Very fun! My complaints would only be that the melee attacks have short range and are kind of hard to understand without a fair bit of trial and error. The ending sequence was kind of hard, I took advantage of the fact that a drone can get stuck if it starts shooting at you and you run away successfully. I don't think it was on purpose, but it was a fun way to clear that section. I'll look forward to your future work!
Hey there! This game looks incredible. I almost didn't believe what I was seeing at first! All the BA art is your own work and it is great. The attention to detail is just spectacular. It felt like an SNES title!
I think the sound design is also pretty good, and your integration of Hoshino's lore is really fun.
That being said, I should make some criticisms on the gameplay. It's really hard to gauge how far your punches go in general, as you have such a tiny range, but it's nearly impossible to gauge it when facing up or down and they're obscured. Having tiles on the ground might help give a sense of depth for this.
Then there's how the drones fire. It's a little weird to me that all the obstacles are kinda not really there. Sometimes they block their view, sometimes they don't. But the bullets don't stop for anything. Even if you hide behind a wall, meaning if you're spotted from far away it's game over.
The drones also have this tendency to fire during takedowns (which should probably be shorter anyway) and a little after they die, which can screw you over. This gets particularly annoying when I get killed and have to redo everything, including getting the drops. You could make a big improvement by replenishing health with these pick-ups, I'd say.
As it stands, I've been playing this game for 2 days and I couldn't beat that crowded room because of the bullet issues.
It might seem like a lot of criticisms, but that's just because this is such a cool game idea and I want to see this go as far as possible. Reading your devlogs makes me hopeful I'll see a version with guns someday. Stay tuned for results on Sunday! This was incredible!
Oh wow! Thanks for taking the time to write this very comprehensive review Siset. I don't mind the criticisms, actually I do encourage it! Really helps me see other's perspective.
Oh and I'll respond to some of your points if that's alright:
"All the BA art is your own work"
It wasn't only me who did the art, my buddy drew Hoshino's sprite mostly, I only did the animation, the title screen art and the enemy drone's sprite.
"It's really hard to gauge how far your punches go in general, as you have such a tiny range, but it's nearly impossible to gauge it when facing up or down and they're obscured"
I do have to agree with that, maybe its the drawback of the gameplay's format or maybe I have played too much Touhou that my sense of hitboxes is a little bit wack and off. Either way, it still needs more improvement. If I do continue developing this game, this is definitely one of my top improvement priority!
"Having tiles on the ground might help give a sense of depth for this"
That is a good idea, currently I am split on how I could achieve better visual depth. Whether I would continue using tilemaps for the environment or go full "hand-drawn".
"It's a little weird to me that all the obstacles are kinda not really there. Sometimes they block their view, sometimes they don't."
I did have some trouble with Godot's tilemapping and obstacle detection that I had to outright disable most of their obstacle AI for this release, sorry about that. That is, however, going to the list of things to improve.
"But the bullets don't stop for anything. Even if you hide behind a wall"
This is one artifact that I forgot to set back to regular bullets, that is the experimental "piercing-variant bullets" that I end up not using at the moment and weren't meant for the level included in the prototype's release. My bad there...
"The drones also have this tendency to fire during takedowns (which should probably be shorter anyway)"
I don't quite understand. Can I ask for a more detailed explanation on this if possible?
"a little after they die, which can screw you over."
If you mean they keep shooting while in their death frames/animation. I intentionally left that as a design choice where the drones do a "takedown misfire" like the turrets in the portal series as a punishment for doing a non-stealthy takedown. Though I can see it becoming too unfair. I'll do note that. Maybe it'll instead become a hardcore difficulty feature instead.
"You could make a big improvement by replenishing health with these pick-ups"
Another good idea. I debated on this early on and in my opinion, it might make the game too easy since items are and will be a big part of the progression. Maybe a difficulty option where items heal might be better or just outright have healing items. Either way, I will balance the game to the best of my ability if I do end up continuing development on it.
"I've been playing this game for 2 days and I couldn't beat that crowded room because of the bullet issues."
(two days?!) Oh, the issue might be misunderstanding how the gameplay flows. For context, I intended this part of the game to go for a stealth approach like hitting the drone from behind *coughmgsparodycough*, if you break stealth, the game punishes you by making the enemies follow you until they lose sight and lose interest on you (which can take somewhat long).
The strategy involves hitting the drones in that room one or two hits at a time then ducking out of their sights. I tried to imply on the going stealthy part through Hoshino's dialogue but I'm guessing she didn't made it obvious enough. At the end, I can say this can be considered as a balancing issue that needs ironing out on my part.
Anyways, thanks again for the review and thanks for hosting this event. This pretty much gave me that little push to get this out there. Hoping I gave enough answers to your critiques.
All good. I'll say that the stealth part was clear to me, but after doing this a few times I was just inclined to keep running through the parts I did a million times.
I don't quite understand. Can I ask for a more detailed explanation on this if possible?
Basically, as you're hitting a robot, it'll keep firing into you, even before death. It's usually kinda random for what rate they'll shoot at, but if you don't get caught it doesn't happen. Might be a skill issue.
The post-mortum firing is also fine in that case, cuz if you fix those other bullet issues it'll be a lot more comfortable.
I was just inclined to keep running through the parts I did a million times.
Ah I see, I should have made checkpoints early on or at least a way to make checkpoints, I'd say, it is one of the weaknesses of the stealth format, I realized that after testing the game, there would be parts I would rather not do the same thing over and over again.
it'll keep firing into you, even before death. It's usually kinda random for what rate they'll shoot at, but if you don't get caught it doesn't happen.
