v 0.5.0 (new core gameplay loop, open world)


When Quest 2 got released, I hoped Tea For God will be just working on it. It wasn't. I haven't updated (officially) the game since July. The problems on Quest 2 were just screaming for an update. I decided to fix the bug, finish what I wanted to do and release it. And here we are.

Quest 2? Fixed.

New stuff? Lots of it.

When I playtest my game, I often do it with breaks. So I can get as fresh mind as possible. I did so a few months ago and I saw that the game was no longer fun. It was not apparent at first but after half an hour, I noticed that I focus on gathering knowledge points - all I was doing was with KP on my mind. Disassembling every object I find, rushing through the level to get more data blocks and so on. To get upgrades. Upgrades that were just about improving some numbers a bit.

I wanted first to add an open world but I already knew that it won't fix much. The game needed a knife. So I started to cut things. I enjoyed those features on their own but they didn't work together. Data Blocks? Gone. Upgrade maze? Gone. Reactor/time limit? Gone. I wanted to get rid of that complicated UI, so weapon crafting as it was was gone as well.

Then I started to think about what I do like about my game, what people say they like about it and focused on making those things stand out. And dropped a few more things that I liked, just to see what if there's just the minimal set. Energy orbs? Gone. Any kind of currency? Gone. There were too many things you had to take care of. A while ago I was playing with an idea of single energy storage per hand, so you can replace any weapon and keep the ammo. I tried that and it felt better.

While I didn't want to have persistence as it may turn the game into a job, where you gather resources to get upgrades, etc, I didn't want to drop upgrades themselves. First I was tempted to reward the player with "money" for killing robots. The money would be used to unlock upgrades. But then you had to kill a specific amount of robots so you would end up with either running close to the upgrade machine killing stuff or having so much money that you don't care much about it. Then I thought that if it is already challenging to go from one point to another, why not just reward this journey. It may seem that rewards are then for free, but you still have to take care of your health, ammo, avoid enemies or kill them.

While there's still no objective, nor narrative, the game, at least in my opinion, plays much better. There are still lots of things to do, besides the obvious. A few more devices that I want to add. Encounter Director to spawn enemies in a way to make fights more dramatic instead of 6 robots attacking you in a huge group and then nothing.

I managed to create a new body for the hero. It was dictated by the story that I hope is the final version (at least the core of it).

What's next? New utilities (weapon mixer, EXM installer), EXMs, EXM stacker. The most important is to start adding things so the game will finally leave "it's just a tech demo" and will be something more.

Get Tea For God

Comments

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(+1)

To be honest I never understood all the mechanics that the old Tea For God had, I love the concept but I didn't fully understand the crafting or timers or other stuff.

Yesterday I opened the game and I was greet with this massive update that I didn't know existed. The game feels much better and its easier to understand.

Nice job!

Thanks :)

There are still a few things that will require introduction. But at the easiest setting (not invincible) it should be possible to just walk through the game and shoot at everything that moves.

hey man just updated from build 4.3 to 5.0, and i'm pretty unsure about some of the new textures and models. the gameplay loop is even better than it used to be but some things like the new arms / hand models look a bit off, same with the new guns. not sure if you plan on changing them or having them customisable?

anyway keep up the great work my guy you're making VR history with this game.

(+1)

I will be changing arms/hands a bit as there are a few problems with them. Same with guns. And there are going to be new gun parts. In the end, whatever does not look/feel good will most likely be thrown out. Oh, one more thing. You will be able to mix/craft guns.

(+1)

What was the problem with the Quest 2 if you don't mind elaborating?

(+3)

tl;dr I didn't have skinning coded properly for Adreno 650 (GPU).

More details: According to GLSL ES specification, for vertex shaders one should be able to index any array with a variable. And so it was implemented. An array of matrices (bones, mat4). Adreno 650 does not support that and one of the solutions is to have an array of vectors (vec4) and when a matrix is required, to construct a matrix out of 4 vectors.

It may affect the performance but still Adreno 650 used in Quest 2 is much more powerful than Quest 1's Adreno 540.

(+2)

Thank you so much for the info, that's very interesting!

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Just wait a bit :)

(+1)

Hello, Just found this amazing game. Totally in love.

Looking through youtube I found this magical theme song made by a fan, guess you heard about it by now. If not here it is :) You guys should collaborate! :D

(+2)

As I said before, I'm inspired and appreciate your thinking process. I will check out the update soon!

A suggestion from my first play session - there was an overwhelming amount of "mods", and I wasn't sure what fits my gameplay the most because, well, I haven't played the game yet. So I ended up taking one of the easiest options - to be able to tell if I like the game or not. 

...which is a pity, because I later discovered the game has much more depth with the other mods. I think it's worth checking if anyone else experienced it the same way I did, and maybe make the beginning more streamlined.

Right now you choose one of three. Those three can be any of the mods but I plan to limit it to three basic ones, so each game starts with those three. And the actual game won't start with upgrade machine. Currently it is so, as it is the easiest way to introduce upgrading and map.

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It's crazy to read about all the things you cut from the game, but I think it's for the better. I'm hyped about this update and the content to come! Thank you for the amazing experiences you bestow on us :)

(+1)

Yeah, I was trying to be too smart. The worst that when I did simple prototypes, it all worked. But only when it was developed into proper functionalities, it turned out that I would either have to spend lots of time to streamline and balance stuff, add tutorials, explanations and I could still end up with something that didn't feel right or I could throw out some things and keep those that do work.

I'd still like to play around with some of the ideas that I cut from T4G. Just not now, of course :)