Last week, a fan of ours decided to play Fingeance using only his right hand. Surprisingly, he did very well throughout the campaign (albeit on easy mode)! It immediately dawned on me how much decreasing the skill floor in Fingeance has helped with approachability and accessibility.

Apparently Fingeance is one hand friendly… #gamedev #indiedev pic.twitter.com/gIDGFoNSQW

— Escape Industries (@EscIndustries) July 29, 2016

In the past, Fingeance had somewhat of a split personality issue in terms of the skill levels we’re focusing on. We’d like the game to be a much more newbie-friendly shmup, but we also want a “shooter with depth” for advanced players. In our efforts to add that depth we crave, we sometimes added overly complex character abilities that turn off both newer and expert players. We’ve found that simplifying parts and lowering the skill floor had a dramatic effect in a user’s understanding and enjoyment of Fingeance.

Skill Floor: A Breakdown

The skill floor is a game design term used to describe the minimum level of ability a player must have in order to progress through the game and/or positively contribute to a team or competitive experience. For example, a game like Super Smash Bros. packs a low skill floor with its simple and intuitive controls as opposed to the comparatively complex Marvel vs Capcom 3. This term should not to be confused with the skill ceiling, which describes the amount of effort it takes to master a game/character/system.

For Fingeance, we aim for that elusive gold standard: a low skill floor and a high skill ceiling. Previous iterations tended to be high floor, high ceiling affairs. Oftentimes, we reach the amount of depth we’d like from the game, but with complicated and unfriendly character parts.

Keeping it Simple

Complicated parts are fun, right? You get to do a lot more with them than a simple part, which makes more interesting decisions.

Turns out, the cost of complexity in Fingeance was higher than we originally thought. See, the basic actions of Fingeance — dodging bullets and hitting enemies — has heaping helpings of complexity and depth on their own. Now, add to that powerful special abilities, and we have a game that’s quite hard to master indeed.

But here’s the problem: we were addicted to adding gadgets with weird, unique, and challenging uses. Here, take a look at a gadget we added a few months ago:

Finn’s gadget, Rally Cry, used to have two selections that you could pick from by moving in a direction. As you can see, while the menu is up, the player can’t actually move their sub. Instead, their analog stick gets mapped to the menu, freezing their movement in place.

Standing still for even a few moments to decide what buff you wanted to apply to your team made that gadget risky to use. The two choices had drastically different outcomes, making the best use case for them hard to determine. Also, newer players couldn’t figure out what Rally Cry even did, as they would press the button too fast to see the menu or would see it pop up without any obvious way to use it.

Here’s another example:

Dorsa’s Pickrocket had a similar issue. Aiming the part took a bit of time to adjust to, which is frequently time you can’t afford in a shoot-em-up. Occasionally, the part delighted a player on completion of a perfect shot. But mostly, it left the baffled or — worse — wishing they had another continue. We’ve made these parts easier to use by making them function as through one button press. No longer will players have to go through hoops to reach the skill floor!

Pumping in the Juice

For the two gadgets above, we’ve made big changes. For one thing, we’ve added lots of visual and audio flair. This gives players a better understanding of what they’ve done and how powerful the action is.

Finn’s Rally Cry replacing gadget is the Defense Formation, a powerful defensive boon that gives all players a large shield for 3 seconds when activated. This shield takes damage for them when until it reaches its health limit. To support this, we’ve pumped some serious juice into this part, making it a clearly momentous occasion. Finn players should feel good every time they use the gadget. Giving someone a boost to their defense isn’t nearly as satisfying if you can’t tell it happened!

Meanwhile, Dorsa’s Pickrocket was changed to a missile that explodes on impact, stealing the health of enemies in the blast radius. We’ve added a fancy explosion when it reaches its mark, and particles now come from enemies hit to all players healed from the life steal effect. Players just starting with Dorsa will now have a clear indicator on their effectiveness.

Playing as Finn and Dorsa feels much more satisfying with these changes, and future content will follow suit. How do you feel about the lowered skill floor? You can comment here on our blog, or reach us on our Twitter, Facebook, and IndieDB pages.

