Ninja Exorcist - 2D action from ASE *Out Now* on XBLIG

[RAziel1979]

Could you do different armor by just changing the color palette of the hero. Maybe add some elemental effects like you would with the weapons. That could work and still give a visual clue as the using different armour sets.

Also for the mini-map, I did not see any indicator for areas that if you fell in were instant death. Maybe use a color key to show these areas. A nice aquamarine would be cool.

I have to say that I really like that mini map but I wish the doors for entering a previous area and exit doors had a color to them. Ex. red=exit door.
I found myself confused navigating through the map a couple of times(My fault I guess)

Also I like the little heads floating around letting you know where the enemies are at, but for some of the harder ones, red color heads would at least prepare you a little more for whats around the corner. Enemies with fire arrows are super hard and hit you off screen with insane accuracy( TH influence ?lol)
when there's no health around your ****ed, so maybe some type of meditation ritual to replenish your health would be nice too.

I like this game man and I hope that this community gets more involve in helping you guys out with this game and future games.

That's just a few ideas, I'm still working on more for you.
Now if you decide to make your next game based on Norse mythology, you know where to look!

[theALLseeingEYE]

I haven't found any spike death traps yet... Also for the stuff I was talking about I was saying for your next game. I didn't know you were adding stuff to this game which is sweet if I'm correct.

Ya, we're mostly trying to address criticisms, and smooth out issues that people had with the game. For example, adding stealth training, sprucing up level 1 visuals.

This guy's video was great for us on many levels.

Indie for Breakfast: Ninja Exorcist
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1Z_ofA-QDg

Most notably, in level 3, he's dying quite a bit, and ends up taking a side door, then jumping to his death, and had to redo that whole area again. So, a bit cheap I'd say . So perhaps toning down the archers in that area, putting a save point in the side door so if he dies, he restarts right there.

But ya, it definitely seems that something is turning some people away, hopefully we can help that. If not, hopefully Episode 2 remedies a lot of that too.

When using the grapple it is hard to accurately nail a target while in free-fall, especially because the physics box or whatever of the platforms is about two feet into the rock from the ledge.

Also, when you touch anything, you lose the grapple. Wouldn't be that big of a deal if the above "issue" wasn't there, but it's pretty hard to stay in the air for any length of time. A "rappel" move where you put your feet flush against the wall could make that more fluid.

Ah, I see where you are coming from. Actually, we did try to address having to just disconnect people from the grappling hook in certain situations, but ran into some pretty big bugs that we had a hard time fixing when they'd collide with walls, or collide with walls and a roof at the same time. I've gotten quite used to the grappling, having played the game so much of course, but perhaps there's something else we can do to help people target platforms a bit easier. Also, if the grapple is going too far into a rock, there may be areas where there aren't enough collision blocks. I'll keep an eye out for that, though for some areas, it might be hard to address at this time, unfortunately.

Rappelling would be cool. Perhaps if you collide with a wall, you go into wallslide mode, but are still connected, and can jump off, as expected.

[theALLseeingEYE]

I have to say that I really like that mini map but I wish the doors for entering a previous area and exit doors had a color to them. Ex. red=exit door.
I found myself confused navigating through the map a couple of times(My fault I guess)

Also I like the little heads floating around letting you know where the enemies are at, but for some of the harder ones, red color heads would at least prepare you a little more for whats around the corner. Enemies with fire arrows are super hard and hit you off screen with insane accuracy( TH influence ?lol)
when there's no health around your ****ed, so maybe some type of meditation ritual to replenish your health would be nice too.

I like this game man and I hope that this community gets more involve in helping you guys out with this game and future games.

That's just a few ideas, I'm still working on more for you.
Now if you decide to make your next game based on Norse mythology, you know where to look!

Ya, good ideas man. I do realize we should probably add icons for the different enemies. Especially for archers, I'll see if we can get that in. Adding a healing skill could be a good ideas as well. Of note, you can gain back a small amount of health from stealth kills.

[RAziel1979]

I knew it! you know while playing the game I was thinking that by stealth killing enemies my health should fill up a little bit but I did not notice it. good thing it does happen then.
This brings me to my next idea. different ways of stealth kills. think of AC. highlight the enemy from above while he has his back to you and boom! stealth kill from above!

