I personally don't like the "try to play as long as possible without spending a dime" meta-game that these games create. And unless you're watching ads instead of spending money, you're not the customer the developers want. They want people who will either continue spending money or continue watching ads. Also -- For me, the timers/lives are one thing. But these F2P match-3s almost always include power-ups that you can buy with cash (looking at you, Futurama). That sours the game for me, too. The developer of one of my favorite games made a F2P match-3 game with a really unique mechanic that I totally got into. But the F2P shenanigans completely ruined it for me. Of course I'll give the new Glyph Quest a chance. But it kills me that Super Glyph Quest (while not perfect) is a match-3 I often point to as an example for doing so much right. And sadly, it's true that "right" and "fun" doesn't always equal profitable. So I can't blame them, but I can still be incredibly disappointed. Edit: And like I mentioned in the Futurama thread, one of the things that almost always feels off with these games is the difficulty curve. If a premium game seems super hard, you can't blame it on the dev's greed.
As I've said many times elsewhere, F2P is merely a tool. It can be used well or it can be used poorly. Of course, your definition of 'well' and 'poorly' are all open to question... Ads in games can certainly work. I think the trick there is to make them opt-in. Crossy Road, for example. I don't think I minded watching a single ad in that game because it gave me the choice to do so and rewarded me afterwards. Balance is a tricky issue at the best of times. When you muddy the water with a differing motivation, then it gets super difficult. The previous two games were balanced in such a way that you'd be able to progress to a certain level without requiring much skill. After that, you'd need to be concentrating on the core mechanic of chains and reversals to make progress. Then you'd have to also rely on your inventory to get you through sticky situations. That's our intention for this one too. The only way you're going to get through this game is by getting good at it and not by paying anything other than in-game currency. You might have to go back and grind a bit, but that was also true of the previous titles and it'll mainly be to find the drops you need to craft the gear item you're after.
Right, and the Crossy Road model doesn't bother me because the ads/money only get you cosmetics. They don't affect the gameplay itself whatsoever. Other games that have taken on the model have started adding in things like continues (even Land Sliders did) and it's a turn off for me. I'm not saying F2P can't be done right. I just haven't seen a F2P/IAP match-3 in which the gameplay isn't somehow affected by its F2P mechanics. (I don't think anyone has tried the pure Crossy Road model on a match-3 yet?) Again, I'm totally willing to give the game a chance. You guys have earned that from me. But I'm just keeping my excitement in check until I see it.
I can't stand Pay-to-win. Items that affect gameplay will only be available to purchase with in-game currency. Premium currency will be used for things like energy restoring - something that doesn't affect gameplay. I tell you what though - the game will be FUN, and that's the most important thing.
Haha yes. That does give me hope that you guys are putting a lot of thought into how the IAP will work. So will reserve judgement.
From everything you've told us thus far, I think the game will do great. The F2P elements you've listed seem more than fair and I'm really excited to get the game
How about some actual game news? I've just put in quest variants. Now, in addition to standard quests, you can have Boss, Mob or Doomsday quests. - Boss quests are what you'd imagine really - the final wave is made up of a higher level Boss monster. - Mob quests are similar but the final wave is made up of three, regular level monsters. - Doomsday quests are timed. All the while the game is waiting for you to input your move, a skull slowly moves around the board. It if ever reaches the top, the quest is failed. It all adds a little bit of tension to proceedings. Some of the more fun bits of gameplay were derived from enemy attacks that messed up the player glyphs in some way. The usual suspects have returned - Burn, Blind, Petrify, etc. - but we've been playing with some new ones too. Infection, for example, deals damage to the player for each Infected glyph on the board. Infected glyphs can be cleaned up in the usual way - by using a neighbouring glyph - but if you ever use an Infected glyph in a spell, the infection spreads to the next glyph on. We're also talking about getting some hardcore effects in there like Acid, which would burn away glyphs completely, rendering them unusable for the remainder of that quest. More info to come - I might even try to rustle up a screenshot or two.
Was super excited to hear about this as an original glyph quest fan. However felt burnt with glyph quest not working with the restore feature after buying glyph quest 2 and deciding to fo back to glyph quest which I never finished. After getting burnt was disappointed. Loved glyph quest 2 and not a fan of f2p. I'll wait to see how this turns out as still a bitter taste in my mouth about not getting the restore to work on glyph quest 1.
Hmm. Sorry that happened. I know it went through periods of the restore functionality not working - specifically after iOS updates. That and me not knowing my XCode from my elbow. Now the whole system behind the scenes has changed and we'll be using Unity's own IAP system rather than one we've had to create from scratch. That gives me a lot more confidence in it a) working and b) being maintained. Or, at least, if it does break this time, it's not my fault and Unity have loads of people who will be able to fix it
For those of you that don't follow us on Twitter (and why not exactly? @BulkPaint @_Ikouyo @WeHeartDragons), we've thrown up a blog post about how our dev process has been refined over the course of the Glyph Quest series.
