No worries, we had a lot of fun playing it!
The reading issue is definitely on me, because usually I just skim through text and go back if it didn't work. I'm kinda impatient lol.
>The tablet would be better if it was a booklet
I feel like if you want to go with the tablet guide - maybe you could emulate GameFAQs look&feel instead of a PDF? I think we mentioned it on stream. And it would definitely fit into the overall feel of a retro game being played (I still look up some stuff on GameFAQs for some older games that I replay every now and then)
>Waiting isn't fun, that could be a problem
I honestly don't think waiting turned out to be as bad once I figured out how to do it (aka - read the manual properly lol). That, and being less precise with the RNG is probably okay. So I dunno, it might just be a bump in the learning curve. I caught the third shiny on my own volition just because I could, so there's that. Initial attempts were a bit frustrating, but having a manual right there next to the cartridge definitely helped with that.
Also - side note - I just remembered - maybe you could add some SFX to the flipper device used to hack/assist with the glitches? To the buttons and stuff? I recall some parts of the game being a bit too silent in terms of user inputs. But again - maybe it's just me.
>We don't know if we're too early or too late
Yeah, I can absolutely see why you have concerns about that. I honestly don't know how to fix/help with that. Maybe you could add a "kotaku journalist playing cuphead" option in the menu, that adds some OOC speech bubbles with hints?
I don't think it's needed, but I also have some knowledge about rom hacks/glitches, so I might be a bit more in the know about that. Dunno about an average person though.
>The sea near the side of the island is square
This is probably something WAY beyond your scope, and a pointless feature that nobody would ever notice - but you could try limiting yourself to 96 sprites per scene (the limit of actual GB hardware). That would both give you an out when people are complaining about "square edges" and give you something cool to brag about. But that might be extremely... niche and not worth the trouble.
I didn't even notice the issue, but I'm not an artistic person, so there's that.
>The controller seems to not be optimal
Yeah, full native 4K. I get lots of issues with that, but... good for playtesting and finding issues causing by large resolution lol?
I ended up not using the controller. Maybe I should've used it just for console and kb+m for everything else for extra immersion - that could've been cool - but I didn't think that far ahead lol.
>So yeah, how the game feels right now is intentional
Yeah, I get that, which is why I'm not complaining. It's just that I have experience with pokemon games, so it took a bit to readjust myself. So no worries.
Thank you very much for the demo, and I hope our playthrough helped. Please keep it up, its a very unique and interesting demo!