Escape Industries and Fingeance will be at The Bit Run in Richfield this Sunday, July 31st!

The Bit Run is the world’s first video game themed run/walk, and we’re honored to have Fingeance shown this year. The course is a 4K or 8K dash through Richfield Veterans Park, with video game themed challenges spread throughout the race, including fights in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and racing through the game Runbow. There’s even a side Pokemon Go challenge for those Pokemon Masters out there! Live music will be played during the run by Ravepulse, and a post-race concert by Do A Barrel Roll.

Fingeance will have special content for runners, including a new boss and more items to buy in the shop! Join us this Sunday at The Bit Run for a fun time!

In our recent demo release, we added in a few unexpected features. There were weird new bosses, a secret difficulty level, and of course, unlockable characters. You might have come across a few already. One character is Spike, the tanky turtle who Lane’s talked about a bit, but the other’s more of a mystery. Sparky, the slippery electric eel, is unlocked if you complete the demo’s campaign on any difficulty.

Sparky’s Electric Personality

Sparky is a little eel with a big ego. She loves to be the center of attention, and her kit allows her to dazzle audiences with showy displays of skill. She specializes in dealing huge damage bursts, and avoiding enemies by zipping around them. Though Sparky has unparalleled ability to shoot and dodge her way out of difficult situations, this agility comes at a cost. With a low starting health, and no way to freeze enemies or heal herself, using Sparky demands fast reactions and skillful decision-making.

But when you get it right? Oh, it’s gonna be sweet.

Sparky’s cannon is the Shock Trooper, a swift-shooting gun with reliable long-ranged fire. The Shock trooper is really easy to use (don’t worry! The rest of Sparky’s kit is where things get interesting), but its high rate of fire means it offers a high reward for what I’ll call “switch timing,” that is, alternating to the next target right when the first one dies. Great timing — plus the use of Sparky’s movement tool, below — lets her keep pace with even the heaviest hitters like Gil.

Teleport to the Top

Sparky’s first gadget is the Teleporter, which lets her cleverly slip through whatever comes her way. Pressing the activation button down starts the process, showing a targeting reticle in the direction of the left control stick/directional keys. Releasing the button transfers her ship instantly to the reticle.

This gadget can be used to quickly position Sparky, whether that be offensively or defensively. For example, she can quickly defeat enemies on the bottom part of the screen, then immediately teleport upwards to continue her onslaught. Conversely, she might linger in the middle part of the screen, attracting a hail of bullets, only to effortlessly warp out of harm’s way.

Now, let’s consider another feature of Teleporter. While its button is held, it’s charging. As you charge up Teleporter, its maximum range increases. This offers a great reward for watching enemies closely: If you anticipate a big attack: start charging early so you can hop over whatever the foe throws at you.

Shock to the System

The Thunderbolt, Sparky’s second gadget, is where her burst specialty comes in. Pressing the activation button starts a charging process, slowing her ship down significantly. Releasing the button unleashes the charge. The longer the charge is held, the more focused the cone is and the more bullets are fired. A fully charged Thunderbolt shot fires all of the bullets in a straight line.

If you’re facing a group of weaker foes, a quick Thunderbolt shot will make short work of them. For bigger baddies, charge it up for higher efficiency, but be ready to Teleport if you get into trouble. An expert Sparky player will determine the optimal Thunderbolt to fit each situation. We’ve seen people have remarkable success combining Teleporter and Thunderbolt use. In particular ,try charging up Thunderbolts from safety, then Teleporting into position for devastating damage on an enemy’s weak point.

Sparky has been revealed! How do you feel about this new character? We’d love to hear your thoughts. You can comment here on our blog, or find us on our Twitter, Facebook and IndieDB pages.

Fingeance has seen some insane changes in the past year, to the point where our old Fingeance demo just wasn’t cutting it. The art and audio is out of date, and several design decisions we made have been tossed out or improved. We feel the game is in a better state than a year ago, and today we’re here to prove it.

Fingeance Demo 2016

Feast your eyes on the new and improved Fingeance demo! The demo will take you through the colorful warzone of the Coral Reef, and in addition to a taste of the corrupted Kelp Forest. Play as Finn, Bubbles, Gil, and Dorsa in their quest for dolphin empire destruction.

