Excited to have another OI entry! Overall I’m excited with the general direction, and your encounter design is interesting, as always.
I see some interesting conversation about some potential ‘flaws’, so I’ll give some of my own (hopefully constructive) criticism:
First, I don’t like the ‘real time’ combat model. It still ends up being turn-based (and I see that it pauses when you are making decisions, which is good and important), with the only effective change being that I have to ‘wait around’ a lot as a player sometimes.
I get that this might be a weakness of the software. You want to have ‘granular’ turn order, where faster combatants go more often than others rather than ‘we go, you go’ activation, and this ‘real time’ version might be the easiest one to get in RPGmaker.
Think of something like Final Fantasy Tactics, where there are speed scores counting up to 100, but no ‘waiting’ - the system just calculates the next turn and goes there.
Also a ‘turn order’ UI where I can see the turn orders of the participants would be amazing! It could also indicate ‘fray’ status…
I get using the tools you know, but it’s kind of a bummer in a hard game where I am replaying combats…
Second, I feel like there are two ‘genres’ in here, broadly, and they feel like they are fighting each other.
The first genre is something like tactical combat ‘discovery’ - here things aren’t totally clear, a bit random, but overall each battle is a puzzle. The ‘unclarity’ is part of the game - a lot of play is learning by doing and putting together strategies, and the output randomness there is ‘juice’ after a fashion.
I think ideally in this type of game, there aren’t ‘attrition’ systems - think something like a SaGa game. You get full HP between battles, and the battles are HARD, maybe expecting you to scrape by nearly losing each time. Also, if you lose, you can usually try again right away - you can generally save anywhere and try again freely.
The second ‘genre’ I’m feeling here is a very ‘attrition-heavy’ game, where you are trying to figure out routes and ‘trades’ to make it though a fixed gauntlet. Think a Magic Tower game, or a well-made Fire Emblem type of game. These games usually don’t have any randomness, and every element is super clear and calculable. ‘attrition’ plays a big role, and the main game is about routing and trying new things - kind of like a good arcade game that can be played at first just to survive, and later for highscore/1cc.
So, you have this hybrid. Things are not clear, but there is attrition-heavy gameplay too. Saves are limited, and the combat system feels ‘slow’ to play.
I really like both of these genres, but there is something a bit ‘grating’ about this particular combination. Specifically the combination of ‘unclarity/discovery’ and ‘heavy attrition’.
I do find the game overall really compelling, and I think it’s short enough that I don’t mind replaying through the friction because the overall design is good. Speeding up the ‘waiting’ so it’s instant would help. And then letting me save anywhere and getting rid of the attrition mechanics, or making everything way more clear and deterministic would make this perfect. Or having a ‘life points’ style attrition system like SaGa games have - if a character is KOed they have to sit out a battle, or use a limited ‘revive’ item, something like that.
Overall I don’t want to seem like I’m dissatisfied with this amazing free experience you’ve given me - I’m not at all :)
I’m actually happier if you make more creative and ‘scuffed’ things, if you doing more polishing or learning other tools would feel bad or reduce your creativity or output.
Thanks as always for sharing!