Solo

I’ve been playing a lot of Rocky ‘Roid solo.

Mostly on my phone.

I made a webpage for it.

It’s not complete yet, but it’s mostly playable.

And it already lets me gather data.

I’m trying to work out a good way of grading the solo game.

Adding difficulty - so you can choose how much of a fight you want to automaton to provide.

I’m testing fuel load and automaton hold size to see which works best.

And learning JavaScript at the same time :)

For the first time in three years I’m hosting Newcastle Playtest this week too. I’ll be bringing three prototypes - including Rocky ‘Roid.

Solo

I love games. Playing them. Designing them. Playtesting them. Doing their graphic design.

But I hate playing them on my own. I very rarely play game apps against the AI. I don’t solo games in my collection. And I hate playtesting games pretending to be multiple players.

For me the fun comes from testing yourself against other humans within the framework of the rules, and the social aspect of a shared experience.

So COVID-19 enforced social distancing has been really tough on my game design productivity.

All by myself

The publisher of my signed game wants a solo mode added to it. Seeing as I can’t test the multiplayer improvements, it seems only fair that I work on the solo mode.

This is a first for me. Something I have no experience of as a player either.

Surprisingly, I’ve been quite enjoying it. Trying to make it feel like the multiplayer game. Get the same experience, despite the lack of human/human interactions.

It’s getting there...