Played it and really enjoyed it! The core gameplay was so enjoyable, hours passed by without noticing it. I really look forward for it’s final release. Also I know it’s early to yip about feature demands but I’d really love to play this on mobile as well. For some reason I feel it would make sense as it’s quite enjoyable to kill time doing delivery missions. But maybe it’s just me. Anyway great game (Obviously) keep it up! Cheers!
What about a job board? It's cliché but it works. After you complete a delivery you can just check the nearby job board for new deliveries from that planet. Maybe you get a bit of control over where you want to go next, like choosing a job to deliver to a tropical paradise planet instead of a barren wasteland.
How about this, your ship expands to the point where you simply can’t operate all of it yourself. Then you become the captain with a crew which you manage instead.
Insert Yahtzee making a unnecessarily insulting, sly remark about how that's not the point and that we're dumb for misunderstanding it, or how we're dumb for asking this supposedly without understanding the amount of labor Yahtzee would have to put in the make this system, or how Yahtzee was afraid of this being asked at this stage of the game because it *is* something that he plans to implement down the line:
I still want there to be more to the packing of the materials . Half the job of package delivery is organizing your shit so you can get to what you need efficiently. Maybe have the materials be different shapes and needing to organize it for space to accommodate everything
Mentioning the music made me realize the impact of the same song clip you've been using on every Zero Punctuation for more than a decade. Aside from that I literally watch the annual compilations to sleep and it now soothes more than excites me, the sheer consistency and association with your tone and delivery has made it so that when I hear any kind of jarring intro on some other video it reminds me that I could be watching something more clever. Basically, it serves the intended purpose of an ideal titlecard for an iconic product. That said, maybe include the song or part of it on loop in the game as an easter egg/hallmark? Perhaps something one character listens to on headphones that you can hear fade in as you walk towards them, adding a quirk to that person and ambience to any room they're currently in. Idea segue, as someone who enjoys podcasts you can probably relate to the importance of having music when doing tedious/repetitive tasks. If folks contribute enough music, the hardworking blue-collar main character could have selectable background tunes via some device on their person. Might conflict with your ability to control the narrative if players can listen to lo-fi while frantically murdering space rats with boxes, but would also make any scene/task/event without the headphones more engaging or any impact that removes/breaks the device more jarring. I notice that after Undertale thunked indie pixel games onto the map with a harpoon many of them lean into audio design as heavily as they can and audio themes really have become a hallmark of the genre that will affect how people receive a game where they'll hear many of the same sounds in the same order, courtesy of emphasis on the core loop. I feel it could benefit from player-chosen themes that add enough personalization to be interactive but are interrupted enough by appropriately concentrative tasks to not become stale. Idea callback, with the idea of friendships between characters affecting the space they live in and enough of the game that it changes who finds you when you pass out, perhaps an individual's theme could fill more of the ship/be unlocked as optional music as you improve relations to emulate listening to what they like or simply having more of them in your life. This has been a ramble. Good luck, I like your attitude and your content, and I look forward to giving this game a shot in a couple weeks and your audiobooks a shot when I can listen to your voice for 30 minutes and stay awake, no offense.
Here's an idea: your character wakes up with some coordinates burned onto their arm and finding out what's at those coordinates is something you can theoretically do at anytime...once you've got a ship capable of making the journey. The destination is always there, the things you do are steps towards it and theoretically you could go there at any time, you just should do some preparations first.
I have a feeling that with the whole "your character is a random captain doing menial tasks" has a bit of potential to mirror New Vegas's plot a bit, with a massive thing going on in the background, but instead you're in the foreground, making a delivery while not caring less about the galactic war in the background.
Except New Vegas isn't about you being a courier against a backdrop of competing factions. It's a Western revenge story against a backdrop of... You don't act as a courier and you don't do menial tasks.
Breath of the Wild’s philosophy of allowing the player to take on any challenge at any point regardless of how prepared they actually are is nothing short of brilliant
@@tahunuva4254 The vast majority of open world games still have plot walls. Areas you can't access or events and quests that won't unfold until you've made enough story progress. In most any other sandbox, wandering in the opposite direction of your quest marker is unequivocally the "wrong" direction. You may find some collectibles and earn exp, but there's never any denying that there's somewhere else you SHOULD be, and the time you're spending elsewhere is effectively just stalling. In BotW, however, everywhere you go is exactly where you're supposed to be. The structure of the game gives both context and validity to every single action you take in preparation for the final boss. That's why I say it's brilliant.
