Mr. Bez, nicely done. You move quick! I find my experience somewhat different from yours. At least for the levels I completed, they felt incompletely solved because I have no idea if there is a more efficient solution than the one I used for each level (for example, defined by the "shortest" combined distance / route taken by all of the trucks). Personally, I think such metrics should be used as an additional goal. It does not need to be the "absolute" minimums, but it should be the ones found by the developer at least during the game's testing.
Actually we were thinking of having some statistics, and few beta testers were also requesting those, but the effort to find the most optimal solution for all levels seemed like a difficult task, especially for the last levels where the solutions are quite complex. Also, as we tried to create as clean and simple style for the game as we could, we removed everything that was not essential for the core gameplay. @yk2mp3 you shouldn't feel that any of your solutions is incomplete: every way to complete a level is perfect by the rules of the game . But I added statistics to our list of requested features. Maybe some day...
Instead of trying to compare the length of a solution's path against some optimal path, a solution score could be calculated (perhaps a level's total path minus the path traversed) and this could be summed for all levels completed and presented in a Game Center leader board. I don't find that getting the best solution is important. There is just something really satisfying in getting any solution on a tricky level. I really enjoy watching the animation of seeing a good solution played out in this game.
I have yet to advance enough into the game to see the difficult levels, but I can understand that it may not be possible to always calculate an optimal path. Perhaps a compromise is to list a "target" score (the path length) that you came up with for each level when the puzzle was developed. This way, while that score may not be the optimal score, the player can know at least where or not the player is matching the default solution.
Thanks! The reception of the game has been better than we ever dared to imagine. It's been just awesome couple of days now! Here's something which all you retro game fans might like: https://soundcloud.com/tero-1/sets/rgb-express-in-game-1 This Soundcloud set contains original RGB Express In-game tune 1 by Panu Aaltio, and a Commodore 64 remix by Finnish C64/SID artist Tero Mäyränen. One of the team's own feature wishlist items is to make a 8-bit C64 mode for the game, which would also contain this track by Tero. (Yes, we're big fans of C64 games and demos). No idea if this is going to happen or not though
We think that wouldn't be totally fair for the people who bought it right away and supported us, so we are not planning a discount for now. Sorry! By the way, we are right now working on some updates for the game: The first update will contain mostly small improvements and fixes, but we are planning future updates that would contain features that we want to include to game and what players have requested. We will most probably also add (free) new levels in the future... And of course really difficult ones too for all the heroes that have been able to complete the current 240 levels!
Great to know that, hopefully all developers would think that way, at least one day flash discount but totally respect your answer
Markus, I think you should have a look at perfect paths (but I bet you already know that game) to see an excellent way of handling "optimal solutions" and scoring: they just consider the community will find the optimal solution after some time, so the player is just in competition with the very best score of the world, for each level. That way, the devs don't have to find the optimal solution By the way: nice game, I think my father is going to spend nights on it once it has some scoring feature
That sounds doable. But we are still considering whether to add statistics or not, we try to keep the user interface clean and simple. Maybe a switch for PRO MODE (?). It's too bad that some of the levels have only one solution, the statistics would work best if every level had a lots of different type of solutions. But that's mostly a restriction of the game mechanics and bit of the level design. And for all of you fans: We wouldn't mind if you'd vote for RGB Express in the TA Forum's Best Game of the Week poll at: http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=243677 (... or any other title you like the most )
Brilliant little game with so much thoughtful attention to detail, I wouldn't know where to start to list it all. And it is not so little in content, I mean "little" more in the sense that it focuses on the core game play experience. I voted for it as gotw, well earned!
Markus, How do you know that some of the levels have only one possible solution? So far, the vast majority (if not all) of the levels I played have many trivial variants in their solutions. As I said before, while I am plowing through them, I can't help but to think that the solutions I found might not be the ones you intended. Is there any way to check against the stock solutions? Or does this comparison matter at all? Or perhaps as a minimum metric, you can put the number of steps in your stock solution for each level. Therefore, the player can feel the challenge on whether or not he or she can at least match your stock solution in its efficiency.
Hi guys! First of all, like you've probably noticed, the game is now free as the App of the Week in App Store! So, go download it now -- or, even better -- get it when it's back to $2.99 We are hoping to release the first update for the game during early November. The update contains 40 new levels and a bunch of small improvements such as enhanced graphics for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. Statistics is one of the most requested feature for the game. Stats will not be yet in the first update, but they are under work and will be added to the game in the future. Most probably you can unlock the statistics feature ("Pro mode") by completing enough levels. We're also considering of adding Game Center leaderboards to see who can solve the levels using the least amount of steps. Your comments and improvement ideas for the game are very welcome!
I was happy to have bought the game, but now that it is free I am telling my friends (not that I didn't before it went free). If a leaderboard is implemented based on the shortest number of steps, it would be great to have your solution for a level saved and then be able to go back to it later and tweak it (for a better score).
Yes, that sounds good. You need to be able to load your most optimal solution and continue from there. As hundreds of people have already completed the game, it'd be nice to have more detailed leaderboards than only the total number of levels, so we are definitely looking at the options how to reward the best players more.
I see this is now featured as Apple's Free App of the Week. Definitely the best game for a whilt to receive that status.
This is a great game, and I'm having a lot of fun with it. I think one missed opportunity, though, is that it would be nice to have some city-specific graphics on each map, e.g. have the Big Ben clock tower appear in each London map, etc.
