I now have an opportunity to play through the early parts of the game (up to mid World II). There is a lot to like about this game, but there are also a few big caveats. I concur with TheGreatEscaper's impression that the puzzles are quite clever. As I indicated in my previous post, the game's core mechanics share much similarities with Ichi. Having this said, Lostim also introduces new mechanics not seen in that game. A good example is the ability to power-push a block. This mechanic is very clever because the game leverages it to create inventive switches or obstacles which the player must either activate or bypass. A large part of the game's high level of difficulty, as the developer likely intended, is that the ball moves in real time and cannot be paused. Thus, the player needs to play out "perfectly" (barring some areas which the ball can be trapped and rescued) a large number of highly choreographed taps to change the ball's color in order to ferry it successfully to the exit. The left/right screen tap interface is very tricky to learn and execute consistently, especially when under time pressure. Although the ball may be moving slow, it is fast enough that "reacting" on the spot to oncoming obstacles is unlikely to succeed repeatedly. Thus, the player needs to "memorize" the large sequence of left/right taps ahead of time and then to learn to execute this sequence in a well-timed manner to succeed. This, to me, is the most difficult skill the player has to learn if the player wants to master this game. In my playthrough, I observed two glitches: 1. In World II Level II, there is no intro screen showing the level name. All of the other levels are prefaced with intro screens showing their names. 2. The taps do not register consistently. There were distinct times when I recalled having clearly and solidly tapped on the screen to change the ball's color, only to have the ball's color unchanged thus missing a critical bounce. This is particularly annoying when the ball is traveling very fast with a power-push, during which the player needs to change the ball's color quickly to match the target's color (an example of this frequent failure occurs in World II Level V). Lastly, while I appreciate the minimalistic interface, it would be nice to have a quick way to "reset" a level and to exit back to the main menu once a level is entered. At present, the only way to access the main menu is to force quit the game and restart it. Overall, this is an excellently made puzzle game. Very clever mechanics. A degree of dexterity is definitely needed to master it.
@y2kmp3: - There is an (almost) invisible diamond in the upper right corner of each level that works as a menu button (it only appears after you started a level). It doesn't offer a reset function, though, so for now the quickest way to reset a level is just dying - I haven't experienced any problems registering color changes on my iPad mini2 with latest iOS, so it could be a device dependent issue. @Teptmi: - I'm stuck at W3L6 and wish it was possible to play 2 or 3 levels ahead so I could continue playing and come back later to it. - It would be nice to see all worlds+levels that are there, but shown as locked, to have a notion how many worlds/levels are ahead. - I'm still not seeing why two touch zones are needed LOL . I think it would be easier to learn one-touch control: tap to change color, hold to fire. Now, "hold" changes color and fires, that would then become "tap" + "hold" (a quick sequence; should not be a problem). Also, two-zone control does not allow very well for "lazy" play by forcing me to sit up and hold my iPad in two hands. - Replaying W3L1 forces the intro on me (and is not skippable afaik). - Levels should show a number indication in the corner (like "2-4"), or at least show the number together with the name at entering a level. - Game Center please! (I know, I repeat myself ) Most importantly, I like very much the presentation and the puzzles! [edit] Ah! I think I know what I missed in W3L6: I forgot about what blue means (makes me think, add somewhere in the menu a help that explains all mechanics in a summary format?)
Nice feedback, y2kmp3. And we think we can have a short discuss about the problems you said. 1. [Level Name]Chapter 2(World 2) Level 2, yes, no name. Some levels actually don't have names. 2. [High-Speed]When the ball(Wilson) with a 'blue-high' speed, the player couldn't change the color of Wilson. 3. [Menu]When you're playing a level, you can see something in the right top corner, right? When you finish this game or you're on Chapter(World) 3, we think we can discuss why this game didn't have 'touch-the-screen-to-change-color' control. Some problems you said are so important to us, such as 'restart' button. We hope you'll give us more feedbacks when you play more. Appreciate!
Something you said really helpful. 1.'Levels should show a number indication in the corner (like "2-4"), or at least show the number together with the name at entering a level.' Yes, it'll be better. 2.'Touch-to-change-clor' and 'Hold-to-fire', it's fine sometimes. But, think this question: If Wilson is black, an obstacle in front of him is white, but we want the obstacle to be black due to some reason. How many steps we need to operate? And, what if the obstacle is really close to Wilson? Actually, we took a long time to test which control is better. But, we didn't choose 'one-touch-and-hold' finally. What's your opinion?
Oh! Now I see. I mistook it entirely as just part of the background design for the level. Sometimes, if a level has a thick white border along the right edge, it covers up part of the icon. Teptmi Games, how many worlds and levels are there in this game?
