[2022] Couch play needs spell cooldown UI

Hi Shabby!

I know it's not fully informational (like, it doesn't say how many seconds are left until it's back), but the wizards' healthbars have little icons above them that show which spells are available. The gameplay 101 video (second video on the store page) does a good job of explaining those.

In a very early version of the game, I tried putting full cooldown indicators all around the outsides of the screen, but you get used to looking in a specific corner for your cooldowns, and then there's no guarantee you always get that corner in a couch game so we shifted to a more minimal, on-the-wizard approach. Another benefit of the on-wizard approach is that you can also tell at a glance what spells your opponents have available.

Hope that helps!

Brett

Very fair! Thanks for the feedback :)

Hi MeteorHead!

Are you talking specifically about couch play? Or having more than one player on a single PC? If you are playing online on your own PC, you already have the option to toggle spell cooldowns on from the pause menu. Actually, when we started working on MageQuit 6-7 years ago, the cooldowns were initially as you described, around the edges of the screen. In the theory, it sounds great, but the issue we ran into immediately was, players get used to looking at a certain part of the screen for their cooldowns, but since everyone in couch mode is looking at the same screen, there's no guarantee that you'll always get the same corner or side of the screen every time you play. The above-head cooldowns are also crucial for knowing what spells your opponents has available at a glance. I know having just an icon with a color means you have to memorize all the spells essentially, but this we the best middle ground we could figure out given the constraints.

Anyway sorry for the ramble, I probably over explained my point 😅
Glad to you hear you and your friends are enjoying it though!!

Brett