Hi DevForum
I am in the workings of a project called Monkey Theory, an infection styled PvP game.
I am worried that players who join (and are put on the monkey team) do not have very much fun and leave early. If some guidance could be given on how the new player experience is in this game and what you would do to make it better, that would be very much appreciated
thank you!
It’s like 2 am, and I played this with like 1 guy. I was the monkey, and yes, it does seem hard to navigate as the monkey. When I did get to the player, I easily died (maybe I suck, idk). Some things, like the Horn, weren’t very well explained, and I only figured out what the spear and crawl were while playing.
Probably what I would do is: if the player is new and spawns in as a monkey in the concurrent round, I would probably add some GUI explaining some of the tools given and their goal for the player.
Just needs some fine-tuning for the game, but good idea so far; it just needs more players to be more consistent with the infection idea, or else the monkey dies too easily.
The idea of the game is to hide and ambush - e.g. crawl by the rocks, and jump out when they get close. the problem is that I’m not sure how to GET players to play like this - I watched some new players join and they hid and attacked (and subsequently killed humans) while others just run up to the enemy, die, then leave.
If you have any ideas on how I can get players to SNEAK UP and attack then that would be amazing, thanks
And the horn tool tip is very cryptic - I’ll fix that. Thanks for playing, tho!
I tried to make the game as simple as possible - as a monkey, kill the humans. As a human, do the objectives.
Ah, there are zombie monster things in the game already, but they are AI controlled rather than the players. Using monkeys was simply a design choice.
If I could get an elaboration on what exactly was confusing I’ll see if I can get it fixed though. But nevertheless thank you very much for trying out my game!
Could you give players that are monkeys the ability to climb trees? Maybe even have them start in trees? I realize this might be a big ask, but that is just where my mind goes.
Some other things… the jump action, I kind of want to be able to do it more often. Not being able to makes the game feel broken to me.
If you want players to crawl under some conditions and jump out under other conditions, have you tried adding text that suggests to players that they do this?
Climbing was originally supposed to be added to the game and it was worked on by another Dev but we ended up giving up because it was too performance intensive and a pain to work with. I loved the idea though.
Reducing the jump cooldown would probably relieve frustration, as it only exists to avoid monkeys from bhopping when attacking a human. I’ll definitely look into finding a better balance.
And recently I added a Stalk meter that rewards players from watching and waiting near a human… And hopefully that convinces them to only attack when its safe - BUT I am thinking of just creating a full tutorial. What do you think?
Thanks for playing! 
Some people like tutorials, so for those people it’s great if you have them. Others, including me, prefer to just experiment and learn from trial and error. So if the game is made in such a way that we can figure it out on our own, that’s great for us!
Too bad about the climbing thing. I get it. I’ve had to make sacrifices and pivot in other directions because of limitations. Can you have them swing on ropes, or throw bananas? Something else to make them feel like monkeys?
A full tutorial usually just becomes something people skip. If you want them to learn how to stalk, use the environment or the Stalk meter to reward that behavior visually instead of forcing a pop-up. As for the bananas, keep it simple; if it’s just another projectile to track, it might just add more clutter.
In a perfect world with infinite time, I probably would add a tutorial - but for the next while, I am going to be very busy so unfortunately I don’t think I can.
I added the Stalk Bar into the game, and hopefully I see improvements. Right now, the statistics are looking bad, but I’m not sure if it’s because the data hasn’t uploaded yet or if there is a genuine problem.
How long should I wait before making a decision about the game, from when I began the campaign?
Update: I added a tutorial. It’s simple, straight forward, optional and quick. I’ll see how it goes.
If you could join and test the tutorial, I’d really appreciate it. Thanks!
I just tried it. I made it through. Almost got stuck on the last part where I was supposed to attack. I wasn’t paying attention to your instructions to strike where he isn’t looking. Once I figured that out it was fine. But maybe you can make that part more clear so people like me don’t get stuck?
Maybe remove the title “Tutorial”, I think it doesn’t need to be up the whole time? Also, I think the continue button would make more sense below the other text.
Also, I was going to try the tutorial again, but I can’t seem to find the option.
Thanks for playing!
In hindsight, having the tutorial title seems very redundant - I could have even placed the button there instead… (the button was above the box to avoid clashing with other UI Elements. But replacing the button with the title seems a lot more logical.)
And I’ll look into making the “Avoid the line of sight!” notification more prominent so it’s obvious as to what’s going on.
You should be able to replay the tutorial in the lobby - but the computer to do so might be a bit hidden. I’ll look to getting this fixed
Thanks for the feedback!