Less reading, more stealing: planning a better first heist

You’ve collected a valuable haul. The lift is within reach. But there’s one more room—and every extra piece of loot makes you slower.

That’s the decision at the heart of One More Room, my iOS heist game.

Recent testers have said they enjoy the gameplay and the balance between speed and greed. They’ve also highlighted something I need to improve: there’s too much text, and it isn’t always clear how everything works when you first start.

One player described having “stumbled into gameplay” before discovering the help menu later. That stuck with me.

The next change I’m planning is a short, two-floor tutorial heist. You’ll learn by actually doing things:

• Collect loot and feel how its weight affects your speed.
• Avoid a guard’s line of sight.
• Reach the lift and learn the cash-out-or-continue choice.
• Choose a perk before entering the next floor.
• See that the same timer carries through the heist.
• Drop loot to regain speed, then escape with what remains.

There will be one short message and one highlight at a time. This will replace the repeated instructional prompts during normal gameplay. Once you’ve learned the basics, you can make your own decisions—including gloriously greedy mistakes.

Small-screen text readability is also on my list, following feedback from an iPhone SE player.

I’m building this as a side project, and specific feedback like this is helping me decide where to focus. Thanks to everyone who has given it a try.

Want to try the current beta? It’s available on iPhone and iPad through TestFlight. The new tutorial isn’t in this version yet.

Play One More Room on TestFlight

Try a heist and tell me: what made you want another go—or what made you stop?