The game has gone through some immense changes since the last Fingeance Demo, so here are a few reminders on what’s new.

Updates for the New Demo

Drastic Pacing and Rebalancing Changes

In the past, Fingeance was simply too fast. Our camera scrolled so quickly that enemies generally had only 8-10 seconds to leave an impression before the players left them behind. To compensate for this swift flyby, enemies dealt massive damage, often leading confused players to die nearly instantly. To resolve this, we made players take significantly less damage and added weight to a large number of enemies, allowing their presence to slow scrolling and force encounters. With these guaranteed knock-down-drag-out fights, you’ll find that Tank and Support characters are suddenly quite valuable.

Same Old Characters, Bold New Flavor

Your favorite fish have gotten upgrades to fight the dolphin menace. In general, each character is much more specialized than in the past, providing your team with unique strengths. The new Fingeance demo features these new character ships, as featured in our articles on Bubbles, Gil, Dorsa , and, of course, Finn. Equally important, the game is more approachable than ever before. Brand new rebalanced difficulties await, promising fun for salty dogs and landlubbers alike. Starting character loadouts are also much easier to use, leading to a far more fun learning curve.

Shop Better, Be Better

Fingeance Demo, 2016 edition also has a new fast-paced shop! We’ve removed buyable cannons and gadgets, and have implemented a new augment and upgrade system. It’s easy: pick one of three perks, then spend money on direct upgrades, then repeat for each level you complete. This is, in short, a massive improvement, as voiced by every friend who’s seen it. It’s easier for newbies and deeper for experienced players.

Variety is the Spice of Life

Fingeance has been given a graphical overhaul, with a new lighting system and more biomes than ever before. You’ll have a sample of the new Kelp Forest, with new enemies to fight and new music to jam to. Characters also react to actions onscreen with 500 new lines of incidental speech-bubble dialogue that pop up during downtime.

The Fingeance demo is out now! You can download it for Windows, Mac, and Linux. Keep up to date on the latest Fingeance news here on our blog, over on our Facebook page, our Twitter, and our IndieDB page.

Intelligent, inquisitive, and maybe just a bit paranoid (but is it paranoia if half the ocean wants you dead?), Gil has always had a reputation as a straight-shooter. Over the last year of Fingeance design, we’ve tried to give Gil abilities that reflect this straightforward, sharpshooting persona. In building Gil’s kit, we’ve tried to keep these ideals in mind:

• Gil must have 100% accuracy and long range on most or all of his weapons. Gil is, first and foremost, a sharpshooter and back-line DPS character, and his gear has to reflect that. He should also demand good aim more than most characters.
• Gil must be capable of highly-rewarding and spectacular shots. A legendary sniper lives to line up the perfect shot. Gil’s weapons, if used to perfection, should allow some amazing moments.

We quickly determined that the simplest way to allow awesome high-skill/high-reward play was to give Gil piercing attacks: if you aim just right, you might be able to score 3-5x damage on every shot! However, we hit a stumbling block: such a character is far weaker when there are few enemies onscreen. Gil was great at fighting swarms, bad at fighting bosses.

Today, we reveal his remade loadout. We’ve given his ship a total makeover to make him the damage dealing champ he was always meant to be!

Meet the Marksman

Gil’s combat role rests on his excellent damage dealing abilities, but is especially defined by how he doles it out. His specialty is decimating all enemies with ease, even if there’s something between him and his chosen target. His unique arsenal allows him to damage enemies cowering behind larger foes, hurt large groups of enemies, and burst down single targets. The massive amount of damage potential comes at a cost, however: Gil lacks any form of damage reducing or avoiding capabilities, so he’ll have to rely on his ship’s innate dodging ability or his team to keep him alive. What’s a better form of damage reduction than a dead enemy anyways?

Gil’s cannon, the Fisherman, fires piercing bullets rapidly, dealing damage to up to two targets. The way to maximize its damage output is to position yourself to hit multiple targets at a time. Try targeting higher priority enemies behind larger targets to kill the major threats while whittling down the protector.