@@tahunuva4254 What? While open world games do allow you to travel as you please and stumble onto a high level area and immediately die. But the plot is still a wall you have to get through. You can't go kill Alduin the moment you get out of the tutorial You can't go beat the pathetic Wild Hunt after Geralt's dream sequence Getting to the final boss, the game usually makes sure you're plenty prepared. Making you dive through dungeons making sure you have the equipment and level to beat the final challenge.
One question that keeps popping up for me is about the primary gameplay loop: Is the loop going to be delivering packages or working on the relationships with crewmates? Or a combination of both? I had this same question about Stardew Valley. It seems like the main loop would be farming, but then the game makes a lot unavailable if you don't work on the player's relationships with the townsfolk. In your game, will it be possible to completely ignore your crewmates and still "finish" the game? Will there be multiple "endings" based on your relationship(s) with your crewmates? Etc.
Well from my understanding interacting with crewmates will be a secondary loop that is built off the primary loop. As such it is pretty likely that you need to at least interact with them a little bit. Also the primary gameplay loop is pick up box, place box, fly to the destination, fix stuff that breaks on the way, pick up box, place box, repeat So you are going to want to interact with the crewmates even as a break from the monotony of doing the same thing over again and again.
I ignored the entire town for a full year in Stardew, then ended the second year with everyone at max hearts. Very easily compartementalized. The recipes are nice, but far from crucial.
Interestingly, your comments on flow and menu navigation echo a lot of what I heard from content creators I met at PAX just before the world went into lockdown. One of them specifically cited obtuse UI in games as a sticking point for them and before I knew it I made a promise to keep my menus simple and clear as part of my personal design ethos, both to them and to myself. I know the validation I'm feeling from hearing you talk about it is incidental, but it does feel nice to know I'm on the right track.
The biggest issues I detected were with the distress Call. Any item on the cargo platform go into space with you, but are invisible, then seemed to appear in the ship on their cargo platform. Also as soon as I entered the ship is was janky and slow and eventually crashed but that may be my system. Primary gameplay loop worked well, but I'd like a manual save button. There was a couple of things that weren't the layout, etc I'd do' were I able to code, but aren't in anyway wrong, and that's just a personal preference. LOVED THE QUAN TUNNEL REFERENCE.
Been a fan of your dev diary series. Thanks for making these videos! Something I ran into while making a game of my own as a hobby: when adding dialogue, I find that it's tough to get the voicing of the character dialogue right. Do you have any tips other than practice writing out scenes and see what works? Thanks!
The intro and outro music are too loud! I turn it down for the intro, have to turn it up to hear yahtzee, then i get my ass blasted off when the outro comes and the volume is still up. please have mercy
I played up until installing the Warp Drive. It was fun but it felt like a lot of busy work with little substance. I took some notes on my experience: * I was confused about how to find hull breach (didn't know you had to equip the hand tool to force open door) * Initially I found it annoying that I had to equip the hand tool (however I got used to it in time) * The arrow pointed to the controls, not the engine during the prologue repair engines objective (because of this confusion I went to impulse engines first) * There should be a way to adjust impulse engines backwards as doing so manually is painful * Initially I was confused what to do when the red light flashed * I found that things got dirty far too quickly (constantly interrupting prologue and I imagine in time also crew interactions) * Flying mini-game is far too easy and the rewards are too low, thus it was boring and I stopped bothering to use it. It would be better at higher-stakes with a higher reward. * There should be a "are you sure you want to exit" warning before exiting the game as a couple of times I accidentally quit while alt-tabbing * Placing the Oniris device is painful, it should give some indication while it is being carried (potentially flashing while it is being carried) * Crates can land on top of NPCs * You can hide items in the Southern bed tile * Stamina drain really feels like it is punishing you for playing the game
From how you described Gameflow I came up with what I think is a good metaphor, a game with good gameflow is like a crystal clear whirlpool, and in Breath of The Wilds case the center of the whirlpool is visible and reachable from the very beginning
With the breath of the wild flow example, how does this relate to companion stories? Is it better to have everyone’s story flowing to the same in point where it all gets resolved at once or is it better to have those concluded separately and before the game ends?
