I played version 1.03, which seems to be "jam version, but fixed".
This game reminds me of some of the flash games of my youth, in terms of gameplay if less so in terms of graphics. The promo/key art really drew me in- it's colourful, fun, and attractive. The in-game art is a little more pedestrian, but still functional and visually pleasing.
I have mixed feelings about the enemies being scaled pixel art. Strictly speaking it's _wrong_, but I'm not a purist and I didn't find it horrendously ugly.
Looking back, I think it could use some more impressive effects, visual and audio. But it didn't really feel lacking while playing.
I like the storyline and premise, but I wish a bit more of it came through in the game itself.
My first impression of the gameplay was very positive. Although I've played similar games in the distant past, it stands out in this jam, and running around shooting weird monsters is pretty fun.
As I played more, a few issues started to crop up. Some of these might already have been addressed in newer versions.
- You have limited card slots, which is fine, but once you've selected a card, you can't swap it out for a different one. By the end I had a dozen cards I couldn't do anything with*
- I got no card packs for a long time, and then a lot started dropping. This is a bit of a weird curve.
- XP and card packs drop right below enemies, which makes it really hard to pick them up, especially since...
- The player character moves really slow, barely faster than most enemies and slower than some others. This makes it really hard to do any sort of maneuvering past "lazy circles".
- The card that pushes enemies away helps, but recharges too slowly and doesn't push far enough to be all that useful.
I played up to about level 15, then I started getting bored of it. The core mechanics could use some tweaking, but they're pretty solid, and there is a good sense of progression and variety. After a while, though, I just needed something more to keep me interested. Maybe some narrative, maybe more dramatic progression like switching out to another girl.
*I checked the game page after and realized this can't be done when the cards are on cooldown, which is probably what happened. If there was a clearer indicator of this in game, that would be great, but I think you're already aware of this.