Here's my Secret Santa review!
I found the introductory cut-scene intriguing and the overall story was interesting as well. I thought most of the dungeon puzzles were fine (though I and another person couldn't solve the one on the left stone tablet in the room with the sunbird; I found it necessary to use the hints on the other two puzzles for this room). The mapping was good, and the graphics and music were very nice and matched the setting of the game, and I liked the windowskin as well!
Some feedback and bugs:
- I think the skill selection screen was nice in the sense that you could see how many skills could be unlocked next, but it would be useful to see the names of the skills on the screen so that you don't have to interact with each one to know what they are. I would also show how much gold you have when choosing to purchase a skill.
- It would be nice if the moving pieces stayed in the same place after they've been moved and you return to the same map later.
- I hold down SHIFT very often to move faster, but this also closed messages immediately so I didn't get the chance to read some of the automatically-triggered messages.
- I could climb up a couple of the walls; if you would like screenshots of which walls, please PM me on the forum.
- I would suggest showing the message about skills requiring gold only once or twice; it was a little tedious to see it every time I talked to the item merchant.
- For the keyboard instructions and map screens, I would move the "Next" or "Close" buttons to the bottom right; it obstructed my view a little.
- It didn't seem like the monsters had different strengths or weaknesses, so I didn't think the battles were very interesting or challenging (I just used the same skills over and over again like 'Attack' or 'Bludgeon' to get their HP down).
- I couldn't use the multi-enemy skills ('Sweep' and 'Flurry', for example) despite having enough SP and there being multiple enemies on the screen.
- There were minor typos throughout the game (e.g., 'increses' in the description of the 'Evade' skill; first letter of some skill descriptions was not capitalized, riddle in the room with the sunbird should be "The Sunbird flies up... the rays of its wings...", etc).
- I thought the screen resolution was a bit small (though everything was readable and visible on my monitor), and there didn't seem to be a way to full-screen or resize the window. Also, perhaps a different font would lend to a more immersive experience?
Anyway, I think many of these things are fixable, and I enjoyed your game in general! Good luck!