itch.io

I love the idea, but it seems like movement is significantly slower when moving only along the Y-axis, compared to X-axis only or combined movement.

You absolutely nailed the aesthetic, from the art style to the animation. Everything about this game looks great and the setting is original and tense.

However, the gameplay itself is incredibly 'meh' in my opinion. You as the player have no real choice during the game. 

What card I flip doesn't matter, since it's position is ultimately inconsequential outside of the middle row (which should always be flipped first, not really a choice). Unless gasoline can be used to flip the Acre Card, but the AI didn't do so when given the chance so I'd assume not. But even so, the act of keeping the fire as far from your Acre isn't really a choice either. This also begs the question of having a grid in the first place—the game would seemingly be no different if we both just had a deck of cards that we flipped through instead.

The utilities are thematic and useful, but again there isn't much choice when using them. Gasoline burns a card, but does it really matter which one I burn? The spyglass is the only source of player agency in the entire game, letting me find a Redraw early and possibly neutralizing it with an axe. But even then, do I really have a choice? Obviously, a Redraw gets the Axe and anything else can be flipped safely. The Spyglass is helpful, for sure, but the utilities are simply present and don't really elevate the game or even solve the underlying issue.

This can be contrasted with Buckshot Roulette where the game roulette itself provides choice in the form of calculated risks. As the player I can determine the chances of the next shot being live or blank, then choose whether to shoot the opponent or myself. That decision matters because if I fire a blank at them, I have a higher risk of firing a live at myself. Or I can fire at myself with the hope of expending a blank, taking another turn, and having a higher chance of firing a live at them later. The point here is that I can make informed choices even without items. Thus, the items can help enhance the game further, rather than being my only source of agency.

I really want to like this game, but there would have to be some significant additions to the full release to make it worth purchasing. As-is, I feel that I have about as much control as I do in a game of War.

Maybe more cards could be added, something that makes the grid position of cards actually matter? I don't know what, if anything, you already have planned for further development but I hope this can become a great game.

Not sure if this is a bug, but the BGM doesn't play during matches

Loving this, much nicer than playing on TTS in my opinion. Are there any plans to add the solo fighters?

A fun little game! Love the idea, especially having text-to-speech read all the player's mistakes.

Only major issue is that the text to be typed could use a quick editing pass. Mostly just minor grammatical errors but there's a spelling mistake on the last level (hight instead of height) which throws off the entire rest of the text.

A good start, going "outside the box" was a neat twist. I will say that the jumping feels extra floaty, which can make the game frustrating to control at time.

I do wonder why the game was made in the style of Pico-8 games and not just made on Pico-8 altogether.

I really like the concept, you could make some interesting puzzles with it! I was a bit disappointed with the last two levels, since they weren't really puzzles and could be won just by going straight for the King and ignoring everything else. 

There are a few minor (mostly UI) improvements that I think would also help.

 First, adding a tutorial tip (or a few) to explain the enemies' health and turn timer as well as when the Necromancer takes damage. These aren't hard to figure out as-is, but the concepts aren't overtly explained to the player.

Adding some visual indicator of an enemy piece's health. I like that the pieces shake when they're about to move, but I wish I could tell at a glance what their health is since that seems to change from level to level. Even just adding a small number inside a heart to the corner of their space would be fine.

A "Next Level" button. It's just the tiniest bit annoying that I had to return to the menu before selecting the next level.

Small Bug: In the final level when new pieces were spawned (which should probably also be explained) they would occasionally be spawned in something that isn't a space.

Just triple the Whiskey (one Whiskey normal, add another to make it strong, yet another to make it stronger)

Aw, I wish there were some water for the boat to sail around in

Fun platformer! Some levels were trippy-er than others trying to visualize what the full "3D" space looked like.

Minor bug: The thudding audio from level 4 continued to play after being returned to the level select menu.

I got to 100 something before it reset. I was fully prepared to get to 1000 just to see if the devs had actually put anything if you didn't chuck the villager

This was a rather unique card game and I enjoyed both the theme and mechanics, all very fun.

However, I restarted the game 3 or 4 times before I finally understood everything about playing the game, it could *really* benefit from either a tutorial or a quick pop-up that explains the rules. Even something in the description would help.

Great theme and I liked the puzzle of figuring out the recipes. I only wish that it was a bit easier to tell where my "cursor" was though. Maybe if the bar were a little larger and didn't flash (or was visible for a bit longer)?