[theALLseeingEYE]

Alright, so, seriously, thanks for all the feedback guys.
We've been working hard to implement everything we can that makes sense. Here's a brief list of things to expect in the title update:

- Stealth Training mode (5 stages training you in various stealth skills)
- Fixed some stealth issues (greatly reduced Archer vision distance, can now wall-slide ti ground without alerting enemies)
- Replaced the Y button combo, with a power attack (I think this turned out great)
- Frame-rate and crash fixes
- Updated mini-map with icons for spikes, different enemies, and objective point (mini-map on by default)
- Ninja Vision available right from the start, mini-map on by default
- Overhauled level 1 art, and took out spikes, replaced with little secret area
- Blocked off secret area in level 3 with demon gate (need first sword to get)
- Toned down archers in level 3, fixed issue where enemy could see you right away there
- Added save points in areas where you might beat an areas, explore, then jump off a cliff accidentally
- Save points, tutorial scrolls, and NPC's now auto-save/auto-open pop-ups when first walking into them, but require button press after that.
- Rising slash now performed by down-down-forward, forward + Y, and also does possible three hits of damage. Should be more effective for flying enemies.

So ya, definitely quite a few changes. Hope this helps people quite a bit. Pretty excited about that Y attack, now it's easier to do the Y jump kick too.

[Purple Gryphon]

Very cool that is a lot of changes. Is it a free update? Sounds like some good stuff.

If you need play testers for episode 2 I think you know were to look.

[theALLseeingEYE]

Very cool that is a lot of changes. Is it a free update? Sounds like some good stuff.

If you need play testers for episode 2 I think you know were to look.

Hey man, ya, the update is free. And ya, i you are up for testing, that would be awesome. Getting feedback before release is a huge help.

Do you have a decent PC? Beta invites are certainly open to all TH.netizens, do long as you are willing to install the required, and not very damanding software

[RAziel1979]

The game was punishing me big time the other day man! I love it!

LEAVE OR DIE NINJA!!

[theALLseeingEYE]

The game was punishing me big time the other day man! I love it!

LEAVE OR DIE NINJA!!

Nice! How are you finding the difficulty so far? I'm hearing that people are finding it pretty tough. I was considering toning down normal a bit, but leaving hard as it is.

[RAziel1979]

Yeah man, tone down the normal difficulty a little bit.
I find myself playing it in small portions because of it. if it's a little bit easy i would of finished it already.

[Purple Gryphon]

I am finding the difficulty good for normal. So far but I am not too far in found the 3rd sword and hook recently. Been doing a lot of exploring. The key is to manage your encounters so far. Dont try to take of more than 3 enemies at once.

The first boss did give me a little work out. You really need to stick and move constantly. Used all my projectiles to soften him up first.

The stealth is also working a bit better for me now that I can see the vision lines for the enemies.

I would love to help with testing if I could. I have a fairly new laptop. Not a gaming rig but it is a intel i5.

[theALLseeingEYE]

Yeah man, tone down the normal difficulty a little bit.
I find myself playing it in small portions because of it. if it's a little bit easy i would of finished it already.

Fair enough man. Ya, I've definitely heard of it being a bit of an issue for some. Would you rate it as leaning more towards 'Hard' rather than a normal difficulty?

I am finding the difficulty good for normal. So far but I am not too far in found the 3rd sword and hook recently. Been doing a lot of exploring. The key is to manage your encounters so far. Dont try to take of more than 3 enemies at once.

The first boss did give me a little work out. You really need to stick and move constantly. Used all my projectiles to soften him up first.

The stealth is also working a bit better for me now that I can see the vision lines for the enemies.

I would love to help with testing if I could. I have a fairly new laptop. Not a gaming rig but it is a intel i5.

Sweet man. Honestly, we would love to have you on-board for help. We are going to look into possibly releasing EP1 on PC soon too. If you are up for helping with that, that would be great as well, but ya, we'd hopefully roll right off the PC version into Episode 2. Also, i'm sure your laptop will be more than capable, as long as it has a graphics card, or decent enough on-board graphics.

Sounds like you picked up on one of the tactics for Boss 1. Did you notice you can knock that thrown head back at him?

Glad stealth is working better now too. Actually, perhaps we can get you a build of the title update, so you can try the stealth training. I'm quite curious how much that will help out.

Do you by chance have a wired Xbox 360 controller? or an adapter to use the wireless controllers on PC? Keyboard controls are pretty good, but do still need some work.

