Nick: A kidsy vampire survivors with couch co op is a million dollar idea. Not sure why we haven't seen it until now. Sounds and overall theme are very endearing.
Ryan: Its cute. its fun
Cons
Nick: Screen gets very busy with all of the telegraphed attack warnings. Most weapons feem so outside of my control i essentially have no agency at all. the orbs were easy to use and it would be nice to feel that way about any of the other attacks.
Ryan: In a game with pursuing enemiesm its surprising there is little to no crowd control abilities. May be too many enemies as the game progresses.
Wishes
Nick: More characters. Couldn't figure out how to do dual controller instead of 1 controller, 1 mouse + keyboard.
Nick: Cool core mechanic. Controls well. Screen information is easy to parse even when things get hectic.
Ryan: Art direction, character design.
Cons
Nick: Game does not adequately present how it 'wants' to be played. Design does not appear to do anything to make the retracting part of attacking discoverable in a way the player will easily see and retain.
Ryan: Too much downtime between shots. Pace of play.
Nick: Lovely art and music. Novel and engaging variation on the tower defense genre.
Ryan: ARPG elements.
Cons
Nick: Levels are dense to the point of feeling crowded. Not enough set up time between wave or at the start of the level. Especially true if one is just learning how the game works.
Ryan: Pace of play is too fast.
Wishes
Nick: Some kind of digestible "these are your characters and what they can do, these are the enemies and what they do" kind of armory/bestiary files in a pause screen.
Nick: Good atmosphere, Gunplay is adequate, thorough map ui stuff makes it easy to get around
Ryan: Fast travel.
Cons
Nick: Most text is unreadable for some reason. Enemies respawning as I loot a room with no warning is, as they say, " :'( ".
Ryan: Enemies have too much health. They should have 1/100th as much health as they have now.
Wishes
Nick: Quick heal button, remove rmb requirement from shooting, more direction at the start as far as what i'm meant to be doing/where im meant to be going
Nick: Sound and art design feel great. Things are explained in a way that is easy to understand. Probably more, but we had limited time and haven't yet deeply dove into the game. The idea of losing battles expanding the narrative rather than giving out game over is the most interesting piece of this game that we encountered. Curious to see what it can do.
Ryan: Pacing is good. No big lore dump at the beginning. The player gets control very quickly and the game reveals itself through gameplay rather than just cutscenes.
Cons
Nick: It's a JRPG. Not anything you can do about that. Just not my thing.
Music is real good. Movement feels a little funny, like its not 1 to 1 it feels like you're kind of being snapped to a grid when you stop moving. Also it'd be cool to get more than a quarter second between the level starting and the boss stomping your face in. Great art. Mechanically solid boss fights.
Its very polished for a solo dev in the time frame. There are a few parts of the UI, movement, and gun behavior that would do well with some tuning. I'm sure you've already got all kinds of tweaks youd like to make. What would be first on your list of stuff to polish up?
Love the grimy music. Can't speak much on the game as it is only there in a very rudimentary way as we're sure you are acutely aware. The core concept is a cool one. QA testing could be a great way to justify a compartmentalized, episodic, and linear set of combat challenges. Hope we see a DX version someday that really let's these bots go to work.
There are a couple of things here that stand out. Firstly, the game works well and is conceptually very cute. Works well as in not buggy, very smooth and complete. Second, the combat system is very annoying straight away. It could have potential in a resident evil sort of 'you cant move while youre shooting' kind of way, but it primarily just felt irksome to constantly micromanage combat zoning in an RTS style game. Maybe modern RTS design has us spoiled with its auto combat. Last, just as a tip, finding some fair use music and SFX and slapping them in there as a placeholder is quick and easy and does SO MUCH to bring a jam project together.
In what directions do you see this game growing as far as mechanics? It is soaked through With style. Just absolutely pitch perfect unity of artistic design. it could be ten more hours of rail shooter spaceship and we would still be excited.
Not bad at all! A nice little QoL could maybe be seeing your zombies health bars while they are off screen. Also if you can move the cards around we didn't figure out how and overlapping cards have their text obscured. Good blend of card game with a tower defensy kind of vibe, though.
There are a lot of things about this i like. The character controls smoothly, the rails are a cool addition, the music and art are great. There are others i would change. Level design being paramount among them. So many spaces, even the first jump in the entire game, are far too close to what is the absolute top end of what the character is capable of. I realize platforming games have come a very long way since the old super mario days, but the precision you're asking of people from the get go is far too much of a skill cliff. I don't know who this game is meant to be for. If its for the Celeste/super meat boy/IWBTG crowd then its ok. Any one with a more casual perspective of platform games is going to find it too demanding. The I-frames you get from spin jumping also don't last as long as I would expect. If it were our game we'd set it so you're spinning right up until you land again. This is the only thing we see from you on itch so maybe this is one of your first entries into game design. If so, it's a great start and I encourage you to keep working. You're on the right track.
we did not, it was sorely missed. considering getting off our butts and making a youtube video about this jam because we have some things to say. this was a really impressive entry.
there is so much to like here. the basic premise is going to be a surefire way to find an audience because it is very cute. the gameplay is basic but functionally solid. the art and music are grounded and endearing. the name is snappy and attractive. what would you add or change given more development time?
Hey, found you on reddit. We're streamers that play a lot of itch games and try to give people feedback. Played this on a whim.
The Good: The cinematic quality of your prologue and epilogue show a lot of promise. It's clear you want that to be a component of your work. The relatively bright art assets in what is presumably a horror game is extremely interesting to us. It doesn't seem like a stylistic choice, but is very striking. It gets our brain running on how this kind of thing could be leveraged. When we say bright we refer to both color brightness and design mood. Its like seeing a cartoon character go through dark material for the first time. The light of the shrine far off in the woods is great. We were pulled in like moths to a flame. The simple story that folded in what we assume is genuine historical folklore is a solid baseline.
The Bad: The walk and run feel arrested, like our shoelaces are tied together and we can only move our feet apart from each other a small distance. The gunplay is trivial and the projectiles for the gun and the boss need more than placeholder graphics asap. The opening sequence is a lore dump that you could spread out through the beginning of the game through audio to improve the pacing. The pans across the level after the opening should be removed entirely. They remove the discovery of the level and deflate the fear of the zombies.
Well that was nice. platforming feels great. Art is as simultaneously simple as it is sharp. That's something we've come to expect from you, though. Second half of the game is an unexpected and cathartic twist.
This is the first game we've played from the jam where the "randomness" feels totally scripted if you play through a second time. Was that intentional? It's an interesting take to lie to the player if intended. Very Portal.
