Judge feedback

Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.

• BattlelandsRL has a cute style of moving from screen to screen, mouse controls and modal combat. Yet, while those are unusual, they are mean little next to the two key quirks below. The first is that moving from one screen to another is what fully heals you. Thus, trying to fight two or more enemies in a single screen at once is very foolish and most likely to just leave you dead, as there's no penalty for fighting one opponent at a time, moving away to heal, then coming back. The second thing is that even with this in mind, the outcome of most battles is entirely random. Up until you can get a Longsword ability (which mainly drops from pixies, who are rarely killable until midgame) every available attack type has a very wide damage range (with the exact numbers completely hidden from the player), and since the player and the enemies have the same abilities, it's completely up to luck who'll get better rolls in the early battles: before your first level-up, even the most basic creatures like Wood Rats are entirely capable of unpredictably getting superior rolls a couple of times and winning. While you can theoretically flee whenever you see that the battle is not going in your favour, that also has a hefty failure chance that can occur repeatedly, so often you might as well just hope for better attack rolls next turn instead. The few non-damaging abilities are equally underwhelming: sleep lasts for just one turn and so it wears off before you can take any other action, rendering it pointless. Invisibility goes away as soon as the caster attacks, and only reduces the chance to take damage instead of eliminating it. Barkskin does do a flat damage reduction, but not enough of it to compensate ceding a turn to your enemies instead of attacking. In fact, Invisibility and Barkskin are at their most helpful when it's the enemy using them several times in a row for no reason, and thus giving you a bunch of free attacks: these AI missplays can compensate for any lucky rolls they make, and make up the difference between winning or losing. In all, BattlelandsRL features unusual presentation that deserves to be used for something more engaging than a slot machine.
• I like the simple and calm design. When you click on the game screen, @ glides around, and enemies occasionally slide in random directions. I think it's a shame that this movement doesn't have any particular meaning. I have a feeling it could be much more interesting with a little polishing.
• Overview Game seems to have much bigger potential than it shows at the first glance. I would like to see it in active development post campo, even if the current version lacks direction and balance. Completeness Mechanically Battlelands seems to be complete. Still, it needs more work, especially towards balancing the game properly. Aesthetics At the first glance, the game is aesthetically appealing very much. Soon after it turns out the game graphics style lacks a direction. There is a fancy background, stylish UI, indeed, but I also would like to see icons in matching style, and perhaps more interesting font. Fun The game idea is definitely a fun one – some time ago, I too wanted to combine *Isaac-like* dungeon generation with turn-based combat. The problem is that the rooms are empty, you can avoid any enemy, and the abilities you gain don't differ much. Idea – fun. But there is actually not much to do... Innovation The dungeon presentation reminds me Binding of Isaac and the like (you can see only one room at time, and there are no corridors between rooms – you just move from one room to another one), and it's not common to combine that kind of representation with turn-based combat. Scope Reasonable. There are some enemies, a few abilities. Everything I can expect from the 7DRL. Traditional Roguelikeness While I wouldn't call Battlelands a classic roguelike, it checks most of the most important marks.