[RAziel1979]

Maybe I'm just trying to rush through it. Maybe PG is just too good of a player that finds normal easy.lol
I'm not worthy to be a ninja yet.

[Guirec730]

You die pretty fast on normal, but there are save stations EVERYWHERE, which made me feel like the game wasn't so "hard". That element of the design supports a stealthy approach, I feel like.

[Purple Gryphon]

Maybe I'm just trying to rush through it. Maybe PG is just too good of a player that finds normal easy.lol
I'm not worthy to be a ninja yet.

Well I guess I should add the caveat that I like Ninja Gaiden so I am use to hard ninja games. But as Guirec said you can use the save spots to help you out.

Also ASE said that he would lower the detection range of the archers and lower the damage of the arrows and that has been the worse part. I try to limit encounters and I hate it when arrows start flying from off screen that usually gets you in trouble.

Fair enough man. Ya, I've definitely heard of it being a bit of an issue for some. Would you rate it as leaning more towards 'Hard' rather than a normal difficulty?

It is a hard game if you move too fast and maye you could make this hard to allow for more people to finish the game. But have not played the easy so hard to say if you need a in between difficulty. But you could move the difficulty up a bit more to the next level. Then make the top level the same as it is now but limit the heal at save points to once or twice.

Sweet man. Honestly, we would love to have you on-board for help. We are going to look into possibly releasing EP1 on PC soon too. If you are up for helping with that, that would be great as well, but ya, we'd hopefully roll right off the PC version into Episode 2. Also, i'm sure your laptop will be more than capable, as long as it has a graphics card, or decent enough on-board graphics.

Do you by chance have a wired Xbox 360 controller? or an adapter to use the wireless controllers on PC? Keyboard controls are pretty good, but do still need some work.

Yeah would love to help if I can. Then I can cross Game Developer off my bucket list.

I have a play and charge kit so that should work for my 360 controller to work on the PC.

Sounds like you picked up on one of the tactics for Boss 1. Did you notice you can knock that thrown head back at him?

Glad stealth is working better now too. Actually, perhaps we can get you a build of the title update, so you can try the stealth training. I'm quite curious how much that will help out.

Yeah the boos fight was pretty intense for a first boss. Yeah I saw the prompts to hit X when the thrown heads but could not really get the timing right. Did you need to do a jump attack.

The stealth has been better and I leveled it up which helps. The pull down kill is great. I killed like7 enemies in a row with it.

The grapple hook has also been fun to fight with but I wish it had a slight stun to it. Many times I will drag an enemy towards me and they end up attacking me out of the drag.

The hook swing jump dash rehook is a good travel mechanic and when you get it right it works very smoothly. I have found it hard to start a swing at some times but that is minor.

[theALLseeingEYE]

Maybe I'm just trying to rush through it. Maybe PG is just too good of a player that finds normal easy.lol
I'm not worthy to be a ninja yet.

Well, you aren't alone in thinking it's pretty hard, I've definitely heard others saying it was too tough. But on the other hand, there definitely seems to be a correlation between people finding it too tough, and not getting into the stealth.

So, I'm considering, tone down Normal somewhat, not drastically, but perhaps enough that action rush style is more viable, but leave hard more as the stealth is mandatory mode.

You die pretty fast on normal, but there are save stations EVERYWHERE, which made me feel like the game wasn't so "hard". That element of the design supports a stealthy approach, I feel like.

If you are crafty, you can definitely use the save stations a lot. I certainly do, I wonder, if we limited this, and balanced the game so if worked within the save limit, if people would have a more consistent experience with the difficulty level.

Well I guess I should add the caveat that I like Ninja Gaiden so I am use to hard ninja games. But as Guirec said you can use the save spots to help you out.

Also ASE said that he would lower the detection range of the archers and lower the damage of the arrows and that has been the worse part. I try to limit encounters and I hate it when arrows start flying from off screen that usually gets you in trouble.

I am a bit worried about people really disliking the archers. Like, I'm not going to lie, I knew full will this would be contentious, since everyone (except people who are good at Ninja Gaiden of course) complains about archers shooting you from off screen in Ninja Gaiden, and even in Too Human.

Would it be more fair if they needed to be within the screen for them to shoot? most likely. But what I was going for here, is more like the snipers in Arkham Asylum, or the gunners in the stealth parts. If you are spotted, you are likely to get nailed, but I wanted to make it so it was plausible to hide into cover, or dodge-dash through the arrows, reach the archers and take them out, even in the thick of the action.

