of mainstream semi-acceptance - games lose their "specialness" and become Just Another Entertainment Choice.

Yep, i tried to make something that is special but not too hardcore. Didnt work that well yet

Y'know what? We're too hardcore for this world. Let's go make a pixel-art platformer for XBL Indie Games.

I wouldnt say no to that, but not before this project is over - probably by end of 2012, as now we need to do console version of Haunted

 

[subversus]

I haven't played the game yet but is there some kind of mandatory tutorial which could explain the necessity of using melee attacks? or some tip in BIG LETTERS on the screen which pop up when the player is in the situation where melee is most useful?

 

[Gileadxv]

Very well said Dambrosi. I haven't played the game, but you have done a good job articulating what drives a player to break out of their paradigm.

 

[ScHlAuChi]

I haven't played the game yet but is there some kind of mandatory tutorial which could explain the necessity of using melee attacks? or some tip in BIG LETTERS on the screen which pop up when the player is in the situation where melee is most useful?

There is an ingame tutorial, but that does not really tell you exactly when to use melee (as its up to the player) - but over time theres enemies that block your bullets where you HAVE to use it
There is no big tooltips yet, but we are working on that

 

[ScHlAuChi]

PCGamer did a nice little video on our game:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJdT1Z8yft0

Its good to see that they actually spendt enough time with it to learn and understand all the mechanics unlike GameSpot/IGN/1UP and their shoddy reviews

 

[Techies]

Well since hard and challenging games are all the rage now, thought it resurrect this thread. Wonder why the game scored so low, that actually the only reason.

But now that it's cool, this game is now technically pure awesome. Chuck Norris round kick awesome, or Lui Kan flying kick awesome.

Oh and because you can get it for 1 Pound 50
http://groupees.com/undead

WITH other horror themed games where killing as much zombies as possible is the main goal.

Oh yeah there's only 5k bundles, and it's close to 5k so better jump in quick.

Now I've played this game extensively (ranked 83rd), and can say with confidence that Gamespy barely played the game for 20 minutes. No idea why no one called them out for that because that wasn't a review, they don't even mention the melee, or melee weapons.
The special weapons you can pick up on the levels, nothing?
They even went as far to add false incorrect information. Gamespot, who also didn't spend enough time on it, but at least more than Gamespy at least got some of the basics right, but also didn't go above the basics.

Here's some user feedback
Probably the most underrated game in eternity
http://steamcommunity.com/app/43190/discussions/0/882957625838746747/#p2

Which probably sums it up, since the bundle you might be able to find some people online, but note that game won't get any more updates soon.

Because when THQ down, so did most of the studio that created this game. Think one of the devs is still there, but he can't do much until he regains control of the IP, which should be in a year or two. Not to sure about the time-frame, but something like that.

If you looking for a game where you can dual Wield shotguns and shoot countless hordes of zombies and demons, and where you have to constantly keep moving and can run, jump, gun, roll, punch,round house kick, uppercut, headstomp, finish off opponent, slide and the good old punch the concrete floor after you fall from the the top of tower; Then this is the right game.

Tiny fact: After 4 rounds, you'll have close to 600 enemies killed.

 

[Techies]

Omw, just read the thread for the first time, shouldn't of done that. No wonder we can't have nice things these days...
Although technically this game plays like Warframe.