want to release game but its in alpha and i need testers

[pootykins]

I just finished my alpha for an RTS/RPG hybrid in the editor. i have spent 4 1/2 months and well over 200 hours on this thing so it's no joke (except maybe that im a newb) and i have a lot of pride in it. i want to share it with y'all but under "map subscription" it was specified to not submit any alphas. i have done many solo tests and it works just fine, but it supports up to 4 players and because of the size of the map and the sheer number of possibilities for how to build your party and how to progress (literally tens of thousands of iterations) i am unable to do sufficient testing by myself. is there anyone on here who's interested in doing some alpha testing with me?

-PREMISE: RPG dungeon crawler where each player controls multiple heroes. No macro element, but because you're microing multiple units at once it still has a very RTS feel. If you're familiar with the starcraft 2 mission in WoL where you go into the nydus network to destroy it with a small group of hero units, you get the premise of my idea, only with rpg elements like levels and items and learned abilities.... it takes roughly 3 hours to beat, and considering theres no easy way to save, that may cause problems, but im hoping that will be less relevant as a 3 hour sesh aint so bad. please let me know if this is something that sparks interest. if i get enough interest i will upload the map... im hesitant to do so right off the bat becuase this is literally my first real project and i dont want to risk losing my name on it (even though i know full well that i do not own it)

EDIT: It should be noted that this game is not for a beginner.... I made this to be a challenge for myself and at least on single player, where i micro 6 heroes at a time, it gets pretty difficult at times. for reference, i am a starcraft 2 player in high diamond league (not sure if that means anything to yall). im not too good with wc3, but thats besides the point. I just want to make it clear that the whole purpose of this game is high intensity micro all the time.

 

[A]mun]

That sounds intriguing, even if i'm not much of a micro player.

Can you share some screenshots/video?

 

[pootykins]

That sounds intriguing, even if i'm not much of a micro player.

Can you share some screenshots/video?

Sorry, i somehow managed to lose sound for the video, but here's some single player game play. with more people you would control less heroes per person so single player is hard mode with 6 heroes to control. 2 player would be 3 heroes each, and 3 and 4 player would be 2 heroes each.

 

[pootykins]

That sounds intriguing, even if i'm not much of a micro player.

Can you share some screenshots/video?

if you'd like, i can get some more and better gameplay footage tonight and tomorrow this time with sound hopefully lol

 

[pootykins]

That sounds intriguing, even if i'm not much of a micro player.

Can you share some screenshots/video?

That sounds intriguing, even if i'm not much of a micro player.

Can you share some screenshots/video?

 

[A]mun]

That's a large map jeez!

I'd like to give it a run, you can send it to me personally or share it here if you like.

 

[pootykins]

That's a large map jeez!

I'd like to give it a run, you can send it to me personally or share it here if you like.

awesome! im super excited to share this. i think it may be best to share it personally with you before making it public. i guess it is important to make sure there are things that i just havent missed that may be broken or that may not work like how i intended. ill send you a dm in just a sec.... along with the map, ill send you my discord and bnet tag if you're interested in playing co op. however, single player mode is the most fleshed out right now so id love to see what you have to say after some single player runs

 

[pootykins]

That's a large map jeez!

I'd like to give it a run, you can send it to me personally or share it here if you like.

here it is i guess i cant send files in a dm .... however, check your dms. you'll find my discord and bnet there

 

[A]mun]

Ok i played for some time and defeated the 3 undead heroes (now progressing in the outer halls):

Bugs
The "Our lady of town teleport" got teleported to my destination as well as the hero wielding the scepter, so i can no longer teleport back to base.
Sometimes heroes move around weirdly. It seems that something is interfering with their pathfinding/target acquisition?!

Suggestions
Add a hardcore mode or so, meaning: dead heroes stay dead and you'd have to choose a new one.
QWERT for ability hotkeys
Add some scripted randomized events/quests, perhaps like in Diablo 1
The terrain needs some alteration, dimensional portals? underground mushroom garden? lava rivers?
What about some custom abilities/sounds/models, especially for bosses?


