(OLD)Volcano Vanquish(Team 4 Phase 2)

1. does the grapple hook have to much force to it? Should it have a cool down on it? 

Yes I think you should make it slower and focus on momentum.

2. What other forms of obstacles would you like to see as the player attempts to swing out of the volcano?

There needs to be middle obstacles so you cant just speed glitch through the middle.

3. Currently there is only one speed set on the rising milk lava. We plan to later make it increase in velocity as the game continues. Is the velocity that it is at now to slow/fast for the start of the run?

I think for people new to the game its fine.

Ben I am going to send you a video on Discord. I remember you saying the grapple only fires when you click near a wall and I found a way to exploit it to go incredibly fast while avoiding all obstacles. Its pretty funny.

1. I feel that the grapple hook does has a bit of a force to it. Maybe tone down the pull for the full release?

2. I would love an obstacle like a falling rock that paralyzes you for a moment before you can continue again.

3. the milk seems kinda fast for this first run, so i would suggest that you slow down the milk, with it increasing as you get higher and higher.

1. To me, the grappling hook feels pretty good. It was hard to know where I was going sometimes. It felt like it was too much force but other times wasn't enough. Getting through the tighter spaces was a little difficult at times. I was also jumping off some of the bumpy geometry on the walls. A cool-down might make it really challenging but could be fun to play with.
2. It might be fun to have some enemies, but nothing do difficult. Maybe they can bump you off the platform you're on? But I think that the volcano would have to be a little bit bigger for that to work well.
3. I die probably 5 times right off the bat. I thought it was fast but as soon as I got further from it, it didn't feel like a threat.  But since it's hard to see it can be hard to tell when it is close to you.

Overall, I really like your game. It's fun! It was hard for me to know where the lava is and what it looked like. The grapple physics confused me at times. But nothing game-breaking! I'm looking forward to seeing the finished product!

1. I think there's a bit too much force when the grappling hook pulls you up. I was able to use it to fling myself upward, where I could double jump and just go flying. A cooldown might make it more difficult, but it could slow down gameplay depending on when the cooldown starts. I could see a cooldown from the moment you send out the grappling hook being good, as it will stop you from just spamming your way to the top.

2. Maybe some falling rocks/candy might be good, and parts of the wall that you can't grapple so you have to be more careful how you climb.

3. It's too slow. I was able to go so far ahead that when I decided to fall, it took a solid 3-5 seconds to find the milk.

1. I think the grapple hook feels alright. It would be fun if it was a little faster and it felt more like you were swinging instead of just shooting straight towards the end of the hook. It was a little frustrating to have to actually click on the wall to grapple instead of the general direction of it. I kept trying to click in the middle of the volcano (in the direction that I wanted the grapple hook to shoot) instead of the wall. It might be helpful to have some kind of indicator to let the player know exactly where they can and can't click in order for the grapple hook to work. I think having a cooldown might feel frustrating since there isn't much the player can do to avoid the lava besides the grapple hook. Instead, I think obstacles should serve as a way of slowing the player down. 

2. I think that you have a great foundation where a lot of different types of obstacles could work and make sense. The types of obstacles don't matter as much as the purpose they serve. Right now it feels like the only thing the player is doing is clicking to go up. Obstacles that force the player to be strategic and think about where they place their grapple hook would be good. Other obstacles that slow the player down might also be beneficial. It might be fun to have parts where the player can't grapple on to. Maybe it is foundationally weak and crumbles when the player tries (causing them to fall halfway up) or maybe they can't grapple there at all. Another thing to consider is having obstacles that slow the player down. Something that might be fun is having "cotton candy" or something sticky that if the player touches/grapples onto then they get stuck (or makes them move in slow-mo) for a short amount of time. Another obstacle might be hot milk bubbles that pop up from the bottom of the lava? I think having the lava pose more of a threat would be fun because right now it feels stagnant even though that is the biggest threat to the player. 

4. I think the milk/lava is really slow as it is right now. This is mainly because the player can move so fast. It is easy to get really far ahead of it. So unless there are a lot of enemies/obstacles that will prevent the player from getting a huge start then it is a little slow even for the beginning of the game. If there were more obstacles that prevent the player from going up as quickly then I think it is at a good speed. Until you have the other obstacles in the game it is hard to know the right speed for the lava. Having random spurts in the velocity might be fun. Since it is going at a set speed it feels predictable. Increasing the speed later in the game would be nice. 

