detach balls or speed up?

I currently like how detaching works (just clicking on it), so speed up would be cool.
Maybe, instead, making a button to order all of your unused goo balls to the point you click?  I find that when I go into the meta-game i usually have around ten missing balls, that have apparently wandered off screen. 

Nah, the system is just great atm. It requires some extra consideration in how heavy your tower gets.
People will come up with their own solution to problems like too much balls on the tower of goo corporation, like  the seperate cube containing all balls. People tend to like finding stuff like that on their own(well at least I do).

So I'd say the right mouse button is great for speeding things up.

Yeah, in the next update we will have the right mouse button be able to speed up the balls, but only once the level's criteria has been met. I kind of like it so far. And it also means we can use the right mouse button for "something else" before the criteria has been met.

I would love it if the right mouse button was used to detach balls, it would make levels with green gooballs much less frustrating. On the other hand, a speed up button would also be good...

Indecision... :-\

Well, depending on the species, the left button either works or not for detaching.
What I'd love to see is being able to adjust the connections, (pull) strech the triangles
of structures I've build, so I can connect points that would otherwise be blocked.

Case in point:
The Goo Corporation chapter/area:
The structures of the towers tend to not allow building completely evenly.
The balls that I am trying to attach as vertical or horisontal structural support:
1. Do not "show" a line between the points
2. They Attempt to join the hive and attach themselves to the "grid", rather than create a line.

Defenitely need an detach button... in world of goo corporation.. the tower is swarmed with black goo's really annoying to select a "bridged" goo
as "moving" goo always make selection super hard

[quote author=kyle link=topic=4.msg14#msg14 date=1204701528]
Yeah, in the next update we will have the right mouse button be able to speed up the balls, but only once the level's criteria has been met. I kind of like it so far. And it also means we can use the right mouse button for "something else" before the criteria has been met.


Time bug shortcut?

[quote author=kyle link=topic=4.msg4#msg4 date=1204693423]
detach balls or speed up?


Detaching would be nice.

Also, I find it anoying when the Goo stares at my cursor,
when I'm trying to click on a the structure under it.

Way to differentiate between picking up a ball and manipulating the structure?

Got an idea that would satisfy the "speed up" idea, and be useful in normal play as well... basically, Goo Whistle, you right click and it makes a whistle blowing noise and all stray goo attempt to come to where you right click.

[quote author=twincannon link=topic=4.msg235#msg235 date=1204904216]
Got an idea that would satisfy the "speed up" idea, and be useful in normal play as well... basically, Goo Whistle, you right click and it makes a whistle blowing noise and all stray goo attempt to come to where you right click.


You know, that's a might inspired.  You could use it to 'wrangle' your goo in larger projects too.  Like when I'm building my WoGCo tower and I need to reinforce the bottom a bit.  Quick goo whistle and down they come, they'll start migrating back to the top like they usually do once I let go but at least for now I've got ample goo to build with instead of scrolling all the way to the top or over to my goo rack when I need one.

Plus it would allow a way to alleviate the whole "Can't remove a ball from the structure because it's too busy being swarmed by goos".

You could even make it an 'item' that you pick up later so it doesn't effect the difficulty of the earlier levels (Which for some areas is enhanced by swarming goos getting in the way).

This whistle thing is a really good idea. Someone on the beta list recalled there was a similar mechanic in Pikmin (great game btw!). I think we will most certainly add this.

Now that it's 2008, does everyone have a second mouse button? If I make a puzzle requiring you to shift the weight of a structure by wrangling the balls to different sides, will some people be stuck forever?

This may be ridiculously obvious, but I've seen professional game designs lack it anyway:  Being able to edit the controls.  Is it that hard to let the player assign keys any way they want?  Anyway, it'd be super if ya did.

[quote author=kyle link=topic=4.msg251#msg251 date=1204928785]
This whistle thing is a really good idea. Someone on the beta list recalled there was a similar mechanic in Pikmin (great game btw!). I think we will most certainly add this.

Now that it's 2008, does everyone have a second mouse button? If I make a puzzle requiring you to shift the weight of a structure by wrangling the balls to different sides, will some people be stuck forever?


Please add this feature! It is a *brilliant* idea and instantly adds another dynamic to the gameplay without making the controls more complex. I dont think too many people would get stuck with this kind of puzzle. I actually thought this dynamic was already in place when I started playing until a few experiements showed otherwise.

