the wave

I made a small god game for the browser, phones too, no account. You never command the tribe: you are a hand over an island. Hold on the land to scoop up sand, water or lava, hold again to pour it. The tribe walks to three hearths on its own; then a wave comes in from the south and a lava spring wakes on the ridge, and the only strategy is the shape of the land you leave them.

Sand walls erode, water finds every gap, and lava poured into the sea cools into rock that holds, so the question each time is what to spend the hand on and where. The first island takes a few minutes. After it there is the rising sea: the towns you hold grow, every wave lifts the sea for good, and you choose which town to send uphill before the water cuts it off.

Everything, the island, the tribe and the ink look, is drawn in its own code. I read every reply: what you tried that the water broke, and what would make the land feel more like a plan.

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[–] 2 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 child)

I agree with this being an interesting concept but I was so confused at first. It's not intuitive. I didn't realize I had to pick up the sand. And what are these hearths. It's like there is a backstory that I know nothing about but it's relevant to the game. If you want a game to be successful you need to be able to jump in quickly. Especially with the short attention span nowadays

It doesn't even feel like a game. The answer is given to me for both levels and then I need to pay.

It would be nice to know if you are currently holding something with an indicator because many times I thought I was holding sand it just took the sand away.

The UI also needs work. Many walls of text like stats that might benefit from icons and bullets.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 2 weeks ago

    Thanks, this is the useful kind of feedback, and you're right on each point. The hand gives no sign that it holds sand, so it looks like the sand vanishes. The hearths (the camps the tribe walks to and has to keep dry) are never explained. And the stats are a wall of text. The next build fixes those three: the hand shows what it carries and how much, a hearth gets one plain line the first time you see one, and the stats become icons.

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