I'd make it dependent on level of engagement per character. Trying to gate one story behind equal progress in the others for a combined climax is ridiculous imo.
It never occurred to me that "The best menu is the one you spend the least amount of time in," but it makes a ton of sense. It's also one of the many reasons why Fable 3's sanctuary was such a disaster. On top of just being overly complicated, it took forever to do what you wanted in that menu. Even loading it up took a long time because rather than just bringing up a normal list of your inventory, quest, and stats, it had to load up entire rooms to plop you into. Oh sure, in theory the idea of an immersive menu that's a series of rooms sounds like a cool idea, but one that probably should have been snuffed out in the pre-alpha phase once the team realized how terrible it worked in practice.
Have you ever thought about getting a random assortment of boxes at each port, to be delivered to various places, which accumulate quite rapidly in the cargo hold if you don't apply any caution about which to accept? Introduce the bare minimum of logistics planning.
Graphical Criticism: The gradient glow for when you set down items, as well as the player's shadow, look a bit too fine and almost Flash-y. I feel a lower pixel count for both would make them more visually consistent with everything else.
About breaking flow to signal stuff being done wrong: The little animation of the character catching their breath in harvest moon games was a great way to indicate stamina. Tweak it a little though, as seeing it three times in a row was always annoying. Maybe have it happen just once at 10%?
Notes: 1) I found it really annoying that I had to switch back to the "Hand" tool in order to use computers, pry open doors, and the like. I don't know why this was more annoying than having to select the right tool, but it was. I'd rather the "hand" operations just happen automatically, or failing that, there be a hotkey or something for "Put away whatever you're holding" 2) I also hated not being able to tell why the ship was giving me an alert without going up to check diagnostics or check every system by eye. When it's just maintenance, that's fine, but if it's gotten to the point of an alert, there should be something more to direct you. OTOH, I also have this complaint about my car's stupid "check engine" light. 3) hotkeys for "bank right" and "bank left" would not go amiss. selecting them in a menu seems very weird. 4) finally, my deliveries never completed in my first play-through. I haven't been able to reproduce it, but I put the boxes on the pad and then... nothing.
How about while it’s still on alpha, beta, and pre-release build, maybe have an update page on the main menu? So that way, you can tell what has changed, and what has been added?
Not sure if there's a better place to put this (maybe provide a link in future videos?) but I found a game crashing bug. Accidentally trying to put a crate down on a door caused a crash.
I wish I could make music, or make... Well, just about anything. I have all those ideas in my head, but any time I try to put them into reality they turn into mush. I have a vague idea of the Starstruck Vagabond theme, but no rhythm. I have a vague idea of a game I want to make, but I don't know how to make it.
@@finler3 The thing is - I started plenty of times. It's just that I noticed that without other people working on the same thing as me I have no direction. My mind starts going in all directions and not focusing on just one thing.
I wonder how that 4th point of flow would translate in RTS (the less arcadey ones, not the spastic APM dependent ones), where stopping to think is kind of in the heart of the gameplay loop. Is flow in that sense simply impossible in these games?
I think it would be neat to try and emulate the actual shipping industry, maybe you don't have such a good broker and you only get one load a week or you get a load that's on a damn near impossible timeline, delivery windows where you get charged if you're not on time..
It bugs me that the escape key doesn't work in the ship menu but it works elsewhere. Honestly quite a small knit pick given your clean interface and how well the primary loop held me in. Oh also it isn't very clear where to go to upgrade your ship once the upgrade is obtained. I had to brute force it. While clear sign posting of critical advancements like that are key I am of the opposite mind for sub events. I loved getting lost, stumbling around random shops and world's.
The game being just 10MB impresses me the most. 😮 A Unity build full of nothing is 10 times that and it's even worse with Unreal. A real advantage for Gamemaker, I must say.
had a quick playthrough. only obvious things were esc doesn't work as a back key for diagnostics and comms ship menu. Also inputing name if you don't push enter after typing and change to surname the text you typed carries over. didn't play enough to find anything hectic Needs music. I know Yatzee already said that for title but please whoever ever does it: you're amazing and will really impact the game. I think there should be minor penalties for doing silly things: welding tool on fuel ore/canister = fuel item lost and health lost and cleaning something already clean continues to drain stamina without xp gain.
in times like these that hilfiger ad is highly inappropriate...sure why dont we all meet up and have dinner together...we could even do it at a cementary that would streamline the whole get-rid-of-corpses a little bit...
