Thanks for playing!
I've been making weird "magical girl" games since the first Magical Girl Game Jam, when I started out with basically no idea about magical girls at all. This one is definitely off base in regards to mahou shoujo conventions. The closest thing to a magical girl anime that I can definitively say directly influenced it is RWBY. I've tried to work in elements that I've picked up through osmosis but it's still kind of its own thing.
I like this style but it's divisive at best, and sometimes a lot more work than you'd think. Both Takagi and Shattered 2, both already in progress, will be much the same, but I'm looking at doing something different for some future games.
I hear you about the enemies' lack of reaction. Both enemy types are kind of lame. I was somewhat limited by what I had in mind for the series in general (I think I elaborated on this in another comment) but I'm looking for ways to make things a little more interesting in subsequent games.
Even with perfect hindsight, I don't think I would have cut the first section. One of the biggest disappointments with In The Middle Of The Night (my MGGJ2 game that this one is a sequel to) is that it was hilariously short. I really wanted the game to be a decent length this time, and although the end result isn't super long I'm a lot happier with the length this time. If I was to cut the first act and merge elements of it into the third, I think the game still would have ended up too short. I'm also not sure if the story would flow as well, but I wouldn't really know that until I tried to rework it.
With that being said I knew I was pushing it for scope from the beginning. The story and concept I had in mind I felt were doable within the timeframe given, but only just. I really wanted to do this specific thing because it's a keystone for the series and I really wanted to get this one out before Takagi. Without that consideration I probably wouldn't have attempted it, and would have come up with something smaller that I knew I could comfortably finish within the timeframe.
I honestly don't know how some folks in this jam manage to make games that are long, polished, and complex. I've only ever been able to hit one, maybe two. This time, polish definitely took a backseat to length and complexity. Next time, I don't think I'm going to do the crazy genre crossing here, maybe just a visual novel. I definitely want to do more experimental stuff next year rather than mostly continuing existing things I've started which I did this year.