This is a great concept that feels like it's about 80% there. Some suggestions if the author is here/reading:
1. I badly want the ability to rotate pieces. Perhaps it's too strong to have this universally, but maybe i get 1-3 piece rotations recharged on each Reroll?
2. Having multiple of the same orientation piece isn't great, but a few times i got 3 pieces in identical orientations. This is really fun-sucking and i'd either code that case out or weight it to be very unlikely.
3. UX-wise it would be great to be able to hold my mouse down and drag across pieces to highlight them instead of needing to click on each block individually.
Feedback aside, i really love the concept here and think it's a great first pass. Some UX improvements i think could make this a really addicting game. Awesome job.
Interesting concept, but it feels like a distillation of the "insanity" difficulty mode of a roguelike where the only way to get a high (or low) score is to win the lottery. Repeatedly.
I'd echo liquidise's comment; some limited ability to rotate the pieces would add strategy instead of just spamming the reroll button and pattern-matching. The frequency that you're allowed to use the ability could serve as a difficulty slider.
It doesn't even take that much interactivity to make a mostly RNG-based game more fun; compare a basic slot machine to video poker.
The only strategy I could find was to not play pieces that make compatible future pieces less likely, mainly by trying to keep the surface as flat as possible, as soon as it gets real spikey you are not really making progress due to probability.
But once you get down to a small numbers it's mostly pure luck. Best I could do was 7, only way i'm getting a better score is by rolling the dice a whole load of times more which I don't feel incentivised to do because there's no skill left to refine.
Very cool! Is there a reason I can't rotate the pieces? Also being able to click and drag to draw a piece would be better than clicking them one by one.
I got to 2. Towards the end it's somewhat random. The issue of getting stuck with multiple copies of the same piece is slightly annoying. Does the player need more control, to raise the skill cap? Losing my entire state when hitting R increases the randomness. If I had a true "next piece" display I feel like there could be a version where I plan out a long fun chain
- Mentioning that you can't rotate would have helped me get started
- I'd like to not have to "unclick" blocks to select others - probably just a list of the last 4 selected, so you can change your mind without going back
- And maybe a drag interface would be helpful - either drag over the blocks to select, or drag the shape to your desired location
- Something about the graphic design of the edges of the blocks almost looks blurry to me
- Would like a more achievable "clear board"/win condition. Maybe if there are no blocks below the top row or possibly top two rows, could show the blocks that would appear next?
Great job - got to 2 once, then back down to 3, then hit three identical pieces, and said it was enough!
- would be nice to display current score, as well as lowest
- trying to get a clear board is really difficult - need to have a multiple of 4 bricks from your latest reroll (1/4) and a sequence of pieces that lets you clear all bricks (really unlikely!)
- on the flip side, it doesn't appear possible to lose, either
Not sure there's enough control with the random block addition to really strategize effectively. Gets frustrating and tedious getting to low counts and then having random additions gradually push you back. Even got to 1 block once...
- would be nice to display current score, as well as lowest
- trying to get a clear board is really difficult - need to have a multiple of 4 bricks from your latest reroll (1/4) and a sequence of pieces that lets you clear all bricks (really unlikely!)
- on the flip side, it doesn't appear possible to lose, either
Not sure there's enough control with the random block addition to really strategize effectively. Gets frustrating and tedious getting to low counts and then having random additions gradually push you back.
Maybe it's just me but ... it starts out fun then it stops being fun when there's only a line a few lines left. If the game ended after 10 re-rolls or whatever, I would replay in the hope of doing better next time. As it is, I have no interest in replaying it.
I like the idea of the Tetris expanded universe. It is interesting to see where the falling blocks are coming from, and where they are going when they disappear. When you play Tetris you are only playing in one part of a larger sequence of events.
One small thing, clicking each block is a bit tedious. It would make this feel a lot more effortless with two tweaks:
1. Drag alone the blocks to mark them
2. Select every block for me when it's unambiguous which tetramino I'm trying to draw
So if I had
[R]eroll abcdef
x xxxxxx 3
xx xx xxx 2
x x xxx 1
xx
xx
xxxx
And I click on d1, you should immediately drop the box since it's impossible to choose another tetramino (or another location of box) that includes that cell, and would be a valid move. Same goes for a3, since the only valid play would be that specific T.
However, if someone chose e1, since theres two different options for a box in that space, (top left d2/bottom right e1 and top left e2/bottom right f1) you have to wait till the second cell selected (or third if they select upwards) to drop the box that fits.
Does that make sense? It would just make play go a LOT faster.
I really like it. I've setup myself to win a few times so far, but never got the right blocks to finish: https://i.imgur.com/Sci8KEU.png Then again I didn't play it a whole lot just a few minutes. I like how your score is the minimum score, though considering that I almost finished it (luck based), it's probably too easy.
There was a cottage Silicon Valley business that sold a mouse input TSR for Welltris called "Mouse Commander" that did what it says on the tin. The line drawn logo on the manual, that came in a plastic bag with the diskette, was a mouse sitting on a tank mixed with *tris elements. I can't find a single reference to it on the web.
Great relaxing game for a hot Saturday night. I think the best addition given that it already has fruit machine mechanics would be a "hold" feature. This would add a bit more strategy at the end when you have clusters of 2 or 3 blocks and you have a piece that could be useful if the next random drops fall optimally in that cluster.
My "lowest score" is 4 and there's literally no strategy possible to finish this game without big chunk of luck. I think I'll keep playing a few more hours but I don't see any way to beat that 4 tbh.
(if you managed to finish, again, it's pure luck, no strategy)
1. I badly want the ability to rotate pieces. Perhaps it's too strong to have this universally, but maybe i get 1-3 piece rotations recharged on each Reroll?
2. Having multiple of the same orientation piece isn't great, but a few times i got 3 pieces in identical orientations. This is really fun-sucking and i'd either code that case out or weight it to be very unlikely.
3. UX-wise it would be great to be able to hold my mouse down and drag across pieces to highlight them instead of needing to click on each block individually.
Feedback aside, i really love the concept here and think it's a great first pass. Some UX improvements i think could make this a really addicting game. Awesome job.