Hey Classical Frog.
I have played your game, and you can see the recording of my playthrough here.
I have created an AI agent that analyze transcripts and screenshots of me playing the game, so that will be put below the videos.
Unfortunately, I had disabled mouse cursor when playing the game, I am sorry about that :(
You can find my game here: Rabbit Rocket Racing - Nonvisual gameplay prototype ;)
AI analysis of me playing, hope it is helpful!Analysis pass — mapping transcript moments to lenses
Strong moments / DELIGHT:
- 0:30 "So far it's like I'm understanding everything. There isn't really anything that I is unclear" — onboarding works
- 1:11 "the clicking thing was unclear, but quite a fun idea" — delight at taming despite friction
- 8:04 "I like this minigame actually of taming" — repeated delight at taming
- 11:00 "Normally I don't play these kind of games but this is actually really enjoyable"
- 11:11 "it has the right amount of challenge"
- 12:07 "it's super easy to learn this game"
- 12:39 "There is some sort of repetition but it's not tedious"
- 13:17 "The pacing of the game is really good. I haven't seen any errors"
STRUGGLE moments:
- 1:11 "What does this mean? Do I have to do something?" — claim screen unclear
- 2:02 "Why can't I? Can I do like this... Why can't I charge this?" — confusion about item use
- 2:23 "So why can't I click this one now?" — node availability unclear
- 2:50 "when I pick a path, I can't go back and do the things anymore. I would actually have liked to be able to do that" — AUTONOMY loss
- 3:50 "What does this mean?" → "why does it say 15?" — unclear stat/number
- 5:11 "How do I get back to my camp?" — navigation unclear
- 6:48 "Crit chance and armor... not so cool fight. I'm probably gonna die" → 7:18 "I wanted to go back to the pond a little bit earlier" — AUTONOMY (can't retreat when wanted)
- 7:36 "What does this do? Defeat six frogs progress" — unclear progression
- 8:04 "I don't know how to unlock this" → at this point game forces continuation
- 10:03 "what do these mean?" "What was this? This was healing again, right? How do I heal?"
- 12:39 "I still haven't understood what the arrow up and down means"
- 13:00 "Some sort of autonomy over which enemies I attack first would be nice. I don't know if there is that" — explicit AUTONOMY request
- 15:00 "So there's no way for me to understand where to put my stuff" — positioning unclear
- 15:48 "how do I decide which one to go?" "I can't decide which of these attacks who. Well I wanted all of them to attack this one first" — repeating the targeting issue
- 17:27 "Can I change? No, I can't" — preparation locked once battle begins
- 20:34 "I don't see why the fight needs to be there, Because it kind of... I can't do anything or prepare anything, and I would love to be able to do that before"
- 21:35 "It would have been nice that I could just take that, but I guess should have thought of that before"
Suggestions player explicitly raised:
- Fast forward / auto-calculate for trivial fights (12:39)
- Target selection (13:00, 15:48)
- Ability to return to pond/retreat (7:18)
- Preparation step before elite battles (20:34)
- Understanding of arrows/up/down indicators (12:39, 13:41)
Game name: HopFall (confirmed by image text). Speech-to-text mangles it as "Hub fall" — clean up to "HopFall" in quotes.
Now I'll write the forum reply. Roughly one page, em-dash-free, addressed to the developer, leading with positives, anchored to specific timestamps.
HopFall playtest, my notes
Hey! I played HopFall (playtest 0.1.1) for about 23 minutes as a first-time player. Going in I'll say I don't usually play this kind of game, but I had a really good time and came away thinking you've got something with real potential. Most of my notes below are about little places where I got confused, not about the core, which I think is solid.
What I liked about the game
- The onboarding is genuinely smooth. Around 30 seconds in I caught myself saying "I'm understanding everything, there isn't really anything that's unclear." That's rare. I figured out the basic loop without having to think about it.
- The taming minigame is the best part. I called it "quite a fun idea" the first time at 1:11, and by 8:04 I was actively looking forward to it. It feels different enough from regular combat to be a real hook.
- The difficulty curve felt right. Around 11:00 I said "this is actually really enjoyable, it has the right amount of challenge." The game is welcoming without being trivial.
- The pacing is good. At 12:39 I noted "there is some sort of repetition but it's not tedious," which is the test a roguelike has to pass and you're passing it.
- It's easy to come back to. I said at 13:00 that if I came back to this tomorrow I'd understand it pretty fast. That stickiness is hard to build, and you have it.
Where I got stuck
- Targeting in combat. This was my biggest one and I kept coming back to it. From 13:00 ("some sort of autonomy over which enemies I attack first would be nice") to 15:48 ("I can't decide which of these attacks who, I wanted all of them to attack this one first") I kept wanting to direct my frogs. This is a learning problem, not a difficulty one. I think the system exists or could exist, but I couldn't find it.
- No way to retreat to the pond. Around 7:18 I realized I was about to die and said "I wanted to go back to the pond a little bit earlier." Once I was committed to a path, I felt I'd lost the option to bail out and regroup. This felt like the game taking the steering wheel away from me.
- Elite battles start with no prep window. At 20:34 I said "I don't see why the fight needs to be there, I can't do anything or prepare anything, and I would love to be able to do that before." For a regular fight that's fine, but elites felt like they punished me for not having read the future.
- Several small icons and numbers I never decoded. "I still haven't understood what the arrow up and down means" (12:39), "what does this mean? why does it say 15?" (3:50), "what do these mean?" (10:03). None of these blocked me, but they accumulated. Learning problem, not a depth problem.
- The claim screen confused me the first time. At 1:11 I asked "what does this mean? Do I have to do something?" I worked it out, but a tiny prompt on the button would have saved me the pause.
What I would improve on the game
- Add a "target this enemy" tap so I can direct attacks. Even a soft priority (the next frog to act will go for the targeted enemy) would solve most of my 13:00 to 15:48 complaints.
- Let me retreat to the pond from the map. Maybe at a cost (lose some progress, lose loot, whatever fits your design), but give me the choice. The fix here is autonomy more than rules.
- Insert a quick "prepare for battle" beat before elite fights. A short loadout/positioning screen would make those moments feel like a strategic decision instead of a surprise tax.
- Tooltips on the up/down arrows and the small stat icons. Hover or tap-and-hold would do it. Right now I'm guessing at meaning, and I'd rather learn than guess.
- A fast-forward or auto-resolve for trivial fights. I floated this at 12:39 and immediately worried it would take the fun away, so I'd put it behind a toggle rather than as a default. Just an option for when I've already won the fight in my head.
Overall
Good game. The fundamentals (loop, art, pacing, taming) are working, and the things that tripped me up are mostly about giving the player a bit more agency: target choice, retreat, prep before big fights. If I had to pick one thing for you to focus on next, it would be targeting in combat, because it came up the most and it's the biggest gap between "I'm watching this happen" and "I'm playing this." Nail that and I think a lot of my other complaints quietly go away.
Thanks for letting me test it, I'm looking forward to seeing where this goes.