Evaluation

Describe your game (including a title).

The title of my game is Risk it or Leave it. The reason for this is because it is a Platformer with many obstacles where receiving weapons or power-ups come with many dangers. You could risk getting the power-up to help you with the rest of the game or you could leave it to conserve your health, as helpful items such as railguns and armour are not completely necessary.


What is the objective of the game?

The objective of the game is to collect 3 different keys in which you’ll need to use in order to battle the “boss” that guards the crystal that you seek.


Discuss two strengths and one weakness of your game.

The strengths of my game are that you’ll need to strategize to get through. Once you fail one obstacle, you will need to start all over because you only have that one chance to get it right. Another strength is that it uses a variety of the different functions of a game. There are jump quests, fighting against monsters, and tricks that are hard not to fall for. A weakness could be that it is a little confusing because it is necessary to move all over the map to get keys to enter certain areas to get more keys. People could find it frustrating if they did not know the path they had to follow.


What improvements could be made?

I think at some points, the game could be too hard, so I could have removed a little of the monsters. Though the bats are of least danger, they are definitely most annoying. I put tons of these bats as alternatives for harder monsters, and that could have been changed, seeing as I have trouble completing my own game.


What difficulties did you encounter while creating your game?

I found it difficult to make sure people would use every single path I laid out for them. It was also hard to come up with the certain blocks for the jump quests to ensure that it wasn't impossible to get to the little room containing the key. The hardest part was making sure people couldn't get by into certain areas they were not supposed to be in, so I had to lock up lots of areas with doors that only opened with either blue or yellow keys.


What did you have to modify or change from the original design?

Instead of keeping two separate paths, I connected them together to make one whole path. Other than that, there was little change from the initial design of my game.


Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of your performance during this assignment.

My strengths are that I was very focused into making the game. I spent a lot of time thinking through what could make it challenging, yet not impossible. I also implanted many obstacles that required time to come up with. My game continued to expand so much that it took many hours to complete, along with a minimum required playing time of 10-15 minutes, thus becoming a weakness in my performance.


What did you do well at?

I think I did really well with coming up with obstacles that required strategic thinking. I thought one of my best ones was where there were three wheels, and if the person playing it didn't get two of the wheels into the ditch, it would be impossible to get past.


What could you have done better at?

I think I could have done better with the overall design. I tried to use different varieties of blocks and colours, but I felt that the background design and additional decorations were lacking. I could have spent more time with making my game look more aesthetically appeasing.


Questions:

Was the game confusing as to where you were supposed to go, or which keys to get first?

Were the obstacles (i.e. three wheels, jump quest, perm blocks/rings) past the monsters you had to fight hard enough, too hard or did you not even get there?

Did you feel that after failing the game for the first time, you felt frustrated, or did you want a second go at it?