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Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Swoopjockey » April 7th, 2010, 3:16 am

Hey everyone, I've been working on my first multiplayer game through Player IO and I'd like to get some feedback from the dev community before I release it. That includes independent devs and the Player IO staff if they're interested as well. (You'll need at least two players to test it).

I've been bug hunting constantly and there are probably plenty left, so please let me know if you encounter anything.

Let me know the good, the bad, and the ugly. Suggestions are welcome. I hope you have fun!

Eleminis Card Game

http://www.eleminis.com/card/

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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Oliver » April 7th, 2010, 9:31 am

Hey,

We just tried the game, and once we got the hang of it, it was pretty fun!

However, we ran into two issues:

a) It was hard figuring out how to play the game in the beginning. We started clicking randomly and it took a couple of rounds before we had figured it out. A small tutorial or even just using someting more obvious than yellow-outline to highlight moves are my suggestion.

b) The "remove two" card came up way to often. We were often sitting with empty hands both of us. It's also annoying that you have to discard your own cards, if you can't discard the opponents (empty hand).

- Oliver
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Benjaminsen » April 7th, 2010, 9:32 am

Hi Swoop

Really fun game, just got owned by Oliver in it. It did however take quite a while to get to a winning position and I was rather annoyed that I was forced to remove my own cards with the "remove two button"

Facebook connect does not work for me either, what system do you use to spawn the popup with? Ours?

I also find it rather frustrating that you have a mochi ad in-between games. This is something that will scare a lot of users away without generating you any more revenue. I suggest you focus on the real deck and iphone sales.

Lastly I got an error when my opponent won the game
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Swoopjockey » April 7th, 2010, 3:43 pm

You guys rock. Thanks for checking it out. To address your concerns:

As far as the card game itself goes, the double discard is OK in and of itself.The fact that it comes up too often is a bit disturbing. The code is *hopefully* written so that the real-life deck corresponds with the online deck, meaning, they have the same chance of being drawn. But the difference is that with the online version there is no discard pile, so any used card is immediately placed back into the deck. I'll see about changing things around. My other friend complained the Skip card came up too much. Did you have that problem? Of course, "too much" can mean a lot of things. The goal of the game is for everyone to have fun.

As for the null reference, there is probably something being called or .addlistener ect. that isn't there. I've been fighting with that nonstop, so I will check it! This came up at the score screen after the game ended?

The login is done through Hey Zap. Basically, I've talked to Mochi, HeyZap, and Nonoba, and they all want me to use their API, of course. I want a seamless experience for the players. You're right about Mochi ads, but I am trying to monetize this game as much as possible without annoying people. But business is business. Was the initial loading ad annoying? Or just between games? I'm getting a lot of opinions from all around and that's what I want so please tell me.

Also, to address the "tutorial", I put in a tutorial in the Puzzle version of Eleminis, and I found that 90% of players just skipped it. They honestly couldn't be bothered. I was trying to make this game as easy to pick up as possible. I fully understand your concerns. Do you have a suggestions for finding a happy medium?

I've had an awesome time working with the Player IO API and would love to use Eleminis as promotion for both my interests and yours.

New Player IO developers too, I would love your input!
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Benjaminsen » April 7th, 2010, 5:01 pm

I was only annoyed by the between games ad. Preloaders is somewhat accepted these days.
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Tsuken » April 8th, 2010, 2:26 am

I played against myself with 2 windows and the discard 2 cards-card came up every second round! It was very annoying.

It also took me a long time to figure out I could change the cards of the other player. I would suggest putting the cards of both players right next to each other and having the drawn card to the side. This way you can clearly see all cards light up.
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Swoopjockey » April 8th, 2010, 7:11 am

Thanks for letting me know. I'm going to expand the instructions to hopefully be more thorough. And I'm going to fix the deck from popping up the discard so often. I should have it updated soon.
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Swoopjockey » April 8th, 2010, 4:14 pm

OK guys, I've tried to address your concerns.

I've removed the ads in-between games.

I've added "tutorial" style instructions that are hopefully easier to learn. I've also included the fact that all player's slots are fair game to be played on.

I've reprogrammed how the cards draw, so hopefully the Discard won't pop up so much. Please let me know if you can tell a difference (I hope so).

@Benjaminsen: I've tracked down (hopefully) what was causing the error. Please let me know if it still happens.

NOTE: Now that I've fiddled with the code, the Swap card seems to be screwing up. I'll be tracking this down as well. It never ends...

If anyone else has any more feedback, feel free to let me know. I've really appreciated what you've had to say so far.
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Tsuken » April 9th, 2010, 7:35 am

I played against myself again. It was good this time. Except one player got 3 stars in a row and won :)

How i think you should program it:
At the start of the game all the cards would be shuffled in a random order. There is only a certain amount of card for each type, as you would in reality. For example:
10 fire
10 water
10 earth
10 nature
10 air
5 discard
5 skip turn
5 star
That's 65 cards in total.

The game would draw 1 card from the top of the deck each turn. Discarded cards end up in a discard pile (not at the bottom of the deck).

When the deck runs out of cards, the discard pile is reshuffled and becomes the new deck.

When I first played it I thought it wasn't very good, until i found out I could change the opponents cards as well, now I really like this game :) Would be a great game to bring on a holiday or something.
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Swoopjockey » April 9th, 2010, 9:59 am

Hey Tsuken,

Thanks for trying the game again!

Your suggestion is actually exactly how I just rewrote the code. There are 90 cards in the deck.

12 x each Elemini
5 x Trash
5 x Star
5 x Skip
5 x Swap
10 x Discard

I've added an (invisible) discard pile. When the deck runs out, the discard pile is shuffled and put back into the deck. This should mimick using a real deck. The fact that 3 stars came up is just the way the random() function works. But in reality, it is also possible to draw 3 stars depending on how you shuffle the deck. But the code now means once 2 more stars are drawn, you won't see any more until the deck is shuffled again.

I'm glad you enjoy the game. The main point of the online version is to promote the decks I'm trying to sell. At the moment, I'm working with a printer to hopefully get some affordable quality decks made. They should be ready sometime next month.
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Re: Eleminis Card Game - Give me your feedback!

Postby Tsuken » April 9th, 2010, 11:50 am

Cool, I guess it was just luck then.

You need to add a "skip turn" or "skip card" button. Because sometimes the only legal moves are either an advantage to the opponent, or a disadvantage to myself. The current work-around is to have the timer run out.

Or have the opponent decide where the card goes when the timer runs out (he doesn't lose his turn, so he gets to play 2 cards in a row)
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