Would anyone care to give my golf game a spin? I released it a while back, but Ive had a fair share of bad reviews from people that dont bother elaborating on the issues they are having. I feel that there is some unforseen technical glitch that I missed and never found, or some property of the game that is confusing.

Something is holding the conversion ratio back, and I cant figure out what it is.

Can anyone find anything that may confuse or otherwise block a downloaders ability to experience the game?

Does anyone think I should simply remove the midi tune from the demo and leave it with no music at all?

http://www.cosmicinteractive.com/downloads/Goofball_Golf_DEMO_setup.exe

Well i'll be honest with you, this game needs some major reworking.


-If you're going to leave a window centered in the middle of the screen you might as well leave the title bar so we can move it around
-graphics are very poor
-menu is ugly and not very friendly ( i had to figure i had to click in the middle to launch a course, i was trying to click on a course )
-music needs to be removed or changed completely
-the controls are weird , it's confusing to have the power and the direction at the same time ( people probably don't understand them )

The programming itself is acceptable, the eye candy is probably the biggest issue.

pat.

I liked that it has some neat ideas in it that I have not seen before in this type of game.

Like patrox, I had trouble with the menu. I consider it to be a major barrier to trying the demo. The problem is that the Demo Course button does not look like a button. It is the last thing I would click on that screen. In fact, it was the last thing I clicked, right before I was going to exit the game without having played it. The bottom row of buttons actually look like buttons, making it even more confusing.

Another big problem for me is probably not as easily solved. In my opinion, it is important to be able to see entire mini golf holes to plan shot strategy. Your holes are bigger than a single screen, which isn't necessarily a problem, but I really needed to be able to scroll the screen to get an idea of the layout. I tried moving the cursor to the screen edges and using the arrow keys to try to scroll the screen. I realize this may be a major change, but I hope you will consider it.

I also agree with patrox about the window. If it isn't running full screen it should be inside a normal Windows window. My experience is that people who see this kind of thing think something is broken, because this is not how Windows is supposed to work. Putting your game in a normal window will help, in my opinion.

Finally, your installer gave a notice after the install completed that the installer software is not registered. I can see how this might put some users off, confuse them, or make them think of your product as amateur instead of professional.

I hope some of these observations help.

-Tom

Thanks guys.

@Tom, well, im hoping the demo course is the last button you pressed.....;) That happens to me too, anyone ever have the experience of finding something you lost always in the last place you look! LOL

But seriosuly.

Thanks for tipping me off to that, It looks easy to find to me, but of course it does, im the developer. Im wondering if thats the problem that the poster to download.com referred to when he wrote "Bad demo, doesn't even work right"

As for the scrolling, yeah, Ive gotten that request as well. Ive looked it over, but I dont think its possible to implement. Maybe I can have the focus not on the ball, but an imaginary point halfway between the ball and the cursor. Holy crap, you just inspired me!

As for the window, do you think I should leave it as a window, or just stick it to fullsreen by default? Also, does anyone think that 800x600 window sizes is innapropriate for the market?

Would anyone else please let me know of anything else that is flat out confusing, or would make someone think that the program is not functioning correctly?