First Bull Run - Scheduled for release Jan 2, 2025

[Valixon]

Havent seen a fix come down for it yet so going to mention it here just incase. There is a image that didnt load up properly on the page where the regiment is marching after getting the orders to leave the ridge we took. Its the page that starts with a lieutenant shouting left march.

[cascat07]

I noticed when I went to shattered unit and then to the left flank during the leaders recon I could go back to the shattered unit and replay all those same choices.

Also in the epilogue I got my character named as Thomas [surname].

[Eiwynn]

Congrats on reaching the milestone of a completed demo, @Dan_Rasmussen !!

I’ll try to read the demo this week.

[Dan_Rasmussen]

Thanks @Eiwynn!

Edit: @Valixon Turns out I didn’t add the “.png” which caused the glitch. It’s been fixed. Now that the writing is done, I am going to create all the remaining maps and standardize the image size and get it all in there.

@cascat07 I thought I fixed that but I left out one line of code. Good catch. It should be fixed, now.

[Cataphrak]

So, I tried this out yesterday, and I had a pretty good time with it (got captured trying to hold Henry House Hill, but I got a colonelcy out of it so it could have been worse). I don’t have a lot of suggestions at the moment, and I think the fundamental structure is sound for a compact little single-battle experience, but I do think there could be a bit more breadth of choice and reactivity there, as well as maybe some better feedback on some of your choices.

One thing which I got told very early on when it came to designing for Choicescript is to try to make every choice have at least three options, so a narrative doesn’t seem too restrictive or binary. A good example, I think, is how you only offer two backgrounds. While being able to choose between a West-Pointer and a local politician lets the player experience of basically two of the most common ways someone could find themselves an officer in the Volunteers, I think the options are still a bit too restrictive, and that you’re leaving some options on the table that could be used to explore some of the other elements of the American Civil War.

Consider, for example, a third origin: a 48er, who fought for Kossuth, or Hecker, and therefore has more of a grasp of warfare than the civilian (especially if they previously served in a “real” European army), but less of an understanding of the theory than a West-Pointer. In addition, it’d give you a chance to show the perspective of a relatively recent immigrant, representative of the hundreds of thousands who eventually fought for the government. I know you’ve ruled out the idea of a Freedman officer for authenticity reasons, but 48ers were a major source of recruits - including officers - for the Union, and the fact that most of them were diehard radical-liberals or socialists meant that they had an ideological fervour for the cause of abolition which a lot of their compatriots might have lacked.

A second suggestion I’d like to make related to reactivity: one of my issues with the game as written right now is that a lot of the choices you make are done without a lot of context as to their potential implications and consequences. You aren’t really given a lot of information to make informed decisions. I’m assuming this is to replicate the fog of war, and to allow players to take actions that might seem a good idea at the time.

What I’d suggest doing is peeling back some of this fog of war specifically for the origins who have a grasp on the relevant field of expertise. That way, a West-Pointer might be able to grasp the military situation more easily (and thus, have a player who gets provided with more complete descriptions of what the options in front of them actually mean) while a Politician might be more able to read what his men are thinking and how close they are to breaking at any given moment.

I’m mostly just spitballing here. Feel free to take or leave anything I’ve just said. It’s a good little game already, and I’m looking forward to release.

[Random_Person]

The GOAT has passed on his wisdom!

[Dan_Rasmussen]

Thanks for the detailed advice! By the way, I played Choice of Broadsides years ago and loved it. Aubrey/Maturin is my favorite book series.

48er is fabulous advice I hadn’t thought of. It’s a group I’ve been particularly interested in for a while (wrote a poli sci paper about Franz Sigel in college.) More backgrounds has been on the to-do list for a while, but that idea is probably going into the game.

As for fog of war, yes, that was my intention. Having the player background impact it seems like a great idea. I hope I have a chance to add that.

[Cataphrak]

For the record, Broadsides was the first choicescript game I played too (I just did the little spinoff/fan sequel, I never worked on the original).

[Dan_Rasmussen]

Ah, ok. I must have misread some post somewhere.