Part of me disagrees with the holding down a button to confirm something. Sure some games do it a few seconds too long, but I think it should be ONE second long at most because there are gamers who might have pressed the confirm button by accident. It's happened to me more than once and those people should be considered
Huh. I was loving this concept up to now, but after loading up the demo and comparing my attempt with the comments from other people playing it I'm starting to worry. I did the tutorial reactor fixing, loaded up the star chart it made me open for my first destination, then it told me I needed the fuel (which I already guessed I'd need so I had placed it right next to the engine earlier). Fueled up and got ready to venture forth when my engine exploded again before I could make it back to the cockpit. I realigned it and cleaned it like the tutorial showed me, but the power didn't come back on, and I don't remember any other steps aside form fixing hull breaches and cleaning the solar panel outside. Neither of those things needed doing this time, so I was stuck before I ever got my ship to go in the first place. Though yeah I know I could probably load up the demo again and try for a better result, and mostly this was just tainting my first impression.
The logo bugs me to no end. It looks like you're going for a symmetrical design, but the V in vagabond is concave while the D is convex so it looks more lopsided than it is.
I think I need to stop watching these videos. The more Yahtzee shows, the more I realize I'm going to buy it, and I'm not sure I want to ruin the experience later. (Like buying Subnautica in early access)
Please balance your audio, I'm begging you! You intro/outro is 10 quadrillion times louder than the rest of your video, and it blows my fucking eardrums out.
Get Starstruck Vagabond on ITCH.IO today. yzcroshaw.itch.io/starstruck
Hey Yahtzee - just wanted to say, now that you're well inside the scary bit... Well bloody done, sir!
Hi Yahtzee. Musician here. I made some opening/title screen music for you. How can I get it to reach your ears?
Played it and really enjoyed it! The core gameplay was so enjoyable, hours passed by without noticing it. I really look forward for it’s final release. Also I know it’s early to yip about feature demands but I’d really love to play this on mobile as well. For some reason I feel it would make sense as it’s quite enjoyable to kill time doing delivery missions. But maybe it’s just me. Anyway great game (Obviously) keep it up! Cheers!
Call it Starstruck Bugabond for the alpha, Starstruck Lagabond for the beta, and Starstruck-on-Trackabond for the RC1. I’ll be here all week.
The rambles are generally the best bits, Yahtz.
enjoying them also in the slightly civil war podcast
What about a job board? It's cliché but it works. After you complete a delivery you can just check the nearby job board for new deliveries from that planet. Maybe you get a bit of control over where you want to go next, like choosing a job to deliver to a tropical paradise planet instead of a barren wasteland.
And boards can also have bits of lore and storytelling smoothly integrated between the quest postings
Personally I would want the ship to get bigger as you upgrade so there is more and more stuff to fix but better out put and more space
How about this, your ship expands to the point where you simply can’t operate all of it yourself. Then you become the captain with a crew which you manage instead.
Insert Yahtzee making a unnecessarily insulting, sly remark about how that's not the point and that we're dumb for misunderstanding it, or how we're dumb for asking this supposedly without understanding the amount of labor Yahtzee would have to put in the make this system, or how Yahtzee was afraid of this being asked at this stage of the game because it *is* something that he plans to implement down the line:
I had that feeling also, or make it a choice... as some like that solo style where others would love that micro.
@@Penguinmanereikel excuse me, are all these mounds of salt yours? They seem to be piled up everywhere now...
I still want there to be more to the packing of the materials . Half the job of package delivery is organizing your shit so you can get to what you need efficiently.
Maybe have the materials be different shapes and needing to organize it for space to accommodate everything
Mentioning the music made me realize the impact of the same song clip you've been using on every Zero Punctuation for more than a decade. Aside from that I literally watch the annual compilations to sleep and it now soothes more than excites me, the sheer consistency and association with your tone and delivery has made it so that when I hear any kind of jarring intro on some other video it reminds me that I could be watching something more clever. Basically, it serves the intended purpose of an ideal titlecard for an iconic product.
