EDIT (15/08/2022): I am RETRACTING this review, as I am beginning to personally get involved in this project.
Original review text below:
NOTE: This review is written for the 2021 Minetest Game Jam version of this game, by a PARTICIPANT. I used Minetest version 5.4.1 to playtest.
There are some bugs in this. Buggy lighting. Coin display overlaps slightly. One thing that cought me off-guard is that the building is too restrictive; it does not accept mirroring or offsetting. You must replicate it EXACTLY, including offset. I like the fact that you get a tooltip when you hover a block, which is important for colorblind people. However, colorblind people are still at a disadvantage since they must walk towards the block. What is annoying is that the same building might repeat after like 2 rounds. Concerning color, I also think the colors chosen for the blocks are a bit too arbitrary. There is dark green and dark gray but no other "dark" colors. For an independent game it might have made more sense to think of a new palette. Also the inclusion of various other blocks like river water seems pointless.
A technical problem is that lighting seems to be very broken with nodes like glass.
The game doesn't seem to have a good mechanic to prevent repetitions. First, the obvious problem that it's possible that the same building might appear twice after only 2 rounds. But the game could also employ some mechanism like randomizing blocks. Like that beds aren't always with oak wood, but from also other wood. Or maybe even occassionally generating a random building from scratch.
Finally, a nitpick, I think the shops (the blocks from which you buy) could look more like shops or vending machines rather than something "printed" on a block.
This game was close from getting a thumbs up from me, but due to the bugs and due to some shortcomings in the basic gameplay (that could have been fixed before release), I give a thumbs down.
First of all can i just mention how difficult it is to fix buggy lighting and weird glass behaviour on such a restrictive engine? believe me, i tried to fix it. the building needing to be exact was just due to time restrictions from the jam and i do hope to fix that later on (allowing mirrors ect). the game does have a mechanic to avoid consecutive repetitions... also, thanks for suggesting the idea of randomising some blocks, i will certainly look into that post-jam.
Also, arent colourblind people going to have a "disadvantage" in most games? I really shouldnt be the one you complain to about people with colourblindness being at a disadvantage, i PRed minetest to try fix this... as you mentioned, i also added the hud telling them what they were looking at and i dont think moving towards the block is that big of a problem.
Hey there, now that the jam has ended, I have been able to:
- allow mirrors
- increase the range of the hud telling you what you are looking at
I will defenitively work on some of the other things you mentioned soon.
I hope this changes your mind about your review
Okay, I can solve now. You forgot to add paramtype="light" for the nodes with broken lighting (like glass and nodeboxes). :D See lua_api.txt.
the game does have a mechanic to avoid consecutive repetitions
That might be true, but it doesn't seem to prevent a "close repetition" like "Building A, Building B, Building A" which happened once to me. Maybe when one builidng was used, "block" for X rounds before it is allowed again. (this obviously requires many more schematics in general for it to work)
i have slightly improved the repetition prevention, now the closest that you can get builds is: Build A, Build B, Build C, Build A. i hope this helps!
also, i forgot to mention that i added the paramtype="light" the other day. please note these changes may take a day to get released here on cdb
By the way, these bugs are already officially fixed by you now, which I hereby acknowledge:
Buggy lighting
Coin display overlap
Mirror
The repetitions have become less bad, but IMO the best solution is put all levels in a pool. When a new level is chosen, draw from that pool randomly, removing the level from the pool. Repeat until the pool becomes empty. When the pool is empty, reset the pool. This method guarantees that repetitions only happen once you completed every level once. It does't make sense to allow ANY repetitions until they're impossible to avoid. I might submit another PR for that if you're OK with this.
EDIT (15/08/2022): I am RETRACTING this review, as I am beginning to personally get involved in this project.
Original review text below:
NOTE: This review is written for the 2021 Minetest Game Jam version of this game, by a PARTICIPANT. I used Minetest version 5.4.1 to playtest.
There are some bugs in this. Buggy lighting. Coin display overlaps slightly. One thing that cought me off-guard is that the building is too restrictive; it does not accept mirroring or offsetting. You must replicate it EXACTLY, including offset. I like the fact that you get a tooltip when you hover a block, which is important for colorblind people. However, colorblind people are still at a disadvantage since they must walk towards the block. What is annoying is that the same building might repeat after like 2 rounds. Concerning color, I also think the colors chosen for the blocks are a bit too arbitrary. There is dark green and dark gray but no other "dark" colors. For an independent game it might have made more sense to think of a new palette. Also the inclusion of various other blocks like river water seems pointless. A technical problem is that lighting seems to be very broken with nodes like glass.
The game doesn't seem to have a good mechanic to prevent repetitions. First, the obvious problem that it's possible that the same building might appear twice after only 2 rounds. But the game could also employ some mechanism like randomizing blocks. Like that beds aren't always with oak wood, but from also other wood. Or maybe even occassionally generating a random building from scratch. Finally, a nitpick, I think the shops (the blocks from which you buy) could look more like shops or vending machines rather than something "printed" on a block. This game was close from getting a thumbs up from me, but due to the bugs and due to some shortcomings in the basic gameplay (that could have been fixed before release), I give a thumbs down.
First of all can i just mention how difficult it is to fix buggy lighting and weird glass behaviour on such a restrictive engine? believe me, i tried to fix it. the building needing to be exact was just due to time restrictions from the jam and i do hope to fix that later on (allowing mirrors ect). the game does have a mechanic to avoid consecutive repetitions... also, thanks for suggesting the idea of randomising some blocks, i will certainly look into that post-jam.
Also, arent colourblind people going to have a "disadvantage" in most games? I really shouldnt be the one you complain to about people with colourblindness being at a disadvantage, i PRed minetest to try fix this... as you mentioned, i also added the hud telling them what they were looking at and i dont think moving towards the block is that big of a problem.
Hey there, now that the jam has ended, I have been able to: - allow mirrors - increase the range of the hud telling you what you are looking at I will defenitively work on some of the other things you mentioned soon. I hope this changes your mind about your review
Okay, I can solve now. You forgot to add
paramtype="light"for the nodes with broken lighting (like glass and nodeboxes). :D Seelua_api.txt.That might be true, but it doesn't seem to prevent a "close repetition" like "Building A, Building B, Building A" which happened once to me. Maybe when one builidng was used, "block" for X rounds before it is allowed again. (this obviously requires many more schematics in general for it to work)
i have slightly improved the repetition prevention, now the closest that you can get builds is: Build A, Build B, Build C, Build A. i hope this helps! also, i forgot to mention that i added the paramtype="light" the other day. please note these changes may take a day to get released here on cdb
converted review into a thread
I have officially retracted this review because of this: https://github.com/Minetest-j45/build-n-buy/pull/8
By the way, these bugs are already officially fixed by you now, which I hereby acknowledge:
The repetitions have become less bad, but IMO the best solution is put all levels in a pool. When a new level is chosen, draw from that pool randomly, removing the level from the pool. Repeat until the pool becomes empty. When the pool is empty, reset the pool. This method guarantees that repetitions only happen once you completed every level once. It does't make sense to allow ANY repetitions until they're impossible to avoid. I might submit another PR for that if you're OK with this.
pr looks amazing, please see my comments :D