Overall, great job! I am excited to see how the game turns out. I love the art and the overall theme/setting. 

1. does the grapple hook have to much force to it? Should it have a cool down on it?

The grapple hook seems intuitive and the force seems right.  Not sure how the player movements work into the grapple hook.  I Started messing with them more and noticed that the jumping seems to stack onto itself.  I found that I could just double/triple jump without using the grapple hook to move up the volcano.  While the grapple hook doesn't seem to cause collision issues, the movement controls seem to cause the player to get stuck on sides of rocks sticking out as well as allowing the player to jump into the wall and get stuck behind the walls of the volcano.  

2. What other forms of obstacles would you like to see as the player attempts to swing out of the volcano?

I think there should be some sort of enemy to fight or avoid.  Maybe adding in falling balls of lava that knock you down further but don't kill you.  Maybe some sort of platform or area that will kill you if touched.  It is fun to just shoot the grapple hook up and move up the volcano but after a bit there's not much more to do.  Speeding up the lava as you progress might help with the urgency as the player progresses.

3. Currently there is only one speed set on the rising milk lava. We plan to later make it increase in velocity as the game continues. Is the velocity that it is at now to slow/fast for the start of the run?

I feel like at the very beginning it seems OK since if you just stand there it will quickly come up and end the game.  Also gives you a little time figure out what's going on.  But as you start to just climb a little, you can tell that the lava is moving too slow, so scaling that speed up the further you go would help.  I think maybe there should be some sort of dialog or info at the start of the game to tell the user how the grapple hook works and maybe delay the start of the lava rising until the hook is first used or maybe a certain spot reached.  If you don't do anything right at the start of the game the lava gets you and the game ends abruptly without ever really seeing the lava.

1. The grapple has a good amount of force, but I actually think a way to make it fun is to have even MORE force, and make the volcano wider so you have more room to zoom around. That way it's a little more chaotic, but in a good way because after playing for a while I easily learned the mechanics and it felt pretty easy to me. I wanna feel like spiderman zooming around really fast if that makes sense. Really fine tune the physics to make it smooth. 

2. I remember your group wanting to have a candy theme, so I think something like candy cane ledges, that break apart after you grab onto it would be cool. Or, maybe a gummy surface that's sticky and makes it harder to jump or reach the next grapple point.  Again, I would either widen the volcano or scale down the player so you have more room to add stuff and make it flow nicely. 

3. A few times I died immediately because as soon as you start the lava is right under you, and it was a little annoying starting out when you are trying to learn the controls. But, after that I think the lava is waaay too slow, since you can jump ahead of it pretty quickly. So, I think there should be a short wait at the beginning before the lava starts rising, but after that it should be fast in my opinion. 

1.) I think the grappling hook does have a very high amount of force, but I don't see that as much of a bad thing.  I think with lower force a lot of obstacles would be much more annoying to navigate, so I think I'd keep it as is.  The only real downside to having it be so fast is that you can outrun the milk lava very quickly.

2.) I think enemies/spikes that you have to avoid would help keep players from just spamming the grappling hook, but I also don't think that enemies would fit in such a small space as you have for the volcano.  Honestly I don't think you could add any obstacles at the moment, it would be too frustrating.  If you scaled down the player to about half size I think then it would feel fair (or scaled up the level sections to double size).

3.) I don't think I saw the milk lava the entire game.  Even when I finally decided to jump down and see how far I'd come my velocity was fast enough that I didn't even see the milk before the game over.  So I guess that probably answers your question, I'd say too slow.

One other thing that you didn't ask about- I'd very much consider decreasing the size of the character.  The one level section where you have to squeeze through a small gap is more frustrating than anything because it feels random if you can even get in or not.  I imagine the frustration would be multiplied many times over if I was on a time limit because of the milk and I couldn't get through the section.

Also, I'm not sure what the purpose of the walking and jumping is.  I never used it, except for one time when I clipped into a wall and I walked out of it to get back into the level.