The open beta project for 'Save Toshi' Updates (by devs of 'Rasta Monkey')

Otherwise simply call it "Help me!"

 

The double H-H alliteration of "Help Me, Handsome" is definitely catchier, and flows better...

 

Just one thing to bear in mind... If you have a title that is just TOO silly, then there is the risk that people won't take your game seriously because they think the game is silly too.
And although the game is meant to be somewhat silly and fun, it is a serious "proper" game. I mean, this is not exactly "Ow, My Balls" is it?

We all know the game now, so our opinions on the title are not necessarily akin to those of players who have never seen or heard of this game before.

It might be worth asking a NEW group of people what they think of potential names, showing them only a list of possible titles, along with a brief description and some screenshots - just the same way a brand new potential customer on the App-Store would see it.

Something to think about...

 

Hi everyone, i'm introducing myself to this thread .

 

OK! My review is coming soon I promise! I've had loads of work the past week, but I'll have my thoughts up by tonight.

 

It makes sense and, jokes apart, I would never call it Help/Save ME (handsome). I still think something like Toshi Dances is better

 

I did say it makes sense ....

 

By request from Noam, I am now introducing myself here

I have not beta tested any games yet but have been reviewing a few games. I have beta tested a countdown application though.

I'm 18 years old and I play a lot of games on my iDevices. I started having an iPhone which I was happy with and loved playing games on and then I bought an iPad. I believe there are games which are meant to be played on each device and therefore I more or less spend an equally amount of time on each device. I enjoy playing casual games which are easy to pick up. This could be Doodle Jump, Angry Birds, Flight Control, Tap Tap Revenge 3, Plants vs. Zombies and so on. These are games that does not require me to put a lot of time into it. I often play in sessions of 10 minutes but do play several times a day.

I spent a lot of time looking for new great applications - mainly games and therefore I play a lot of different games on my iDevices (which are also my favorite gaming platform). I beliece this means that I have a great knowledge of how games "should be" and what’s possible. I have been programming for eight years (I started early, I guess) and I am now trying to learn Objective-C and primarily Cocoa Touch this is do to my general interest in new and upcoming iPhone applications which I would like to contribute to.

I live in Denmark and speak Danish. I do believe though that my English is easily understandable and I spent a lot of time talking, writing and studying English (this is one of my main subjects in school). That said, I do make mistakes in my language.

I'm looking forward to beta test the game with you guys - and you, Noam

 

Hi Noam,

I'm so sorry I haven't gotten you feedback yet.
Things have been really busy here.

1) Levels
On my first sit down I played through the entire first set of levels and made it to the 6th level on set 2 and hit a major road block. That one was particularly frustrating, as was 4-13

I think other than those, I liked the added complexity that you've made to the level designs. I don't mind replaying a level multiple times, as long as I feel that there is a probability that eventually I can succeed.

I'm curious to see what this hint system you mentioned is like, as I still feel it would be good to have a description of or more formal introduction to each "block" type to really get the player familiar on how they will react.

2) Main Objections

As I mentioned previously, the game needs to realize when I have no possible chance of successfully completing the level and end it for me, with a failure message.

I like the variations on Toshi for each level pack, but I agree with Brett A's comments about the 3rd level pack's Toshi, looking flat and undefined.

3) Bugs life

I too have experienced the "Toshi is taken "through" the ice block" issue mentioned by Brett A.

4) Rating system
I think the new rating system works quite well. The only enhancement I could recommend here might be to put a number of shots in parenthesis under each star to let the user know the max number of shots to achieve this, without having to play through to find out.

Kind of like:

* * *
MAX (8) (3)

Though this may be unnecessary and take up too much screen real-estate

5) More name suggestions


I've got nothing


Other comments:

I also agree with all of these observations from Brett A.

 

I've just played through the first two packs of the latest build, I'm gonna have a go at the rest later today but I thought I'd give you my feedback so far and then update the post with any additions.

1) Levels - My favourite levels so far have been the ones involving the red bouncy blocks (especially the "hammer" level) and also the ones which involve moving the dance platform. It's a really good twist I hadn't even thought of myself. My least favourite levels are the ones which involve Toshi standing on a sort of "table" over the dance floor, because these ones seem to take the most trial and error in getting her to fall in just the right way. I haven't become stuck for too long on those, but they're less interesting than the others.

So far the game isn't too difficult (packs 1 and 2), the second pack seems like a step up from the first which is good. I don't think you necessarily need to have the levels in perfect difficulty order, it's nice to have a very slight mix and play the occasional easier level amongst the harder ones.

As I said I've only played two packs so far, but right now I'm thinking 100 levels in total is definitely enough. If the game does well and you get enough requests for updates then they'd be welcome, but the amount you have already shouldn't disappoint anyone in terms of quantity. I don't know what price you're thinking of for the game but I can see it being a great deal for money as it is now.

2) Main Objections - I only have once slight annoyance currently; when I press the reset button and the level rewinds to it's starting position, there still seems to be a slight delay before I can shoot the balls again. There's nothing technically wrong with this, but I find myself tapping in advance waiting for the moment when I can fire. I think a good idea would be to include a small notification when the level is ready to start over, perhaps after pressing the reset button the level would reset and the word "Go!" would flash on the screen just to confirm I can start shooting.

3) Bugs life - Two bugs! One seems to be a memory issue, the game crashed back to springboard three times trying to load level 1-18. Resetting my iPod fixed this. The second bug is similar to the ice problem but with one of the black blocks instead: on level 2-19 the stone ball kept pushing Toshi through the black block at the end of the dance floor. Other than that the game has been fine, the frame rate lowers slightly on my Touch 2G, but the game still remains perfectly playable, I don't think it's the kind of thing you'd receive complaints about.

3) Rating system - Works for me! Obviously the first time you play a level you won't know how many shots you've got, but I didn't find that to be a problem. I'd simply hit the reset button and go from there.

4) More name suggestions - Off the top of my head... Dance Physics & Toshi Tumble.

At the risk of sounding lazy, I also think Brett had some great input Not everything he said occurred to me as I played, but I think his suggestions would definitely help to improve the game.

 

I wholeheartedly agree with both of these points. Put my vote down for these too.

Although I would add something to the second point here: When you first play a level, it's kinda nice to have the very brief animated set-up of the blocks settling into place, but when you REPLAY the SAME level, especially if you play that same level over and over, it's kinda annoying having to wait for this. I'd much prefer to have the animated set-up of the blocks NOT happen if you REPLAY the SAME level immediately, without leaving the level you're on. I would only like to see this on the FIRST play of a NEW level.
By the way, I don't mean keeping some sort of record of previous levels played EVER... I just mean, for me, there's a difference between LOADING a level (whether it's been loaded before in the past or not, like yesterday, or 5 minutes ago, or whatever), and RELOADING a level. Know what I mean?