I think it would also make you feel much more attached (pardon the pun) to your structure if the gooballs behaved this way.   

Maybe a good way to introduce the concept would be the golden comedy classic of a bunch of people/gooballs running back and forth across a ship so it does not capsize. I saw this kind of skit in many a silent film!

Yay to the whistle idea! 
Kyle, I'm pretty sure everyone has a second button.. If not, you can always make keyboard hotkeys anyways.  You could have hotkeys for pick up, detach, speed up, and whistle.

The whistle is an excellent idea.  I'm with Dil when it comes to secondary control schemes.  You need to build the game to be the most convenient to the majority of your intended market.  It's true that there are probably many Mac users whom still do not have a right mouse button.  However, they're used to it and the inclusion of an apple key + mouse button mechanic will satisfy them plenty.


Which leads me to a second point.  I've heard a couple of times the idea that you would release your game on Mac.  I find that an inspired idea.  The Mac community is rabid for new entertainment on their platform.

My vote is for left button to only grab free goos (so you don't accidentally dismantle a structure you didn't mean to), and the right button would do the opposite, it would only grab an already placed goo, even if there are free floating goos obscuring it.

I don't think operating under the assumption that players have multiple buttons is a good idea.  Apple notebooks only have a single physical button, (Multi-)Touch input devices are becoming popular, and many young or non-computer-savvy users don't intuitively understand different types of clicks.

I'd suggest a double click for the "Goo Whistle".  It's more intuitive to the average person, and works with any input method.

And I wouldn't mind a (right-click or triple-tap?) "Goo Scatter", which makes the balls move away from the cursor for a few seconds.

For the larger maps I'd also love to see a zoom function, akin to OS X's new "Spaces".  Press the "Zoom" button to see an instant full view of the map, limited by the current scroll extents.  Then click anywhere on the screen to jump back to the normal view, centered on that spot.

I still think the game should be designed for the masses- and since most people own PCs with 2 button mice, the game should definitely take advantage of that second button, but also provide a secondary method (for example double clicking or pressing a key and clicking) to do everything.

Though it's a mouse centered game you have a whole keyboard of possible functions even for mac users and personally i find most modern PC mice have 3 buttons or more hell my cheap optical has 6 so if there was a a way to let the user asign function keys what does it matter how many buttons you have available

I have followed this discussion since it began, but I didnt have anything to add before now.

There are several issues here, foremost that people wouldnt like to use the right mouse button to to special things like grabbing placed goo balls, this makes no sense as games has PC games has used two buttons since forever, that's why we made mice with more than one button in the first place, for ex. Many FPS games use right button to fire alt shot, RTS games switches between selecting objects and moving objects with the left/right button, and most other games uses the right button to show a menu of sorts.

Anyway, here are my two cents on the issue.

For me there are two games in this game, one is the standard 'escape-into-the-pipe', and the other one is 'reach-for-the-stars', for the pipe games you will rarely select an already placed ball because it's locked (with the exception of the green goos), unlike when building a tower, when you might need to grab an already placed ball, for ex to reduce damage when the tower is about to tip over.

The common denominator here is that the left button will be used 99% of the time anyway, so that leaves the right button.

Since there are maybe as much as 20 active people on this forum, and already there's like 25 different opinions I suggest having a control-config window where one can set the input of the different functions, this would also work on the WII and the Mac, since they are very much used to pressing keys together with mouse clicks.

Here are some suggestions for the PC
Select goo ball                  - Mouse Left
Select placed goo ball           - Ctrl + Mouse Left (rarely used so I add a key for this)
Whistle (Attract goo balls)      - Right Click (Makes it easier to build quick
Scare (Scatter nearby goo balls  - S
Mouse Wheel Up                   - Zoom In
Mouse Wheel Down                 - Zoom Out

Nice response, Torqai.  I took you suggestion and changed the controls a bit:

Pick up goo ball (drop when you let go) - Mouse Left / A
Whistle (Attract goo balls)            - Right Click/Shift(or whatever)click for macs / W
Scare (Scatter nearby goo balls)        - Double Clock / S
Mouse Wheel Up                          - Zoom In / E
Mouse Wheel Down                        - Zoom Out / D
Scroll                                  - Mouse / Arrow Keys

Also, I thought it would be nice if you made special hotkeys to prefer certain goo balls.  Lets say if you have a balloon and tons of other goo balls around it, you can hold down a key and click so it prefers selecting balloons over anything else.

