Topic
Coupla observations on 7/9 test
So I haven't been on Glitch for a stretch, though I managed to check if the game was open at the right time today to play a bit.
I knew I wasn't going to be able to play much, so instead of trying to race through levels as in the past, I was trying to put on "new player eyes" (NPE) a bit. I know this wasn't the point of today's test, but here's some things I noticed:
1. It was great that the rock, let's call her Petra, was screaming at me at the beginning to listen up. I liked that.
2. I didn't get many quests in the length of time I was on, but one was confusing from NPE: The garlic kiss. The cooking vendor doesn't sell garlic, as one would expect, and who in their right or even impaired mind would think that they needed to buy lips. Nutty. If I hadn't played before, I think this would be a very very hard task indeed. So I gave up on NPE after a bit and went to vendors.
3. There seemed to me to be no suggestion that I could spend skill points. I didn't spend any because in this case I didn't put away NPE, and just waited. Maybe Petra would give me a nudge when there were enough of them unspent to tell me that I was an idiot and should spend them. But I don't think "an idiot", because I think today there was really no clue. I think the "would you like to spend it now?" question was preferable, and I think it should even be more clear that I was earning skill level points and COULD spend them. Instead, the only thing I really noticed with NPE was that I was leveling up.
4. I wonder if the completed quests could be grayed out or something so that it's easier to tell which ones are done and which are outstanding.
5. I did, in fact reach a point where I had no quests, but that was because I kept the NPE and did not spend skill points. I'm sure I would have had new quests if I'd acquired new skills.
6. I don't think I encountered any quests that asked me to sell things to vendors, so my NPEs were wondering how I could make currants.
Okay, some more thoughts on garlic kisses:
1. Again, why "buy lips"? I have lips. I can see them! Why would I try to buy them? I know it's sort of parallel to buying a moon to moon people, but it's not. The parallel would be to buy a kisser. Or maybe you need to buy lipstick to do your kissing, and maybe that makes your intended target a little attracted to you, so that they can't leave the scene too quickly or something (always a problem with kissing).
2. Hints are needed, regardless. In this case, for the lips or lips substitute, I might prefer an adventure-style approach. I can try to kiss someone when I encounter them, but when I click the kiss button, I get a message, such as "you can't kiss with rough lips like that! go get some lip gloss!" In the current version, kiss is not an option unless I've got everything I need. But okay, if that doesn't work, Petra should give me hints.
3. Why does the COOKING vendor sell lips? Tools seems the closest thing.
4. I think it would probably be good to have a vendor quest before this anyway, four things you had to buy that would require seeing each vendor's wares. There was a little scavenger hunt thing before that accomplished this (buy X and take it to Y, etc.), but if it's still there, I didn't encounter it today. Then I'd have a chance of understanding about getting things from vendors, and maybe a sense of the kind of things I can get from each.
5. The garlic gave me a special power for a time limit. This comes up with a number of items, but it's easy to overlook. I wonder if there should be something more in your face the first time to call your attention to that part of the display.
I know I am going on about minor things. The game had a great feel to it today, and I was really loving it.
Replies
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there are no "skill points" anymore.
you can learn skills whenever you want now, it just takes time to learn them [timer based].
maybe you weren't truly playing with "NPE" if you were assuming skill points existed. -
"3. Why does the COOKING vendor sell lips? Tools seems the closest thing."
the tool vendor does sell lips. maybe you're getting them confused. -
Well, okay so I didn't know about learning skills, whatevs. I don't think anything suggested to me that I should go learn skills.
And I'm pretty sure I got my lips at the cooking vendor. Maybe all the vendors have the lips. In the short time I was playing, I didn't buy anything from the tools vendor (I think). -
all the tools vendors have lips. not sure if the cooking vendor does but i don't think so.
i think the skill learning is probably mentioned in the introductory tutorial.
there's also a link top right in the interface to start cooking up a new skill. - probably what should happen is that whenever you're not currently training a skill, the pet rock should remind you to train one.
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You mention that the cooking vendor doesn't sell garlic. There is more than one cooking vendor, and had you looked around properly you may have noticed that one of them does, in fact, sell garlic. Alternatively, it is possible to create garlic, if you have the right skills.
I find it odd that people moan about not having enough quests to do, but complain too when they have to actually experiment a bit to achieve their goals. Lots of very easy short quests would be too boring. I like the fact that you aren't guided through every little step. I would actually prefer it if the quests were longer and more complicated - perhaps tiered so that the completion of part 1 of a quest gave some XP and currants, but also opened up part 2 of the quest. This gives an incentive to complete more difficult quests, as it is the easiest way of getting more quests. - Clare, thanks so much for such a thorough collection of your observations! It's very helpful. The follow-up conversation is great too. I just wanted to jump in and let you know this is being read and acted upon.
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you can buy garlic from uncle friendly's in Ix.
the cooking vendor should probably sell it too, although i think that quest is a great way of encouraging people to visit Ix. probably better is to have the rock tell people where they can buy garlic. - I think there's also potential in using the "Talk to" option with vendors to gain clues about things you might be looking for. Maybe if there's no other reason to talk to a vendor, the default response you get is "Can I help you find something?" You could then type in what you're looking for, like "garlic" or "lips" or "sno-cones" or "the meaning of life" or whatever, and the vendor might either give you a hint, or just straight out tell you, or maybe ask for some random item to help 'jog his memory', depending on the whims of the devs. :)