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A Postmortem on Starstruck Vagabond | Semi-Ramblomatic

🕑 Added 2024-07-04 15:06:06 +0000 UTC

Comments

Daniel Craddock

Now I've finished my current hyperfocus I might shift over to this.

Maytree

Several decades ago I worked as a game designer for Sierra On-Line. The rule is: no game release ever survives contact with the player base. Since a lot of bugs, even game-breaking bugs, show up very infrequently or only under a very unlikely combination of circumstances, the Law of Large Numbers is required to find and bash those unlikely little pests. I had a friend who was doing some playtesting for pals at LookingGlass and he was very pleased with himself that he was able to crash his testing version of the game by telling his character to eat his compass. The devs were like "WHAT? WHY WOULD YOU EVEN DO THAT??.... okay fine we'll fix it. Geez." It's a bit weird, but being able to "creatively break" stuff is not all that common a skill and very valuable in a game tester. It can be challenging to think like a clueless player when you're not actually a clueless player! As a side note, it's been irritating me a lot lately that many interactive web sites and utility apps appear not to have taken basic usability into account when doing their design. I've lost track of the number of times I've gone to a web site or downloaded a simple app only to discover that the controls for extremely basic functions that everyone needs have been either buried three menus deep (behind a sign saying "Beware of the Leopard"....) or have not been included at all, and I have to wonder, "Did a real human even look at this before you pushed it out the door?"

Robert Daniel Pickard

was waiting for verified on SDeck. purchased! looking forward to playing it

Michael Alicea

Very thoughtful - the first half meditating on being a critic who also produces games could be an entire episode

Kevyn Pickett

Ah, zoobs. The adorable space blobs turned cannibal menace from Yahtzee's novels. Love that little bit of crossover.

Garry

Bought it for myself and everyone I know. Get some sleep, Yatz!

Jaszon Alexzander

Oh yeah I did buy that didn't I... seems like a solid time to actually... install it. heh.

Ryan Evans

I appreciate a video like this, also why I like hearing yahtz talk about his old games like the consuming shadow etc. Watching someone realise and rectify their mistakes or oversights in real time is true growth and the way all creatives should operate