REQUESTING FEEDBACK ABOUT SPIRIT BOW

[Bahamut123]

Lots of people have expressed that the spirit bow isn't super fun. I'm looking for feedback on how to improve / entirely redo the mechanic. Nows your chance!

[Siri]

I think it's super cool. I only have trouble if I have to aim in the middle of a fight, like with the dancing lady boss (and that's probably because I'm using a controller). By the way, the speed of which the aim goes longer is fast when using RT trigger and slow when clicking the right analog stick. Is that intentional? (btw I just beat the final boss and had to share with someone lol)

[Pebbles]

I think the Spirit Bow itself is very fun to play.

The only problem I have is that players have to constantly switch weapons for different puzzles/combat.
I think it would be better if instead of only equiping two weapons, let players automatically equip all weapons and change R1 (playing on a controller) into a *Weapon Wheel* which would let players change weapons on the fly.
This would significantly reduce the amount of times we have to go into the menu to change weapons. Hope you like this idea and can implement it in the future!

Last but not least, SUPER GOOD GAME DESIGN!!!

[Nermanater]

I only got it recently in my run, but I was blown away at what a unique and unexpected ability it was. I was thinking how tired I was of wall jump, grapple hooks, double jump, etc. from every other metroidvania game and what a fresh breath of air it was. Loving Unworthy so far!

[NeoDeltaI]

(Edit) Actually, after playing for a couple days, I take it back: The Spirit Bow takes some getting used to, sure. But after some practice it's now my go-to weapon for several enemies. Going to keep my initial thoughts here for posterity, but I've come to like the Spirit Bow in it's current form (at the time of this edit, I'm playing the beta build).

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Hi Aleks. Yeah, when I first got the Spirit Bow, I had a lot of difficulty adjusting to using the trigger and aiming with the Right Stick, and it felt cumbersome to use. Some thoughts and counter-thoughts:

1. Change the right trigger so it controls the power of the shot (based on how far the trigger is pressed).
   
   • It's frustrating when trying to hit the right spot of ground, only to have the shot power increase past too quickly to account for (especially for the sections with moving platforms!)
     
   • The catch is, how would you release the arrow? Release the trigger quickly? Hit another button? Might take some tinkering with to get the feel of it right.
2. Or alternately, use the right stick to aim and control shot power (based on how far the stick is moved.
   
   • This allows the trigger to still control the release of the arrow.
     
   • Possibly not as much fine tuned control over the shot power as option 1?
3. May not jive with the design of other weapon-specific puzzles in the game, but it might be worth changing the spirit bow into something that can be used all the time via the right trigger? Could be something where it doesn't do damage to enemies, so it's not confusingly tied into the weapon ability cooldown?

Great game overall, really happy to see you interacting with players and taking feedback well. Best of luck!

[Otter]

Making more steep arc on alternative button. So instead of U-shape it could fly in V-shape too.

[Stoon Finger]

The Father has released me of my burdensome sins many times due to my unworthiness but having mastered the art of spirit archery I was able to consume his sin quenched heart and atone. I am very satisfied with this holy relic, it supports my misguided belief that I will one day be worthy.

[Abael Kindborn]

Won`t lie, the first part with spirit bow was the part where i thought about refunding the game.
The bow overall is neat idea and can be used for interesting combat moves or enjoyable for traveling around. But THIS CONTROLS OW WHY.
Maybe change aiming to be stuck on the place when you use spirit bow and aim at better angles with movement controls. Or maybe speed up ONLY straight shots, so spirit bow could be used on combat more efficently.
Using spirit bow in Father Amandil bossfight is REAAAALLY problematic and my first time with that thing was pure hell. When i met dancer in gardens, i didn`t even bother using spirit bow.
Hey maybe just change something about Father Amandil? Like walls would disappear after some time and you could just pass them without requiring locking one of your weapon slots with spirit bow.
And how someone said changing spirit bow all the time while you adventuring is not very fun either.

The game overall is very solid but the spirit bow is the only part that bothers me.

[Grim.Jr]

it feels lacking than other weapons, maybe change the bow to rapid fire instead of splitting the arrows? Make charging the bow faster but decrease its usage.

[Swiggy]

Here are my 2 ideas for the controller users (and maybe keyboards as well)

(1) - Once the bow is drawn, have it so all you need to do is press fire (X or RB) and it is a 'fully charged' shot. Also it costs no meter.

The right stick now moves and adjusts the arc of the shot left and right only, so just the X axis. If possible you can code it to simply auto-adjust the arc so it will land on the spot on the ground you want. If there is a ledge above other solid ground then have it so when you press up on the D-Pad or the stick it will move the ground marker to the higher/lower ledge.

I hope that made sense but in essence I think it should be that we don't need to arc or charge it ourselves and the game just auto paths to the selected spot on the ground.

(2) - Change the bow completely in the sense that now when it is drawn you get the same thing as the first idea where it is just a ground marker, but now there is no actual need to 'aim' it.

