I think I need to make Hapax harder to make it easier; AKA I'm struggling to make Act 1 fun

[Legend]

This whole post will probably be outdated in an hour, but here's what I'm struggling with and what I think is a path forward.

If you need a refresher, Hapax has an easy ending where you escape the alien ship and a true ending that is much more xenoarchaeology focused. I call those Act 1 and Act 2.

I tried to make Act 1 as simple and approachable as possible so every player could get in and have some fun with the game, but in practice that has just made Act 1 incredibly boring until players hit a brick wall and it becomes incredibly hard. It's the blue line in this graph.



The player needs to learn the alien word for "Earth" in order to set the proper destination and get the first ending. Everything else with the language is optional in Act 1 but that just turns "Earth" into a needle in a haystack.

So instead I think I'm moving grammar over into Act 1. It's not just Earth but "take me to Earth" that the player needs to figure out how to say. This is the red line above. The end result is harder but the added complexity pushes players to engage with the language as a whole. It turns Earth into just one more thing they want to learn instead of the only thing worth paying attention to.


It's way more nerdy than I was planning for Act 1 but the opposite at this point is a braindead Act 1 that no one likes.

[the-pi-guy]

I'll let you know what you should have done, several months down the line after you've released it and I've played through it.  




You're welcome.

[Legend]

I'll let you know what you should have done, several months down the line after you've released it and I've played through it.  




You're welcome.

Brilliant!

Then I'll just pull out my nifty time machine.

[BananaKing]

Maybe have players learn words that turn into a riddle? That way you can keep players engaged throughout act 1.

You're not just learning a language, you're receiving a message, and you need to understand what it is, and where it can lead you.

Also, maybe add a possibility to a bad ending? Where the player is tricked somehow?

[kitler53]

i know!   

a pvp shooter where you play as a box in a geometric world that allows you to be camouflaged just by sitting still!!

[Legend]

Maybe have players learn words that turn into a riddle? That way you can keep players engaged throughout act 1.

You're not just learning a language, you're receiving a message, and you need to understand what it is, and where it can lead you.

Also, maybe add a possibility to a bad ending? Where the player is tricked somehow?

Thanks for the idea.

There is already stuff like that in the game but I worried it was too complicated for act 1. The player has to really learn the language themselves. But as long as it's gradual it's not actually that hard.

There are bad endings and there are different versions of the escape ending. At least for now there is a metagame of trying to discover all endings.

i know!  

a pvp shooter where you play as a box in a geometric world that allows you to be camouflaged just by sitting still!!

Have you been playing too much What The Box? lately?

[Legend]

Feeling pretty great today. So relieving to have a path forward that is just a few tweaks here and there, not a massive overhaul.

The specific changes I'm making are:

• Individual control panels on each device, universal remote is found later. This makes it more obvious what the player has to do. It limits options.
• Every word has to be fully typed every time it is used, until the universal remote is found later. This is slightly inconvenient but it stops the language from acting as single use keys.
• First number puzzle cannot be bypassed with an alternative solution anymore. This forces the player to learn how to use control panels while the content is still pretty easy (Hapax numbers are much easier than FEZ and Obduction numbers, at least while small).
• A closed door earlier in the game cannot be bypassed with an alternative route anymore (no vent crawling here). This forces the player to learn early that they should be paying attention to the language.
• As stated in OP, the final command is now "take me to Earth" or something like that instead of just "Earth." This gives the player reason to try to learn everything they can about the language, instead of putting on blinders and only searching for "Earth." Thanks to some other stuff, it will be very obvious at this point exactly what the player needs to translate in order to beat act 1.
• Shifting some things around so the player has an active goal at all times during act 1. Not just the broad "escape" goal I was working with.

Once I get all this implemented it'll be interesting to see how it feels. Will of course need more tweaks but this should at least give it a better difficulty curve. Will also be interesting to see how long this new version of act 1 is. Gonna be super short and have to act as just an appetizer for act 2? We'll see!