Since I played it before, my plan was to test out the new areas and new time powers.
The underwater section took me the longest. I am not a fan of the water movement. That area might be too easily accessible to new players who are still not used to even normal movement. Backtracking was not so bad, but I wish it just was not there.
I tried to do the section with fire pillars with the projectile power, but I think I ended up softlocking myself. It never went back in time enough to give me an opening even with sprint. I am sure I just got the wrong idea, but I am just letting you know getting to the middle is possible like that.
I enjoyed the scale puzzle, the room after that not so much. The rewarded power I got is cool, but I never found any good use for it. It seemed to work on some tentacles in later area, but twisting didn’t actually move them.
I also got the cloning power in the lava area. I guess it’s main purpose is to help deal extra damage. I am happy I did not have to backtrack that section.
I stopped playing when I got to the “modern” area. I felt pretty drained doing all that in one sitting. I used sprint more than back in DD when it was unlocked from the start. My most used sub power was the projectile.
Yeah water controls are janky. The castle area has levers which need a charged attack to activate- they reverse all the traps in the area, so the fire pillars go the other way (and there's another lever in that room to get back out). The Twist ability needs you to hold up or down after you grab something, to move it back/forwards in time. Its all a whole game's worth of mechanics to dump on people in a short demo, so I didn't expect anyone to really figure it all out in one go, you've done some of the most of those new areas I made.
it's still fun. i like the new areas. i have some slowdown in the larger open areas, but that's just because my pc is trash. i'd prefer it if clicking didn't pick up objects
Really good game. The time mechanic and plot are very interesting. My only real complaints are the motion sickness from the world turning as you run and the clarity of what is a danger and whats not. There seems to be a lot of objects on the floor and sometimes it makes it really hard to tell at a glance.
Hah thanks this was actually really helpful and exactly the kind of response I was looking for! Part of my experiment was that I didn't put in a lot of control reminders and I wanted to see where players would be tripped up by not knowing the inputs. And boy oh boy. All the way through 6 levels without pressing Q to cast a spell a single time, messing around in the scale room without realizing you can pick up objects from the floor by -crouching- first. Definitely would have benefited from gating a free early spell powerup that showed the 'press Q to cast' message, though I suppose thats not an issue for the real game (start with none). Also I plan the game for game controller setups and balanced around it, but clearly needed a reminder for mouse controls that you're aiming in 8 directions with them. Although considering almost all the content I created since the last update is the 8 new spells (I made the new levels in one day prior to DD), its a bit of a shame people won't see them if they can't find the secret areas to unlock them. And it worried me you guys were going to immediately suicide by casting discontinuity when you found it, since its a risky spell
/e and the the levers are activated by charged attacks. Intending them for the first dungeon which is gated beyond the charged attack upgrade, so its really nonobvious in the demo, lots of people trying to crouch on them or press random buttons
keep in mind that i'm stupid, it was late, and i got the streamer debuff of -20 INT. if something that i didn't pick up (like the ability to pick up smaller objects) is fairly obvious to you or others, you can safely ignore my experience and chalk it up to user error.
I don't expect picking up small objects to be obvious that you need to crouch first. Its a problem of gameplay necessity. Since it uses the same button as attack, I disable it if an enemy is nearby and for minor objects, but always prompt for solid physics objects which block you, or table height objects.
The demo was always bound to be totally overwhelming since its a whole game's worth of mechanics packed into 7 levels instead of slowly rolling it over the course of a game. I'd hope to be able to have a longer tutorial and a helper monkey to navi you whenever a new mechanic is rolled out
thanks for the footage, its indeed very helpful
/e also consider as a point of pride you made it through the whole demo which is supposed to be made much easier by the ranged attack spells and debuff mechanics (spike/freeze in particular trivializes a lot of it). So you basically just did an Ironman+Despair run ^^
I am having a lot of fun with the mechanics, sound is kind of boring overall, visuals remind me a bit of the first Axiom Verge. Quite like it.
I am not so strangely enough being reminded a lot of Braid, but also Terraria when it comes to the general look and how the enemies operate. It is a very interesting project you have got going on here.