There is a way to stun lock them but that requires very precise timing and frame counting. Very Impractical method but somewhat viable. I tried to simulate a situation on whether you take them down head on but risk getting shot down for every missed timing or do it the safer way and initiate a stealthier approach. The former does sound like cheesing though and is more appropriate on a speedrunning context. Overall, it works as intended but clearly needs more balancing to make other methods viable. I'll see what I can do in the future.
Comments
Very fun! My complaints would only be that the melee attacks have short range and are kind of hard to understand without a fair bit of trial and error. The ending sequence was kind of hard, I took advantage of the fact that a drone can get stuck if it starts shooting at you and you run away successfully. I don't think it was on purpose, but it was a fun way to clear that section. I'll look forward to your future work!
Hey there! This game looks incredible. I almost didn't believe what I was seeing at first! All the BA art is your own work and it is great. The attention to detail is just spectacular. It felt like an SNES title!
I think the sound design is also pretty good, and your integration of Hoshino's lore is really fun.
That being said, I should make some criticisms on the gameplay. It's really hard to gauge how far your punches go in general, as you have such a tiny range, but it's nearly impossible to gauge it when facing up or down and they're obscured. Having tiles on the ground might help give a sense of depth for this.
Then there's how the drones fire. It's a little weird to me that all the obstacles are kinda not really there. Sometimes they block their view, sometimes they don't. But the bullets don't stop for anything. Even if you hide behind a wall, meaning if you're spotted from far away it's game over.
The drones also have this tendency to fire during takedowns (which should probably be shorter anyway) and a little after they die, which can screw you over. This gets particularly annoying when I get killed and have to redo everything, including getting the drops. You could make a big improvement by replenishing health with these pick-ups, I'd say.
As it stands, I've been playing this game for 2 days and I couldn't beat that crowded room because of the bullet issues.
It might seem like a lot of criticisms, but that's just because this is such a cool game idea and I want to see this go as far as possible. Reading your devlogs makes me hopeful I'll see a version with guns someday.
Stay tuned for results on Sunday! This was incredible!
Oh wow! Thanks for taking the time to write this very comprehensive review Siset. I don't mind the criticisms, actually I do encourage it! Really helps me see other's perspective.
Oh and I'll respond to some of your points if that's alright:
It wasn't only me who did the art, my buddy drew Hoshino's sprite mostly, I only did the animation, the title screen art and the enemy drone's sprite.
I do have to agree with that, maybe its the drawback of the gameplay's format or maybe I have played too much Touhou that my sense of hitboxes is a little bit wack and off. Either way, it still needs more improvement. If I do continue developing this game, this is definitely one of my top improvement priority!
That is a good idea, currently I am split on how I could achieve better visual depth. Whether I would continue using tilemaps for the environment or go full "hand-drawn".
I did have some trouble with Godot's tilemapping and obstacle detection that I had to outright disable most of their obstacle AI for this release, sorry about that. That is, however, going to the list of things to improve.
This is one artifact that I forgot to set back to regular bullets, that is the experimental "piercing-variant bullets" that I end up not using at the moment and weren't meant for the level included in the prototype's release. My bad there...
I don't quite understand. Can I ask for a more detailed explanation on this if possible?
If you mean they keep shooting while in their death frames/animation. I intentionally left that as a design choice where the drones do a "takedown misfire" like the turrets in the portal series as a punishment for doing a non-stealthy takedown. Though I can see it becoming too unfair. I'll do note that. Maybe it'll instead become a hardcore difficulty feature instead.
Another good idea. I debated on this early on and in my opinion, it might make the game too easy since items are and will be a big part of the progression. Maybe a difficulty option where items heal might be better or just outright have healing items. Either way, I will balance the game to the best of my ability if I do end up continuing development on it.
(two days?!)Oh, the issue might be misunderstanding how the gameplay flows. For context, I intended this part of the game to go for a stealth approach like hitting the drone from behind*coughmgsparodycough*, if you break stealth, the game punishes you by making the enemies follow you until they lose sight and lose interest on you (which can take somewhat long).The strategy involves hitting the drones in that room one or two hits at a time then ducking out of their sights. I tried to imply on the going stealthy part through Hoshino's dialogue but I'm guessing she didn't made it obvious enough. At the end, I can say this can be considered as a balancing issue that needs ironing out on my part.
Anyways, thanks again for the review and thanks for hosting this event. This pretty much gave me that little push to get this out there. Hoping I gave enough answers to your critiques.
Best Regards,
Kenda
All good. I'll say that the stealth part was clear to me, but after doing this a few times I was just inclined to keep running through the parts I did a million times.
Basically, as you're hitting a robot, it'll keep firing into you, even before death. It's usually kinda random for what rate they'll shoot at, but if you don't get caught it doesn't happen. Might be a skill issue.
The post-mortum firing is also fine in that case, cuz if you fix those other bullet issues it'll be a lot more comfortable.
Ah I see, I should have made checkpoints early on or at least a way to make checkpoints, I'd say, it is one of the weaknesses of the stealth format, I realized that after testing the game, there would be parts I would rather not do the same thing over and over again.
There is a way to stun lock them but that requires very precise timing and frame counting. Very Impractical method but somewhat viable. I tried to simulate a situation on whether you take them down head on but risk getting shot down for every missed timing or do it the safer way and initiate a stealthier approach. The former does sound like cheesing though and is more appropriate on a speedrunning context. Overall, it works as intended but clearly needs more balancing to make other methods viable. I'll see what I can do in the future.