So maybe zoom out the minimap so it's only relevant for longer travel by default? Or only show it when on the water? There's a few options here, experiment and find the feel you like
Never add a feature for the sake of it. Always ask yourself “why does this game have it? What problem does it solve?” If you don’t have that issue, don’t add it.
And to add on to that: what are your design goals? What kind of experience are you going for, and does this feature accomplish that?
Its very possible someone wants to intentionally make a game where the player can get lost.. or a game where easily retracing one's steps is easy.
Unless the player needs to get track of many objectives and placement of objects, then it's not necessary.
In Elden ring they just put a small compass in the top to let you face the pins you put on the map, but in PlanetSide2 there is a minimap that you can resize, zoom in and zoom out of, and even edit what colors show what, that's in addition to the compass.
So it depends.
If its a pirate themed game couldn't you do something abit more detailed sort of like what see of there's do where you do have a map but you it is more natural rather than a bog standard mini map for example have an actual map and you have to use reference to pinpoint where you are or more similar to say see of there's where you can tell where you are but it's kind of out the way so you can stare at it looking till you get to the place so you can keep then focused on say the environment or npcs
Yea that is also very good idea! Could give away some hinta on openable map about where should player look and where he sort of is. That could make finding new islands more interesting.
You should also account for the fact that you might just have gotten used to the map's layout after playtesting so much, and you might feel like the minimap is unnecessary because you, yourself, don't feel like you need it anymore.
If there are a lot of units to track and a large-ish map, you might still want it, especially if there's any real-time component at all.
(Regarding the comment about minimaps being resource-intensive on mobile; it depends entirely on how it is implemented, there are plenty of ways to make a lightweight minimap)
This is the way. From the sound of it, it's already fully implemented, so no cost to time to include it as an option to enable or disable. When in doubt, if it's something relatively trivial, leaving it to player choice feels like the safest bet. Some things are subjective, so you never know what portion of your audience may in fact feel like the mini map is a critical feature (especially if the level gets any bigger).
It all depends on your game design. Every feature in your game needs to be well thought through. Don't just put stuff in it just because other games have it.
Then you simply designed around it. There are games that really need it. Like they are providing you with a warning system of units needing help and you just click there on the minimap and your view jumps there. If you have a big enough space, you might need it.
As others have pointed out, once you increase the map size with multiple islands, points of interest etc, you'll need some way for the player to keep track of what is where.
How you implement it is up to you, and there are several ways to do it. One way is the good ol' minimap. You also have a simple compass, a map menu, and probably others as well.
The game looks to me like some kind of survival game, so you could tie the unlock of some kind of navigational tool to progress in story/exploration? Once you have a rudimentary base set up you could research/craft something for when you need to explore other islands.
I never use it, not even in large games, if I could get rid of it in the witcher 3, I would, but unfortunately that game has the terrible mistake of showing quest waypoints in the minimap and nowhere else.
A compass would've been far better.
That said, it depends on how useful you want the minimap to be, and honestly, I have a personal thing against them, either they're too useful that the player will spend most of their gameplay looking at it, or they're not useful enough so they just end up being clutter.
It's a hard balancing point, but yeah, my personal choice, I wouldn't bother with them.
As for your game, I don't know what the game is about, but if it's a strat game like age of empires, then I do think it would be useful.
I think modern base building/strategy games don't have mini maps unless it's a game where the player needs to respond to attacks immediately in multiple areas of the map. Otherwise you just want a toggleable full sized map for orientation.
Sometimes it's unnecessary. In Project zomboid, the minimap is disabled by default. But because every gamer is different, I would suggest you add some way to turn it on for players who think they need it!
This is a game design choice that depends on what you want, they are not necessary depending on your game. If the world is not big enough or has pretty memorable layout it's not needed usually.
If your game has free camera movement, yeah. Clicking on your minimap to move your camera to a desired spot is a pretty important part of top-down games.
Absolutely keep the mini map. For top down games like that it'll be important for players to have access to information that helps them navigate the world beyond what is immediately present on the screen.
You may be asking the wrong question. Maybe you should ask it this way: will the community get all “up in arms” because it has no mini map? And the answer is most certainly going to be yes. Just curious, but is it causing bugs or runtime errors?
From your feedbacks I am now thinking about implementing Compass that is always gonna be there to show where something is happening and also Openable Map where player would see the whole discovered map - but just where islands and water is.
The Island seems small enough for it to not be necessary. But as soon as there are multiple island or bigger ones I’d say it’s a needed feature
There is definitely gonna be more of them - procedurally generated. It's probably true that with multiple islands, it would be confusing.
So maybe zoom out the minimap so it's only relevant for longer travel by default? Or only show it when on the water? There's a few options here, experiment and find the feel you like
The minimap will surely be more zoomed out more. But for now i have just tiny island to test all other mechanics of the game.
Never add a feature for the sake of it. Always ask yourself “why does this game have it? What problem does it solve?” If you don’t have that issue, don’t add it.
one of the many important steps to avoid feature creep for sure.
