I think the premise of a incremental game is that the upgrades should evolve the minigame, so that you are rewarded for either mastering the minigame, or it reduces attrition. The upgrades are the payoff for the player's rewards, they need to feel impactful. earlygame, it was 1% change, almost unnoticeable. the current minigame felt like challenge fatigue after a few rounds, since it feels like the game demands more and more consistent engagement from me, but the game itself didnt evolve in meaningful ways. adding longer and more skillchecks are changes to the minigame, but it doesnt necessarily make it more engaging. Conversely, the punishments for failing the skillchecks make me want to disengage, especially since failing a skillcheck seems to nosedives me in midair.
Maybe make the minigame circle Pjtor, so you have more design space for more mechanics? it would also give more feedback to the player because Pjotr would spin faster. the same for the flying through the air mechanic, currently I am looking at a circle, away from the action, instead of looking at the wonderful pixel art animation.
frzyc
Creator of
Recent community posts
yeah for a game jam this is very strong fundation and a rabbithole of expansions. the ability spinning around the player reminds me of a game called Asterogues, where you can catch enemy projectiles in your own orbit, and throw it back.
imagine if you can generate different element spells in your orbit, and combine them! the combinations becomes endless!
I would love to see things like, water enemies being less effective for fire, using wind abilities for mobility as well as mobbing, using earth to create a wall to buy you time to cast other abilities, fire spreading fire to nearby enemies, or a lightning ability that spread across wet enemies. different enemy types and affinity could force players to vary up their playstyle, since currently you can probably spam one or two ability to get through the waves.
my arm hurts from spinning, my brain hurts from channeling into the avatar state! The element system and how it interacts with the mobs were very exciting, and I would love to see this game expanded after the jam with more enemies, and more opportunities to use these abilities! the synergies and reactions with elemental enemies is very promising to explore.

