Thread: The Lands: Share what you like

Experience Title: Alpha Season 4 Hub

• What you liked: Screens with the game tutorial! 🍿

• Impression: The screens are really effective and interesting to watch. I don’t recall seeing such video feature in games elsewhere 🤔

• Conclusion: The video screens are underrated! This is one of the awesome features available, and it definitely needs to be utilized:

1. They are convenient and add detail without impacting performance.
2. It’s great that the tutorial can be shown in a pre-recorded format, as this significantly simplifies game development. Videos can always be updated and re-uploaded. This makes updating the tutorial much easier.
3. I bet this could be a profitable niche for motion designers.
4. Neural networks for video creation are gaining momentum; perhaps in the future, in-game screens could synergize with communities creating AI-generated videos. Online cinemas, award ceremonies for indie AI films, etc.
5. Undoubtedly, this is a key feature for native marketing. It’s a new market worth exploring 💯

I'll think of more to say about them and add it in the comments.

Experience Title: META WORLD: MY CITY

What you liked: It's a bit like a monopoly.

1. I liked the style of the NPS, especially the cowboy with his hat and rope over his shoulder.
2. There's also a cool game element in the form of a flashlight that really lights up the darkness.
3. It seemed like an interesting mechanic of buying a house in the game, on a large notepad I could choose the style of the house and its color
4. This is just a tiny detail, but the developers really put effort into making the object movement look good. It was hilarious to see myself carrying a huge dog on my back in the game!

Conclusion: The game is great, and it would be interesting to see how it develops further. Plus, the idea of using a flashlight just begs for a horror game!
P.S. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find the game on the map to take a screenshot of the big notebook.
Maybe one of you will find the game and take some screenshots of the big notebook and the quest where you carry the dog on your back 🥲

Experience Title: Alpha Season 4 Hub

So, here’s my quick take on Alpha Season 4 Hub—overall, a surprisingly solid experience, and I’ve got a few cool things to share.

What you liked:

1. First off, the character models from Ragnarok? Spot on! Those guys know how to nail textures. The detail they’re putting into these avatars is insane.

2. The Terminator-themed entrance scene cracked me up. Models look solid, but the decal textures, in my opinion, were kind of slapped on a bit too roughly. Could be smoother, but it’s still cool.

3. I’m really into how they’re doing the portals in the metaverse context. Arriving at a train station through a portal is such a nice touch, and it seems like the studio’s making portals a big focus. It’s a standard thing now – Fortnite and Roblox use it all the time, and it just works.

4. In the earlier seasons, I wasn’t a fan of how many in-game shops there were for gear assets. But here, they’re blending it all in smoothly. Not too pushy, which is nice. Hopefully, other devs catch onto this approach and promote their paid assets a bit more gently.

5. Another great feature that I really enjoyed: you can play a free game first, and then after finishing, you get a ticket to access an exclusive game or some reward. Haven’t gotten my ticket yet, so no clue what’s inside. But I’m curious! 👀

Conclusion:
Honestly, I’m liking this season more and more in terms of content quality. Tried a few games, and I can see Game Maker turning into a legit tool for creating simple games. At this point, you could probably make a decent Hotline Miami or Fez clone on here.

Alpha Season 4 Hub

Experience Title: Cut the Rope: Om Nom Panic

What you liked:

1. Really like how they designed the game and managed to bring over the original style. I have my doubts about whether this would work for something like Attack on Titan—I haven’t tried that one yet—but for Cut the Rope, it actually works quite well.

2. From a gameplay perspective, they tried to copy the Bomberman mechanics, which could definitely work. The only downside is that there was a bit of a lag with the effects.

Conclusion:
If you look past the bugs and unfinished parts and focus on how smoothly it’ll run in the future—and it definitely will—then the angled camera and the Bomberman-style experiments give a lot of hope for more games like this. Not too far off from something like Brawl Stars or IO games...

Cut the Rope: Om Nom Panic

Experience Title: Tom Yum Planet: The Secrets of Authentic Flavor

In this experience, we get to learn how to make Tom Yum soup, and it’s awesome. I didn’t take enough screenshots and now I regret it. The game is simple and kid-friendly, but that’s exactly what it should be.

What you liked:

1. Just look at that intro the loading screen!

2. Surprisingly, we got to choose our character's gender! The team showed a great way to do this, and it's definitely worth noting.

3. Finally, a clear, effective control tutorial! Sadly, not everyone can pull this off in a clean and understandable way, but they nailed it.