That said, maybe include the song or part of it on loop in the game as an easter egg/hallmark? Perhaps something one character listens to on headphones that you can hear fade in as you walk towards them, adding a quirk to that person and ambience to any room they're currently in.
Idea segue, as someone who enjoys podcasts you can probably relate to the importance of having music when doing tedious/repetitive tasks. If folks contribute enough music, the hardworking blue-collar main character could have selectable background tunes via some device on their person. Might conflict with your ability to control the narrative if players can listen to lo-fi while frantically murdering space rats with boxes, but would also make any scene/task/event without the headphones more engaging or any impact that removes/breaks the device more jarring.
I notice that after Undertale thunked indie pixel games onto the map with a harpoon many of them lean into audio design as heavily as they can and audio themes really have become a hallmark of the genre that will affect how people receive a game where they'll hear many of the same sounds in the same order, courtesy of emphasis on the core loop. I feel it could benefit from player-chosen themes that add enough personalization to be interactive but are interrupted enough by appropriately concentrative tasks to not become stale.
Idea callback, with the idea of friendships between characters affecting the space they live in and enough of the game that it changes who finds you when you pass out, perhaps an individual's theme could fill more of the ship/be unlocked as optional music as you improve relations to emulate listening to what they like or simply having more of them in your life.
This has been a ramble. Good luck, I like your attitude and your content, and I look forward to giving this game a shot in a couple weeks and your audiobooks a shot when I can listen to your voice for 30 minutes and stay awake, no offense.
Here's an idea: your character wakes up with some coordinates burned onto their arm and finding out what's at those coordinates is something you can theoretically do at anytime...once you've got a ship capable of making the journey. The destination is always there, the things you do are steps towards it and theoretically you could go there at any time, you just should do some preparations first.
You don't see your arm ever. It needs to be as unmissable as a doom fortress at the horizon, that's why it worked in BotW.
Please feel free to make these videos longer, I dig the rambling style
I have a feeling that with the whole "your character is a random captain doing menial tasks" has a bit of potential to mirror New Vegas's plot a bit, with a massive thing going on in the background, but instead you're in the foreground, making a delivery while not caring less about the galactic war in the background.
I was under the assumption that it was more inspired by papers please then new vegas
Except New Vegas isn't about you being a courier against a backdrop of competing factions. It's a Western revenge story against a backdrop of... You don't act as a courier and you don't do menial tasks.
@@Robert399 Wasn't really talking about NV's plot after you get headshotted, just the Courier's job before that.
@@570RMP1R8 Sure but that doesn't really affect the actual NV experience.
Breath of the Wild’s philosophy of allowing the player to take on any challenge at any point regardless of how prepared they actually are is nothing short of brilliant
I hate how games nowadays have no structure because of that. You have a chore list instead of a difficulty curve
.. That's called "open world", and it's been a thing since forever.
@@tahunuva4254 The vast majority of open world games still have plot walls. Areas you can't access or events and quests that won't unfold until you've made enough story progress. In most any other sandbox, wandering in the opposite direction of your quest marker is unequivocally the "wrong" direction. You may find some collectibles and earn exp, but there's never any denying that there's somewhere else you SHOULD be, and the time you're spending elsewhere is effectively just stalling. In BotW, however, everywhere you go is exactly where you're supposed to be. The structure of the game gives both context and validity to every single action you take in preparation for the final boss. That's why I say it's brilliant.
@@tahunuva4254 What? While open world games do allow you to travel as you please and stumble onto a high level area and immediately die. But the plot is still a wall you have to get through.
You can't go kill Alduin the moment you get out of the tutorial
You can't go beat the pathetic Wild Hunt after Geralt's dream sequence
Getting to the final boss, the game usually makes sure you're plenty prepared. Making you dive through dungeons making sure you have the equipment and level to beat the final challenge.
@@2CPhoenix Maybe I gave to play it to understand it, then.
One question that keeps popping up for me is about the primary gameplay loop:
Is the loop going to be delivering packages or working on the relationships with crewmates? Or a combination of both?
I had this same question about Stardew Valley. It seems like the main loop would be farming, but then the game makes a lot unavailable if you don't work on the player's relationships with the townsfolk.
In your game, will it be possible to completely ignore your crewmates and still "finish" the game? Will there be multiple "endings" based on your relationship(s) with your crewmates? Etc.
