Note: This post discusses the gameplay systems of the game in detail and hence contains some spoilers for the game.

We decided pretty early on that the game would be entirely based upon various minigames. But all the minigames would revolve around talking with people.

Another constraint we kept in mind was that all minigames will revolve around the WASD keys.

Pulling Mochi Back

Since the main premise of the game was about stopping Mochi from spreading gossip, this was the mechanic that went through most revisions.

The basic idea was, every time Mochi sees someone, this minigame comes up. If the player succeeds, then mochi stays quiet. Otherwise, mochi spreads the gossip to that person.

Come back!

Gossip spreading is a whole 'nother mechanic, so that requires its own post. For now, just imagine that if even one person gets to know the gossip, it starts spreading to the whole school.

As mentioned in the introduction post, we wanted the minigame to feel like a game of tug-of-war. Button mashing was the closest thing to "pulling" that we could think of. It's way better than just holding a button at least.

First Version

The first version of the game just had a bar with a threshold. Getting over the threshold means you succeed, otherwise you fail. The minigame keeps getting harder every time you trigger it so there's a nice difficulty curve over the course of the level.

Simple enough!

Make this pretty and we're done... right? Well not quite.

After a bunch of playtesting, we figured out that a whole lot of button mashing doesn't really account for good gameplay. 

It's not the 2000s anymore...

Button mashing is not a very fun thing to do. Players get bored of the minigame very quickly. Another issue with button mashing is that it's braindead. There's not a lot of thinking the player has to do to press a button as fast as possible.

Are ya havin' fun yet?

We needed the minigame to evolve over the course of the game, so it stays fresh, and we needed more intentionality required in winning the minigame.

One of our friends, after playtesting, recommended that instead of having a threshold, mark an area that the player has to stay within. We really liked the idea. It doesn't change the minigame by much but still adds a lot of variation every time it pops up.

Since the marked area can be anywhere in the bar, we can also make it ping-pong from side to side. That'll help change up the minigame at later stages.

The Prototype

We quickly whipped up a prototype of this minigame before one of the playtests. It wasn't the complete thing, but it had an area that the player had to be inside to win. The area keeps getting smaller the more you trigger it, and a smaller area means there's more places where it can be placed.

Stay inside the white area to win

It was enough to get a feel for it.

However, seeing this minigame in action in the hands of an actual player made us realise that the annoyance of the previous minigame was something we needed. Making the minigame more interesting meant that people won't avoid the minigame as much, which is completely antithetical to the premise of the game.

This version also takes away the feeling of pulling Mochi back. Narratively this version feels more like a balancing act. As if the conversation has already started and you need to stop her from spilling the beans.

This and other narrative aspects of the game will also be discussed in detail in a future post.

So... this won't work either

But it wasn't all bad. The area not being at the same place every time certainly meant that the player had to pay closer attention to the minigame. The main issue was it not feeling like you're pulling the character.

Then we tried flipping the minigame's parameters. Till now, pressing the correct button filled the bar and the bar kept reducing over time. Changing that to the bar filling up on its own and the player having to bring it back looked like this.

Okay... this feels a lot better.

The area being placed randomly (or moving around in later levels) was also something we didn't want to let go of completely. So, we restricted the area to always be on the left half of the bar, while the minigame always starts from the right half.

The area is still placed randomly but always on the left half

Good. It's like the best of both worlds. Now...

How can we add more depth?

One more way to add intentionality to the gameplay was giving more hardcore players a bonus that can benefit them in their gameplay somehow.

We added a smaller area in the bar. Ending the minigame in the bar will give the player some kind of bonus.

But what's the bonus?

Skill based bonuses can be a tricky thing. You want to reward hardcore players for being more skilled, but if the bonus makes the game easy for them, then the hardcore players can just breeze through the game.

A small gameplay detail that we haven't discussed here is cooldown.

After triggering the minigame, regardless of whether you win or lose, the character goes into a cooldown. This is not as much of a mechanic as it is just a moment of respite for the player so they can step back and recuperate before moving on. Think i-frames after taking damage in a platformer.

Giving a longer cooldown as a bonus would just make the game easier for skilled players. So, we decided on a speed boost instead. Very helpful if used well but can go out of control pretty easily if you end up in front of another NPC.

So, to take advantage of being skilled in the minigame, you need have map knowledge and be aware of your surroundings. And who knows, maybe you want to end up in front of more people to maintain the speed boost?

Putting it all together

Put all of that together with some prettier visuals, and you get this...

Where do you think you're going?

We're pretty happy with this version of the minigame. At the point of writing this post, we haven't playtested this version with anyone. So, we might revisit the minigame and make more variations based on feedback.

Wow this was a long post! I guess we can cover the other minigames in a separate post. (Don't worry, the other ones didn't go through so many revisions)

Wishlist the game on Steam!!

Teammates: Anushka Karmakar and Nimish Rohankar