It looks like we have another Game Maker user here haha! I loved the game! Starting with the introduction, I found it really beautiful and engaging. It captured my attention in every aspect, from the animation to the composition and sound effects. The text also did a great job of providing all the necessary context. However, I noticed that at certain points, some of the text appeared slightly blurry compared to the rest. It didn’t affect readability, but it stood out a bit.

The screen resolution is interesting, but I noticed that it cut off part of the fullscreen instructions in the bottom corner. This could be a bit problematic since playing in fullscreen makes the experience much better. However, since we don’t start in fullscreen by default, I think this kind of instruction should be more centered or placed at the top, as the current position might cause some players to miss it depending on their monitor.

The art style was very pleasant—beautiful and quite charming. I liked the enemies; even though there wasn’t a huge variety, each one had its own unique personality in terms of design and behavior. I also noticed that sometimes the basic enemies would collide with the planets (I assume they’re planets?) and get stuck. Maybe using an A algorithm could help fix this issue, or perhaps an mp_potential_step to make the enemies avoid obstacles.

The difficulty level felt quite high—perhaps because we start at a relatively advanced stage already? At times, it was a bit frustrating to die without having a chance to react, particularly when enemies suddenly spawned at the edges of the screen without any indication that danger was near.

The aiming arrow design was great, but at first, it confused me a little—I initially thought it was pointing towards my objective haha! I later realized it was simply following my mouse cursor. In this case, I don’t think the arrow is entirely necessary, as players will naturally focus on the target itself. I believe investing in the crosshair design rather than an indicator like this would be more beneficial. Since all attacks are long-range, the arrow would make more sense for melee attacks like dashes, where knowing the player's exact direction is crucial.

When picking up weapons, I would have loved an option to choose which one to keep at that moment. It seems that when we pick up a weapon (which automatically moves toward us), the other disappears, forcing us to change our strategy on the spot. Perhaps allowing players to keep a default weapon and a secondary one that could be used with the right mouse button would be a good solution.

I genuinely had a lot of fun playing this! You did a fantastic job. I wish you the best of luck in the jam and success as a developer!

Oh man, you really touched me with that ending. Especially that song. I forgot for a moment that even game jam entries can have some soul in them. And I love the "princess kisses hero after being saved" trope, lol.

From a gameplay standpoint, I felt that the triple-shot gun was markedly worse than the default gun. Maybe it deal more damage, but it's not communicated with the game feel. It was annoying sometimes that I'd have the goated yellow laser gun and then out of nowhere get the triple-shot gun against my will.

I felt that enemies either spawned too close or moved a bit too fast for me to react while moving away from the final boss. It make me take some cheap hits, but at least there was a big enough supply of health powerups that I didn't get at all close to dying.

And apart from that, the usual "would be nice to have more enemy types and gun types" etc yada yada.

Obviously for a jam entry it would be impractical to have the player actually play through all 255 levels first... but I'm kept wondering how awesome this game would feel to beat if it was an actual full release like that. With even more fourth-wall breaks at the final boss fight and ending. This concept certainly has potential.

But please clarify... how do you see a "loop" in this game's backstory? So all other players just tried to get to level 256 and beat it and simply lost? Game-overed? Can you really call that a loop? Or was there some kind of glitch that didn't allow them to reach level 256? If so, how did we overcome it? Your interpretation seems to make sense, but under scrutiny, I don't know.

Either way I really liked this so don't let my criticism get too in your head lol

I enjoyed this A LOT!

I first thought that the theme had to be with the mechanic of reseting every death, but then I won and I got the REAL theme interpretation. It was on the story all the time!

I liked the intro animation a lot, and then the ending animation and song played and I liked them even more. Gameplay is challenging, enemies are cute, and music fits really well, with that lovely ending tune <3

The game is very good as it is, so I don't think I can reccomend anything (maybe a web build?). I want to warn other players that stumble uppon my comment: Please, give this game an opportunity and try to finish it. It deserves it. You may find it difficult but if you move on straight line it gets easier.

On the other hand:

I think I may found a little easter egg, but I'm not really sure... Does it have to do with the "2" key shortcut?

And what the initial score of 927300 means?

Thank you for sharing this project, it made me smile C:

Consider making future games playable in a browser, especially if you participate in a game jam. This makes it more accessible for players to quickly try it out and you will get more feedback. I really like the intro, overall game design, music, and SFX. Everything comes together nicely! The game itself is quite simple, and I see how it fits the theme, somehow. However, this interpretation is the most simple approach: a level that repeats upon failure. While functional, it’s not the most unique take on the theme, as many games naturally follow this structure. Still, the execution is well done, and the game feels polished. With a more creative spin on the theme, it could stand out even more. Great work overall!