In this idea you instead get a silouette of your character (or a shiny spot on the ground, etc...) and move it around the screen. When you fire the bow it shoots a huge white glowing arrow upwards and you travel with it (similar to Materialize animation for Kilns) and then you get shot 'down' to your location and materialize there.

The only problem I can see with the second idea is some of the off-screen shots you need to make (i.e. Thornvale's entrance requires a shot or two that you can't see on the screen exactly). So perhaps in those cases the sillouette can go off of the screen like the arrows do right now and it is all just calculated. You can also flag this sillouette like the current bow to not be able to go through a wall or land on spikes and all that.

(Conclusion) - I hope I at least inspired an idea here if anything, and perhaps if the worst case scenario needs to be done you just rework the whole weapon as something new, like a whip or chain that you use. Just a random idea perhaps but hopefully you can work something into the game with the bow still there, I love it to be honest and have gotten pretty amazing at using it. Funny enough I enjoy it being challenging to use for some reason but do agree it needs some tweaking to cover everyone's taste.

-Swiggy

[Edit]

I totally forgot to also add that I agree completely with Novalex. I think a weapon wheel to change out your weapons is a great idea to be able to get rid of the menu navigation issues. Simply hold the button down and use the stick to select a weapon and upon releasing the button you equip it.

You can also think about grouping the weapons and leaving the menu as is perhaps. I have yet to unlock more than 5 so far, but maybe have the main and secondary weapons but create a 'category' for the puzzle-solving/utility weapons. Create a hotkey to swap to the utility weapon of your choice by usng the weapon wheel idea for those only. That way we can easily choose what we need at the time. I would also suggest turning this feature off for boss fights of course in order to keep it as intended and not be able to switch to every weapon seamlessly and cheese a battle.

[CasualCheetah]

Would love the ability to roll out of drawing might help on Father boss fight, although he's still beatable .

It might be too much but a rebalance of the draw speed, arrow speed and arc angle might make precision playforming a bit smoother

[Nagandrea]

I think you can roll out of normal bow when drawn and still keep the drawing strength after roll ends?

My issue is how sharply it goes from small distance to maximum arc, often further or higher than I need it to be. There have to be sensitivity controls, and, personally, having it use such a short weak arc in the first half second or so isn't very nice. I might have to walk up to the light wall and tap the arrow through it instead of drawing it in challenging moments. Also, is being able to spam the bow button in melee for like five quick arrows and high dps intentional or okay? It is a big risk.

[joelaferaille]

the bow is fine and was fine even before the patch i my opinion , dont lissen cry babys and lower difficulty , its nice like it is

[Nagandrea]

Originally posted by joelaferaille:

the bow is fine and was fine even before the patch i my opinion , dont lissen cry babys and lower difficulty , its nice like it is

Do not conflate Quality of Life with difficulty. A ♥♥♥♥♥♥ control scheme doesn't mean the game is harder, it means the controls aren't good, for example. A hard fight that is hard mainly because a bow has gimmicky controls or situations like working on a charge with minor indication of when its actually a teleport arrow for example is something even the developer agrees wasn't a good *design decision*. At best, it'd be artificial difficulty, which is not good.

If QoL changes were there from the start, you wouldn't mind them. But fearing QoL changes messing with the difficulty is a dangerous misunderstanding of what the difficulty is supposed to be based upon.

[Bahamut123]

Originally posted by Nagandrea:

I think you can roll out of normal bow when drawn and still keep the drawing strength after roll ends?

My issue is how sharply it goes from small distance to maximum arc, often further or higher than I need it to be. There have to be sensitivity controls, and, personally, having it use such a short weak arc in the first half second or so isn't very nice. I might have to walk up to the light wall and tap the arrow through it instead of drawing it in challenging moments. Also, is being able to spam the bow button in melee for like five quick arrows and high dps intentional or okay? It is a big risk.

Yah spamming bow on low range reduces it's damage. I agree with you on the speed of bow charge. I personally found it OK with mouse, and a bit tricky for some on controller. If you hold down the right stick while charging the bow, it charges slower... not sure if that was conveyed well with the "teaching" message. Despite all this, I definitely need to do something to make the bow more pleasant to use, increasing the minimum shot range and then slowing down the charge speed is quite possibly just what the doctor ordered... I'll try that!

[gmcdowell2001]

The spirit bow isn't a bad weapon, I think. It's just that when you're trying to teleport with it, there's no way to control the range with a controller. It goes from minimum to max range very quickly, and once it goes to maximum, you can't pull it back, making short warps difficult. Plus, if the destination is offscreen, good luck. A possible improvement might be a zoom out feature. Or, better yet, when you target the warp ability while in combat, slow or stop all character movement and give us a cursor that we can target with. Trying to target the bow for a teleport during a boss fight is hard when the arrow won't teleport you if it accidentally hits the boss.