Help and guidance

What can be bothering is that some mechanics are fully explained (“touch here, oh look you can use this bonus”) or hinted (“why is everything upside down?”) while others are simply not even acknowledged. One example could be the “non rootables” walls introduced on the 2^nd world with no explanations at all.

This help is crucial for the player to understand what he has to do. Even the simplest sentence can push the player to adopt a completely different strategy. Even if the mechanics seem simple at first, a little clue can be very helpful for some players. If it is crucial for the game experience that the player experiences the new mechanic himself then you can display a hint after a few failures.

This is a good way to help the player understand what he has to do.

For some players, understanding the level and how to reach the end is part of the fun. In Rootworld, it is very easy to die and start again, this is part of the game. It can be frustrating to see the ghost as it can be understood as the game taking the player by the hand, saying: "You can’t do it properly, let me show you”.

This could be less aggressive to just add a “help button” after the player died 3 times. When pushed, it would show the ghost. This way the player could continue experimenting on his own and choose when he need help.

Information perception

There are two different menus for navigation between levels. This is a major issue because it become very easy to get lost and the game isn’t about finding the right level. Even more, the 3 menus of the game are functionally very different. The interactions vary a lot between each of them and it can become very confusing.

Choose one menu for navigating between levels and stick with it!
It could also be interesting to show a name or a specific image for each level. To help the player recognize each of them.

There are numbers in some places in the game. Each of them for different things, but very few are explained. The number of fluffies is understandable, as they are the main currency, but the number of fireflies at the end of each level is very confusing. This number serves no purpose (that we know of) and can be mistaken for the number of fluffies.

Be careful to show the player only relevant information. If the number of fireflies is important, show it under the number of fluffies, if not, don’t show it at all.

Affordance

While some of them are explained in certain levels, some others are left to the interpretation of the player and can be really hard to understand. We still don’t know what the “trampoline” one does, and 200 fluffies was an expensive price for something useless.

The bonuses could show what they do with an animation before the player buys them.

Although difficulty can be fun too, be careful when asking players to react quickly. Even more when they are using touch interactions and can hide part of the screen with their hand just by playing.

Agency

This criterion is about the feeling of influence the player has about the game. Whether it is by being at the origin of his actions or leaving a mark in the game.

In Rootworld, progress between the worlds is shown as a map coloring itself the more the player has unlocked levels.

Players can vote after each level if they enjoyed it or not. Even if it is only for the test phase, this feature is interesting for players, they can leave a feedback and feel like participating in the game’s development.

Rules Discovery

The rules aren’t consistent! Sometimes levels begin with the fluffy hanging on a root, sometimes it is inside a bubble and sometimes it just stands on the ground. This is just an example and there are more cases where rules simply change for no apparent reason.

Be careful with the rules, even if the levels aren’t made by the same persons, they MUST apply the same rules. Or else it would be a new game each level.

Dring the course of the game, new abilities are unlocked at some points. When this happens, the game explains how to use them but not that they are brand new. It can be easy to believe that they were available since the begining when they weren't. For example, when we learn that roots can be launched downward and serve as a pole, the only information is the little text hint below.

When the player acquires a new ability, be sure that he knows what it is, even more if some other ability can be bought for a short time. This is one of the mechanics similar to Rayman, when the character learns a new ability, be sure that the player knows it is new and permanent.