If everyone is having trouble with this though, we need to fix it.

It is a hard game if you move too fast and maye you could make this hard to allow for more people to finish the game. But have not played the easy so hard to say if you need a in between difficulty. But you could move the difficulty up a bit more to the next level. Then make the top level the same as it is now but limit the heal at save points to once or twice.



Yeah would love to help if I can. Then I can cross Game Developer off my bucket list.

I have a play and charge kit so that should work for my 360 controller to work on the PC.

Ya, I'm thinking easy might be a bit easy, and medium is a bit close to hard. I'm going through the game tweaking now, we'll see how it goes.

Actually, bad news on the controller, Play and charge kits only charge , they don't transmit your signal to the PC, so you'd actually need a wireless adapter to use it. But you can still play with mouse/keyboard, or just keyboard. We'll be working on those controls soon, and could really use feedback there too.
http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget....-windows-2.jpg

Awesome though man, if you'd like to get set up, please install
visual studio 2010 C# express
http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudi...csharp-express

and then
xna game studios 4.0
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/downl....aspx?id=23714

Yeah the boss fight was pretty intense for a first boss. Yeah I saw the prompts to hit X when the thrown heads but could not really get the timing right. Did you need to do a jump attack.

The stealth has been better and I leveled it up which helps. The pull down kill is great. I killed like7 enemies in a row with it.

The grapple hook has also been fun to fight with but I wish it had a slight stun to it. Many times I will drag an enemy towards me and they end up attacking me out of the drag.

The hook swing jump dash rehook is a good travel mechanic and when you get it right it works very smoothly. I have found it hard to start a swing at some times but that is minor.

Cool, seems like you are catching onto the grappling pretty good, I've heard others say it could be smoother, but I've gotten so used to it, I tended to think it was fine.

Glad you are having fun though man, we actually had the grapple pull completely stun the enemy before, I kind of leaned towards it being ok as is, because it ads a bit of risk to its use, as opposed to being overpowered, but we can definitely consider making it a bit more powerful too.

[Guirec730]

To clarify, I think having lots of healing stations around coupled with only having the ability to scrape by a combat situation if spotted supports a fair "trial and error" stealth approach. There's a strong penalty for being spotted without it being insta-fail, and the redemption for it is always close. That way it "feels" harder than it actually is.

[Purple Gryphon]

To clarify, I think having lots of healing stations around coupled with only having the ability to scrape by a combat situation if spotted supports a fair "trial and error" stealth approach. There's a strong penalty for being spotted without it being insta-fail, and the redemption for it is always close. That way it "feels" harder than it actually is.

Yes but some "gamers" just want easy and not to actually having to work at it. The finish rate on most games is pretty low. People did not finish Dead Space because it was too scary and Gears was too hard even though the basic difficulty was not very challenging. Even Mass Effect got a basic mode because people could not make decisions.

[RAziel1979]

Nowadays People don't have the time to really finish a game, unless it has an awesome story that gamers want to see it's ending or awesome gameplay that drives the player to finish the game.
We don't have to look very far to see how Sk failed with TH not catering to all gamers and making the game they themselves or should I say he wanted to play. As a starting Director/developer, ASE needs to balance those two things out, catering to both the casual and the hardcore.

I really like his game, it is very challenging like the old school 2d games before it, but like I said before he needs to strike a balance so that any game he makes will be enjoyed by both the casual gamer and the hardcore gamer.

Right now I'm teaching my son how to play all kinds of games, but when something is too hard he calls it boring. This is what kids or gamers say of games that are too hard for them. it is definitely not like the old days when I went through quarters like crazy trying to finish Contra or Ghouls N Ghosts when I was a little kid.
It's all about giving the gamers options, lots of it at that. Keep that in mind my friend.

[theALLseeingEYE]

To clarify, I think having lots of healing stations around coupled with only having the ability to scrape by a combat situation if spotted supports a fair "trial and error" stealth approach. There's a strong penalty for being spotted without it being insta-fail, and the redemption for it is always close. That way it "feels" harder than it actually is.

Cool man, ya, so it sounds like you feel our current approach is fair , which is great. My comment was largely aimed at wondering why there's a disparity between those who find it way too hard, and those who find it good.

