Wow, this was a rush!

Thanks everyone, for organising and playing my game.

Funny how the thing that was easiest to program was the thing that contributed most to how difficult it was to play. The movement of the boat was the first thing I finished, and a stuck with it for good and for bad. I found out relatively quickly that it was making my game quite hard, but is was central to my idea for the game and I felt it was to late to come up with something new.

The controls where literally floaty, though adding animated oars helped a lot for how floaty it felt. I tried fiddling with everything else, like the starting speed of the stream, the collision radius of the boat, the width of the safety corridor and the number of rocks. At a certain point I observed for many new players giving any input became more of a liability than an asset.

Also a lot of players played the game in a way that was much harder than was intended! Sorry to everyone who rowed upstream for giving you a negative score! Also turning the boat around and rowing in the direction of the stream instead of rowing against is much harder than keeping your bow pointing upward. These ways of playing where enabled by slowing down the starting speed of the stream, but speeding it up again would also have made the game harder.

So I started the game with a screen with instructions, which helped a little, but not enough. I admit they were not very clear. There is a very good chance that without the knowledge that comes with making the game I myself would not have understood the instructions. I'm not sure I would have read them at all.

While writing this it occurs to me that maybe the game over screen would be good place to acknowledge the player for playing the game in a way that is extra challenging, while hinting there is a way that is easier. Maybe make separate high-scores!

If I do this again I will make more diary entries. I hadn't fully figured the site and I was more focused on making my game.

Good by!