Anyway, it looks like solid groundwork so far!
Just for improvements things need to get more creative i think.

 

[pootykins]

Ok i played for some time and defeated the 3 undead heroes (now progressing in the outer halls):

Bugs
The "Our lady of town teleport" got teleported to my destination as well as the hero wielding the scepter, so i can no longer teleport back to base.
Sometimes heroes move around weirdly. It seems that something is interfering with their pathfinding/target acquisition?!

Suggestions
Add a hardcore mode or so, meaning: dead heroes stay dead and you'd have to choose a new one.
QWERT for ability hotkeys
Add some scripted randomized events/quests, perhaps like in Diablo 1
The terrain needs some alteration, dimensional portals? underground mushroom garden? lava rivers?
What about some custom abilities/sounds/models, especially for bosses?


Anyway, it looks like solid groundwork so far!
Just for improvements things need to get more creative i think.

YESSSS! Thank you so much I love the input and suggestions.

As for lady of town teleport, you should be able to teleport to any of the other 3 i believe - i had that working earlier on but may have changed something that messed that up and i havent re tested that recently so thank you for finding that I actually kind of like that you can move your own lady of teleport around because the map is so huge, but i can see that becoming confusing and weird.

Ive been having some trouble with acquisition range and i dont really know what im doing wrong or how to manipulate it even. Every hero has an acquisition range of 500 (which i believe is normal) what might be weird is the individual speeds and sizes of units. i will look further into that. i have been testing on both formation and non formation movement, but ultimately i tend to like formation for this game. if you havent already, try playing with formation on and that may help a little. regardless, i will look at that in more depth.

Hardcore mode would be a cool idea but i think i would need to implement it in a totally different iteration of the map (please correct me if im wrong). I will check that out after i get a little bit farther along the developmental process.

QWERT: so.... i totally see why thats preferable in many cases. i am an old fart who likes the good ol days when abilities would correspond to a letter in the name. i still use this for my starcraft play (for instance, "T" for "infesTation piT" ect.... i believe the hotkey orientation is not too too important especially considering that i managed to move all key bindings to the left side of the key board and it gives a bit of a physical style uniqueness to each character. (one's ability hotkeys may be T, R, D, B. and another would use G, F, R, C.... making each hero just downright feel mechanically different in your fingers... i kinda like that).... if this is a problem that you believe is a serious hindrance to the game then i definitely will consider this change but i think im going to wait for more feed back before i do. i guess its the difference between style and consistent user friendliness.

scripted events/quests: yes. i love this idea. right now, the progression of the game is a little bland and tedious. i have added things like mini bosses to try to address this but i do believe ive only gone so far and there are many things i could do to improve upon the experience. i will def be looking at some ideas for scripted events

Terrain alteration is very important i feel to keep things from getting too monotonous. Im not sure how far you have progressed but i actually do have portals taking you to different areas that use different terrain pallets and weather.... if these changes are too subtle, please let me know and i can improve upon that, but i do have many of the things you have mentioned.

Custom abilities/sounds/models.... so the biggest reason why i haven't done this is that i have found classic doesn't support of lot of custom stuff and i have a buddy who only has classic..... pretty shallow reason i know lol but considering i haven't showed this to anybody else until now it has been a real concern to make sure that things work in both classic and reforged. if this gets a little bit of momentum i def will want to use some custom stuff because there are a lot of restrictions on what i can do using vanilla wc3 stuff

Dude... Thank you soooooo much. you really dont know what this means to me, and im so happy to get all the feed back you have given me. please keep in touch and if you ever want to do a party romp through please let me know. i really want to do some co op and 3 and 4 player.

