Initially, I had scheduled to release Frail’s Alfa at the end of January, and surprise surprise, that didn’t happen. I’ve been trying to cram as much in the Alfa as possible and of course, that didn’t work. So now I’m trying to remind myself that the Alfa isn’t a representation of the finished game, ánd that the Alfa mostly is going to land in the hands of developers. Therefore I would not need to worry so much. It’s all about the core gameplay feedback.
Eventually, I pushed about 80% of the features and bugs that I wanted to put in the Alfa towards the Beta and even towards the Release build. Leaving me with some doable deliverables for the coming two weeks.
Another thing I stopped doing is immediately trying to fix bugs when running into them, which feels very counterproductive. Thing is that in 80% of the time, these bugs (and honestly often missing art and features) don’t affect the Alfa build at all and are, at this point, just wasted time. So with the schedule cleared, I should be able to get to the Alfa in time.
Putting the different systems together for the Alfa build did make me reassess my core gameplay loop though. Frail isn’t a big game, but having focussed so long on the smaller details and mechanics of it just makes me doubt if the core loop is fulfilling enough. It’s a common feat during a development cycle I know. You could break any game down making it blehhh. After a while all these ideas and narratives just get foggy. I reckon that’s another reason to do the Alfa. Having some folks play the game longer than me just shoving it into their hands in a social gathering and being able to get a more in-depth experience of the thing.
Frail’s Alfa will be available in the first week of March. If you’re interested in providing some feedback on the game and I haven’t asked you already, just contact me through mail or social. I really can’t get enough feedback on the game so any help is much appreciated!