#Nuclear throne together commandas code#

However Infinifactory doesnвЂ™t have this problem as itвЂ™s less about programming and more about an assembly line and engineering. ThatвЂ™s why SpacechemвЂ™s learning curve was so high as it also forced you to make multiple commands without the benefit of instant or immediate feedback.

#Nuclear throne together commandas code#

This means the code that youвЂ™re typing is not going to provide you with feedback for minutes or even hours depending on the scope of the program and by then youвЂ™ll have a lot of code and it will be harder to track down any problems.

There are certain exceptions like simple for loops and if statements, but if youвЂ™re trying to build something that makes use of multiple functions all working together, thatвЂ™s a different story. The reason is that many parts of programming rely on your other pieces of code to work and you canвЂ™t reliably test a program until the entire foundation is done. The reason is that SpacechemвЂ™s puzzle designs leaned more towards programming which is a very abstract concept and more importantly, one that doesnвЂ™t provide immediate feedback.ДЄny programmer can tell you that itвЂ™s very hard to compartmentalize a multi function program and test as you go along.

The thought process for both games require the player to construct a solution step by step that will solve the problem at hand but for a lot of people and including me it was harder to learn Spacechem. Spacechem was tough to learn as you were dealing with abstracted concepts that were hard to get feedback based on how you built your command chain. Both titles were about building a production chain with Infinifactory about an assembly line and Spacechem with chemicals and commands. I recently had a group discussion with Zach Barth from Zachtronics about educational games and learning and we talked about the challenges that went into someone learning Infinifactory vs. Taking this further, IвЂ™m going to tease an upcoming podcast and how two games of similar thinking and design had vastly different learning curves for me. This is also why visual learning is stronger than just reading as youвЂ™re providing the person with the action and feedback that they can learn from. The reason why action games are easier to learn compared to massive 4x games is the simple fact that any action that the player makes provides an immediate response and feedback to the player.ДЄnd this goes both ways, the immediate feedback allows the player to trace it back to their recent action and can process what happened for future situations. IE: You press the punch button and you punch someone or they dodge because of the defense mechanics.Д«ut IвЂ™ve come to the realization that itвЂ™s not the type of feedback that makes it better or worse for learning, but the time it takes to get said feedback. In a previous post I talked about how action games were better at providing feedbackВ to the player compared to strategy and 4X games and I said the reason was that you could directly see whatвЂ™s happening. Being able to see the reaction to your actions allows you to better understand how what you did directly translated to whatвЂ™s happening.

But a recent conversation that will be a podcast soon got me thinking about how itвЂ™s not the type of mechanic, but the time it takes for the feedback that impacts learning.ДЇor a quick recap, feedback is a very important learning tool when it comes to just about anything. real time systems like in fighting games. In the past IвЂ™ve talked about the differences in abstracted systems like strategy games vs. TodayвЂ™s post returns to an important point IвЂ™ve talked about before - Feedback and how it relates to learning and not just in video games.