This game does the Beyblade concept the best. Making RPM a health/resource is a great way of actually incorporating the spinning theme rather than just making it visual.
Some context about my playthrough beforehand: I played the tutorial, then did 2 runs, 1 big run where I was actually playing then a 2nd one where I was just testing a couple of things. My peak RPM was 500,000,000 (seems like it capped at that) with a max combo of 334.
What you're doing well:
In the context of this 1 week jam I think there is a good amount of content.
A good tutorial that actually lets the player understand the game first-hand before throwing them in, which is surprisingly rare in this jam. Though I do have 1 suggestion about it below.
Absurdly good visuals. Not only do they look nice, but there are a lot of fantastic small details that make it look and feel satisfying. Things like enemies spinning slower as they lose health, moving combo text, great use of screen shake & flashes, etc.
Audio is great! I think the game could use 1 additional music track to make the music nicer to listen to but even without that the current music is great and the sound effects are well done.
UI is smooth, not much to say about it, it does the job and looks pretty.
The additional mechanics like powerups and combo system are fantastic additions and are mostly well done.
Insane amount of dopamine when you do just about anything right.
Dash mechanic is well done!
Suggestions for a more long-term build:
IMPORTANT SUGGESTION: The enemy spawning logic should be tweaked a little. The fact that enemies can spawn directly on your screen and even on top of you is something that can be fixed relatively easy while also improving the immersion a lot. And if you do intend for them to be able to spawn on the player or their screen, you should add a delay + animation.
I'm going to split up powerups into sub-suggestions due to their importance. The powerups are A LOT more impactful than you'd think they'd be.
- Firstly, while the tutorial is good, it NEEDS to explain powerups and their absurd effect. One issue I had is I spent a good chunk of my time not even knowing how to get one because the game never told me to explore the map to find them.
- The powerups are immensely satisfying, slight problem though: INSANELY BROKEN, to the point where the only way to maintain an extremely high RPM is by solely relying on them.
- Consider adding more powerups! 2 is good but you can really do some cool things. One idea I had was a scorched earth powerup that makes it so you leave behind a lingering fire trail that does a ton of damage.
- Have a clear timer for the duration of a powerup so I don't get jumped by the enemies after my invincibility wears off
- Consider having arrows that point to the nearest powerup? This isn't really necessary just could be helpful for first-time players.
- One easy way to help balance powerups that can also look cool is to make it so when a powerup is active (specifically the invincibility one) the enemies slowly path find away from the player, sort of like pacman, that makes it even more satisfying when you destroy all of them.
This sort of ties in with powerups, but I feel like upgrades are a bit underwhelming. Not because they're inherently bad, but because of the fact that powerups are just so game-defining that it makes the upgrades feel a bit useless when a powerup is active.
The map could do a lot more than you may think. Random things could really be cool, like making the borders bouncy so you can bounce off of them to launch yourself at enemies.
The enemy variety could be improved. Honestly I can't say too much about how because it depends on the direction you take the game but some ideas could be a forcefield enemy that doesn't give you an RPM boost for breaking, a "healer" that boosts the RPM around nearby enemies, and of course bosses but I believe that's more obvious.
A more minor detail but you should make it so when your dash recharges there's a small audio indicator, I think it'd make it a bit nicer.
Make the combo text change color and get bigger and flashier as you get absurdly bigger combos.
Your team should be proud of themselves! I was shocked to read that this was your first jam for some of you, because this really feels like it was made by a group of highly experienced developers.