itch.io

We are always open to feedback and discussion.

Our original plan for the jam version was less story and more fast paced combat. The story grew over time, and now we are reworking a lot to go more RPG. This game is not going to be a full free roam JRPG, as we know just how much additional time it will take to properly build the world for such. We aim to stick with the current, mostly linear, side-scrolling, but adding more to do in the towns, along with optional side quests, random events, and choices that can allow the player to pick their path, among the ones offered.

My partner is a storyteller, and we have a lot we want to do for world-building. A lot of our upcoming todos are related to building out the systems to add more to the world. The new town UI will be adding flavor text to each inn, and we are adding taverns with the ability to chat with random NPCs. We had been focusing on later towns, but I agree with you that the opening could be stronger. We were skipping over the starting town with the new story bits we are currently working on, but you make a good point, and we will be sure to add more to do there as well.

This has me thinking on ways to improve the intro to our story. We've discussed your comments, and can acknowledge that going to a big fight at the camp worked decently for the original design, but may be too much combat too soon for our current direction. We are considering adding a small town between the start and the camp combat, to help with world-building and more smoothly introducing the combat.

The combat is going to expand, which should help it feel more balanced. The original jam theme was "Consume", so the combat was based mainly around consuming the items. We still like the core idea and plan to work with it, but also add more than just eating the item that best matches the Slime's affinities and the enemy's weaknesses. The # of slots is planned to increase as you progress, but we are considering how best to improve the overall feel of combat and its UI. For the fast paced gameplay we wanted to have a smaller number of options that could be quickly clicked to progress combat. With going more RPG, we may switch to popup/sub-menus that give more options without flooding the screen with too much UI at once.

Thanks for your feedback. We appreciate hearing honest feedback from other devs and gamers. Even if we don't always agree with all the feedback, and can't implement everything suggested, we still keep everything we read in mind and consider it when making decisions, while staying true to the core of our vision. This kind of feedback is exactly why we decided to host this jam. We look forward to playing your game in the near future.