I was happy with the difficulty when we released, but I'm not going to lie, I'm probably one of the worst judges for that. I'm too close to it, and know things about it that no one else does, so ya the feedback from you guys is super helpful.

Yes but some "gamers" just want easy and not to actually having to work at it. The finish rate on most games is pretty low. People did not finish Dead Space because it was too scary and Gears was too hard even though the basic difficulty was not very challenging. Even Mass Effect got a basic mode because people could not make decisions.

Ya, this is an interesting point, I thin our easy difficulty should suit these people well, but they certainly aren't everyone. There's definitely a healthy contingent of gamers who love challenge. It is definitely really important to offer choice.

Nowadays People don't have the time to really finish a game, unless it has an awesome story that gamers want to see it's ending or awesome gameplay that drives the player to finish the game.
We don't have to look very far to see how Sk failed with TH not catering to all gamers and making the game they themselves or should I say he wanted to play. As a starting Director/developer, ASE needs to balance those two things out, catering to both the casual and the hardcore.

I really like his game, it is very challenging like the old school 2d games before it, but like I said before he needs to strike a balance so that any game he makes will be enjoyed by both the casual gamer and the hardcore gamer.

Right now I'm teaching my son how to play all kinds of games, but when something is too hard he calls it boring. This is what kids or gamers say of games that are too hard for them. it is definitely not like the old days when I went through quarters like crazy trying to finish Contra or Ghouls N Ghosts when I was a little kid.
It's all about giving the gamers options, lots of it at that. Keep that in mind my friend.

That's an interesting point about your son. I think getting the difficulty right, and offering a good amount of choice is really tough, but it's super important too, since as you said, if people find it too hard, they could get bored, or frustrated and quit (I did that in Symphony of the Night yesterday!, mostly just cause I died though). But also, if it's too easy, people can get bored as well. If you can hit that sweet spot, and keep them engaged, that's when things get really exciting I think.

It's tough, I loooove Ninja Gaiden 1/2 on Xbox. There's really nothing like it for me, just the rush of excitement slashing though tons of smart enemies that keep me on my toes is something I can't get anywhere else. Even Bayonetta, which I love, doesn't quite give me the same thrill. But at the same time, I know that turns some people off.

I think TH would have done really well to offer difficulty settings, but tis the way it goes.

[RAziel1979]

We're all here to help that's for sure.
Another review.
http://gamingillustrated.com/ninja-e...xbla/#comments

[theALLseeingEYE]

We're all here to help that's for sure.
Another review.
http://gamingillustrated.com/ninja-e...xbla/#comments

Ya, read that review. Sounded like she enjoyed the game overall, but really struggled with the controls. 2/10 for controls though?... not sure what to say. I agree the game is pretty complex, but like I say, I'm too close to it. I never have troubles with wall-jumps or ledge climbing, which is why we haven't tweaked them, I'm honestly at a bit of a loss on how we can make it easier to do. Perhaps she expected to be able to constantly wall-jump up the same wall? (something we purposefully tried to dissuade in order to make the grappling hook actually necessary for climbing).


In other news, the title update is almost ready. Some more updates:

- Upgraded uppercut and rising slash. Both are now Shadow scythe attacks, with longer range/reach, so you essentially have a shadow scythe weapon if you upgrade your melee skills now.
- Improved enemy collision boxes
- Adding the keys to the map
- Re-balanced normal difficulty

Some others I'm probably forgetting

[RAziel1979]

Able to see those evil spiky fences that kill you in one hit?
Toning down those archers that never miss?
I'm sure there's a few more.

[theALLseeingEYE]

Able to see those evil spiky fences that kill you in one hit?
Toning down those archers that never miss?
I'm sure there's a few more.

Ya man, we've added the spikes to the mini-map. We could also go through and revise things so spikes are always visible where you might fall in.

For the archers, I think it will take some work to really adjust that.
Edit.
Actually, looks like we've already addressed this quite a bit. Since we reduced the vision distance of the archers to less than a full screen (750 pixels), they can still see you from off-screen, but won't be able to shoot you unless you are within that range. So hopefully that helps. We'll likely tweak it more in the future.

If anyone has ideas there, let me know.
Cheers,
Joel

[Purple Gryphon]

Yeah seeing the spike areas when near it would help alot. I did find that I can move the camera if I click down on the right stick I think. Was that intentional. I don't remember that in the tutorial scrolls.