Judge feedback

Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.

• Fun little game. It is a bit difficult to understand the system, but once you do it is quite fun. The only problem is that it is difficult at start, but once you build a powerful combo it keeps rolling, probably, indefinitely. All these spell combos, while cool and all, most of the time are used not in a meaningful way, but rather as the only option. As a result, from tactical point of view, it's not as diverse as it might seem at first. The game is ok sized for 7drl. Actual gameplay is more like puzzle and less like roguelike.

• This is a fantastic entry. The central mechanic is exactly what you want from a 7DRL: beautifully simple with all kinds of interesting emergent properties. The game is balanced well enough to be challenging but quite beatable, and the scoring mechanic is a clever way to get the best of both worlds by letting players see the whole thing but still keeping it highly replayable. It's tight and polished, and the graphics are gorgeous to boot.

  The only criticism I have is that it wasn't terribly clear at first just how the spell wheel worked, and it took a few playthroughs before the concept finally clicked. That's mostly down to me being dense, but I think it could also have been aided by some more in-game cues. But that's a very minor gripe for an amazing game.

  Not a ton to say about this one, because it speaks for itself - it's a game that's supremely easy to pick up and complex enough to spend many hours on. Amazing work.

• Really impressive effort here, Jere. I'm really glad I got to play your effort.

  I feel like I may have struggled more if I hadn't have played some of Brough's efforts in the past - namely, 868-Hack. It made it notably clearer what was going on with picking up powers, and I can imagine a new player might struggle with that. But - you clearly wear Brough's influence on your sleeve, and have a good understanding of what makes his games work.

  I was impressed by the depth of the spell system and the (slightly deranged) variety of monsters. I still struggled with a bit of clarity about exactly how it worked, but I was able to do better by the end of my playthrough than at the start. I think the difficulty was good, but it crept up on you. Generally, I felt most deaths were my fault.

  This game is a highlight of this years competition. Thank you.