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Thanks for the feedback! I had a failed ADS prototype, but all the feedback can hopefully help me find a happy medium.

Thanks for the reply!

Readability was also an issue for the blocks you couldn't land on either (ones with an X). Not sure if it was on purpose, a missing upgrade, or something I didn't understand. I just figure the X meant I couldn't stand on it, but at that point I wasn't sure why it was there.

As far as the radiation blocks go, affordances and signifiers go a long way. So if they shared color/appearance to the radiation clouds, the connection may be stronger. You could also have like a sound cue when approaching radiation like the radioactive detector static commonly found in games.  

I checked out your game and it was fun!

In terms of difficulty, I'm thinking of giving players custom settings for the match. Ideally I would love for this game to encourage playing with friends. So having different game modes (just twist on the match rules) and having custom settings will hopefully allow some really casual almost friend slop fun.

Hmm, I'm so torn on how to approach the issue. The far view is necessary, but It's a common enough complaint that I think I do need to clamp it.

Which would you say is the main reason the camera is annoying? You can pick more than one, but if you do, can you rank them in order of most problematic?

1. Navigating the environment gets hard when not in view.
2. Crucial UI elements (status bars and health) are centered around the player, and therefor are out of view.
3. Can't tell if enemies are nearby and therefore, can't tell if you're in danger and respond appropriately.
4. Controlling the right aim position/distance is difficult due to how much the camera distance can scroll changes.
5. Scrolling too far makes aiming in the opposite direction too slow
6. Other

How do you feel about the idea of the following possible solutions?

1. Cap camera, but add an ADS button allowing you best of both worlds. look far away and better line up multi-kills
2. There is an attachment system planned in the full release. Base weapons would have their aim clamped, but you could optionally chose to attach a sight that gives you the current unclamped aiming.
3. Leave the current camera system, but show a mini-map or onscreen indicators when zombies are getting close so it is more apparent if you are in immediate danger and where you are in the environment.

I think the game has potential, unique art style, and a clear vision, but the main mechanic does not feel satisfying and we need more world context.

I would say the onboarding experience is pretty frustrating. The menu being part of gameplay was weird since you can control both at the same time. Also you start facing the end of game where you dump all your radiation? The art style is so abstract I don't know what I'm looking at and where to go first loading in. It was made even harder since we don't any controls yet, so trying different buttons made me zip around a lot confusing me and I actually fell of the map (also did this in the main level) because you have limited boost and lack of collision. The only way to keep playing was to reopen the game. There needs to always be a check in a 3D game to kill/respawn the player if they fall too far past the floor.   It took me a few minutes to get out the staging area and almost quit there. Games like this would typically start you in the first level so you can learn and play the game first before worrying about upgrades and stuff.

Overall, the readability proved my biggest issue. It being so unique and placeholder art made it frustrating to figure out what is going on. I couldn't tell what type of platforms were or what the radiation was. The radiation sucking requires a lot more feedback. It's hard to tell it's doing anything, collecting doesn't feel fun, and there is no challenge to collecting them. This makes upgrades feel unnecessary since they're not needed to make the game easier or solve harder puzzles. 

I feel this game has something to say, so I'm curious to see where it goes next.

It takes some getting used to, but overall was really fun once you get in a groove.  Maybe starting the player in one of the narrow hallways would be better to get players thinking in a side scrolling manner before moving into a more open area.  It's cool to walk around and find new areas and maps. 

I did find it a bit hard to aim at the correct enemies when navigating the bigger areas when stuck in corners or using the Z axis to move. This is extra frustrating because all the best weapons require tucking yourself into those corners or through narrow choke points that require you to use 80% of that ammo/durability just to escape. So yes you had a strong weapon, but it was so short lived. Another thing is melee weapons feel pretty bad to use. They take 2-3 hits and are very slow making them almost useless outside the machete . Last gripe is it would be great to be able to hold food like in Dead Rising. Because you lock players from backtracking too much, it's hard to get back to enough food to say alive, especially since most food gives so little health.

Thanks for the feedback! Art style is a huge issue and will be updated. As far as how long until the next round, there is a message at the start of a round telling you when the next wave will start, as long with a message when the first spawn starts. In the future, there will also be audio queues. 

Do you think the aiming is really only a problem for the sniper or also other weapons as well?

In general, the game was really good and I enjoyed it. It feels very polished and looks nice. 

