[HN Gopher] Show HN: Influence, a Go-inspired 1-minute board game
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Show HN: Influence, a Go-inspired 1-minute board game
Author : jawslouis
Score : 91 points
Date : 2021-06-15 20:12 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (cintrest.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (cintrest.com)
| cdubzzz wrote:
| The animations are a bit sluggish. I kept missing clicks on tiles
| that were finishing animations from a previous turn. Maybe I was
| playing faster than I should have been but it made things
| somewhat confusing.
| cowvin wrote:
| Yep, same here. The animations are way too slow. For whatever
| reason it seems to wait like a second after you move to pulse
| influence. There's no reason it should wait.
| jawslouis wrote:
| Now that you mention it, there does seem to be a bit of a lag
| before that animation starts. Will look into it.
| jawslouis wrote:
| Thanks for the feedback. What device are you on - mobile,
| tablet, desktop? I am wondering if the animation is taking
| longer on devices with less processing power.
|
| I could also add an option in the settings to disable
| animations, for those who like to play fast.
| cdubzzz wrote:
| Desktop -- an MBP that should have enough processing power.
| An option to disable animations would be ideal. But I was
| also just trying by doing without reading about the game at
| all so maybe not a huge priority (:
| jawslouis wrote:
| Thanks for letting me know!
| falcor84 wrote:
| Nice! Gave me that old school Hexxagon vibe
| grimgrin wrote:
| I did win the first game but noticed you mentioned difficulties,
| clicked hoping it wasn't on Easy. It was! ha
|
| For people in this thread, if you're into abstract game design in
| the hex/table space, Nick Bentley creates some games I find very
| interesting, though haven't played. Bought some generic tiles
| once, hoping to eventually try out Circle of Life:
|
| https://www.nickbentley.games/circle-of-life-an-ecosystem-si...
|
| His "best" list:
|
| https://www.nickbentley.games/category/my-best-games/
| qsort wrote:
| Hi, a couple of comments.
|
| First, I understand you were trying to make an approachable
| presentation, but the rules as you presented them are incomplete
| (how does influence work? what is a "threshold"?), and I think
| for a board game that's a big mistake. What makes games like
| those cool is that rules work deterministically, even for games
| that involve randomness. Having to guess the rules is something I
| actively dislike.
|
| Second, have you considered a square board instead of an
| hexagonal one? Using Go terminology, it feels like the groups
| have too many liberties.
|
| Other than that, the game is pretty good. I feel it captures the
| attack/defense territory-based gameplay of Go perfectly.
|
| Have you tried to measure the first move advantage?
|
| edit: Wow this thing is a drug. Hard AI is deceptively good, I
| managed to tie a game 25-25 after several attempts, but you
| definitely can't afford to be sloppy if you want to stay afloat!
| scrooched_moose wrote:
| It seems like there's a bug if you drag your mouse from the board
| area, off the board, then back on; it will automatically select
| the first unclaimed tile the cursor hits. I just progressed the
| game to a 14-36 loss by just waving my mouse randomly without a
| single click.
|
| It seems to require some fairly fast movement, but I did
| accidentally trigger it a few times when I was trying to play for
| real.
|
| I've tested on Firefox 89 and Chrome 91.
| chewmieser wrote:
| Fun game! It wasn't always immediately obvious where exactly I
| could play, but I imagine the more you play the more it clicks
| too.
|
| I also agree with your decision to not use numerical indicators.
| It would definitely make things too complex and the graphical
| representation you have is pretty elegant as-is. Optional if at
| all.
| zokier wrote:
| Neat. While it would draw away from the visual elegance, the game
| would be bit more playable if it had numeric indicators, both for
| current level of influence and the change for next turn.
| jawslouis wrote:
| Thanks! I did think about numeric indicators but didn't want to
| introduce too much complexity. Would also take away from the
| fun if players had to check the numbers for many cells each
| turn.
|
| Still trying to figure out the best way to show that
| information.
