Zombie Tactics – Post Mortem

PLAY ZOMBIE TACTICS

LESSON LEARNED: Make Something Smaller!

I feel like this is the same story every single LD. The point at which your game works completely, has EVERY feature you want, AND has some final content in is really the halfway mark.

From there you have to playtest like crazy to “find the fun”.

I feel like the wisest choice is to make a game you’re sure you can finish in just a few hours. A – you’re probably wrong and it will take longer. B – you need to allocate > 50% of your time to discovery, tuning, and adjustment.

Zombie Tactics has ~90% of the features I intended to add, but it feels empty and the fun isn’t really there. There’s a kernel of something interesting, but it’s only barely touching it instead of fully living inside it.

Smaller scope and more iteration!

LESSON LEARNED: Work with people!

I normally go solo but this time I worked with my girlfriend who provided animation and art. It was so much more fun working as a team! I hesitated at first because I wanted to enter the compo, but let’s be real – I probably wouldn’t win the compo alone, and working with people is so much more rewarding.