1 - Prefer Black / Albino
2 - Prefer Green
3 - Prefer Balloons

In my Opinion the addition of More Special Shortcuts would overkill the controll of the Game.
The current control instruction could be told  in one simple Sentence and when you start to add freaky Keyboard combination click combos then a new Player will look at the Instruction page and think "WHOW! So many shortcuts I have to memorize to move the Goo Balls?! Thats nasty!"

The only control function that I miss, is to "scare away" the Goo balls from my Current Cursor Position to grab the Sticked Goo-Ball!
Its pretty annoying to grab it, specially in the Goo Corp. Level, when the Tower is kinda small.

Well, on the Other side you could add some more Movement Functions but without direct Documentation. So the new Player didn't get scared of by the Instructions.

I agree that the game should be so simple and intuitive that even my dead grandmother could play it, but there is also another saying, 'a minute to learn, a lifetime to master', I am a fan of this and I agree that the game should be based on click-drag-drop, but with the more advanced options behind the scenes, this would mean that a leftclick also could detach a gooball if there are no other goo-balls running around.

When my kids play they game they should be able to use one button and play as usual, but when I play I would love to have a couple more advanced functions to help me.

I don't think we should bog people down with keyboard modifiers for what you want to happen. In my experience complex controls in anything but RPGs just get in the way. I think left click should remain as-is, and right click should become the 'scare' key. The scare key solves a few of the problems that would have to be put on another keyboard modifier otherwise, like the disassociating joints problem. Hover the mouse over the ball you want to grab, hold right click then left click. Balls that have wandered away from your tower? Scare them back into the tower.

I do however accept that theres lots of things that need doing, but if I had to use a modifier I'd only use one modifier key so I dont have to frantically scrabble around the keyboard to find the buttons. Something like control or even the spacebar, so left click picks up free balls or joints, left click + Ctrl isolates joints, right click scares and right click + Ctrl whistles (I've got the right clicks that way round because I personally would rather just use grab and scare)

To sum up, I personally think 2dBoy should keep it as simple as they can.

I agree with Ballisticsfood here.  Part of the allure of this game is its simple elegance.  It's just a mouse cursor and a bunch of goo balls.  There are no configuration screens, no real settings to be had.  You just launch it and start building.  The complexity should be gradually added through game elements like gooballs and terrain so that by the end of the game even you are amazed at how complex things have gotten without you realizing it.  That is a great game.

To bog things down with lots of control configuration screens takes away some of the elegance we already have.  I even support the idea of adding the controls I would like gradually (you find a whistle that scares or attracts the gooballs in one of the levels). This isn't to say I don't play games with complex controls, heck I'm a flight sim jockey.  I'm just saying it doesn't belong here. 

I have a brand new suggestion for the right mouse button.

I think that the right mouse button should push away goos, like make a little circular goo-free zone around the cursor so that you can see through to augment your structure.

I don't think this would be at all useful in the levels, and most inexperienced players wouldn't see the use for it.

So really I think it should only be like that for the goo corporation level, because thats really where I was having difficulties. When you are building at the goo corporation, you would never have to whistle for your goos, because your just building straight up and they already head in that direction.

It becomes a problem when you are trying to build more complex structures.

Maybe it shouldn't even be the regular right click, maybe like control-click, or middle mouse button, but Kyle, I beg of you, please put this function into the game so that I can see through my goo hordes to build better!

A bit off topic but...
Don't forget we have SPACE BAR!!!  ;D
Space bar - Goo run away from the cursor! Should be re-define-able, since my mouse has like 5 buttons and I want it all on my mouse.

Right click? IMHO - break it. Make the goo which is part of the tower break off the structure. I miss this button the most in the goo tower (they just gather together on the top of the tower, making it hard to de-attach anything). But it would be better to make "hold RMB to de-attach" since accident clicks could be a disaster. Scatter works as well but it will take time for them to walk away and I am not the type to wait for a while ;)

Undo button please!!! Like Backspace or back button on mouse (I also have forward button).

I realize I'm a bit late to the party but I wanted to point out that context sensitivity could be used to achieve both the "speed-up" feature and the "detach" feature.

If the cursor is over an affixed goo it detaches regardless of goos in the way.  If its not over an affixed goo and the win condition for the level has been met it speeds up. 

Just as an Idea you could make different keys to hold down on the key board to attract just that type of goo while you hold down the right mouse button. Like B + right click = attract only black goo G + right click = attract only green goo... etc.