I don't think anything was outright bad, but if I really had to pick something, it would be the tutorial. It's honestly one of the better tutorials I've seen in an indie game, but there are a handful of minor points of friction making it feel like 80% instead of 100% there. I like it's pacing and thoroughness. My minor points:

• Forcing it shouldn't be required. it's really annoying if you already know how to play.
• Nowhere does it teach you that shapes disappear on collision with the same shape, but go through different shapes. It can be learned eventually, but it took me a bit to realize this, as it seems pretty important.
• The tutorial never actually test if you learned the skill it just taught you. This could be a problem since as long as you kill all the enemies, you're moved on.
• Tutorial should pause when giving you instructions which is really bad at times when you give lots of text like explaining the wall abilities. I am a slow reader and missed half the text. I couldn't tell what the blue one did and missed that using them is a 2 hit process. It took me a long time during gameplay to figure those things out.
• A small thing is player's could get soft locked. It is possible to trigger the blue ability and be left with only a single enemy left. This can happen before you learn about how abilities work, and advancing the tutorial requires killing all enemies. I recommend not adding the abilities until that section of the tutorial arrives.

Overall, the game feels like it's missing something for longevity. I would have really liked to see more interesting level designs then them all just be shrinking squares.  Something that makes you think where you aim and how to properly rebound. Currently there isn't much reason to aim. Just shoot toward abilities and let them rebound kills. Likewise, the upgrades feel really underwhelming. Its really just making things fly around more. There should be more verity and encourage playing differently. I also don't feel like enemy types don't change up much how you play. 

thanks for all that wonderful feedback! Will hopefully get to test your game tomorrow and compare and leave feedback!

1. All valid points and obvious in hindsight! Will definitely be fixed in the next version. 
2. I think the redesign may help then. I agree it takes too long to get “difficult” once you get used to the game. 
3. My zombie AI did have heavy flanking in the beginning, but they felt too smart. Combine with them being hard to kill,  it felt punishing to do anything but camp. Will definitely compare your choice. Maybe I just didn’t balance it right. 

thanks for the play and I planned on checking your game out as well! Some responses to your feedback:

1. The aim lagging and slowing the player’s movement is to simulate weapons being harder to handle. They are a bit exaggerated in this prototype for the sake of testing levers. Did handling feel too clunky across all weapons or specific ones? Handling goes in the order pistol -> smg —> shotgun -> ar -> rifle -> lmg. 
2. The layout will change to start you outside the building and lead to more tense situations. What round did you make it to? I wonder if difficulty didn’t scale as fast as you’d like?
3. About openness and surrounded. Is the problem one or more of the following: areas weren’t open enough, zombies funneled too much from one direction,  there weren’t ever enough zombies on screen to feel surrounded, or something else?

Glad you enjoyed it! I don’t typically play top down shooters either, so I wanted to make one I would enjoy. And here are some responses to your feedback!

1. You will die very quickly with new weapons and upgrades. The next update will hopefully guide the player into better progression. 
2. This game is difficult. A full release will have ways to make it easier.
3. A darker color palette is coming to address the atmosphere. I’d love to hear your feedback if the colors help or if a bigger art change is needed.
4. N/A
5. This map is currently framed as “defend the building”, but the concept is “utilize all the space to survive”. I plan on changing the layout to reinforce the correct intent. References for CoD Zombies clones (especially in 2D) are scarce. I mainly using older games like Enter the Gungeon and Zombieville. 
6. Agreed. Proper visuals and sound will be key. 
7. The darker palette will help text visibility. Zombies has the flow of powerless -> powerful -> powerless.  However, after watching others play, the economy is steep early game keeping beginners constrained. Is the economy blocking you or is it something else?
8. Hopefully the next build allows players to get further. 

Dev here, I'm mainly just looking for feedback of my prototype and if you could see this game polished up into something worth playing a full version of.

Huge patch update

-- Setting to switch between hold to sprint and toggle

-- Change controller interact button to bottom face button

-- Zombies only stun from headshots but increased stun duration

-- Expanded world view to see more of the level and changed base resolution to 720p

-- Removed incoming zombie count and instead show a message on round start

-- Increased starting health to 3 and cap upgrade to 6 hearts

-- weapon damage upgrade doubles each time and caps at level 3

-- workbench now only upgrades once and doubles ammo capacity and cuts reload speed in half

-- Powerup machine now limits to 2 powerups per round

-- Powerups can now be picked up sooner after they spawn

-- Barricades only give up to a certain amount of points per round based on round number

-- Update a few prices, made purchase text clearer, and removed negative price labels

-- Repositioning the intractable locations

-- Fixed issue where one wall was too thin to tell it was a wall

--Shooting/reloading can be used now and will interrupt actions where appropriate

-- Added controller vibration sensitivity and vibration doesn't happen when not using controller

-- Challenges now have increase levels of difficulty each time they are completed during a round. You must complete both challenges at their current level before you can tackle the next

-- Various fixes other fixes