Gil’s Great Hunt

The first of Gil’s new gadgets is the Whale Gun, a powerful tool that fires a large and fast bullet straight in front of him. The Whale Gun can be fired multiple times, but only has four bullets. If he runs out of bullets, he can’t fire again until another ammo recharges after a period of time.

Careful not to use it all, in case you need it!

This gadget can be used to bolster Gil’s already impressive damage output by either providing a steady stream of high powered shots, or a massive damage burst. Use a rhythmic fire pattern when weaker enemies are on screen to increase his DPS, then unleash on dangerous foes to finish them more quickly. Enemies with weak points are especially effective targets for the Whale Gun.

Welcome to the Light Show

Gil’s second gadget is an enhanced Laser Deploy. It creates a drone that fires an extremely deadly laser forward after a short charge period. The laser deals damage to all enemies in front of the drone. The Laser Deploy is best used to deal damage to a large number of enemies as quickly as possible. Because of its long cooldown time and high energy cost, it’s smart to save the gadget for an opportune moment.

The deployed laser drone has about a second of delay time, but is a separate entity, so Gil can use it to deal damage while he moves to a safer space. It can also be used to deal damage to multiple areas of the screen at once, and since the Fisherman can damage multiple enemies, Gil’s range of influence is massive while the Laser Deploy is active. As you might imagine, this gadget gives Gil particular power over bosses that rely on a swarm of tiny minions. The Laser Deploy can effortlessly carve a hole in minion formations while Gil peppers the big target from afar.

Gil can grab augments over the course of a campaign that can grant him even more damage ability, more piercing ability, and even a little defensive benefit if he needs it.

Do you feel Gil is the ultimate underwater marksman? Feeling Gil-ty about doing so much damage? We’d love to hear your thoughts. You can reach us here on the comments of our blog, or find us at our Twitter and Facebook page.

Dorsa has been in the game since the beginning, but she’s never really had a role that fit her character well. As detailed in our character descriptions, Dorsa is a greedy, self-absorbed fish who wants to profit from the takedown of the Dolphin Empire as much as possible. However, we’ve oftentimes saddled her with a loadout more suited for a selfless support role. We’ve asked ourselves time and again: do we want this character to be a rogue or support? And then we thought, why not both?

Meet the Rogue

Dorsa has been built from the ground up to be the best of both worlds. Her toolkit revolves around manipulating both her positioning and enemy positioning to yield the most reward for her and her teammates. Her abilities are best used when enemies have been grouped together by her excellent movement slowing capabilities. For all her utility, though, she lacks damage. She delivers less firepower than any other member of the core squad, but she makes up for it by keeping her teammates fighting and her enemies at bay.

Dorsa’s cannon is the Super Sniper, a powerful gun with a slow rate of fire. Each bullet deals high damage, but every shot counts! A Dorsa player will want to make sure that she’s in a good position to hit each bullet. Missing even a few puts a devastating cramp on your damage per second.

Icy Personality

The Ice Grenade can make many enemies in the Kelp Forest vulnerable to attack.

Dorsa’s first gadget is the Ice Grenade. It fires an explosive projectile that triggers an icy field on hit, slowing all enemies within that area drastically while it’s active. In addition to dealing solid damage in the area, this gadget makes hitting enemies with the Super Sniper super simple. A mobile enemy is rendered nearly useless while frozen, and is far easier to bulls-eye with further shots.

Proper use of the Ice Grenade will vary from stage to stage. In the Kelp Forest, it’s an invaluable tool in slowing down the hordes of aggressive enemies mobbing you from all sides. In the Cave, however, use it to freeze big enemies when their weak points are exposed, elongating their window of vulnerability.

Feels Good to be a Thief

The Pickrocket rounds out Dorsa’s loadout. This versatile weapon can be aimed in any direction she chooses while holding the gadget’s activation button down, and fires a piercing rocket on button release that deals little damage to enemies hit. Dorsa and her team are healed for each enemy the rocket hits as it travels. The ideal strategy is to line enemies up to hit as many as possible for a massive healing burst for the team. Enemies can be manipulated by positioning Dorsa or an ice field from the Ice Grenade, making the Pickrocket even more effective.