Spoiler Alert! Please don't see this before you're on Chapter 3 Touch-left(right)-to-be-black(white): LBRW We think it's hard to say which control is better. It depends. 'one-touch' is pretty good before Chapter 3. But from Chapter 3, all the levels need the 'Hold' control. Due to our level design, the sample situation(Two steps: Change color, then fire) we said in the last post occurs frequently from Chapter 3, 'one-touch-and-hold' will make it to be harder to take the right reactions. Obviously, when you're facing the sample situation now(LBRW), you just need to hold right half screen(white) to fire. Just one step. So, maybe 'one-touch-to-change-color' is friendly before Chapter 3, LBRW is friendly after that. We chose LBRW because we thought if you play these levels(From Chapter 3), you can focus on solving more and more interesting puzzles. It's still really hard to say which control is better. If you think you have a better solution, please post here. Thanks.
Of course we can tell you how may levels. But we just wanna ask a question: why you want to know this? We mean, you'll know if you see the ending, right? TheGreatEscaper asked the same question before, so, we're really interested in this question.
Forgot to say, if Wilson is inside an obstacle, you can't change the color of Wilson too. From the animation and the sound(If you didn't turn off the sound), it's not hard to notice that, right? The first few levels are also made for you to understand this. We're not so sure about the situation(couldn't change color) you said. If the situation you said is a different one('inside an obstacle', 'blue tail'), it must be a bug.
In the current (2-zone) control scheme, and let's say we want Wilson to end up as black, it requires 1 Left-Hold. In the proposed one-zone control scheme: 1 Hold (anywhere, so it is simpler to learn/memorize). If we want Wilson to end up as white, the actions are: L-Hold,R-Tap versus Hold,Tap. In these examples, the 1-zone control scheme is simpler to memorize as you don't need to learn where to tap
[Spoiler Alert] Don't see this until you're on Chapter 3 Let's talk about this level(example). Current control: (Steps: 4) 1. Hold Right(White)(No matter what the default color of Wilson) 2. Tap Left(Black) 3. Hold Right(White) 4. Tap Left(Black) One-Touch: #1 (Steps: 6) 1. Tap anywhere to be white(The default color of Wilson is black) 2. Hold anywhere 3. Tap anywhere to be black 4. Tap anywhere to be white 5. Hold anywhere 6. Tap anywhere to be black #2 (Steps: 5) 1. Hold anywhere(The default color of Wilson is white) 2. Tap anywhere to be black 3. Tap anywhere to be white 4. Hold anywhere 5. Tap anywhere to be black In this level, 'One-Touch' has at least one more step. When you're on Chapter 3(after getting a new ability), some puzzles become more difficult, 'One-Touch' will make the controls to be difficult to master too. That was why we didn't choose 'One-Touch' although it's really easy and friendly at the beginning. We know when you first play this game, you may feel a little bit wired about the controls. But if you remember 'Left-Black Right-White', few levels later, it would be fine.
On the last world (World 5) now. Puzzles in World 4 are very clever. Nice! Good point about the more taps, Teptmi Games. Perhaps you can implement an option to give the player a choice between two-zone and one-zone tap control. Even though the one-zone tap control scheme may require more steps, these steps are less prone to error during execution and may be done faster than with the two-zone tap control scheme because of inherent lag time the player may need to coordinate and execute the more complex maneuvers. The more relevant comparison is not to count the number of steps but to record the players' reaction times playing the same level using the two different control schemes. I suspect that the one-zone tap control may actually shorten the players' reaction times as compared to the two-zone tap control that is more difficult to learn and execute under constant time pressure. As I recall, there were a number of academic or white papers on games concerning this topic investigating the one-tap control in auto-runner games and why it is easier to pick up than multi-tap control in those games. Though not sure, I suspect the issues raised in those papers may apply to your game.
I agree with y2kmp3, it is not (only) about the number of steps. Also, the additional complexity to "get into the game", that is to learn the additional complexity and reflexes to deal with the two-zone scheme might not be worth enough to justify a slightly better economy with respect to number of taps (*). And the design concept of the game is such that even in rare situations where speed might become an issue, there is enough space on the canvas to enlarge the width between elements a little. The 1-zone control is easier to learn and has better chances to keep a portion of the public interested that otherwise would have desisted of a "difficult game" (in their experience). (*) slightly better economy with respect to number of taps:
Visualize it like this and you better see the difference in complexity I would love to experiment with the 1-zone control scheme (an option in a future version? ) Current control: (Steps: 4 (No matter what the default color of Wilson)) 1. Hold Right 2. Tap Left 3. Hold Right 4. Tap Left One-Touch: (Steps: 5 (The default color of Wilson is white)) 1. Hold 2. Tap 3. Tap 4. Hold 5. Tap
Unsure if this is device specific, but for me, the problem with randomly not registering my tap is growing to be a big annoyance in the later levels when multiple tightly coupled taps are needed (such as in Level 5-5). I think this may be an issue with programming rather than hardware. The problem is that if I press "too long" to try to make sure my tap is being registered, then the tap itself is read as a hold by the game. Is this a calibration or sensitivity issue or is the game having some kind of random blanking period in which my input is being ignored? The purely random nature of it points to the latter.
We're so sorry about your problem. You said, if you hold right for a lone time, then Wilson won't change color when you tap left, right?(Any sound at this point?)
