Very nice update and glad to see the game is still being worked on, it looks fantastic and absolutely adorable! Few minor issues in the latest build I’ve noticed. Take these with a grain of salt as they are just my personal opinions, and is in no way me implying the game is bad (much to the contrary!)
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(Bug) Predominantly, the store purchase system seems to be broken.
- A bunch of items are already available from the start instead of assumedly being a purchase you need to make.
- The two upgrade pumps, when you don’t have enough money, simultaneously show the price and the equipped/unequipped label overlapping.
- The second page of the Items tab is largely unusable; Better Microphone, Scrap Broomba, Better Nozzle, and Worse Nozzle all appear as $0K, and cannot be purchased/equipped.
- The watermelon skin cannot be selected. When clicked, it transitions to a blank page.
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(Bug) If you use the ghost hands early without any capacity upgrades, and it pops you resulting in a game over screen, the game continues to run in the background, meaning the ghost hands continue to pump and pop you, resulting in a softlock.
- Similarly, since the game runs in the background, you can sometimes double pop say if you pump over your limit, then a powerup like mentos fires and pumps you again.
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(Bug) Coke+Mentos sometimes gets stuck at the end of the animation, showing the fluid sprouting out but not moving. When this occurs, it will no longer randomly fire until you pop yourself.
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(Bug/UX) You are able to interrupt pumping if you click the handle too quickly. It should preferably ignore subsequent clicks while animating instead of resetting.
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(Bug) The settings HUD button does not do anything when clicked.
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(Bug) The capacity/deflation speed/recovery speed upgrades get their upgrade costs stuck at the previous displayed value for tiers III ($50), II ($25), and II ($20) and beyond respectively. The cost does appear to increase for some, but the UI does not reflect it, so it leads to user confusion why they can’t buy something it says they can.
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(Bug) Strength upgrade does not update its visuals when bought. Also its displayed change (2.0s > 1.8s) is misleading and it is instead much stronger.
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(Bug/Future Intent) The viewer counts and chat elements are otherwise unused and always blank. This might just be a placeholder for the future though which is understandable if so.
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(UX) When you change pump in the store, returning to the world, it does not update sprite until the next interaction.
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(UX) The capacity upgrade values can be misinterpreted. Seeing “10% > 20%” during a glance, one may believe its a flat 10% increase, but it’s in effect a doubling. Might make more sense to say “2x”.
- Similarly for the other upgrades, giving flat increments is generally more well-understood (e.g. instead of “0.1sec > 0.2sec”, saying “+0.1sec” is more understandable). This might be personal preference though.
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(QoL) The Cork Stopper likely shouldn’t be equippable (locked/greyed out) until you reach the condition.
- Similarly, it is hard to tell when the Cork Stopper is active, as there is no in-world nor HUD representation of it taking effect, so it is easy to equip it by mistake then wonder a few minutes later why you aren’t able to deflate anymore.
- There does not seem to be (unless I am mistaken) gameplay benefit to holding inflation, as your main source of income is actively pumping, and to do so without popping, you must deflate yourself so you can pump again.
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(QoL) Pump Flux, and Body Markers don’t seem to have a physical in-world representation unlike the clothing garments/microphone/coke+mentos, so it’s hard to tell they are active.
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(QoL) It feels like you should be able to click on the pump too, not just the handle, to interact. This could also be fixed if interactables had an outline on hover, to indicate where you can and can’t click.
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(QoL) The respawn progress bar should ideally be linear instead of interpolated, as it represents linear time.
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(QoL) Being able to name your streamer on save start might be a fun addition (with prefilled/a collection of premade randomise button options). If a save manager is eventually added, this will help in distinguishing between saves too.
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(Balance) Even at max deflation speed, deflation can take a very long time if the Capacity is even halfway upgraded. It is ironically quicker to pop yourself with the slowest (default) recovery rate, than to wait for natural deflation.
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(Audio) Going from having BGM in stores, to pure silence in-world, then back to BGM for later purchases is a bit jarring. Ideally there should be separate BGM for the main world (likely toggleable, for those who want a true ASMR experience). The music could even be an upgrade for the giggles if needed, like buying a radio or music library license.
Again, the foundation here is fantastic. I hope these notes help with the polish, and I am really looking forward to the next update.