Like many of the other commenters are saying, I think you got something really good here. The mechanics, graphics, audio and content are all superb. Obviously the main menu is placeholder, so I don't think it is really worth talking about. I found myself in one situation where it was a bit frustrating and I quit the game and restarted from a previous checkpoint - this was in the underwater part with the downward water torrents, I got stuck at the bottom and couldn't get out even after using the reverse time feature to exhaustion a number of times. Not sure if this is intended to be a part of the level where you simply need to quite and reload at.
I think one of the main things that is currently missing now is the sense of story/plot/lore. I think a little bit of plot building as you make your way through the world would take this game to the next level. The sense of wonder and exploration I get while moving through the interesting landscape would be complimented by small snippets of story elements that you see along the way - why am I here, what is the purpose of this struggle?
All in all, I think you have a serious winner on your hands here. Definitely looking forward to seeing your continued progress.
First play and I'm planning on playing it longer but here are at least some comments before DD ends.
It looks really polished, the basic mechanics are nice and easy to get. I guess the main menu and UI could be a little more fleshed out so as to be at the level the art/tiles/animations are.
One thing that adds some noise is that there's lots of small objects that kinda clutter the floor and at first it makes it difficult to determine enemies like fo example the enemy plants from the rest of the objects on screen, I could see this being a design choice and if thats the case then you should probably disregard this.
First time playing. Oh man this is one of those games I feel guilty playing because it's so complete and polished already.
No bugs to report over 1hr 5m of playtime.
The combat is interesting and I love the idea of removing enemy collision hurtboxes when you get some hits on them. Feels very rewarding. Didn't find myself using the charge attack much. Projectile deflecting was cool but sometimes it did this weird interpolation and fizzled out before hitting the mob. Not sure if intended.
Levels felt fine. I don't know if it's a good idea to introduce alternate gravity (walking on walls, ceilings, etc) that early into the game but it felt natural. The one room I had a problem with that just felt wrong was the room with the key in the futuristic mecha base. The angles it puts you in just felt so disorienting and wrong. There was also a rope a bit too close to a swinging platform in one of the earlier rooms. They intersect at a point and its like weird. Other than that it was fun.
I was kind of sad when I got to a new area and there wasn't a teleporter within the immediate vicinity. I know that's a really big lame boring design thing but in a game like this I want to immediately go back and explore when I reach a new area and when there's not a checkpoint I get into "I'll go back as soon as I get a checkpoint" mode and then oops I cleared another zone. The maps DID help a lot with finding stuff when I actually got used to reading them, so there's that.
Art is charming. I love any game that lets me be a badass wizard guy. I noticed a lot of things didn't have sounds but I honestly think the game is better off with minimal sounds because the visuals are chaotic as there are many things flying around like rocks and pumpkins and wooden chests all over the place, and adding sounds onto those might just be overwhelming.
Not sure if i'm just getting old or what but I did find it hard to see enemies sometimes in comparison to the background but it wasn't too bad. This goes the same for objects that you can hit versus objects you can't, as well as little critters that are just there for flavor vs a landmine and such. Found myself hitting the air many times.
The gimmicks work out great. The initial shock of dying in one hit quickly vanished when I realized you can literally just rewind before you got hit. Even if that was the only mechanic in the entire game it would be enough to make a clever little game.
BUT obviously there's a lot more to work with than just the rewind! I unlocked almost all of the spells except for one? I think? Guess i'll give my random thoughts.
Coil: I think stuff recoils too fast and it makes stuff like the reverse-conveyor-belt-fire-trap-thing hard. Granted, I don't know if that was the 'intended' strategy for that puzzle but it definitely might be nicer if it was a bit smoother. I like that I can use it as a projectile though when fighting enemies.
Surge: Never really used this to make stuff faster, just kind of used it as a chain lightning thing (this got me killed many times from charged enemies)
Spike: The most broken one IMO. Slowing down stuff makes traps much easier to deal with, but that's kind of needed I guess. Pretty much carried me in the entire last secret level.
Backtrack: Didn't really see myself use this except once at the beginning. Maybe i'm not big brain enough to use.
Twist: There were definitely places where using this would have been better than the other spells but I didn't use it much. I think not being able to jump while using it kind of sucks.
Remnant: Didn't realize what this did until the end. Thought it would be used for dual-switch puzzles or something.
