Hi, I'm hakairyuousinn (my X account).
Dig It! was the first game I made. Dig, collect ore and get back to the surface before fuel runs out. Get greedy and dig too far, and you won't make it back.
I couldn't buy anything after the first run
It first ran on October 20. You could go down, collect ore and come back. But the first run earned about $25, which didn't buy anything in the shop.
Stuck right from the start…
I fixed that by lowering upgrade prices. The text was also so small I couldn't tell C from O or 5 from S, so I changed the font.
It had become a reflex game, so I rebuilt it
This was my own reaction after playing on my phone:
It's turned into a reflex game where you instantly pick the best route. That's different from what I had in mind.
Getting trapped in a dead end with nothing to do but wait for fuel to run out was painful too.
So I rebuilt it as a turn-based game where you could think before each dig. But an automated playthrough took 384 moves in one run. Upgrade the fuel and each run goes past 300 moves. Long…
“No sense of achievement,” so I rebuilt it again
My reaction the next day was, “There's no sense of achievement. What do people like about the popular digging games?”
That was rebuild number two. I made it dig only while you held the controls, with no fuel loss just from time passing. I added effects for digging then too.
After that, I kept adding and removing things. Tapping near the drill on a phone hid the screen behind my finger, so I moved the controls to the bottom. A warp stake could take you there and back, but the display made it look as though you needed two. People said there was nothing to do in the middle of the game, so I added hidden rooms, requests and 50 kinds of treasure.
I added an ore-processing puzzle too. After playing, my reaction was, “Please remove just that puzzle minigame we added last.” So I removed it. Ore that players had already collected was returned to them.
I submitted it to an overseas site. It was rejected the next day
On October 25, I submitted it to CrazyGames, an overseas browser game site.
Even submitting it took some work. I had to select the game folder instead of a zip file and prepare cover images in three sizes. I redid parts of the submission several times.
The reply came the next day. Rejected. The only reason given was that the game's overall quality didn't yet meet expectations. It didn't say what was wrong, just pointed me to recent games as examples of the quality they wanted.
CrazyGames starts with a human review, then lets ordinary players try games that pass. Mine failed that first review, so there aren't any playtest numbers. I still don't know what was wrong.
I decided to leave Dig It! as it was and make the next game. You can play it on this site now.
▶ Play Dig It! (how to play and tips here)