The point is that you will also very often see your drawing getting roundedly ass-kicked without being able to do anything about it. In the demo movie you showed I was deeply rooting for the gullible girl with huge arms but had to see her getting beaten over and over. After putting that much time into your first character, only to see her not being fit for fight, I don't think anyone will be coming back.
Providing a quality product means meeting people's expectations. You say that many people expect to control their character, so let them. You're in awe of your excellent algorithm, but people are not going to be so happy when they don't get your algorithm on the first try.
You could still map different moves to different keystrokes depending on the output from your algorithm and make the result depend on the characteristics .
Last but not least, don't look down on "every other fighting game out there". The only users that will be interested in your game will be people that are deeply in love with every other fighting game. They will expect to be able to use their honed fighting game skills in your game as well, but with the awesome addition of bringing their dream character to life.
Above all, they will not get back to the drawing board when their awesome character is shredded to pieces by a simulation over and over.
"very often see your drawing getting roundedly ass-kicked without being able to do anything about it"
In reality you are able to do alot about it. Aside from the actual fight, everything you do controls what will happen. How your draw, who you choose to fight, what arena you fight in, what items or weapons you select etc etc. Simply because you are not pressing buttons at the time of action does not mean all hope is lost and everything will become a random simulation. A la the video, we are working on the balance of the game.
"The only users that will be interested in your game will be people that are deeply in love with every other fighting game"
Disagree, almost all of the people who have sent us sketches are not from the typical gamer crowd. They are drawn to the fact they don't have to control them, it takes the pressure off.
"You say that many people expect to control their character, so let them."
This is a really interesting argument that I go both ways on. History has shown both times where it pays to listen and times it pays to ignore your users requests and show them something new and better that they never even thought of. "Providing a quality product means meeting people's expectations" Or exceeding them :)
Thanks for your feedback though, you bring up some interesting points. We aren't ruling out controlling your characters forever, but for the initial launch we think it will ruin the purity of the game. We are exploring adding more decisive elements without adding live "control" if you know what I mean. Mini games etc.
The demo video isn't real the most fair representation - Petunia, the gullible looking girl, is actually really hard for most of the other characters to beat, but damage isn't her best match-up. Trust me, I was rooting for her too.
Also, you won't have a character getting pummeled again and again - but there are some opponents you might just not have any luck beating, and for those fights you want to have a diverse base of characters.
"The only users that will be interested in your game will be people that are deeply in love with every other fighting game." - I don't think this is true at all. The feedback we've been getting range from avid gamers, casual gamers, to even people who don't game, but would love to see their hand-drawn character brought to life. The problem with setting this up as a traditional fighting game is that is then becomes immediately too technical for 95%+ of our audience, which isn't really ideal.
Providing a quality product means meeting people's expectations. You say that many people expect to control their character, so let them. You're in awe of your excellent algorithm, but people are not going to be so happy when they don't get your algorithm on the first try.
You could still map different moves to different keystrokes depending on the output from your algorithm and make the result depend on the characteristics .
Last but not least, don't look down on "every other fighting game out there". The only users that will be interested in your game will be people that are deeply in love with every other fighting game. They will expect to be able to use their honed fighting game skills in your game as well, but with the awesome addition of bringing their dream character to life.
Above all, they will not get back to the drawing board when their awesome character is shredded to pieces by a simulation over and over.