Discontinuity: The only time I ever got a game over was when using this lmao. The potential for puzzles with this thing is nuts but it's definitely scary to use which I think is a good thing.
Dash: There were definitely times I used this in conjunction with other stuff, but the weird angle it puts you at when going from above is a bit awkward.
No idea where the other spell was. I might go back for a bit and play some more and explore more stuff because it's very fun.
Sorry if it's a lot to read. Don't bother addressing anything I just wanted to share my thoughts. You made a very special game and it really deserves recognition. I hope you can get into early access ASAP!
Thanks for the feedback! I've been busy and I'm still playing other people's games to give them some feedback so I'll have more time to type a detailed response later (thanks for your details!), I just wanna give a quick tip that if you're in the big metal factory level, a screen 'above' the save spot, you'll see a doorway in the wall on the left, out of reach. And all you've got around it is some grabbable rungs on the ceiling, a big metal crate on the floor and big jet flare fires underneath them
Another great demo. Nothing to complain about except that the bosses are too easy, especially with the new remnant power. I think you should make them at least 4x tankier.
About what the other people said about the bees, I think it oddly works. There's something unsettling about the world. It gives me a feeling that there's some kind of super evil entity that controls the world and is out there to kill you, and even the super bees are part of it.
I like how there are multiple solutions for some of the puzzles. I think you should focus more on the puzzle side and even mix it with the combat because the time mechanics are very well suited for it, instead of making it a more generic game like the other comment said.
It's extremely impressive, to say the least. I didn't expect this to be this mechanically impressive as I first thought at first glance. It's shocking how this isn't on steam in early access, as far as I'm aware of? Especially after taking into account just how well it works mechanically.
Technically, it's the most impressive thing I've ever seen come out of agdg. If the mechanics or execution were lesser, I wouldn't be giving the following feedback, but as it stands I think it's worth saying.
You give us this incredible avatar, a wizard that can bend space and time to his will. And what do we do with such power? Whack little bugs and plants. Jump over spikes. Climb random structures. Nothing out of the ordinary for an SNES era platformer. In a way, it's kind of awesome how it transforms those tedious experiences into something new. You really have to relearn your risk assessment, and how to think non-linearly and experiment with how to use the mechanics.
But on the other hand, I can't help but think about the game that these mechanics want to be a part of. It's a bit like you've just created Superman, but are only facing him up against run of the mills robbers and crooks. When what you need is a Lex Luthor. Not even in terms of a specific villain, but in terms of the types of challenges you're giving to the player.
Imagine fighting an actual God. 10x your size, more powerful than you can even imagine. In a straight up fight, you stand no chance. But you are a wizard who controls time and space. When the player finishes him off, it feels like they basically achieved the impossible. Imagine traversing a crumbling necropolis, using your time rewind powers to actually interact with the far past, unlocking the secrets of the city and the long-dead civilization that inhabited it.
Anyway, sorry if this feedback is presumptuous. I don't really know where you're at with development. I just want to see the best for this project, because I see such awesome potential in it.
The main menu sucks and needs volume settings. I couldn't read the text on the save spot because I walked over it. The tutorial text should be persistent, since I can't see it after the game decides so. Dying in one hit to bees make the protagonist feel super weak and lame. Same thing with attacking things, since he can't even smash fruit, and the moth enemy is rewound instead of dying. Since looking up does nothing most of the time, I would like it better if it was another jump button. You can't access the options menu during a run. The default mouse controls suck, this feels like a game that should be keyboard-only. Having such complicated combat moves together with the time gimmick doesn't work. Is this meant to be a MMZ-like combat game, or be a Kaizo game? The two concepts work against each other. It's really unclear if your attacks are doing damage. Overall the combat/movement feels like shit. It's too complicated and unsatisfying. It's like you felt something was missing, and just kept adding more mechanics. I suggest you model it closer to Mega Man or other metroidvanias.
The graphics are great and the sound effects are neat. There's clearly a lot of effort put into this, but this gameplay doesn't do it justice.
Comments
Since I played it before, my plan was to test out the new areas and new time powers.
The underwater section took me the longest. I am not a fan of the water movement. That area might be too easily accessible to new players who are still not used to even normal movement. Backtracking was not so bad, but I wish it just was not there.