Well from my understanding interacting with crewmates will be a secondary loop that is built off the primary loop. As such it is pretty likely that you need to at least interact with them a little bit. Also the primary gameplay loop is pick up box, place box, fly to the destination, fix stuff that breaks on the way, pick up box, place box, repeat
So you are going to want to interact with the crewmates even as a break from the monotony of doing the same thing over again and again.
I ignored the entire town for a full year in Stardew, then ended the second year with everyone at max hearts. Very easily compartementalized. The recipes are nice, but far from crucial.
Releasing the alpha for free is a good idea. Once you're charging money, "work in progress" stops being a valid defence against criticism.
Can't wait to see how it progresses!
Immortals Fenyx Rising sounds like it would be a shitty mobile game that has weird sponsors. Like Raid Shadow Legends
At least Raid has the decency to put a colon in its word salad.
(probably the only kind of salad you might want a colon in)
Atleast comfortingly most people went see this or know that it's out for another week
Jesus Christ Yahtzee's insightful. Doubly regretting not keeping up with this series as it came out in real time.
Interesting DIary as always! Can't wait to get my hands on the demo-snippit-verticle-trial
Interestingly, your comments on flow and menu navigation echo a lot of what I heard from content creators I met at PAX just before the world went into lockdown. One of them specifically cited obtuse UI in games as a sticking point for them and before I knew it I made a promise to keep my menus simple and clear as part of my personal design ethos, both to them and to myself. I know the validation I'm feeling from hearing you talk about it is incidental, but it does feel nice to know I'm on the right track.
The biggest issues I detected were with the distress Call. Any item on the cargo platform go into space with you, but are invisible, then seemed to appear in the ship on their cargo platform. Also as soon as I entered the ship is was janky and slow and eventually crashed but that may be my system.
Primary gameplay loop worked well, but I'd like a manual save button.
There was a couple of things that weren't the layout, etc I'd do' were I able to code, but aren't in anyway wrong, and that's just a personal preference.
LOVED THE QUAN TUNNEL REFERENCE.
Been a fan of your dev diary series. Thanks for making these videos!
Something I ran into while making a game of my own as a hobby: when adding dialogue, I find that it's tough to get the voicing of the character dialogue right. Do you have any tips other than practice writing out scenes and see what works? Thanks!
The intro and outro music are too loud! I turn it down for the intro, have to turn it up to hear yahtzee, then i get my ass blasted off when the outro comes and the volume is still up. please have mercy
I played up until installing the Warp Drive. It was fun but it felt like a lot of busy work with little substance. I took some notes on my experience:
* I was confused about how to find hull breach (didn't know you had to equip the hand tool to force open door)
* Initially I found it annoying that I had to equip the hand tool (however I got used to it in time)
* The arrow pointed to the controls, not the engine during the prologue repair engines objective (because of this confusion I went to impulse engines first)
* There should be a way to adjust impulse engines backwards
as doing so manually is painful
* Initially I was confused what to do when the red light flashed
* I found that things got dirty far too quickly (constantly interrupting prologue and I imagine in time also crew interactions)
* Flying mini-game is far too easy and the rewards are too low, thus it was boring and I stopped bothering to use it. It would be better at higher-stakes with a higher reward.
* There should be a "are you sure you want to exit" warning before exiting the game as a couple of times I accidentally quit while alt-tabbing
* Placing the Oniris device is painful, it should give some indication while it is being carried (potentially flashing while it is being carried)
* Crates can land on top of NPCs
* You can hide items in the Southern bed
tile
* Stamina drain really feels like it is punishing you for playing the game
From how you described Gameflow I came up with what I think is a good metaphor, a game with good gameflow is like a crystal clear whirlpool, and in Breath of The Wilds case the center of the whirlpool is visible and reachable from the very beginning
@4:34 somehow describes my Prom night.
With the breath of the wild flow example, how does this relate to companion stories? Is it better to have everyone’s story flowing to the same in point where it all gets resolved at once or is it better to have those concluded separately and before the game ends?
I'd make it dependent on level of engagement per character. Trying to gate one story behind equal progress in the others for a combined climax is ridiculous imo.
It never occurred to me that "The best menu is the one you spend the least amount of time in," but it makes a ton of sense.
