itch.io

This was very fun! Once again, the game didn't work in Firefox for some reason, so i had to pull out my Edge (thank god I didn't mess with my Windows to uninstall it)

Machine lever, as the previous commentator said, was prone to going out-of-mouse-hover-radius if spinned fast, but this only added to the tense feeling of needing to be very accurate.

At first I couldn't get grasp on how long was it until the customer entered the infinite-stare state (I did watch your video beforehand, it was lovely and calming as always) and tried to speedrun it. It led to me having to get 38k on the last day... and I got two okays, so I had to make not 4, but 5 entire bills. Luckily, I still managed to finish with 156k on balance :D It was really hard, but definitely manageable even with my initial screw-up.

Are weddings really that expensive in America? They are expensive in my country too, but for this price we can buy an apartment in a middle-wealthy city here...

I loved the audio and art in this game, just like the previous time. Seeing pixels getting squished and stretched vertically — though it usually is said to be an error — was fun for me. Kinda added to that carefully-crafted-careless style you aimed for.

Thanks for a great game, and looking forward to your non-jam projects! Btw I scrolled through your itch profile, and it turns out that Magnetism Rally is made by you too!? Loved the game when I played it not long after that jam ended!

Thanks for replying!

I tried making different character voices by just changing pitch of the same sound for each character, but your approach sounds so much better. I'll try your method!

BTW, I've recently been wondering on doing a few things in Godot, and these appeared in your game. So I wanted to ask you a few questions:

— How did you do the tutorial boxes? Was the same as cutscene system (I assume, it was powered by Dialogue Manager?), or it was some other method of doing them?

— Were dialogue sounds just one sound with different pitch for each character, or did every character have their own sound? Did you record these by yourself?

(I thought that the original post was already long enough and the questions would ruin the flow, so here they are in the replies :D)

Heyy, I came from your devlog video which got recommended to me by Youtube! I actually commented there today :D

Just beat all 6 endings (in order: Crafter, Artist, It worked out, Marketer, Normie, and then I had to use a guide for the last one).

Getting two of the endings was actually challenging, though not because you had to melticiously plan out stat-rising, but because I didn't know requirements to get them. In some games I'd call this bad, but here the game is short enough for it to add to replayability, so I thought that it was good here.

No need to say that presentation and sound are brilliant, as everyone already said.

I really liked writing, it was really close to home and kept me smiling. And I also liked length of the cutscenes: they were long enough to convey story and characters, but not too long for a stat-riser to get boring (hello to a visual novel of a stat-riser called Uma Musume).

Going to gameplay, I like simple UI-based games with short or no animations which I can turn my brain too (Uma Musume while skipping cutscenes, Plague Inc, Tubestar, Slay the Spire etc), and this definitely is one of these!

Your game felt like an actual polished game. You could easily add a few variables (like maybe money?) and an endless mode and go sell it on Steam (instabuy from me BTW).

Of course, there are some slight QOL flaws, but some on, this is a 1) free 2) gamejam game 3) which was made in half the time. I'd never bash a game, while considering this and 4) the game actually being really cool. And 5) these "flaws" most people probably wouldn't even register.

But I (personally) would love if someone listed me little things like these so I could consider them while making my future games. So I'll write them out (though if you don't want to read them at the moment, please feel free to skip this numbered list!):

1. For a replayable stat-riser, an ability to skip animations (like results of your actions) would be great. Sometime you just want to click through everything without waiting, just like with clicking instant text in cutscenes.
2. If you advance your cutscense by clicking the spacebar icon with mouse, you can accidentally make prints if you click fast and don't notice that a cutscene ended fast enough. I personally can see two possible fixes for this: block controls for a bit after cutscene ends (this would be in line with action results), or allow player to progress by clicking anywhere else in the speech bubble. Also, being able to advance tutorial boxes with the spacebar like cutscenes would be great!
3. I couldn't read finish stats, because the cutscene would start immediately after they appeared. I'd integrate this stats in the ending cutscene or add a screen with them after the cutscene (either before credits or right with them). That is actually probably the worst I can say, which says a lot about quality of your game.
4. That's probably more than a nitpick, but the game didn't launch in a Firefox fork with some extensions enabled. You said in the devlog that you didn't like making downloadable games for jams, but having the option would be nice. I still managed to play with Edge though.
5. That's a smaller one, and probably not a UX-thing but me-thing (as I never saw this hindering anyone else), but it would be awesome to have text tips for making-things buttons. Having text with an icon really helps me reassure it's meaning. Even small tips like what you have with training buttons would still be great!
   

Yeah, I didn't call these nitpicks for no reason. These probably made half of the comment, but in the end, please remember that nitpicking is easy, and for a professional UX-nitpicker such as me, my latest game turned out to be a UX-nightmare thanks to my great UI-making skills :D

And! I actually have two little things I really appreciated while playing too!

1. I loved that in the action-result and logs texts were always stating not just how energy has changed, but also how much did I have after that. Always writing out how did stats or inventory change was also very helpful!
2. Thanks for the bold fonts!!! It was easy to read them both on PC and phone. I usually play Switch games on a Switch Lite, and playing this game with big bold fonts was such a nice experience! I don't know if you (Moka) or the artist (Mini) picked them out, but you did a great job!

All in all, I had a great time with this game. I'll be looking to your next games and videos (the devlog was lovely)! Thanks for the great game, reading my wall of text and also replying me on Youtube!

I found this game very hard, but it looks pretty and idea seems fun!

Yes, shialone drew all graphics specifically for this game! I've added a link to her Telegram channel in the description

Gonna take a look at your game too :)