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knorker edited this page Sep 25, 2014 · 7 revisions 
   Roadmap and stuff for greenlight release

There is ONE greenlight release. Failure is not an option.

After release there is not time for fixng, players leave quickly if the game is buggy.

If you plan to fix things when they are reported by newbies, then you already lost: Players are NOT beta testers!

Table of Contents

Annoyances to existing players can not be avoided

Preparation for release will likely require actions that will annoy existing players:

  • deleting custom Commanders
  • reseting elo
  • limiting map pool
  • changes to lobby or game

(those were random examples)

Even if that annoys you, please understand that these things might be nessecary.

If you want to help the game, then do not bypass it: For example should map selection be limited, then it is not helpful to create custom hosts just to play your favorite map.

Likewise devs will need the courage/nerves to do things despite causing existing players to whine.

STATUS:

  • ...There seems to be hesitance when it comes to doing certain things.

Feature freeze

  • It is not possible to test and polish something that is constantly changing.
  • Adding new things that risk to break the game should be avoided.
  • A spring game is never "100% ready" but when critical things like GUI, gadgets, widgets are being
changed around then the game is not ready for launch.
  • It is impossible to do manuals/videos of an interface that always looks different.

STATUS: ...stuff get changed too much.

Network with other spring things

No spring game exists on its own. Each "sub system" must explictely state state that it is ready for launch.

Something is not ready ==> abort launch.

  • engine
  • lobby
  • playable content (game, missions, tutorial)
  • download sites
  • lobby server
  • manual, FAQ
  • auto hosts
  • ...

Interaction with Steam

Legal entity to talk to steam.

Multiple people need to have the rights/passwords/knowledge to publish new versions etc.

Not good if a new version needs to be released but it must be waited 24h for the only steam-admin to get online.

STATUS: ...?

FAQ

An FAQ is needed to get help to players.

Note: An FAQ is something that gets written after release, when new problems pop up.

If you think of writing an FAQ *now* then you should rather write a bug report or feature request.

FAQ engine

For engine trouble, the engine FAQ and bug tracker should be used.

STATUS: The engine FAQ could need some updating.

Bug reporting

For new bugtracker on github there need to be some standards. For example closing solved isses, using tags.

  • Needs a way to mark issues that are "steam-critical" to get an overview.
("Nicer model for bomber" is not steam-critical but "Tutorial crashes" is.) Suggestion: Prefix title with "STEAM" - eg "STEAM: Tutorial crashes"

STATUS: ...

Helping one player does not fix the bug

Any problem needs to be reported: 

  Noob: help, something is broken.
  Dev: ok, delete this file blablabla go to menu XY.
  Noob: thanks, now it works.

After such dialog the problem is not solved!

Only one player was helped, many others will encounter the same problem again.

Bug reporting (non-dev players who want to help)

Try to read most of the FAQ etc and keep a bit up with development, so that you give the correct help.

Many times newbies will simply state their problem in chat. They can not be expected to fill out a detailed bug report. Be on the lookout for that. Report problems even if they did not happen to you.

Where can newbies report problems?

Players need an easy, hassle-free place to report bugs. Where should that be?

  • zK Forum: requires having sucessfully registered a springlobby account - not good.
  • github: No normal gamer has a github account. Site is too "intimidating." - not good.
  • google.code: google accounts are somewhat common - might work.

Still bug reports ("complaints") will be all over the place: It will be nessecary to read reviews, steam forum, everything, and fill it into the dev bugtracker.

Any plan that relies on players helping newbies will not work

  • The idea that "lots of moderators can help players" or "experienced players can help newbies in chat" is naive.
  • Manual helping is a band-aid, not a solution.

It is false sense of security to think "zK has more experienced players than other mods and so will be okay." If you already have the feeling that newbies will need help, then improve those areas that give the bad feeling.

Small pre-release before big release

A test-launch of some sort might be good: Instead of thousands of new players, only a few dozen. That can help to fix problems for the real release.

For example:

  • release on steam as "beta" or "pre-release alpha" or what other options greenlight offers
  • Announcement on steam: "This is our final release-test"
  • release on a smaller plattform first. (for ex desura) But risk of having to maintain 2 things in future.

STATUS: ...need to check what options there are?

Engine version

  • Use newest version: Engine devs refuse to deal with problems of old version.
  • Should be tested for some weeks.

STATUS: next engine version is not released yet.

