I've seen you guys around often in the RM community, but this is surprisingly the first time I played one of your games. (you guys even beat me for the timtams, if I remember correctly) And to start this little feedback review off with, wow, this is clearly my favorite IGMC entry I played yet.
This game is an ode to classic Final Fantasy games, which I love. It somehow packs in an RPG journey within an hour and a half. The mapping is fantastic, the battles are well designed, and the story is flat out fun.
The game starts you off with letting you choose the gender of yourself and your lover, which I found to be a great touch. It is the game starts with wedding trope and villain steals bride, which simply works. It was done in a unique way I quite enjoyed. Classic RPG fun.
The first segment of the game lets you explore a town in unlinear fashion and more or less learn the mechanics of combat in a leisure way. I put animation speed on max and went at it rapidly. (I love it when games let me choose battle speed, I will try my best to incorporate this in my future games.)
The battles are fast paced and you feel powerful, even if the enemies pack a bite sometimes. You feel good fighting. It's not always a math quiz trying to proceed through a battle. You are three badasses who plow through the game.
Music in RPGs is a very important part. The music choice for this game was fantastic. The battle music felt like love letters to classic Romancing Saga games and there were several Castlevania inspired songs as well. It was such a good combination for me.
I played the game on max speed, but I still had about 1:30 hours before beating. Personally, I did not care. It was all so fun. But for an hour limit of contest (which I know doesn't remotely doom a game if it exceeds) I think some parts of it could have been cut or optimized better.
I personally think equipment should have been scrapped and just have the characters get their bonuses through the shrines you encounter exclusively. I also think that for a contest game like this, just having the player heal after each battle would have cut down quite a bit of time.
I am not someone who says all games should be that way. But if you stay damaged after a battle, usually it's for a sense of danger in a dungeon. This game, it was rather easy to walk back and there was never any danger walking back. So it was just added time and nothing else. Nothing beneficial to the gameplay.
I think some of the flavor text/tutorials were a little too wordy. I know why it was explained, but at the same time you don't need that much description telling you that "Girl badass, uses magic in battle."
I love skill trees and I did enjoy how it was done, but I think it would have fit better for a longer game in this case. They are also a little hidden in the menu, I don't think most players who aren't well versed into RPG Maker games would have a hard time finding it, even after the tutorial description.
The only actual problem I ran into was that last boss fight. I had defenses up for certain ailments, but the last boss bypassed them with one attack (and it was done a little too often) The fight itself I really enjoyed, but it was a bit trial and error-y. For non hardcore rpg fans, the difficulty spike might have thrown them off. And it made all the equipment managing for me obsolete (as I did stuff to prevent ailments mostly)
And even though it warns you to save in extra slot, I think just adding a shop option anyway would have been fine there.
Overall, I really enjoyed this game. A lot. I'd love to see a game like this but MUCH longer. The mapping and level design just pleased my soul. The dialogue was all well written. The music choices were perfect. The combat understood exactly what made old Final Fantasys so fun to me. Fantastic entry. I should definitely play more games from you guys.