| chris_st wrote:
| Maybe some kind of vertical line through the hex, say green
| on left, blue on the right, and as the line moves away from
| the middle it's obvious which side is gaining influence
| there? When it hits one side or the other, it's locked.
| dddw wrote:
| Yeah I agree, but maybe have also non-numbers as an extra
| option.
|
| very nice game, will pass it around to fellow-go players
| shoo wrote:
| i agree that there is a "legibility" issue. the game doesn't
| communicate the state of unlocked hexes or the rules of how the
| threshold to lock hexes. It wouldn't necessarily need to be
| numeric indicator. it could be a visual indicator on a hex to
| communicate that a hex will lock to a particular colour next
| turn. For even more usability, the game UI could update these
| indicators for all hexes when the player hovers over a hex (if
| you place here, then this is the immediate result you will
| get..)
| lainga wrote:
| Maybe press-hold TAB view them, like the production markers on
| tiles in Civ 4
| jawslouis wrote:
| That's a good idea! For those on mobile though, perhaps a
| button to toggle the view?
| jawslouis wrote:
| At the end of every turn, each tile influences its neighbors and
| imparts some of its color. Tiles with a dark border can no longer
| be selected.
|
| The rules are simple but it takes awhile to master. What is your
| best score against the Hard AI? I got 27 (me on green) - 23 (AI).
|
| Would you want to see some sort of match-making to play against
| others online?
|
| See demo gameplay or view the source code at
| https://github.com/jawslouis/Influence-Game
| neogodless wrote:
| I got 29 vs 21 on Easy Blue AI on my first attempt.
| jawslouis wrote:
| Better than my wife's first attempt :)
| SimonDorfman wrote:
| Interesting. Instead of just using shades or green and blue,
| would you consider displaying numerical values too? I was
| confused about how close the tiles were to flipping to my
| color.
|
| Side note: I'm working on a game that has some similarities
| that might interest you: https://simondorfman.com/volcanoes1
| jawslouis wrote:
| Looks like one of the consistent pieces of feedback is for
| numeric values :) Will think about how to implement that.
|
| Checked out your site too. Looks interesting!
| isaacremuant wrote:
| I tried it on Firefox mobile and when I lose in the second
| difficulty level I can't really see anything but the "game
| over restart" message.
|
| I'd like to be able to see the score and the layout to
| analyze the game.
|
| Really nice job, though! Fun concept.
| sundaypancakes wrote:
| Wild, I made something extremely similar a couple years ago (also
| inspired by Go) called Quagen (https://quagen.io). I like your
| use of hex and the UX better than mine. Nice job!
| jawslouis wrote:
| Wow our ideas were really similar. I read your blog post - even
| how we came up with the idea was similar! I too played a lot of
| Hearthstone, and thought of adding a new digital element to a
| board game. Seems like Go was a natural fit :)
| dddw wrote:
| This is fun. a bigger field maybe even more!
| CGamesPlay wrote:
| The small board size and easy AI combo was too easy as a starting
| point. But I started to lose against the Medium AI. The
| animations are a bit lengthy. I think the ideal numeric indicator
| would show the number of turns (stone placements) before the
| space "locks" itself to a particular color.
| jawslouis wrote:
| Appreciate the feedback! The number of turns before lock is an
| interesting indicator. There are some corner cases that I'd
| have to think more about though - e.g. when a tile is almost at
| the threshold but at a deadlock (both colors are evenly
| surrounding it)
| alttab wrote:
| Well done.
| mdoms wrote:
| This is very cool and fun. My only issue is it's hard to know if
| a move is going to make a tile reach threshold, or even if a tile
| is already at threshold.
| KMuncie wrote:
| This is very good. Any way I can play 2 player against my wife?
| mihaifm wrote:
| Set the AI to None for both players in the settings, that
| should do it.
| jawslouis wrote:
| Thanks! Yes you can play 2-player - just disable both AIs in
| the setting.
| roetlich wrote:
| In the settings you can disable the AI. I had a lot of fun
| playing against my girlfriend!
| [deleted]
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