Although the burst healing from the Pickrocket is strong, it has little effectiveness when it hits only one enemy, which makes healing from many boss encounters difficult. Many bosses call up minions to fight your team off, however, so if you can survive until then, you can keep your team fighting strong well after. Don’t be afraid to wait for the right angle either! The reward for hitting many enemies is worth it.
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We’ve finally feel we’ve made a loadout that feels right on Dorsa’s ship, and still provides support utility that her team would want. Do you feel we hit the mark? Tell us how you feel in the comments below, send us a tweet to our Twitter page, or comment on our Facebook page.

Escape Industries and Fingeance will be at GlitchCon next week on April 29th!

If you haven’t heard of GlitchCon, go check out their website. It’s like a miniature Midwest version of PAX or IndieCon. Despite being relatively small and new, it’s pulled in startlingly high-caliber talent from across the United States. They’ve played host to designers from Blizzard and Riot, to speakers like James Portnow and Ashly Burch, and to dozens of local speakers, developers, and academics.

We’re not affiliated with GLITCH or GlitchCon, but we don’t mind waxing enthusiastic about this event. We may be a tiny bit biased: last year, Charles snapped up their Best Game Audio award for his work on Glitch in the System. Join us on April 29th in the McNamara Alumni Center at the University of Minnesota! There will be special performances by Richie Branson, Super Replay Live with Game Informer, and late night karaoke, not to mention all the local games your heart could desire. If you’ve been interested in trying out some of the new content we’ve been adding to Fingeance, GlitchCon is your next shot!

You can find out more at the GlitchCon website. Tickets are available there as well. We hope to see you there!

Over the past few weeks, we’ve talked about some major changes we’ve made to the shop. I left Lane a nice present in the form of new Bubbles equipment before we left on our trip to the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. That’s not the only character we’ve been fiddling with however! Finn’s got a few new tricks in his ship too.

Meet the Leader

The new Finn weapon set has been designed from the ground up to emphasize the leadership role he plays within the group. In order to do that, Finn’s been equipped with extremely powerful abilities that can change the course of a fight drastically. These abilities allow him to organize a strategy around the activation of his gadgets. It’s important for Finn to choose wisely though! His gadgets have long cooldowns, so they’ll need to be used at opportune moments. His playstyle is built with the idea of creating high moments of huge impact at the expense of higher vulnerability when they are down.

Finn’s cannon fires four bullets: two in the center, and two angled upwards and downwards from the center. The cannon deals pretty solid damage when all the bullets connect with a target, so expert play will involve positioning closer to enemies when possible to deal the maximum damage.

Turret Training

Finn’s first gadget, activated using the left trigger, deploys a fast-firing turret directly in front of his ship. This turret lasts a maximum of 3 seconds, but its time active is decreased when it takes damage from enemy collisions or projectiles. Finn’s turret has a wealth of possibilities, both offensive and defensive.

Finn can use the turret to tank enemy bullets for him, creating a wall of safety for a short time. It can be placed in more dangerous parts of a level to continue to deal damage while the team attacks from a more protected area. The turret can fiercely destroy grouped enemies, clearing a path for ships to slip through. Or, you can just use it to deal more damage. Hey, you’re the leader; you call the shots!

Finn’s Rally Cry

This idea of Finn giving the orders becomes even more literal with his second gadget. This flexible part inspires his team with powerful buffs, turning the underwater tides of any fight when used well. Finn’s got a couple shouts pre-installed in his mobilizing megaphone:

Increases the team’s rate of fire significantly for a short time.

Decreases damage taken by team over a short duration.

Obviously, these buffs can be used in a variety of ways. See the Biggest Baddest Turret’s weakpoint is open? Rally your team for extra damage. Huge line of missiles coming your way? Command a defensive stance from your team. Communication with your fellow teammates make this gadget even more powerful. For example, you could coordinate with a tank to have him/her protect the team temporarily when a Laser Grunt fires, and mount a quick counteroffensive with an offensive shout to deal with it when it’s vulnerable.

Rally Cry works with the Turret Deploy as well!

