Fidel & The Pauper's Paradox Preview & News!

Hello everyone,

I wanted to write an update about what has been going on with Fidel & The Pauper's Paradox, the upcoming sequel to Fidel & The Maker's Trial.

I recently conducted a closed beta test where players were able to explore half of a level and fight a boss. This beta test was closed and limited to only a few select people. The purpose was to collect some information to check that I am on the right path for this game and to see where I need to make an adjustment. If you are just here to read about how that news went, then I will summarize it now: It went well, but it's definitely not without some problems. We'll discuss what this means for the game later, but for now, since you were likely unable to play the beta test, I'd like to share some screenshots and walk you through some parts the players experienced. Before we begin, let's listen to some music while we read!
Alongside the closed beta test, I also released a public preview of the soundtrack. One compliment that I received near universally from my play testers was that the soundtrack is good. Really good. So I'm delighted to share what I have been working on publicly. Please enjoy listening while you read:

The Beta Test

The beta test begins in the central room of the cave level. The cave is a quartz filled cave that runs through a mountain, unfortunately, some strange recent event has made the mountain "fall sick" and it is now spewing lava and erupting. Fidel has entered the cave to solve the sickness that has befallen the mountain.

The cave is divided into 2 halves, which I have called "ribbons" due to how the two paths loop around and join back at a central room, like the loops in a ribbon 🎀. The main goal that the player will quickly discover is that they want to take the stairs up, towards the loft of the cave that will exit out to the pathway that leads to the peak of the mountain. However, for now, the paths are blocked, and so the player will need to find a way to repair the stairs so that they can exit the cave bound for the mountain peak. In this beta test, the players can only take the left ribbon.

In the first room of the left ribbon, the player will encounter the backbone of this dungeon's puzzle design: the fish. This fish in an invasive species to the few but natural fauna that populate the cave. Fortunately, they work wonderfully at creating platforms. These fish will create temporary platforms for Fidel to jump across the rolling lava. There were quite a few people in my beta test that remarked how strange it is that a fish is used to accomplish this.
The original design idea behind this puzzle element was to use a boulder or a pot of water à la Dragonroost dungeon from The Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker. However, while sandboxing this puzzle element, I used placeholder art - a fish - as a joke. I found the result humorous and more interesting of a concept than the aforementioned concepts of a boulder or pot of water. So I decided to keep it, which became a foundation to adding a lot of character to the level design as well as some character to the writing itself by having some humor tied to the absurdity of throwing fish. This also helped create a diegetic mini-game. Most mini-games exist as their own entity separate from the world, however, in this case the mini game exists as part of the current world and level. In the pool of water, the fish will swim in a fast pattern around the pool. Fidel must grab the fish with perfect timing in order to catch it. Mini games like this help break up the flow of the game to reduce the monotony of: walk, fight, puzzle, walk, fight, puzzle.

Now that the player has come to understand the fish, they will use it to solve some tricky puzzles. One of the upcoming puzzles seemed to have stumped many of my players, but in a good way. None of them reported frustration, but did report it was a real brain teaser, which I am happy to hear.
It wasn't without flaws though. In the past (on my live streams) I have talked about how the 3rd person perspective helps give a lot more information to the player. For example, if the player is sailing; in a top-down 2D game, you can only see the blue water beneath your boat, while in 3rd person, you can see the horizon line, and therefore you likely can see the silhouettes of islands in the distance so you know where to travel. Similarly, the puzzle that was built here likely benefits being able to see it in front of you, look around the horizon and into the distance. Unfortunately, this is a top down, 2D game, so I cannot offer that type of interaction. However, I implemented a camera system that will zoom and pan out so that the entire puzzle can be in a single camera frame allowing players to see all the elements at work. This helps them concentrate on solving the puzzle, rather than remembering where things are.

After some head scratchers, the player will arrive at a small room with an extravagant chest.

Before the player can open the chest, however, they must solve a time-trial. This time trial will act as a tutorial for a much bigger section in this dungeon.

