Re: soundStrider: Exploration game and relaxation tool
@Dark, seriously thank you for the detailed feedback and suggestions.
You're correct that I created false expectations by describing a brief attempt at tutorialization as a real tutorial. My approach to game design is to find natural ways for things to explain themselves. I'll consider the language in the manual and how I talk about it in the future. Possibly a rewrite of the manual to describe your first adventure and the sounds to expect would go a long way. Overall my aversion to verbal description in-game, including the way I've structured the quests, is because I'm afraid of internationalizing dialogue and the interface. It's something I have no experience with or budget for at this time.
Thanks for pointing out that my game defies some conventions that could be confusing or unapproachable to first-time players who already have experience with audio games. That's valuable for me to know. Honestly, I've only played a few, but I joined this forum to study them more seriously. I'm looking forward to playing more and improving my game based on what I learn.
I love your suggestions for increasing the usefulness of breadcrumbs/waypoints by designing quests that require backtracking. One thing to mention is that the demo only contains A-to-B expedition-type quests. These can definitely be improved. You might be interested the quest types that are available in the full game. Please find my response to @drg below.
P.S. I'm so glad you were able to check the visuals. With this game I wanted sighted folks to have relatively the same experience, just with something simple and pleasant on the screen. Personally I close my eyes while playtesting.
Here's a description for others (apologies if unsolicited): It's similar to window blinds. Basically they visualize the intensities of sounds with horizontal colored bars. The colors cycle between night (black/pink/yellow) and day (pink/yellow/white) over a 30-minute period. For folks who don't prefer reduced motion there's a breathing effect that makes them oscillate in height like ocean waves.
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