That time in the middle
Every project has “that time in the middle” when seemingly nothing happens. While porting Ore Miner, this time came when we started porting the mathematical model that powers the game. Analysing the source code of the original, made it quite apparent how complex the model itself was, with effects being applied in non-obvious and sometime illogical ways. During this porting process, the mathematical model which powered OMC was analysed and graphed. Then it was trimmed – a lot. Connections which no longer made sense were removed, connections which no longer had any effect were removed, connections whose effect was negligible were removed. By the end, we got the model to a much more manageable state:
We said manageable, not understandable.
We also took a look at the crafting graph. Ore Miner Classic’s crafting involves four types of items: ores, materials, potions and equipment.
- ores are the base currency which can be acquired by tapping the stone on the main screen,
- materials are transitionary value carriers, which can be exchanged for either ores or crafted into potions or equipment,
- potions are the game’s temporary and instant effect mechanic – they either change the player’s interaction with the stone or provide an instant effect (such as a random item), equipment is one of the game’s passive effect mechanics – it changes the player’s interaction with the stone.
We decided to graph the cost of each material and potion in ores, and the values were all over the map. Some of the least useful potions were priced way higher than many of the most useful ones. We also graphed the crafting tree itself:
Seeing this graph, the developers of OMC started to acknowledge our original assessment that there are things which need to be improved and simplified. The crafting graph isn’t meaningfully difficult, it’s just tedious and frustrating.
Following this revelation, the potions were split into two categories: potions and scrolls. Potions would be the ones with temporary effects, scrolls would be the ones with instant effects. Potions’ effects were radically simplified, making them and their effects understandable. We redesigned the crafting graph to include these new potions and scrolls.
With the implementation of this new crafting system, we concluded the “time in the middle when nothing happened”.