Matchmaking

  • Gamesize needs to be limited. In a 8v8 with newbs, too many will crash out or be noobing around, a
game will never this way start. Similiar with speclimit, it is not desirable to have 30 newbs stuck as specs.
  • Possible solution: Limiting roomsize & speclimit is more robust than any matchmaking algorythms.
It reliably works with all lobbies. If there is flood of players then trying to balance does not even matter: Everyone is new, many will have problem.

With such playerbase there is initially no need to care about balancing, the only thing that matters is that players get to play as many matches as easy&fast as possible.

Another situation that needs to be accounted for: 

  "We are four newbies and want to play together, without other players."

  '''STATUS:'''

...?

Packaging

  • The "package" that players download from steam must contain everything needed to play.
  • If there is a dozen newbies in a room and half of them are waiting for map-dl to finish, then no
game will ever happen.

Another way that might work is that the lobby downloads everything (as is now) but then... ..that needs to be very clear. ..spring server must be able to handle it.

  • Maximum size should be ~1GB: Too large and it causes annoyance if one has to re-download etc.

STATUS: ...solution needs to be decided and implented...?

Map selection

  • Newbies do not know which map is suitable for FFA, 1v1 or chicken or what teamsize.
They will randomly play anything.
  • The maplist must account for that and only contain maps that are suitable for as many game modes as
possible.

STATUS: ...There are "featured" maps but those are way too many.

Testing

  • "I played zK for 3 years and it seems pretty ok" is not testing.
  • Everything needs to be througly tested, from download to tutorial to ingame.
On different systems.
  • Best to record it (openbroadcaster, twitch.tv, anything) and share for analysation.
  • Newbies should be encouraged to record/stream their install-to-game process so it ca be learnt from.
Even one such video would be more helpful than endless discussions.

STATUS:

  • Game is not tested beyond normal playing/modding.
  • There are no reports how geniue newbies react to the game.

Ingame Interface

  • Must work out of the box, without tweaking.
  • No "moving that menu a bit too left", no "making this list a bit bigger", no "change cameraspeed":
Delete all your configs and custom configurations because that is how new players will experience it.

STATUS:

  • Nobody is playing with default interface.
  • GUI is constantly being worked on and not final.

Tutorials, Missions, Manuals

  • The tutorials must be 100% clear and work. Needs selection of first few missions that newbies play.
  • Missions that teach the game are more important than missions with story.
  • Missions needs some tracker that shows how many newbies tried to play the mission and how many completed it.
  • Until release maybe re-enable "manual download" link, to get non-zKlobby users to test too.

STATUS:

  • Comments under missions report many problems.
  • It is not known if/how many newbies are completing the tutorial.

Videos

  • Instruction video is needed that explains the game in 1 minute. Not. Longer. (No longwinded "blabla video-diary style.")
  • Must use default interface.
  • In such video it is not nessecary to go into too much detail: It is about teaching the bare minium to play.

There can be more videos on specifique topics like hotkeys, eco in detail etc.

One short video per topic: Unlike written text, videos can not easily be edided if things change.

It is easier to make one new "hotkey video" instead of editing an hours-long supervideo that tries to cover everything.

STATUS:

  • There are no instruction videos
  • The manuals are bit outdated (screenshots etc) and it is not clear in what order they should be read (?)

Unlocks / Commander Modules / Newbie rooms

  • Too many buildoptions are confusing = bad.
  • It is not possible to make a tutorial/video/manual that explains the game when even the basic
construction unit is always a different one.
  • Many different Commanders are bad:
    • They require [i]one more/i menu to navigate.
    • If the resource-income is different among them, then it is harder to learn(teach!) buildorders.
      • Tutorials would then need to take that in mind, too.
    • Morphing the Commander too soon can be a newb-trap.

Suggestion to Newbie-Hosts:

  • All the newb-trap-units are strictly locked. (no nukes, no singus, no antis etc)
  • Only two factories: One vehicle, one bots.
    • (No water, no air, no anti-air: The game is complex enough without them)
  • One type of Commander.
  • There is no way to unlock things.
    • To play with full unitset player has to go to a normal room.
  • The newbie-hosts are limited to even fewer maps:
    • These are 1-3 special "newbie-maps" with VERY clear design:
      • Arrows pointing to metalspots, markings for good defense places, roads towards enemy.
      • Signs on the maps with the kind of hints that a helpful teammate would give: "Defense here", "At start take those 3 mexes"
      • The start area is similiar to the location used in tutorial. (in ex. middle of 3 mexes, geo)
        • This way things learnt in tutorial can directly be used ingame.
      • Fixed start locations are used instead of free choice. This takes care of another newbtrap.

