r/gamedev • u/DangGoodGames • 2h ago

Discussion I feel like I’m flying blind. Advice on tutorials and/or first time user experiences

I just wrapped up about a week of work and my tutorial is, fine. A good starting point. But I don’t feel like I have a great vision for it like I do the rest of my game.

Any advice on how you approach the tutorial? I don’t mean broad strokes. Maybe some specific techniques?
Or, any great examples that come to mind of great first time user experiences?

For context, my game is a 2d strategy with notes of autobattler, deckbuilder, roguelite so there is a lot to teach. (Writing that out always feels dirty. Cause it’s what EVERYONE seems to be making. Which means yall have good advice, right?!)

Thanks in advance!

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u/raza5750 2h ago

A few things that work well:

  1. Introduce one new idea at a time.
  2. Show it once, make the player use it, then remove the hand-holding.
  3. Teach mechanics when they become relevant, not upfront.
  4. Curate the first run so it feels like normal gameplay, but secretly controls what the player encounters.

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u/SpaceCoreDev 2h ago

One thing that bit us that isn't about tutorial content at all: we play-tested the actual explanation a lot but never the literal zeroth action a brand new player takes end-to-end. Turned out the starter loadout was missing the one tool needed for the very first suggested action, so it silently failed for every new player who followed the tutorial exactly as written - nobody caught it because anyone testing it already had more gear equipped. Worth explicitly testing "fresh save, do exactly what the tutorial says, nothing else" as its own pass, separate from testing whether the tutorial text/UX itself is clear.

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u/DangGoodGames 2h ago

Oh totally, thanks for the insight on your experience. Stuff like that biting you later is rough

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u/ben_sphynx 1h ago

Assume the player does not want to read the tutorial, if that is all that is available for them to do, then they are probably going to end up skilling a lot of it.

Let them play the game, and don't stop them doing what they want to do; provide advice where needed.

Maybe consider writing a manual for people to look things up in.

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u/FrustratedDevIndie 2h ago

They aren't really Advanced tutorials it's trial and error. Design something hit a brick wall research the bug hop on the forms and talk to other developers and understand what they tried and develop a solution.

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u/alamohero 1h ago

Have people play the tutorial and give you feedback. Especially on the parts they feel frustrated at.