The release of Unicorn Training came with the expected nervous waiting for something to go wrong. In this case, many things. Being that I've never made a game this complicated, I had exponentially more bugs post-launch than I'm used to (with games like DragCore). I had some shaky internet access all weekend so there were lots of moments where I wondered what could go wrong next. The feeling disappears when I upload a new patch, allowing me to rest easy with the feeling of having a game that works. Too bad it's not permanent because I know there are some things wrong with the game that can't be changed due to the way certain systems were designed.
I've been getting lots of feedback through reviews, emails, blog comments, and looking at numbers. A lot of it is people showing support for what I'm trying to accomplish (quality, honest games for mobile) and some were valid complaints / smack downs. People turned out to be upset about the same things I disliked about the game: the controls, repetition, useless spells, pointless items, and general bugs making the game feel like an amateur project. Which it is.
I gave up on it being perfect, but if a bug pops up and I can fix it within an hour I'll do it. I can accept it having a few problems. It's just my first game.
There are always lessons to learn and Unicorn Training is still not done teaching me what it's like to gamedev. Another lesson to take to heart is necessary extensive playtesting, through myself and more than 10 other people. I'll keep patching for now because I want to leave the game behind in a playable form, but in the future, I hope I won't need to.
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