If this seems too strictly limited then think:

  • Newbies will be overwhelmed in their first games anyway.
  • In your first game you can only play on one map and with one factory anyway.
    • Better make sure it is a good map and a noob-friendly factory
      • Preferably the factory that is best explained in tutorials

STATUS:

  • There are different opinions how unlocks/modules/newb rooms should work.

Keeping track of events, statistics, measuring sucess

  • A "diary" of notable events should be kept: Learn from past, avoid making same mistakes again.

If you graph the numbers of any system, patterns emerge. Needs logs or graphs of:

  • players numbers / new players
  • players idle/ingame/in room
  • stats about mission: who played, how often, what outcome
  • stats about players: how many games do they play / do they leave after 1 match?
  • server logs like dl bandwith etc

The graphs need to be in a sensible scale so that one can see cause & effects.

For example it is helpful to know "On same day as update #342: ingame player numbers dropped" Not so helpful if the graph only tells "drop was somewhere in novembre"

  • These analysis should be collected in one place.

Steam has shown potential to bring hundreds of players at once into lobby: Currently zK has ~30 players playing at peaks, if that was to grow by 10 then that would be a relative sucess but the large missed potential means it would ultimately be a failure.

STATUS:

  • There are some public statistics but they are scattered and I am not sure how helpful they are.

Understand that the game is NOT easy

We all do complex hotkey combinations and mouse-wiggles while playing as if it was the easiest thing in the world.

  • BUT: Do not confuse powerful with easy

The gamedesign of zK is in ways uninuitive and even basic things are hard to explain without lengthy descriptions. That can not be changed anymore, but good to keep in mind.

For example a Starcraft tutorial might say: "Left-click on an SCV to select it, then rightclick on a mineral to mine resources. Leftclick the commandcenter and click the "build SCV" icon." That covers everything.

In zK a tutorial might say: "Select a commander in menu. Select a startlocation in your box and near metalspots. Go to the eco-tab of the buildmenu. The game is not really started yet, but you can still do that. Select the metalextractor icon and click on a metalspot."

It is many more steps and there are more things to do wrong. (for example the map might have no near metalspots for that player) That is why simplified newbie rooms are so important.

Communication to newbies (technical)

A way is needed to announce things to newbies. For example:

  • "The lobby server will restart and be down for 30min"
  • "Singleplayer is currently broken, hopefully fixed next day"
  • "You absolutely need to do XYZ or the game will not work"

How can such things be communicated to all players?

  • Annoucements on steam
  • lobby-broadcasts
  • sticky forum threads
  • "wiki status pages"

...will all be needed and must be maintained.

  • The "news" pop-up of lobby should be used for this, too.
  • Sticky threads should not contain text but a link to a wiki page:
This makes updating easier and avoids having old infos lingering around.

STATUS:

  • ...there is lobby-popup-news on login, bit ugly
  • ...?

Talking to newbies (style)

  • Players will be very blunt with critic.

The comments will not be as positive as before release. Before release players are more positive towards the game because their opinion is solely based on descriptions and videos and that When something does not work then they are *rightfully* annoyed. If a review reads "The interface is shit and the crappy AI always gets stuck" then you STILL can NOT reply in the same tone. In intern discussions "anything goes" but whenever you are posting in public steam forum you are representing the game.

Some statements that in any form are unacceptable:

  • "It is open source, go help fix it." -- they are players, not developers.
  • "The game is actually very easy and casual" -- A game with 100+ units is never easy. A game with so much focus on interface & hotkeys is never casual.
  • "It is free and you get what you pay for" -- Free software is a selling point or "ideal", not an excuse.
  • "You are too stupid for xy" -- obvious.
  • "Game/Lobby XY is even worse" -- obvious.
If you feel you can not communicate without falling into such behaviour, then stay away from newbies. That also goes to players "fan boys" who might want to defend their favorite game.

No false joke advices, no matter how obvious it seems to you:

No "CTRL-A, CTRL-D for more overdrive", No "Build another 12 storages"

Instead of trying to come up with own solution, stick to what is written in FAQ. If needed, expand FAQ.

For engine trouble, use the engine FAQ.

Be honest

  • There is nothing wrong with saying "We do not know why that bug happens" or "I do not know if feature XY can be done"
  • It is not helpful to contiually promise fixes or tease with new features and not deliever.
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