It's also one of the many reasons why Fable 3's sanctuary was such a disaster. On top of just being overly complicated, it took forever to do what you wanted in that menu. Even loading it up took a long time because rather than just bringing up a normal list of your inventory, quest, and stats, it had to load up entire rooms to plop you into. Oh sure, in theory the idea of an immersive menu that's a series of rooms sounds like a cool idea, but one that probably should have been snuffed out in the pre-alpha phase once the team realized how terrible it worked in practice.
cue the Queens Of The Stone Age song.
Just downloaded it, going to be recording my playthru and commentary.
Have you ever thought about getting a random assortment of boxes at each port, to be delivered to various places, which accumulate quite rapidly in the cargo hold if you don't apply any caution about which to accept? Introduce the bare minimum of logistics planning.
Never thought we'd hear this man utter the phrase "genshin impact"
Graphical Criticism: The gradient glow for when you set down items, as well as the player's shadow, look a bit too fine and almost Flash-y. I feel a lower pixel count for both would make them more visually consistent with everything else.
About breaking flow to signal stuff being done wrong: The little animation of the character catching their breath in harvest moon games was a great way to indicate stamina. Tweak it a little though, as seeing it three times in a row was always annoying. Maybe have it happen just once at 10%?
Hey Yahtzee, Do you ever intend to put Starstruck on Mac? Just the casual Mac guy waiting for some love.
Linux user here wondering the same thing. I think Gamemaker supports cross platform builds, but I might try it out in Wine in the meantime.
noone ever decides that at such an early phase. He's still making the alpha version, let's ask him when the game is almost done
@@recs5685 good idea
Notes:
1) I found it really annoying that I had to switch back to the "Hand" tool in order to use computers, pry open doors, and the like. I don't know why this was more annoying than having to select the right tool, but it was. I'd rather the "hand" operations just happen automatically, or failing that, there be a hotkey or something for "Put away whatever you're holding"
2) I also hated not being able to tell why the ship was giving me an alert without going up to check diagnostics or check every system by eye. When it's just maintenance, that's fine, but if it's gotten to the point of an alert, there should be something more to direct you. OTOH, I also have this complaint about my car's stupid "check engine" light.
3) hotkeys for "bank right" and "bank left" would not go amiss. selecting them in a menu seems very weird.
4) finally, my deliveries never completed in my first play-through. I haven't been able to reproduce it, but I put the boxes on the pad and then... nothing.
I made some demo title music and just need to know where to send it.
How about while it’s still on alpha, beta, and pre-release build, maybe have an update page on the main menu? So that way, you can tell what has changed, and what has been added?
Looking forward to it my dude!
Loved the episode! Will we ever see a MacOS port of the game?
Fully ramblomatic
Not sure if there's a better place to put this (maybe provide a link in future videos?) but I found a game crashing bug.
Accidentally trying to put a crate down on a door caused a crash.
2:32 if you pass out, what happens next would change if you happen to be near someone who *really* likes you
*oh no*
everybody else be like oh cyberpunk meanwhile I'm all like oh Yahtzee put out a demo I better try it
When cleaning some components, some of them get stuck on 1 or 2%.
I wish I could make music, or make... Well, just about anything. I have all those ideas in my head, but any time I try to put them into reality they turn into mush. I have a vague idea of the Starstruck Vagabond theme, but no rhythm. I have a vague idea of a game I want to make, but I don't know how to make it.
Doesn't hurt to try putting something down and work your way from there. Sometimes starting something is all it takes to get inspired.
@@finler3 The thing is - I started plenty of times. It's just that I noticed that without other people working on the same thing as me I have no direction. My mind starts going in all directions and not focusing on just one thing.
@@zednotdead I hear ya. Hope it works out!
@@zednotdead look into design paralysis and techniques to avoid or escape it. That may be what you need to get forward momentum going.
great series! thanks yahtzee
I wonder how that 4th point of flow would translate in RTS (the less arcadey ones, not the spastic APM dependent ones), where stopping to think is kind of in the heart of the gameplay loop. Is flow in that sense simply impossible in these games?
I think it would be neat to try and emulate the actual shipping industry, maybe you don't have such a good broker and you only get one load a week or you get a load that's on a damn near impossible timeline, delivery windows where you get charged if you're not on time..
