Toybox Experience: Should There Be An Ability To Grab Objects?

[Mevnie-Enn]

Alright, a little clarification may be in order.

I just got around to playing the Toybox. It's amazing! The controls feel great, the graphics, music, everything is perfect.

Then I got to roll a pink ball up a ramp. I get it that it was supposed to be challenging (?) and this might be just a silly noob "complaint", but I feel like having an ability to grab objects and move them around would make it much easier or better atleast.

Also, I was a tad disappointed that you couldn't use your tail swing attack to move the ball around, though I do get that letting the player do so would make the ball bounce all over the map and off of it very quickly.

So... Any thoughts on this? Does the Toybox+ experience have much more moves to test out? Do you think grabbing balls (eh) will be implemented in the full game? Should we atleast be able to "attack" objects like these to make them move a bit faster? Let me know!

[Taylor]

I think at the very least Yooka's hands should come up and push the ball rather than running blindly into it.

I don't think you should be able to tail hit it though. I imagine if a similar ball appears in the final game it will be textured as a boulder or snowball etc. (along with appropriate rolling sound effect) to give it 'weight'. You wouldn't expect a big heavy boulder to go bouncing around with a tail whip.

[Mevnie-Enn]

[GeneralWalnut]

I think Yooka's arms should come up and there should be a light "snap" to the object, something you can jump out of but that gives you a little more control over the object. A dedicated button would probably be too much, I think.

[Yavga]

Trowser should teach you the ball grabber

[Quarg Ranger]

I just spent a ridiculously long time playing with the marble, my conclusion is that it works pretty well after you're used to it. I think there needs to be a little more precision in Yooka's movement, but that'll come with a full release.

Boxes I would like to be able to grab, just because cardinal directions feel right when sliding a square box :).

[BanjoThreeie]

I think they should do it exactly like that minigame in Mario Party 7 where a pushing animation is played when you're running into the ball, but you aren't exactly locked to it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXwFvlYqgYQ

[moritasan2040]

Speaking of floaty objects, the barrels felt floaty. They were all over the place. Walking into a felled barrel, it shouldn't fall back into upright.

[GWoolly]

With the Ball and the Crates Yooka needs to move his arms up and push the objects with his hands rather than walking into them.

There also needs to be a light snap to the object being pushed so Yooka and the object dont slide past eachother.

A push / pull feature for objects would be most useful for some puzzles / challenges.

Also what are those crates made out of? There's litterally no weight to them!

[Grakiao]

I think a hands up and head move to one side animation should be added when interacting with objects like the ball/crates/barrels and also when running against walls.

[ReturnRare]

One of the things the team behind Conker set out to do was give Conker animations for just about everything. It really brought the game to life and was one of the things Bad Fur Day did that set it apart from other 3D platformers at the time such as Banjo. If there's one thing I want Playtonic to borrow from BFD it's the variety of animations for various actions and situations. Whenever Conker walked into an object or even a wall he brought up his arms to push against it. It's that attention-to-detail that made the game all the more charming and quite frankly more immersive. It was like playing through an interactive cartoon!

Gameplay comes first but little aesthetic touches really make everything feel more complete. For example, if Yooka is walking around and there's an NPC near by Laylee could tilt her head towards them. If you're outrunning a boulder the duo could look a bit panicked. If there's a Pagie up ahead the duo could look at in awe.

[Tomato]

I second what ReturnRare said. I love that attention to detail. The more animation, the merrier (if time permits...). Speaking of boulders rolling, that reminds me of , notice how he's panicked and checks behind to see how close it's getting. It really does add a lot of personality and charm. Another semi-recent game that did something similar is Castle of Illusion (which Grant Kirkhope composed for!).

[Rikkukun]

[Rueckkoppler]

[Nanirourou]

In the new Gamescom trailer there is some kind of a ledge grab ability where Yooka uses his tongue to grapple to specific structures. I'm assuming it's a power up move. This is fine by me.