So Ludum Dare is done, but Moo Problems: 2021 is not. I've been taking time to digest feedback and even in some cases get a chance to watch other people play through streams.

And I've come up with three areas to improve. What I affectionately call me ty's (tees). Visibility, Difficulty, and Subtlety.

Visibility

So this issue was originally brought up during a stream I watched. Someone commented that the game seems like it would be easier from the perspective of the title screen which reveals the entire map. While, I wasn't certain that that would be true, I was curious. Trying it out locally, I realized that it did indeed give me an edge. Knowing when and where my cows were going to be in trouble next, made me able to act decisively. The major issue is that the majority of the art was made for a size that was much smaller. So, rather than redo a ton of work, I compromised. I increase the size of the camera slightly, decreased the space that the UI took up, and most importantly repositioned the two machines to be centered (top and bottom of the level) and added a second drop off point.

The increased visibility definitely gives an edge, but the horizontal collapse allows the user to focus on the verticality of the level which provides both a natural defense against the robots and allows them to more quickly close the gap between cows. Falling and jumping are definitely faster than sprinting across the map. The addition of the second drop off point made it where the user never really gets significantly off balance to the left or right of the level, so they are always able to recover after a dropoff before the next bot wave begins.

Difficulty

The game is hard. Like, really hard. I don't want to point fingers, but I blame the lack of balancing and effective playtesting by people other than myself. Okay, so let's dive into why. My first guess was that the bots just came too frequently, but after making changes to visibility, I realized that killing the bots actually wasn't that bad. They came at a frantic pace, for sure, but being able to react effectively to them made a world of difference. The difficulty had already been made easier. So I decided to get my family to play the game (begrudgingly) and extort USEFUL feedback (no Kyle, the game is hard is not constructive!) from them. This led to some more breakthroughs. Most people lost because of the secondary lose condition, you run out of money. People usually ignored the money until they reached the danger zone. Then it was too late for them to recover, literally running out of time as they sprinted that last bit of cheese to the delivery truck, or even worse, shifting focus entirely away from fighting until their cows died. So, I made it easier. I upped the initial starting money by 1500 to give people an earlier edge as they get familiar with the controls. And, I removed the second lose condition.

Money is still tied to using tools, but it can go to zero, even below zero. At this point, the user can't use their tools until they recoup their losses. This means that while they need to shift focus momentarily, the game isn't over. This allows people to move cows and adjust positioning in addition to collecting cheese and the like. They shift from offensive to being defensive and evasive. This prolongs the game for those that previously would have lost and gives a chance to recover from not adequately preparing in the early game when resource balancing is easier.

Subtlety

Subtle things in games go unnoticed. That's something that pretty much anyone that makes games, unfortunately, has to come to terms with. Especially, for games that need to be learned and played in a matter of minutes like games made for Ludum Dare. I did a lot of subtle things. Most of that subtlety focused around the grass seeds. Which of course, I had the wisdom to make the most expensive tool. Grass seeds were more effective on the higher platforms and cows could only recover health if they ate grass. Plus I added a tutorial step that had you throw down grass seed before you really needed to, and I watched many a person assume that something was broken as they wasted their starting money trying to get grass to grow. :slight_frown: So, I took away the subtlety. Grass seeds now would completely heal the grass with two throws. Easy to understand and visualize.

Now cows complain if they don't have grass. They'll occasionally spawn a little blurp that drives the user to drop seeds. Creating a more solid connection between the cows and the grass color. Removed the tutorial step, but made it where the damage was more noticeable when you milked the cows. That damage would then only recover (in safety before bots spawned) if you kept the grass green.

Additionally, I added more messaging around when you can pickup things with a similar E blurp. Previously, you were allowed to carry multiple of the same item or a cow all at the same time, but only in certain circumstances. The circumstances were maintained in your own head, and if you lost track of them you either made the game artificially more difficult or you wasted time spamming E on something that you wished that you could pickup. This little blurp will alleviate all confusion around that.

:smirk: Boom! Some changes. Also, new music, SFX, and VFX. OooooOOOooooOOO. And a stat page for if you win!

Newest version can be played here: https://owlandjackalope.itch.io/moo-problems-2021-post-ludum-dare