I tried to do the section with fire pillars with the projectile power, but I think I ended up softlocking myself. It never went back in time enough to give me an opening even with sprint. I am sure I just got the wrong idea, but I am just letting you know getting to the middle is possible like that.
I enjoyed the scale puzzle, the room after that not so much. The rewarded power I got is cool, but I never found any good use for it. It seemed to work on some tentacles in later area, but twisting didn’t actually move them.
I also got the cloning power in the lava area. I guess it’s main purpose is to help deal extra damage. I am happy I did not have to backtrack that section.
I stopped playing when I got to the “modern” area. I felt pretty drained doing all that in one sitting. I used sprint more than back in DD when it was unlocked from the start. My most used sub power was the projectile.
Thanks for the feedback, its always appreciated!
Yeah water controls are janky. The castle area has levers which need a charged attack to activate- they reverse all the traps in the area, so the fire pillars go the other way (and there's another lever in that room to get back out). The Twist ability needs you to hold up or down after you grab something, to move it back/forwards in time. Its all a whole game's worth of mechanics to dump on people in a short demo, so I didn't expect anyone to really figure it all out in one go, you've done some of the most of those new areas I made.
it's still fun. i like the new areas. i have some slowdown in the larger open areas, but that's just because my pc is trash. i'd prefer it if clicking didn't pick up objects
this can't be a demo.
i have seen fully released commercial games less polished than this
this game fucking gives symphony of the night a run of its money, while adding the sands of time to it, and it all fits wonderfully
well done, man
Really good game. The time mechanic and plot are very interesting. My only real complaints are the motion sickness from the world turning as you run and the clarity of what is a danger and whats not. There seems to be a lot of objects on the floor and sometimes it makes it really hard to tell at a glance.
a few idiots play time wizard
https://mega.nz/file/HagUATZT#G6Hq2vROeHI1Thkc12_dU4NYTqyQTaA0F9tmcMa-xrI
Hah thanks this was actually really helpful and exactly the kind of response I was looking for! Part of my experiment was that I didn't put in a lot of control reminders and I wanted to see where players would be tripped up by not knowing the inputs. And boy oh boy. All the way through 6 levels without pressing Q to cast a spell a single time, messing around in the scale room without realizing you can pick up objects from the floor by -crouching- first. Definitely would have benefited from gating a free early spell powerup that showed the 'press Q to cast' message, though I suppose thats not an issue for the real game (start with none). Also I plan the game for game controller setups and balanced around it, but clearly needed a reminder for mouse controls that you're aiming in 8 directions with them. Although considering almost all the content I created since the last update is the 8 new spells (I made the new levels in one day prior to DD), its a bit of a shame people won't see them if they can't find the secret areas to unlock them. And it worried me you guys were going to immediately suicide by casting discontinuity when you found it, since its a risky spell
/e and the the levers are activated by charged attacks. Intending them for the first dungeon which is gated beyond the charged attack upgrade, so its really nonobvious in the demo, lots of people trying to crouch on them or press random buttons
keep in mind that i'm stupid, it was late, and i got the streamer debuff of -20 INT. if something that i didn't pick up (like the ability to pick up smaller objects) is fairly obvious to you or others, you can safely ignore my experience and chalk it up to user error.
the game was a lot of fun, well done!
I don't expect picking up small objects to be obvious that you need to crouch first. Its a problem of gameplay necessity. Since it uses the same button as attack, I disable it if an enemy is nearby and for minor objects, but always prompt for solid physics objects which block you, or table height objects.
The demo was always bound to be totally overwhelming since its a whole game's worth of mechanics packed into 7 levels instead of slowly rolling it over the course of a game. I'd hope to be able to have a longer tutorial and a helper monkey to navi you whenever a new mechanic is rolled out
thanks for the footage, its indeed very helpful
/e also consider as a point of pride you made it through the whole demo which is supposed to be made much easier by the ranged attack spells and debuff mechanics (spike/freeze in particular trivializes a lot of it). So you basically just did an Ironman+Despair run ^^
I am having a lot of fun with the mechanics, sound is kind of boring overall, visuals remind me a bit of the first Axiom Verge. Quite like it.
I am not so strangely enough being reminded a lot of Braid, but also Terraria when it comes to the general look and how the enemies operate. It is a very interesting project you have got going on here.
