Adventure Gamers - Forums

I understand that difficulty in adventure games is hard to balance—and, contrary to shooters or RPGs, you can’t just tweak a few numbers to create different difficulty levels. Believe it or not, I’m usually not among the small clique that keeps whining that every game is just too easy for their superior intellect. I don’t like frustrating games; as Ron Gilbert wrote a quarter of a century ago, “The average American spends most of the day failing at the office, the last thing he wants to do is come home and fail while trying to relax and be entertained.” I’m fine with games nudging me in the right direction—as long as they maintain the illusion that I’m terribly clever.

One of Prominence’s lowest point for me is the whole business with the hydroponics in the second ending:
1. ANNIE decides that it’s time to take care of it.
2. She points out that the problem is that the machine is out of CO2, even though just looking at it gives you that information. (Does she think I’m blind and/or completely dumb?)
3. She figures out that we can use the CO2 from the scrubbers.
4. She unlocks said scrubbers.
5. And now I just have to pick up the cans, put them in the machine and press a button!
So basically ANNIE set the objective, identified the problem, figured out a solution and enacted half of it. All I was left with was the menial tasks she couldn’t do because she lacks physical appendages. This did not make me feel clever; it made me feel like a mindless robot following instructions from a computer lady.

Prominence follows a structure that I think of a the Beneath a Steel Sky structure: pretty linear, an ever-expanding gameworld, and puzzles that you encounter early on but can sometimes return to and solve only much later. That made me instantly like Prominence, because I love that structure and consider BASS one of the best-designed games ever. However, those games can be tricky: unless you expect players to make a mental note of every unsolved puzzle they’ve encountered (and you really shouldn’t), you’ll need to nudge them in the right direction from time to time so that they won’t have to re-explore the entire world every 15 minutes. I understand the temptation of having something like ANNIE do that.

But, as your favourite infomercial would say, there’s got to be a better way! Take this example from BASS: Late in the game, you stumble upon the dead body of a character you had met much earlier. This makes you want to return to where you had originally met her (maybe there are clues there). As you do so, you revisit old locations and are reminded of puzzles that were there—and you realize that you now have what you need to deal with them. Is that the game nudging you in the right direction? Yes. Does it serve the exact same purpose as ANNIE telling you that you should revisit the waste disposal area in order to reach the lab? Yes. But in one case, you have the illusion that you came up with the idea yourself, whereas in the other you’re faced with the frustrating realization that the game knows you’re a moron. And that makes all the difference between a game that I loved and a game that kept making me feel frustrated.

Anyway, enough pontificating from me. Regardless of my complaints, there were lots of things I liked about Prominence, and I’ll definitely be looking forward to your next game.

Kurufinwe—did you happen to figure out the business with the Steam achievement icons? I’ve been trying to puzzle it out and haven’t had any success. Some help would be great.

Becky - 13 December 2015 03:56 PM

Kurufinwe—did you happen to figure out the business with the Steam achievement icons? I’ve been trying to puzzle it out and haven’t had any success. Some help would be great.

In Steam, you can see all the achievement icons by clicking: Achievements > View global achievement stats. Then it’s just a matter of cutting and pasting away.

Because I have far too much time on my hands, I actually did it. Here you go.

I have no idea what that means. I tried entering it into the archive terminal, but it’s not recognised. Even Google doesn’t seem to know what it is.

I also did the cut and pasting thing. And I came up with what you did. I also assumed that it could be entered into the archive terminal, but had no success. I did wonder if I simply didn’t use the right combination or order of words when I tried to enter it. Could the last “A” in “Palahana” be a separate word? (So it’s three words instead of two?) If anyone actually managed to get this to work, I’d love a hint as to how to enter it.

Could it be the name of one of the characters? It’s sounds vaguely Indianish, as most of them do. I started doing a list of the characters and their jobs when playing, but I stopped at some point; it’s not on my list. Or maybe it’s something in the language, like “Pel Koloro”. Maybe it’s Lettari for “You’ve got too much time on your hand.”

Honestly, I don’t know.

ARGHGH! What’s Letarri for think outside the original instructions? Pay no attention to the “help” instructions.

dmwi_mike - 08 December 2015 09:15 PM

Hitting the right level of difficulty in an adventure game is a challenge. About 85% of the feedback we’ve gotten from players has been that the difficulty (including ANNIE’s guidance/help) has been just right. About 10% have said that the game is too hard. About 5% have said that the game is too easy.

For some players—like you—the option to turn off the Objectives doesn’t offer enough difficulty. You’d almost certainly prefer to have a filter for ANNIE messages that suppresses anything about progress/objectives and just allows the narrative commentary.

If we make another adventure game, maybe we’ll get the chance to incorporate something like this. Thanks for the feedback.

Most often I find that adventure games are hard because of the feedback rather than puzzles themselves. Early on when I was trying to get the power back online, I was
using items on the coil when the cover was still on, before I had the battery. The game was telling me the way certain items were unsuitable (too small etc) and when I used the crowbar it said something like “you can’t use that”. So when I put the battery in and got the cover off it didn’t occur to me to use the crowbar because I assumed it was unsuitable. I then spent a half hour searching every nook for a replacement which I already had. This could have easily been solved by NOT telling you anything until the battery was in and the cover was off. It wasn’t a hard puzzle, but it was misleading.

That’s why I think testing, testing and more testing by real players is extremely necessary before a game is released. You definitely don’t want to dumb everything down because of a few misinterpreted cues which could have been clearer.

Wow. you guys really picked apart the game - I can always find flaws but overall it was an enjoyable experience.

So many adventure games are either boring or just plain awful that I appreciate when something fun like this comes along. There’s a ton of room for enhancements available for what I hope will be a future game - I’m looking forward to it.

incometrader - 20 December 2015 12:55 PM

Wow. you guys really picked apart the game - I can always find flaws but overall it was an enjoyable experience.

So many adventure games are either boring or just plain awful that I appreciate when something fun like this comes along. There’s a ton of room for enhancements available for what I hope will be a future game - I’m looking forward to it.

Of course, it’s a great game and these are minor points we’re talking about. I would like to think most developers appreciate all constructive feedback as it helps them to make better games - I’m sure dmwi_mike is no exception.

That’s great news. Terrific customer service

I have another question - why does the URC only appear in communications after I get into the cafeteria? I’m pretty sure it does, because I explored communications thoroughly once I first got to level 3.