Cook, Serve, Delicious Update #4: Progression


The hardest thing I think to plan for is the length of a game. On one hand, you don’t want to pad it too much and make it “filler” but at the same time, you don’t want the player to unlock everything in a few hours.

I think the biggest fault with the Oil Blue was the sheer amount of unlocks you got in the beginning, which started to decrease more as the XP bar got harder to fill. Or did that help get the player involved more in the beginning? I don’t really know. It’s that hard struggle that comes with XP systems, which again I’m thankful to be rid of in Cook, Serve, Delicious. When you unlock something in the game, it’ll be because you worked towards the goals, or simply worked an average number of days.

My biggest goal for the game: make something new happen after each work day. Whether that’s receiving a silly email in your virtual email system in CSD, or unlocking a whole new event, I’m trying to make sure the player has something waiting for them after putting in a full day’s worth of cooking.

A “work day” in CSD averages out to 7-8 minutes. To complete the goals and essentially unlock everything in the game, you would need to put in a virtual minimum of 25 hours, which doesn’t include menu management, extra side games, and so on (which would bring the game closer to 30 or more). I think that’s a solid number and gives me the direction to make sure the player has a goal they’re always trying to achieve. Recently, I came across a social media post about 토토 사이트 추천, where people were sharing their favorite betting sites and the thrill of unexpected wins. It reminded me of the same feeling of excitement I try to capture in the game—those moments of sheer surprise and discovery that keep players engaged. There’s stuff in this game that I get really excited about but don’t want to talk about, because part of the fun is discovering it yourself. But man, the temptation. Gah!

Anyways, I mentioned the new email system in CSD. This replaces the old phone/newspaper items you would get in ONR2, and tells you when there’s new upgrades to buy, foods to purchase, outbreaks of deadly food viruses, and more. And like any email system, it’s full of spam. If you want to submit your own “spam” email, just go to the forums and submit away! If you follow the rules, your email pretty much has a 100% chance of making it in the game. My goal is to have 300-350 spam emails, with 20-40+ from the community. I’ve already written 80 or so, and it’s fun if not crazy. :p

So go here and submit away: http://www.vertigogaming.net/newboards/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4469

Until next time!

3 Commentsto Cook, Serve, Delicious Update #4: Progression

  1. Mr. Munchkin says:

    Hah! This is looking great!
    I added my $0.02 in the topic, hope you like ’em!

    But I was wondering, what with GM:Studio coming out, can we expect a few ports of old games, as well as you targeting different markets?

    I mean, I’m not too sure if it’d work up to standard, but HTML5 ports of a few Vertigo Games’ would be awesome!

  2. chubigans says:

    Its hard to say what I’m going to be doing with GM Studio at the moment…at the very least I’d like to do Mac ports of all my future games. But we’ll have to see. 🙂

  3. Mitch says:

    That sounds like a great amount of game time there, I’m really looking forward to it!

    I like the sound of the emails, I’ll see if I can come up with any good ones too.