Like many of the other commenters are saying, I think you got something really good here. The mechanics, graphics, audio and content are all superb. Obviously the main menu is placeholder, so I don't think it is really worth talking about. I found myself in one situation where it was a bit frustrating and I quit the game and restarted from a previous checkpoint - this was in the underwater part with the downward water torrents, I got stuck at the bottom and couldn't get out even after using the reverse time feature to exhaustion a number of times. Not sure if this is intended to be a part of the level where you simply need to quite and reload at.
I think one of the main things that is currently missing now is the sense of story/plot/lore. I think a little bit of plot building as you make your way through the world would take this game to the next level. The sense of wonder and exploration I get while moving through the interesting landscape would be complimented by small snippets of story elements that you see along the way - why am I here, what is the purpose of this struggle?
All in all, I think you have a serious winner on your hands here. Definitely looking forward to seeing your continued progress.
First play and I'm planning on playing it longer but here are at least some comments before DD ends.
It looks really polished, the basic mechanics are nice and easy to get. I guess the main menu and UI could be a little more fleshed out so as to be at the level the art/tiles/animations are.
One thing that adds some noise is that there's lots of small objects that kinda clutter the floor and at first it makes it difficult to determine enemies like fo example the enemy plants from the rest of the objects on screen, I could see this being a design choice and if thats the case then you should probably disregard this.
First time playing. Oh man this is one of those games I feel guilty playing because it's so complete and polished already.
No bugs to report over 1hr 5m of playtime.
The combat is interesting and I love the idea of removing enemy collision hurtboxes when you get some hits on them. Feels very rewarding. Didn't find myself using the charge attack much. Projectile deflecting was cool but sometimes it did this weird interpolation and fizzled out before hitting the mob. Not sure if intended.
Levels felt fine. I don't know if it's a good idea to introduce alternate gravity (walking on walls, ceilings, etc) that early into the game but it felt natural. The one room I had a problem with that just felt wrong was the room with the key in the futuristic mecha base. The angles it puts you in just felt so disorienting and wrong. There was also a rope a bit too close to a swinging platform in one of the earlier rooms. They intersect at a point and its like weird. Other than that it was fun.
I was kind of sad when I got to a new area and there wasn't a teleporter within the immediate vicinity. I know that's a really big lame boring design thing but in a game like this I want to immediately go back and explore when I reach a new area and when there's not a checkpoint I get into "I'll go back as soon as I get a checkpoint" mode and then oops I cleared another zone. The maps DID help a lot with finding stuff when I actually got used to reading them, so there's that.
Art is charming. I love any game that lets me be a badass wizard guy. I noticed a lot of things didn't have sounds but I honestly think the game is better off with minimal sounds because the visuals are chaotic as there are many things flying around like rocks and pumpkins and wooden chests all over the place, and adding sounds onto those might just be overwhelming.
Not sure if i'm just getting old or what but I did find it hard to see enemies sometimes in comparison to the background but it wasn't too bad. This goes the same for objects that you can hit versus objects you can't, as well as little critters that are just there for flavor vs a landmine and such. Found myself hitting the air many times.
The gimmicks work out great. The initial shock of dying in one hit quickly vanished when I realized you can literally just rewind before you got hit. Even if that was the only mechanic in the entire game it would be enough to make a clever little game.
BUT obviously there's a lot more to work with than just the rewind! I unlocked almost all of the spells except for one? I think? Guess i'll give my random thoughts.
Coil: I think stuff recoils too fast and it makes stuff like the reverse-conveyor-belt-fire-trap-thing hard. Granted, I don't know if that was the 'intended' strategy for that puzzle but it definitely might be nicer if it was a bit smoother. I like that I can use it as a projectile though when fighting enemies.
Surge: Never really used this to make stuff faster, just kind of used it as a chain lightning thing (this got me killed many times from charged enemies)
Spike: The most broken one IMO. Slowing down stuff makes traps much easier to deal with, but that's kind of needed I guess. Pretty much carried me in the entire last secret level.
Backtrack: Didn't really see myself use this except once at the beginning. Maybe i'm not big brain enough to use.
Twist: There were definitely places where using this would have been better than the other spells but I didn't use it much. I think not being able to jump while using it kind of sucks.