In the first Glyph Quest, we gave you a choice to play as a man or a woman. In the second, we introduced a character creator where you could define the look of your avatar yourself. We came in for a bit of stick for only having white characters. In Chronicles, we've gone for bespoke characters that should cover a more diverse range of ethnicities. Here are 3 of them - the Summoner who deals with Primal magic, the Warlock who is aligned to the Arcane and the Shaman who devotes herself to the element of Earth. In total, there are eight different character types - one for each element - and this dictates your starting abilities and elemental loadout. Over the course of the game, you can swap out the character's equipment by crafting the items that the other characters wear, so you can end up mixing and matching how you like. The eagle-eyed among you may have noticed that all of these characters are female. At the risk of sounding like a dodgy record >cough< Ubisoft >cough< this is purely down to resources. Simply put, Leanne just doesn't have time to draw all of the male versions just yet. We feel that her time is much better spent creating more monsters for you to fight. That's not to say that there will never be male versions - just that it's not looking likely for launch.
As we're nearly feature-complete, it's probably time to talk a little more about our monetisation model. Now several of you are probably still concerned that the game is going to be F2P, so let me try and head some of those fears off at the pass. On the one hand, we're going to utilise a fairly standard, two-currency system - one in-game and one premium. You will be able to buy premium currency with cold, hard cash, or it will drop by completing in-game achievements. This currency can be used to buy in-game currency if you feel you need a bit of a boost or the odd item here and there. It can also be used to make up the shortfall in materials when either crafting or feeding / evolving your familiar. There's also a mana (energy) system that gets depleted whenever you go on a quest. So far, so... well, normal. This is where things get a bit more interesting. Firstly, we're never going to prevent you from playing the game. Even if you don't have any Mana, you'll still be able to go on the Challenge Mode quest to see how big a score you can get. Secondly, we've got a Loyalty Card system. You know those little cards you get in coffee shops? The ones that give you stamps and, when full, a free coffee? We do the same thing. Whenever you complete a new quest we give you a stamp. Complete your card and it's free quest time! There's even an IAP that lets you get a Loyalty Card with fewer stamp slots - meaning that you get free quests more frequently. Finally, we've got a cap. We keep track of how many things you've bought. Buy enough things and the game switches into... well, we haven't thought of a name for it yet, but it's a mode that turns off the mana system and introduces the premium currency as in-game drops. In short, it means that you don't have to spend any more money on the game - enough is enough, see? I mean, you can if you want, but there's really no need for you to do so. So there you have it. I hope these things will make you feel a little better about our foray into F2P. Do feel free to let us know what you think of them in this very thread. Happy Questing!
Just added support for mounted enemy units. You'll have to kill the mount before you can get at the chap on its back. Also, we'll be in the Expo at the Develop conference in Brighton next week. If you're in the area, why not drop by and try the game out.
Really looking forward to a new Glyph Quest. One question about the cap: would it be based on the number of IAP items purchased or on a dollar amount? I definitely plan to support the game and hope to reach the cap quickly. Keep up the good work!
That's an insanely good idea. Genius! Very curious about how this will play out for both the user as well as the dev.
I have yet to find a decent, cross-currency way of determining just how much a player has spent. However, I do have access to the 'tier' value of each purchase, which does work in each market and is close enough, so we'll probably just use that instead. So let's say we set the cap at 20 tiers. That means you'd have to buy 20 tier 1 things or 10 tier 2 things and so on. Note that we have yet to finalise the actual tier value of each purchase - which is going to require a certain amount of sticking our fingers in the air and going 'that one!' The thing is, it's a bit of a risk. The standard F2P model relies entirely on 'whales' - people who will spend an insane amount of money, which essentially pays for the other 99% of the people who don't pay for anything. Introducing a cap works directly against that, meaning that you can completely hamstring any chance you have of making money. To that end, the benefit of the cap is that, we feel, the player will get a better experience from the game - not having to worry about troublesome IAPs any more. We hope this leads to conversation and people spreading the word about the game and how we're not just a bunch of gouging bastards out for a quick buck.
Strange Flavour did something similar with their "Play Nice" IAP system, but it ended up not working out: http://toucharcade.com/2015/07/28/strange-flavour-ditching-their-play-nice-iap-system-returning-to-paid-games/ Not saying yours isn't a good idea or won't work either, just some food for thought My personal opinion is only do free to play if you have the time and resources to pull it off. Free to play demands nearly constant monitoring, the ability to tweak things on the fly from your backend, and lots and lots of updates. I've seen free to play games launch and appear to bomb, but get turned around over the course of weeks, months, and sometimes years but it takes a lot of effort to make that turn. Usually only the bigger companies that have the manpower and the financial resources to weather that initial flop period are able to right the ship. I actually think the paid upfront model is more viable for smaller teams of 3-5 people, as you aren't making as much (potential) money as a free to play game would but you also don't need to make as much since your overhead is less than that of a big team. Still, that route is hard as well and even a "perfect" launch and great reception isn't always enough to stay afloat. For instance, Rush Rally 2 is a fully paid game made by just one guy and sells for 4 bucks. It got a lot of great coverage by us and other sites, was reviewed really well by press and users, and shot up reasonably high in the charts the week it released. That's about as perfect as a launch gets, and even still the dev says he's not sure if he'll be able to continue adding to the game as the revenue just isn't there. It's BRUTAL out there. Anyway, this turned into a longer rant than I intended, just wanted to pass my thoughts along. Love your other games and really looking forward to this one
Yeah, that's what we're afraid of. Did their Play Nice bit disable all subsequent IAPs when the threshold was reached? Would leaving the IAPs active but optional be enough to make up the shortfall?