Here, the player must gather amber stones and place them in the empty holes of the phoenix statues before time runs out. One thing that I am proud of here is how well players seemed to understand what I was hinting at. Admittedly, my game will often hold the player's hand when tutorializing puzzle elements. I think this is a necessary evil when using abstract concepts that have no basis in reality (such as throwing fish into lava to create platforms). However, here, the twinkles on the phoenix statues (seen in the gif above) seemed to play the role that I hoped they would; informing players that they need to interact with them. So, in this section, no text was provided to tell the player how to complete this puzzle, however my players were still able to figure it out without frustration.

Once the time-trial is complete, the player will receive the Hammer & Chisel; a new tool for dungeon exploration, as well as providing a helpful skill in combat!

Now that the player has acquired their new tool, they will need to head back to the central room this beta test started at. This won't involve much back tracking through. Like I said, it's a ribbon, not a 2-lane road. With the tools acquired, the player will be able to tread the lower portion of the left ribbon which will eventually lead them back to the beginning of the ribbon, and finally back to the central room.

Once the player is back at the central room, they will be able to enter the loft where they can finally exit the cave and walk the road up to the mountain peak.

Maybe my ego is a bit too big for myself, but this portion here is one of my favorite points in the game. The music in the cave is quite dramatic, the volume and energy is high, creating a lot of tension. When the player steps out onto the mountain path, the music fades out. The earthy tones of the ash give your eyes a rest from all of the quartz purple below as you watch the shadows of the mountain's smoke billow overhead while ash gently rains down. The only sound here is the wind and distant rumble of the erupting mountain. It's the calm before the storm, and I find this moment rather captivating. And the sad part: this is just a one-off section. There is nothing to explore here, and the player won't be able to return to this map after they complete the level! It just acts as a transition between the cave, and the caldera of the volcano.

Fidel reaches the peak of the mountain exhausted. In the closed beta, the screen just fades to black and informs the player what happens; "Fidel falls into the Caldera". At this point the full scene hasn't been implemented yet.

Fidel will quite dramatically crash into the ground, causing all of her equipment to be dropped. Before she is able to recover her equipment it gets burned away, leaving Fidel helpless without her tools. At this point, it appears to the player that they have been roped back into the cave with more purple quartz surrounding them, however it becomes quickly apparent that this is not actually the case, but just a subversion.

The dramatic calm before the storm leads into a unique game play portion I worked quite hard on. This is Caldera Colosso.
Caldera Colosso was influenced by 2 things: First, Battle Royale games. This isn't truly a Battle Royale game (and in truth, I'm not really a fan of the Battle Royale genre), however I wanted to keep the same luck-based gear grind as well as the momentum to be constantly moving. Second, the largest influence on this section and where the "Colosso" name sake is derived from, is the Colosso from Golden Sun. In this portion of Golden Sun, the player is stripped of all their items and team mates. They are then tasked to race through an obstacle course that eventually leads to an arena. Contained in the center of the arena is a high quality gear item and a low quality gear item. This attempts to push the player towards the center as quickly as possible so that they can obtain the advantage over their opponent, however along the way inside the obstacle course are chests that also contain useful items; some gear but mostly healing items. Assuming the player hasn't over-leveled themselves (a common problem with a lot of JRPGs), these arena fights can be quite challenging, so it's advised that the player also takes time to obtain some of the items within the obstacle course.
Hopefully now you can tell how Golden Sun's Colosso influenced Caldera Colosso. The whole of Caldera Colosso is huge. The point is not to explore it in a single run. Due to platforms spawning randomly, the path the player can take might be different every time, but if the path isn't different, the chests are. The chests come in 3 categories: General items, which mostly contain consumables but also basic accessories if you are really lucky. Accessory items, which contain the higher quality accessories (or if you are unlucky, you'll get a basic accessory). And finally, a weapon chest. You have a higher chance of getting a weapon from it, but there is a small chance you'll get a high tier accessory. What type of chests that spawn are randomized, and what the chest contains is random as well.
The goal here is to venture out into the greater arena and explore for as much equipment as you can, and then make it back to the center arena (seen in the screen shot above) to fight a boss before the 5 minute timer runs out. Overall, in my play testing, I often found myself getting caught up in the moment just enjoying this section, which is why it was such a surprise (and shot to my ego) when nearly every beta tester said that it wasn't fun 😭.