Remnant: Didn't realize what this did until the end. Thought it would be used for dual-switch puzzles or something.
Discontinuity: The only time I ever got a game over was when using this lmao. The potential for puzzles with this thing is nuts but it's definitely scary to use which I think is a good thing.
Dash: There were definitely times I used this in conjunction with other stuff, but the weird angle it puts you at when going from above is a bit awkward.
No idea where the other spell was. I might go back for a bit and play some more and explore more stuff because it's very fun.
Sorry if it's a lot to read. Don't bother addressing anything I just wanted to share my thoughts. You made a very special game and it really deserves recognition. I hope you can get into early access ASAP!
Thanks for the feedback! I've been busy and I'm still playing other people's games to give them some feedback so I'll have more time to type a detailed response later (thanks for your details!), I just wanna give a quick tip that if you're in the big metal factory level, a screen 'above' the save spot, you'll see a doorway in the wall on the left, out of reach. And all you've got around it is some grabbable rungs on the ceiling, a big metal crate on the floor and big jet flare fires underneath them
Another great demo. Nothing to complain about except that the bosses are too easy, especially with the new remnant power. I think you should make them at least 4x tankier.
About what the other people said about the bees, I think it oddly works. There's something unsettling about the world. It gives me a feeling that there's some kind of super evil entity that controls the world and is out there to kill you, and even the super bees are part of it.
I like how there are multiple solutions for some of the puzzles. I think you should focus more on the puzzle side and even mix it with the combat because the time mechanics are very well suited for it, instead of making it a more generic game like the other comment said.
It's extremely impressive, to say the least. I didn't expect this to be this mechanically impressive as I first thought at first glance. It's shocking how this isn't on steam in early access, as far as I'm aware of? Especially after taking into account just how well it works mechanically.
The time reverse spell even works with going back to the main menu.
Love the gravity defying parts of the levels.
Lot of cool mechanics introduced and lots of cool level design stuff that takes advantage of the mechanics.
You did an amazing job.Technically, it's the most impressive thing I've ever seen come out of agdg. If the mechanics or execution were lesser, I wouldn't be giving the following feedback, but as it stands I think it's worth saying.
You give us this incredible avatar, a wizard that can bend space and time to his will. And what do we do with such power? Whack little bugs and plants. Jump over spikes. Climb random structures. Nothing out of the ordinary for an SNES era platformer. In a way, it's kind of awesome how it transforms those tedious experiences into something new. You really have to relearn your risk assessment, and how to think non-linearly and experiment with how to use the mechanics.
But on the other hand, I can't help but think about the game that these mechanics want to be a part of. It's a bit like you've just created Superman, but are only facing him up against run of the mills robbers and crooks. When what you need is a Lex Luthor. Not even in terms of a specific villain, but in terms of the types of challenges you're giving to the player.
Imagine fighting an actual God. 10x your size, more powerful than you can even imagine. In a straight up fight, you stand no chance. But you are a wizard who controls time and space. When the player finishes him off, it feels like they basically achieved the impossible. Imagine traversing a crumbling necropolis, using your time rewind powers to actually interact with the far past, unlocking the secrets of the city and the long-dead civilization that inhabited it.
Anyway, sorry if this feedback is presumptuous. I don't really know where you're at with development. I just want to see the best for this project, because I see such awesome potential in it.
The main menu sucks and needs volume settings. I couldn't read the text on the save spot because I walked over it. The tutorial text should be persistent, since I can't see it after the game decides so. Dying in one hit to bees make the protagonist feel super weak and lame. Same thing with attacking things, since he can't even smash fruit, and the moth enemy is rewound instead of dying. Since looking up does nothing most of the time, I would like it better if it was another jump button. You can't access the options menu during a run. The default mouse controls suck, this feels like a game that should be keyboard-only. Having such complicated combat moves together with the time gimmick doesn't work. Is this meant to be a MMZ-like combat game, or be a Kaizo game? The two concepts work against each other. It's really unclear if your attacks are doing damage. Overall the combat/movement feels like shit. It's too complicated and unsatisfying. It's like you felt something was missing, and just kept adding more mechanics. I suggest you model it closer to Mega Man or other metroidvanias.
The graphics are great and the sound effects are neat. There's clearly a lot of effort put into this, but this gameplay doesn't do it justice.