The future of Cove Kid. Design direction and next steps.

Whew. What a long journey it has been. Roughly two years ago, I started following Handmade Hero on Youtube but found it challenging because nobody had ported it to the Mac in a way that I, as a new game engine developer, could get started with and understand.

It took me two years of my spare time just to get to a point where I understand C and how it relates to game engines on the Mac. I now have a fluency and freedom with lower level programming that I didn't have before, and I got it through consistent practice over a long period time.

How this game's core idea came to be

The design work for this game, Cove Kid, originally started in September of 2020. I quit iOS contracting full-time in order to focus on building this business.

I had the start of the game idea, and I used much of my time to expand upon it, explore it, understand what's good and bad about it, and begin to craft a world around it.

The idea started as "what if you could edit the level while playing?" and now that I am a more mature game designer, I understand that this was a rather naive design idea. 

There is a sense in which we "edit the level" any time we play a game that has entities in a world that we can interact with. That's not a special idea, but I think what is special about my game is the fact that it's a platformer where you can use the core idea to move platforms around and position them in some unique ways.

Now the idea is more about picking up a 3x3 section and moving it with your beam. There are other elements in the game as well, things like moving blocks, blocks that redirect your beam, ghost blocks, water you have to avoid, and a few things I haven't announced yet.

Puzzles naturally emerge from all of these ideas combined, and solving them is what makes this game more engaging than anything I have created thus far.

The problems this game currently faces (in my opinion)

I think this game is rather unforgiving and harsh, except to the most experienced puzzle gamers. It's just one long linear sequence of increasingly harder puzzles. It plays awkwardly in some respects, and there isn't enough fun window dressing so people can kind of goof around without always tackling difficult puzzles. 

Other games are better in this respect. Portal had some difficult puzzles, but you could always sort of goof off with the portal beam, throw chairs into them, and laugh for a little bit. Braid's rewind mechanic is entertaining in and of itself, regardless of whether you play it seriously enough to get at the deep truths it expresses.

I want to make deep interesting games, but if people come to my games and only appreciate the surface level "fun," I'm totally fine with that. People have different personalities, capabilities, and kinds of intelligence. Some people are serious analytical and logical thinkers (pointing at myself here) while others are more inclined to take care of others and better sense the emotional climate of the room.

People are mostly born the way they are, and the environment only has a small impact on them. You can't make others into the kind of people you want them to be. You have to accept them as they are.

This applies in relationships, and it applies to the audience for products you make. If you want your game to have a broader market appeal, I think it needs to be fun on a purely surface level. That's the hook into the deeper aspects, which only a smaller portion of your audience will appreciate anyway.

How to make the game better

That leads to some ideas for the future of this game. There are a few items I believe that when addressed will lead to a more enjoyable experience that hooks more players.

1. The world is too linear. People get stuck on puzzles and get frustrated. Then they quit and don't pick it back up.
2. Forcing the player to always use the beam to place blocks feels awkward, arbitrary, and cumbersome. Why can't you just place the blocks in front of yourself and then choose to use the beam if you need to?
3. Aesthetically, the world is a still too clinical. As the sound designer Chuck has said, "it could use more plants."
4. We need more fun things to mess around with.

This gets me thinking that the intro to this game should be more in line with what they do in Portal. 

In Portal, you aren't given the full portal gun until you get a little deeper into the game. You start with portals that open for you, so you understand what the portals are. Then you're only given one half of the portal gun, so you have to learn in this more constrained environment where you can't just shoot both portals. Puzzles emerge from that constraint.

Finally, you're given the full portal gun, and then you have to figure out the harder puzzles which require you to use both portals.

I think there is a possible progression in this game, something I am currently exploring. I want to see what happens to the puzzles if you start with the ability to pick up the 3x3 and place it in front of yourself. Later on, like in Metroid, you get an upgrade to your drone that lets you use the beam. Then, even further down the line, you could get other upgrades like a 4x4 selection grid or other abilities.

Obviously if the game goes down this path, it turns into something totally different from what it is now. It trivializes at least half of the current set of puzzles, but it also makes some puzzles play less awkwardly. 

I currently think it's a better design, but I haven't fully explored the implications. I literally need to go over all of the existing puzzles and see if they need to be discarded or modified to fit the new rules. 

If too many of the puzzles become trivial, we don't really have a puzzle game. But if it opens up a whole space of new puzzles while making the game play less awkwardly, then we've hit upon a better overall design for this game idea.

That said, I would love to hear what you, the player, think about this idea. If you've played the game and have something to say about it, let me know in the comments.

I'm in this funny space where a certain Steve Jobs quote applies. "It's really hard to design products by focus groups . A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them."