Hi,
Wafflem streamed Rubix's singleplayer levels on twitch yesterday: All of Pleasant and the first half Sinister.
Vod for 14 daysOne-pixel gap: See attachment. Lixes walk across this gap. This is intended: Physics resolve the land in 2x1 chunks (2 pixels wide, 1 high), and consider a 2x1 chunk solid when at least one of the two pixels is solid. I'm nonetheless unhappy about these gaps.
These gaps happen occasionally when terrain tiles sit at odd x-coordinates; here, the pagoda sits at (1395, 191). Maybe I should nudge the pagoda by one pixel. But in general, I'd like to keep all integer positions for tile placements, and exploder craters generate odd shapes anyway. I don't have a good final answer on the one-pixel gaps.
Unclear spawn interval: Nepster and Wafflem both wanted to view spawn interval during play, but neither found this in the user interface. Chatters eventually explained how you can mouse over a hatch to examine the SI.
Issue #207.Skill blueprints, splat ruler: Skill blueprints (shadows) show resulting terrain on the map before an assignment, while mouse over lix. Splat ruler measures splat height from arbitrary ledges.
This is getting important. Earlier this year, I've focussed on minimum viable multiplayer, but the multiplayer is in good shape since 0.9. I have to focus on the general user experience again. The blueprints seem like the most urgent lacking feature here.
Mark lemming: First, I'd like to improve the highlight under the cursor. That lix doesn't stick out clearly. Game draws her lighter, but I'd like to draw her really bright and with a dark outline, setting her apart from the bunch.
Issue #247.And I'd like to perma-mark able lixes (at least 1 permenent skill) on the map. The cursor already prefers them in the crowd, but that's not clear because the highlight under the cursor is too dark.
I believe that with these UI improvements, marked lemmings become unnecessary. Marking introduces a mode, and I'd like to avoid modes at all costs. The marking was necessary in NL because the cursor didn't snap to athletes.
Platformer doesn't turn: This is awkward, indeed, because the builder turns and the platformer looks so similar. I designed the platformer 9-10 years ago and decided that copying L2's behavior was a good idea. I can't judge neutrally what's better. The non-turning platformer is easier to anticipate, but the turning platformer is consistent with the builder.
Steel sensitivity: Lix terrain removers cancel when the mask overlaps steel, with small grace areas near the boundaries. When things align to the 16x16 grid, it's easy to anticipate chokes on steel.
The basher removes terrain in her own column and forward, and will therefore choke on steel within her head. We gave the miner a grace column here in 0.7, but didn't change the basher. No idea whether either grace column is good or not.
The NL terrain removers are extremely lenient and won't choke even if 80 % of a pickaxe's swing tries to remove steel. I understand that when you're used to the NL lenience, the Lix chokes on steel feel strict.
Thanks for the stream, and for the excellent feedback!
-- Simon