How Cards Went from a 2.6 to an 8.2 in Lethal Deal - Lethal Deal Development Log

Context: We have just finished our second sprint when developing a vertical slice for Lethal Deal. We are 8 weeks into our 12 week development cycle for this vertical slice. We have just conducted our second round of over-the-shoulder user testing. 

The Problem with Cards: In Lethal Deal, the implementation and engagement of card play was always going to be tricky. As a designer, that was kind of the point, I wanted a tough challenge to overcome. The difficulty of said challenge was confirmed when the quantitative results returned from the first round of user testing just over a week into development, 2.6 out of 10. The qualitative data confirmed that there was almost no want to engage in the mechanism, and the mechanic definitely felt tacked on to the player. 

Did we Solve the Problem?: Yes, quantitative data showed that the rating for card play went from a 2.6 to an 8.2 out of 10. Qualitative data backed up this improvement in results too.

How did we Solve the Problem?: 

• Added iconography and art to cards. -  Shortening the time between the player reading what the card does to understand what it does, and the player just seeing the card and knowing what it does is vital to the success of the card play mechanic in Lethal Deal. Iconography and art is a very important tactic to achieve this.
• Added DPS counter. - One bit of feedback we received from the first round of playtesting back in January, was that players didn't know what their cards were actually doing. They could get a vague sense if they killed an enemy with three bullets instead of six, but really there was nothing of substance there. Introducing a DPS counter gave players a concrete, black and white data point to provide feedback for their card play. 
• Designed Pre-Built Deck - Especially as this is a vertical slice, having players create their own deck in this "deckbuilding" game is actually counter to what we want. The level design, enemy design, and overall pace of the game isn't accurate to what it would be in the final version as we are essentially throwing you in the middle of the game. So having a player create a deck with no context or knowledge of what the cards do doesn't really make any sense. Therefore I created a pre-built deck designed to showcase the synergistic potential of card play. There are plenty of opportunities to get just 10 DPS builds if the mechanic isn't engaged with properly. However, if the player tries to use the cards to their maximum potential, they could achieve DPS counts of over 150.
• Vending Machines - To be transparent, this aspect of the game is still very much in it's infancy. However, vending machines, even in their current state, really give the player that agency that the need when dealing with a pre-built deck. The vending machine allows you to buy and sell cards, and once players spend about 5-10 minutes with the game, they are hungry to see what they can do with vending machines and how they can improve their deck. 

Now we added countless other systems to the game which complement the card play, to list them all would make this post too long. However, the four points above are the standout causes for such a jump in positive feedback relating to the cards (from 2.6 to 8.2/10). I can say now that Lethal Deal isn't just an FPS game with deck building added onto it, but it really is a FPS, deckbuilding game. 

​Credits:
Niall - Designer
Aspen - Programmer
Wes William - Programmer
Salvatore Tarantino - Programmer
Daniel Scott-Wilson - Generalist/Blueprints/Environment Artist
Migle Ignotaite - Character Artist
Liam - VFX/UI
Eti - Artist