4. I got a real kick out of the simple but fun quest where you dress up as an ingredient for making Tom Yum.

5. The little dioramas were just so charming! It made me think—why not make a game set in a micro-world at this diorama level? I might try testing that out sometime to see how it works and write something up about it.

6. This experience really deserves some attention because it’s such a fun way to gamify just about anything. Now, for example, I know how to make Tom Yum soup.

Conclusion:
I have to say, they really put in the effort here. Yes, it’s a bit rough, yes, it could be more polished, and yes, the style isn’t perfect in every spot, but they managed to create a complete experience that’s genuinely enjoyable. The developers proved that it’s possible to make a solid and clear tutorial, include a character selection option, and offer well-structured quest navigation, making it a comfortable game to play.

Tom Yum Planet: The Secrets of Authentic Flavor

Experience Title: Dungeon Siege - Stonebridge

What you liked: This is the first real attempt to create a proper RPG using the tools Game Maker provides at this Alpha stage. It’s visually appealing and fun (especially if you’re a kid).

1. Stonebridge is the first mini RPG I encountered while exploring the new season. It’s a small world based on the Dungeon Siege universe, and I genuinely enjoyed it. The textures are great, and the minimalist modeling is unobtrusive.

2. Level Design: It's solid, standard, and doesn’t raise many questions. Yes, the camera still shakes a bit, but that’s an issue with the engine, and I’m sure they’ll fix it eventually.

3. Quests: Damn, they work, and they’re not annoying! I found them interesting and engaging, and I was honestly a bit sad there weren’t more of them.

4. I didn’t know, but apparently, you can make time-of-day dependent quests in Game Maker. It's awesome that this functionality exists.

5. Dungeons: While the dungeon design isn’t the best, it's not bad for a first attempt. At times, it was hard to find my way, but it wasn't a big issue.

5. The biggest highlight for me was the portals. Finally, someone created decent portals, hinting that more content is coming.

Conclusion: To sum up, this is the first game I've seen so far that’s exploring the direction The Sandbox community of developers could take. Portals, solid quests, and good graphics. I really hope that all games in The Sandbox will eventually reach this level and that developers will standardize some approaches to building quality mini-worlds on this platform.

1. I’m still convinced they need to fix the void beyond the LAND borders—it kills the vibe. I plan to write a bigger post on this soon because, as it stands, this is a major shortcoming in the engine that we can’t see neighboring LANDs.

2. This game lacks scale. One LAND isn’t enough, but that’s not a dealbreaker, as Dungeon Siege has enough potential space to create a proper mini-world for exploration.

Overall, I enjoyed it.

Dungeon Siege - Stonebridge

Experience Title: Color Catch

What you liked: Oh wow, this is probably the hardest game of the Season. I haven’t even beaten it yet! The game is fantastic, especially when you play with friends—I got to play with @LiuFogel, @Kinein, @oddwhocanfly, and some other people. It felt like everyone was having a great time. It’s a perfect example of a game where the level design and balance really make it work, way more than fancy graphics. Sometimes it’s easy, then it gets harder, and the further you go, the tougher it gets. I really hope I’ll finish it soon!

Conclusion: Obby games are amazing. They’re super simple to make, and it’s awesome to see more of them on the platform. Adding this kind of mechanic is definitely worth it if you want to boost player retention in a multiplayer experience.

Color Catch

Experience Title: Ms. Donuts Tycoon

What you liked: Awesome mini-game! It took me about 30 minutes to complete, and everything worked smoothly. It’s really well-made, and you can tell the project has room to grow with more mechanics and structures. Plus, the animations are incredible! This is a new level of quality in The Sandbox.

Conclusion:
This season stands out from previous ones because the developers started experimenting with Tycoon mechanics. Even with the limited functionality of Game Maker, experiences in The Sandbox now feel more like real games. I’m eagerly waiting for Game Maker updates to see even more projects like this. It’s clear that once this project moves out of Alpha, we’ll be able to make some truly exciting mobile gaming experiences.

Ms. Donuts Tycoon

Experience Title: KUSINA

What you liked: This is Overcooked. There’s a map with multiple levels. The controls are super intuitive, and the animations are fantastic!

Conclusion: A great, simple game. It still surprises me how people manage to create such fun games using a raw engine. Vaux Machina will definitely be a leader on the platform if they keep making high-quality mini-games like this. You guys are doing an amazing job!

KUSINA