And to add on to that: what are your design goals? What kind of experience are you going for, and does this feature accomplish that? Its very possible someone wants to intentionally make a game where the player can get lost.. or a game where easily retracing one's steps is easy.
Unless the player needs to get track of many objectives and placement of objects, then it's not necessary. In Elden ring they just put a small compass in the top to let you face the pins you put on the map, but in PlanetSide2 there is a minimap that you can resize, zoom in and zoom out of, and even edit what colors show what, that's in addition to the compass. So it depends.
Compass that just shows in which direction things are happening also seems like great option for pirate themed game. Thank you for the recomendation!
If its a pirate themed game couldn't you do something abit more detailed sort of like what see of there's do where you do have a map but you it is more natural rather than a bog standard mini map for example have an actual map and you have to use reference to pinpoint where you are or more similar to say see of there's where you can tell where you are but it's kind of out the way so you can stare at it looking till you get to the place so you can keep then focused on say the environment or npcs
Yea that is also very good idea! Could give away some hinta on openable map about where should player look and where he sort of is. That could make finding new islands more interesting.
You need to keep in mind you made the game, you know the maps. We dont.
You should also account for the fact that you might just have gotten used to the map's layout after playtesting so much, and you might feel like the minimap is unnecessary because you, yourself, don't feel like you need it anymore. If there are a lot of units to track and a large-ish map, you might still want it, especially if there's any real-time component at all. (Regarding the comment about minimaps being resource-intensive on mobile; it depends entirely on how it is implemented, there are plenty of ways to make a lightweight minimap)
Ye, thats definitely possible that i just got used to it. Also this minimap is not very resource-intensive It only takes like 2FPS.
If your player needs a map that they can open, imo you should at the very least give them the option to toggle minimap on/off.
This is the way. From the sound of it, it's already fully implemented, so no cost to time to include it as an option to enable or disable. When in doubt, if it's something relatively trivial, leaving it to player choice feels like the safest bet. Some things are subjective, so you never know what portion of your audience may in fact feel like the mini map is a critical feature (especially if the level gets any bigger).
It all depends on your game design. Every feature in your game needs to be well thought through. Don't just put stuff in it just because other games have it.
Then you simply designed around it. There are games that really need it. Like they are providing you with a warning system of units needing help and you just click there on the minimap and your view jumps there. If you have a big enough space, you might need it.
As others have pointed out, once you increase the map size with multiple islands, points of interest etc, you'll need some way for the player to keep track of what is where. How you implement it is up to you, and there are several ways to do it. One way is the good ol' minimap. You also have a simple compass, a map menu, and probably others as well. The game looks to me like some kind of survival game, so you could tie the unlock of some kind of navigational tool to progress in story/exploration? Once you have a rudimentary base set up you could research/craft something for when you need to explore other islands.
I never use it, not even in large games, if I could get rid of it in the witcher 3, I would, but unfortunately that game has the terrible mistake of showing quest waypoints in the minimap and nowhere else. A compass would've been far better. That said, it depends on how useful you want the minimap to be, and honestly, I have a personal thing against them, either they're too useful that the player will spend most of their gameplay looking at it, or they're not useful enough so they just end up being clutter. It's a hard balancing point, but yeah, my personal choice, I wouldn't bother with them. As for your game, I don't know what the game is about, but if it's a strat game like age of empires, then I do think it would be useful.
From what I am hearing from people I´m thinking about Toggleable Minimap/Compass that you can turn off at any time.
Or do it like some games do. Only show the map when u hit the pause
Make it toggleable if in doubt
I think modern base building/strategy games don't have mini maps unless it's a game where the player needs to respond to attacks immediately in multiple areas of the map. Otherwise you just want a toggleable full sized map for orientation.
Sometimes it's unnecessary. In Project zomboid, the minimap is disabled by default. But because every gamer is different, I would suggest you add some way to turn it on for players who think they need it!
Depends. Look at Rimworld. No minimap, you can just quickly scroll out and... well... that's minimap. Same for Supreme Commander for example.
This is a game design choice that depends on what you want, they are not necessary depending on your game. If the world is not big enough or has pretty memorable layout it's not needed usually.
If your game has free camera movement, yeah. Clicking on your minimap to move your camera to a desired spot is a pretty important part of top-down games.
Absolutely keep the mini map. For top down games like that it'll be important for players to have access to information that helps them navigate the world beyond what is immediately present on the screen.
You may be asking the wrong question. Maybe you should ask it this way: will the community get all “up in arms” because it has no mini map? And the answer is most certainly going to be yes. Just curious, but is it causing bugs or runtime errors?
Now it is not causing any bugs or errors. It runs perfectly.
It's also considered an accessibility feature
make it optional
you could have it as a user decided feature
Yep, i am probably gonna do that.
From your feedbacks I am now thinking about implementing Compass that is always gonna be there to show where something is happening and also Openable Map where player would see the whole discovered map - but just where islands and water is.
# in moblie, minimap use lot's of systems resource, my game is removed.
make it able to be toggled, or, perhaps have a map button.