Thanks much

 

[A]mun]

Thinking about multiplayer...
Wouldn't this result in a huge cluster**** with so many heroes?
See, let's say we only have 4 players, that would result in already 24 heroes and then there are so many narrow passages = lot's of blocking etc.

I think 3-4 heroes per player would be better, also in general, because 6 decked out heroes are way too strong.

Oh i played on classic graphics btw, better fps (even though my rig can handle reforged) and stability!

Alright, interested in future updates!

 

[pootykins]

Thinking about multiplayer...
Wouldn't this result in a huge cluster**** with so many heroes?
See, let's say we only have 4 players, that would result in already 24 heroes and then there are so many narrow passages = lot's of blocking etc.

I think 3-4 heroes per player would be better, also in general, because 6 decked out heroes are way too strong.

Oh i played on classic graphics btw, better fps (even though my rig can handle reforged) and stability!

Alright, interested in future updates!

Yes, so it should say in map description the number of heroes available for each player depending on how many players are in the lobby. 1 player = 6 heroes. 2 player = 3 heroes each. 3 and 4 player = 2 heroes each. This means the only odd one out is 4 player, in which the total number of heroes is 8 as opposed to 6. Thank you for pointing this out though the more i get this kind of input, the better of an idea i have about how easy it is to figure things out in this game. i dont want anything to be vague, so please keep em coming i actually did some multiplayer testing with strangers last night and it all worked splendidly (except 4 player in which one of the players couldnt figure out what to do). If you'd like to play some multiplayer with me, please let me know

Interesting observation about classic graphics. i have not experienced this problem but it is something that i definitely need to be aware of. my guess would be map size and just overall the amount of stuff in this game, but it could be more. if you dont mind, could you please tell me some of your comp specs? (cpu, ram, gpu) i can get a more clear picture of what could be the problem with this info. if it is a computer issue, i have a serious problem on my hands as i really want this to be accessible to everyone.... im hoping you have similar specs to me, because that means its less likely to be the case that this game isnt very playable if you dont have good enough specs

Thank you so much for expressing your interest ... i have collected enough feedback to get back to work and i have a good deal of work on my hands but i will keep you updated. expect another post from me within the next week or so about the updates.

 

[pootykins]

Thinking about multiplayer...
Wouldn't this result in a huge cluster**** with so many heroes?
See, let's say we only have 4 players, that would result in already 24 heroes and then there are so many narrow passages = lot's of blocking etc.

I think 3-4 heroes per player would be better, also in general, because 6 decked out heroes are way too strong.

Oh i played on classic graphics btw, better fps (even though my rig can handle reforged) and stability!

Alright, interested in future updates!

just so you are aware of what to expect in updates. Thing i am for sure going to work on:

1) enemy units in act 2 have too much health. This causes game progression to be sluggish and tedious. enemy units scale with your heroe's levels so i should start them out with less health and the game should end up progressing in a less exhausting manner, while still presenting a challenge as the game progresses

2) act 2 mini bosses are too hard. again, i should lower boss health. Boss level scales with how many bosses you have defeated so if i start them out a little easier, they should still present a challenge at higher levels while not completely wrecking you when you first encounter them. i still want them to be formidable so im leaving their dps the same for now.

3) everyone who i have talked to so far has mentioned "side quests". This will be the brunt of my work in this first update. i have several ideas. I intend to have at least a dozen side quests interspersed throughout act 2 to help alleviate any sense of monotony and give players more options when just grinding through stuff to gain levels.

4) your heroes level up a little too slowly in act 2. This has been quite a problem for me to figure out as i designed my own exp/lvl up ratios and i have no idea what im doing (LOL) so ive been fudging with this a lot actually. i believe if i just make it so act 2 enemies give you just a little more xp per kill (like even just 1 or 2 more xp per hero per enemy) that leveling up should feel less grindy.

.... there are definitely more things to consider but for right now, i believe this is a good place to start. if there is anything you find imperative for me to work on that i have not mentioned, please let me know. Thanks again