Both of these gadgets can be changed in impactful ways in between levels by buying augments in the shop, ranging from new shouts for the Rally Cry to a larger, tankier turret.

How do you feel about the Finn changes? Miss aspects of his older kit? Let us know what you think in the comments on this blog, tweeting at us on our Twitter, or commenting on our Facebook page!

Escape Industries has been hard at work to bring you new content, as we’ve shown for the past few weeks. One new feature we haven’t shown yet is a new shop, updated for the coming changes to Fingeance. This new shop should look fairly familiar to veterans of more recent builds, but there are some neat features we’ve added to help players easily buy the part they’re looking for.

The blueprints of each shop item have been simplified, resulting in a far cleaner appearance. The new shop also features small descriptions of each part, so players can take in and analyze their options quickly. The small and poorly-explained icons that once plagued the screen have been removed. Players new and old should find the new shop far more user-friendly.

Keen-eyed readers might note that there aren’t any cannons or gadgets in the new shop. Rightly so: we’ve drastically changed our approach to buyable items. No cannons. No gadgets. You can upgrade what you start with, but at the end of the game Gil will still have a laser turret, and Spike will still be able to get huge.

Why the change? On the positive side, we want to cut through the confusing, fiddly parts of Fingeance. Ever since we introduced Augments — passive upgrades to existing gear — these parts have been more attractive than top-shelf bait. With them in the shop, people felt it wasn’t worth the scrap to buy new Cannons or Gadgets (replacing and obsoleting their previous part). We decided to go with the flow and make as many clever, strategic Augments as we can. More practically, these enhancements are easier to understand, letting people get to the action quickly, if they desire.

Now, players will be able to buy augments that enhance your chosen character’s abilities in some way, possibly giving players new possibilities when bought. Each character has been rebuilt to support this change as well. We’ll be going over each character’s new loadouts in the upcoming weeks.

How do you feel about the new shop? We’d love to hear your feedback! You can comment here on our blog, or on our Facebook page or our Twitter.

Last week, we showed you some of the bosses you’ll be fighting in Fingeance, but what about the regular enemies? The smaller grunts may be weaker than their larger counterparts, but there is strength in numbers. We’ve created many new enemies over our recent push to pack each level with fresh challenges.

Ghasts

You’ll find the persistent Ghast in the Deep Sea Cave. Ghasts constantly follow the nearest player. This behavior doesn’t sound very interesting for normal enemies, until you come across a large group of them!

Area of effect gadgets, such as the Bomb Launcher, are very useful to take these enemies out quickly. Quick movement is key to avoiding their contact explosions. A player with a strong emphasis on debuffing could slow Ghasts down as well, making them easy fodder for your team.

Crab

The mechanical Crab makes its first appearance in the Coral Reef. If you’ve ever seen the Sony E3 press conference in 2006, you may be familiar with this kind of enemy. The Crab constantly peppers the screen with large bullets from its two claws, but its belly is left open to assault. Staying true to its character, it takes massive damage when you attack its weak point. If you can slip between each Crab’s firing pattern, you can make short work of these contemptible crustaceans.

Doom Jellies

Doom Jellies, corrupted by the Kelp Forest, are toxic in more ways than one. If a ship comes into contact with one of these dangerous creatures, the Doom Jelly will explode in an acidic cloud, slowing and damaging anything – friend or foe – that moves through it. Worse yet, Doom Jellies also release toxins when killed.

Crafty players can, on occasion, use these explosions to their advantage. Sometimes, when there’s a flotilla of oncoming guppy darters and you position the toxic explosion just right…

 Laser Grunt

The massive Laser Grunts carry giant cannons on their stomachs, and are some of the first responders if you manage to reach the Dolphin City. After a short charge up period, the laser cannon fires, dealing deadly damage to anyone caught in the blast. If you can defeat these enemies before they fire their cannon, they won’t be much of a threat. Otherwise, you can try to lead them into a less threatening position before they fire. Their lasers cut off access of the field significantly, so they need to be dealt with quickly!

As you can see, regular enemies can be a big threat when they coordinate. Have any battle stories to share? Let us know what you think in the comments here on our blog, by tweeting at us on our Twitter, or leaving a comment on our Facebook page.