So great to see your rational development process. And avoiding issues you notice in AAA games. Way to put your money where your mouth is.
It bugs me that the escape key doesn't work in the ship menu but it works elsewhere. Honestly quite a small knit pick given your clean interface and how well the primary loop held me in. Oh also it isn't very clear where to go to upgrade your ship once the upgrade is obtained. I had to brute force it. While clear sign posting of critical advancements like that are key I am of the opposite mind for sub events. I loved getting lost, stumbling around random shops and world's.
Also sending 5 boxes of chips to one planet only for it to be returned (I assume a mix up of flavor) was a great bit of nihilism on my run.
I really want to try out Starstruck Vagabond but sadly I'm a Mac user and am a notice at emulating stuff, can anybody point me in a helpful direction?
Is this panic?
Huh, didn't know that template could be done in comments.
The game being just 10MB impresses me the most. 😮 A Unity build full of nothing is 10 times that and it's even worse with Unreal. A real advantage for Gamemaker, I must say.
had a quick playthrough. only obvious things were esc doesn't work as a back key for diagnostics and comms ship menu. Also inputing name if you don't push enter after typing and change to surname the text you typed carries over. didn't play enough to find anything hectic
Needs music. I know Yatzee already said that for title but please whoever ever does it: you're amazing and will really impact the game.
I think there should be minor penalties for doing silly things: welding tool on fuel ore/canister = fuel item lost and health lost and cleaning something already clean continues to drain stamina without xp gain.
in times like these that hilfiger ad is highly inappropriate...sure why dont we all meet up and have dinner together...we could even do it at a cementary that would streamline the whole get-rid-of-corpses a little bit...
Would be neat if you streamed some of your gamemaking!
Part of me disagrees with the holding down a button to confirm something. Sure some games do it a few seconds too long, but I think it should be ONE second long at most because there are gamers who might have pressed the confirm button by accident. It's happened to me more than once and those people should be considered
Any chance of a Mac version?
Pubic hair selection?
Hey yahtzee have you ever thought about making the voices like how SNES star fox did voices ?
Who cares about Cyberpunk when this is out.
Nice E;R pfp.
Does Yahtzee use a Trello to organize his planning?
Goodness, no, he uses these videos for planning, if at all.
Huh. I was loving this concept up to now, but after loading up the demo and comparing my attempt with the comments from other people playing it I'm starting to worry. I did the tutorial reactor fixing, loaded up the star chart it made me open for my first destination, then it told me I needed the fuel (which I already guessed I'd need so I had placed it right next to the engine earlier).
Fueled up and got ready to venture forth when my engine exploded again before I could make it back to the cockpit. I realigned it and cleaned it like the tutorial showed me, but the power didn't come back on, and I don't remember any other steps aside form fixing hull breaches and cleaning the solar panel outside. Neither of those things needed doing this time, so I was stuck before I ever got my ship to go in the first place.
Though yeah I know I could probably load up the demo again and try for a better result, and mostly this was just tainting my first impression.
Please, let Starstruck Vagabond come to Sony consoles!
Heheh, Quife.
The logo bugs me to no end.
It looks like you're going for a symmetrical design, but the V in vagabond is concave while the D is convex so it looks more lopsided than it is.
It's also blurry for no reason 🤔
Chris I can't Unser that now. How would he fix it though without distorting the letters?
@@veggiedragon1000 arguably, by not going for a symmetrical design at all, i.e. finding an entirely new one. Not sure if that is worth it
@@veggiedragon1000 either stylize the D or lean into the asymmetry of it and shift the second word over.
@@gothmuffin666 Hrm, yeah. Maybe giving a more pronounced slant outwards like the word "Starship", or using a font with less round ds?
A planet called Quife V... Pronounced Queef-y?
There's something funny about UA-cam thinking the game this video is talking about being FTL
running away and running to
I think I need to stop watching these videos. The more Yahtzee shows, the more I realize I'm going to buy it, and I'm not sure I want to ruin the experience later. (Like buying Subnautica in early access)
look at all these suggestions in the comments, they must be new
Hire some artists! It will pay off
Quife V? seriously?
Dripberg? Really?
Yahtzee immortals fenyx rising is already out
Please balance your audio, I'm begging you!
You intro/outro is 10 quadrillion times louder than the rest of your video, and it blows my fucking eardrums out.