Often players complained of getting lost, which lead to frustration. Other players just didn't enjoy the randomness of it. To summarize their feelings: they were there to play a JRPG, not a rogue-lite.
This section wound up creating the most discussion around my beta test, as I had to dig my heels in on this one. I think for larger games - games with a budget and a team - this type of feedback should be heavily considered and potentially, if so many players hated it, it might just be worth scrapping the whole thing. However, my game has a limited scope. Scope is not just about the amount of features you implement, but also the amount of polish you put in - including cutting portions of the game that time had been spent developing. My limited scope mostly tells me that I spent a month developing this portion of the game (the same length of time it took me to develop the whole of Fidel & The Maker's Trial! 😱) so throwing it away just isn't an option.
However, I did re-tool portions of Caldera Colosso so that it was easier for players to find their way home.
Ultimately, the decision boiled down to this: This portion of game play amounts to only a small part of the total package, and while it may be frustrating, I don't see it as a major quitting point for players. Once they have completed Caldera Colosso, they don't have to do it ever again. I also believe that there are people who will enjoy it. If I was able to have so much fun play testing this portion of my game, there is no way I can be alone in that. So I guess someone out there will find the joy in this portion as much as I did.

Once the players completed the boss fight, the beta test ended - and ends quite abruptly too.

Delay.jpg

Ultimately what this beta test had shown me is that I have a lot more work to do than I had anticipated. Besides Caldera Colosso, one of the other major complaints I had received was that combat was boring. Retooling portions of my game and overhauling the combat is going to take some time. As it is, I am already behind where I wanted to be. I am still working on the second level - the cave. Though the cave is mostly finished at this point, I just need to implement the final boss (yes, the boss of Caldera Colosso is not the final boss of the level) and implement the ending scene for the cave (there is also a small bonus section the player can explore once the cave is complete). However, I was hoping that by the start of December I would have already begun work on the third and final level to be developed. However, here we are near the end of December and I haven't laid a single tile in the third level.

I had never committed to a real release date, so it's hard to really call this a "delay" - it's funny to think, I originally expected to complete this game within 7 months, hahahaha, yeah right - because I am aware development takes more time than I anticipate. However, with the beta test alongside gaining some traction on my Youtube streams, I've been asked a few times when I think the game would be finished, and I had been saying something along the lines of "I hope it will be Spring of 2023." But it's becoming more apparent that time frame won't be happening.

The good news is that my artist, Somon, is eager to do more art and with the pushed back release date, it's allowed her more time to do even more art for my game! So, as usual; insert over-used Miyamoto quote, and just remember; the delay means a better quality game at the end of it...though, again, I hesitate to call it a delay since I never committed to anything. I think it will be easier to commit to once I am closer to the "final polishing" stage. Right now, as it is, there are just too many unknowns to give anything concrete.

There was more I wanted to share with this update, but just like my ability to anticipate development time, my ability to anticipate the length of my rambles is hardly accurate. Let's cut it here for now - we can always talk about the newly implemented "Speed Run" mode later.

If you want more information about the game's progress, you should check out my Youtube channel where I stream every weekend, and if I am not feeling lazy about video editing, then I also post stream highlights of the games I have reviewed in the past. But don't worry, you don't have to wait for my lazy butt to catch past streams, Youtube archives every live stream I do, so you can watch past archives to see what you have missed in my game's development!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtjh_cDxm2GJIHFEOfOKzYg

And with that, I think it's time we end this lengthy post.

I'll see you guys in the next update!