[Cataphrak]

Another suggestion that came to me:

I’ve noticed that most of your interaction within the story is either with your superiors or your company officers, both of which have sort of fleeting presences in the story because (obviously) they have other places to be.

I’d definitely suggest adding one or two “constant” presences as well, ones who’d accompany your MC and are available for more regular interaction or characterisation: maybe a senior NCO on one end to serve as the representative of your enlisted men, and a junior officer serving as an adjutant on the other, as something of a protege.

In either case, you’d be able to show off another perspective on the war and on combat - and being as they’d be fictional characters instead of historical figures, you’d be more free to kill them off.

[Dan_Rasmussen]

Yeah, I’ve had the issue of superiors/subordinates resulting in less character interaction. I do have an adjutant and a Sergeant Major in the story. The SgtMaj is pretty minor, only cropping up occasionally. The adjutant is there most of the time, but he isn’t really a constant presence in the story. Maybe your suggestion is to just have the two characters closer and regularly interacting with the main character. I agree, it seems like the right move.

As for killing off characters, I’m happy to do so whether they are real or not. In my other books, I tend to be like GRR Martin, slaughtering main characters and supporting characters alike, haha.

I appreciate the feedback.

[Dan_Rasmussen]

Minor update released. Would like if someone can test it out. There’s a few minor text changes, but the biggest change is the addition of a customized character portrait. I have also updated the stats screen to show photos of some of the regimental officers next to their names. It should be easy to test without playing more than 5% of the game.

[ChanceOfFire]

One image isn’t loading.

Character portraits aren’t showing side by side on my iPhone (unlike my laptop).

You could consider making the all the character portraits one large picture instead.

Edit: I checked the rest of the stats screen, and I think all the other images are working correctly.

[Dan_Rasmussen]

Thank you! The order of battle image was too large. It should work now.

I actually don’t hate the zig zag look… But maybe I can just put them into one image like you say. I am just thinking it might be too large for dashingdon. No clue if there’s an image limit on the actual publish.

[ChanceOfFire]

@Dan_Rasmussen

The order of battle image was too large. It should work now.

It works.

@Dan_Rasmussen

I actually don’t hate the zig zag look…

Might not be the best for a smartphone, since screen real estate is precious and folks might not enjoy too much scrolling.

@Dan_Rasmussen

No clue if there’s an image limit on the actual publish.

I don’t think there’s a limit, but probably try to cap it around 50mb. I remember a comment saying that most choicescript games are around 20-30mb.

[Dan_Rasmussen]

I have combined the images so they should appear correctly on mobile and computer.

50 mb should be doable since I’m shrinking all my images to one uniform size anyway. Hopefully the maps won’t be too much.

[ChanceOfFire]

Another thing. I can’t remember which appearance I chose to get here, but the pictures aren’t scaling properly on a smartphone. These were all taken when I was playing on my iPhone.

Bad Example

Needs to be something like this below, can’t remember which appearance this was (maybe you could combine all five pictures in the above example to make one big picture, with a blank picture on the bottom right):

Good Example

[Dan_Rasmussen]

This is very helpful, thanks! I will see if it can handle six in one image.
Right now the portraits are 8 beards, 7 goatees, 6 mutton chops, 5 mustaches, and 4 clean shaven. There is no particular reason for the numbers, mostly just the amount of cool pictures I was able to locate in a couple hours of searching. But the variety of numbers seems to be creating this issue.

Edit: This should now be fixed.

[Dan_Rasmussen]

Minor update published. New features listed here:
UPDATES
detached skirmisher units to appear separately on the stats screen.
standardized portrait sizes and formats.
player and regiment state customizable.
Stats page shows Willcox as regimental commander during the henry hill charge.
re-added the ability to talk to all four regimental officers at the beginning.
Minor fixes and improvements.

[Random_Person]

I think it would be an interesting idea if once the series is over, if we choose a state that is a territory or has a large slave supporter like Virginia, we could see an little epilogue if we gained enough that shows how states in the modern day will view our MC and he could of brought fame or redemption to the his home state