Heyy, I came from your devlog video which got recommended to me by Youtube! I actually commented there today :D
Just beat all 6 endings (in order: Crafter, Artist, It worked out, Marketer, Normie, and then I had to use a guide for the last one).
Getting two of the endings was actually challenging, though not because you had to melticiously plan out stat-rising, but because I didn't know requirements to get them. In some games I'd call this bad, but here the game is short enough for it to add to replayability, so I thought that it was good here.
No need to say that presentation and sound are brilliant, as everyone already said.
I really liked writing, it was really close to home and kept me smiling. And I also liked length of the cutscenes: they were long enough to convey story and characters, but not too long for a stat-riser to get boring (hello to a visual novel of a stat-riser called Uma Musume).
Going to gameplay, I like simple UI-based games with short or no animations which I can turn my brain too (Uma Musume while skipping cutscenes, Plague Inc, Tubestar, Slay the Spire etc), and this definitely is one of these!
Your game felt like an actual polished game. You could easily add a few variables (like maybe money?) and an endless mode and go sell it on Steam (instabuy from me BTW).
Of course, there are some slight QOL flaws, but some on, this is a 1) free 2) gamejam game 3) which was made in half the time. I'd never bash a game, while considering this and 4) the game actually being really cool. And 5) these "flaws" most people probably wouldn't even register.
But I (personally) would love if someone listed me little things like these so I could consider them while making my future games. So I'll write them out (though if you don't want to read them at the moment, please feel free to skip this numbered list!):
- For a replayable stat-riser, an ability to skip animations (like results of your actions) would be great. Sometime you just want to click through everything without waiting, just like with clicking instant text in cutscenes.
- If you advance your cutscense by clicking the spacebar icon with mouse, you can accidentally make prints if you click fast and don't notice that a cutscene ended fast enough. I personally can see two possible fixes for this: block controls for a bit after cutscene ends (this would be in line with action results), or allow player to progress by clicking anywhere else in the speech bubble. Also, being able to advance tutorial boxes with the spacebar like cutscenes would be great!
- I couldn't read finish stats, because the cutscene would start immediately after they appeared. I'd integrate this stats in the ending cutscene or add a screen with them after the cutscene (either before credits or right with them). That is actually probably the worst I can say, which says a lot about quality of your game.
- That's probably more than a nitpick, but the game didn't launch in a Firefox fork with some extensions enabled. You said in the devlog that you didn't like making downloadable games for jams, but having the option would be nice. I still managed to play with Edge though.
- That's a smaller one, and probably not a UX-thing but me-thing (as I never saw this hindering anyone else), but it would be awesome to have text tips for making-things buttons. Having text with an icon really helps me reassure it's meaning. Even small tips like what you have with training buttons would still be great!
Yeah, I didn't call these nitpicks for no reason. These probably made half of the comment, but in the end, please remember that nitpicking is easy, and for a professional UX-nitpicker such as me, my latest game turned out to be a UX-nightmare thanks to my great UI-making skills :D
And! I actually have two little things I really appreciated while playing too!
- I loved that in the action-result and logs texts were always stating not just how energy has changed, but also how much did I have after that. Always writing out how did stats or inventory change was also very helpful!
- Thanks for the bold fonts!!! It was easy to read them both on PC and phone. I usually play Switch games on a Switch Lite, and playing this game with big bold fonts was such a nice experience! I don't know if you (Moka) or the artist (Mini) picked them out, but you did a great job!
All in all, I had a great time with this game. I'll be looking to your next games and videos (the devlog was lovely)! Thanks for the great game, reading my wall of text and also replying me on Youtube!