itch.io

kind of a janky lil prototype, but definitely off to a fun start - with some finesse I could see building this out into a fun idle / resource management / risk reward / apm challenge type game!

yeah you know in all honesty, the chased-by-unkillable-enemies schtick was the mechanic I liked the least - like - I was never very happy to see that show up in a level. I'm much more okay with levels where you have to juggle incapacitation e.g. the fish against progressing through other elements - mister candycane feels fine as an exceptional case, maybe he gets to stay unkillable, but reference something like the Angry Sun in SMB3 - use it sparingly, and once the player makes it through a sequence, give them a break for a bit, maybe don't just throw them right into another chased-by-unkillable-enemy thing.

I actually thought that was something that Celeste kind of messed up too - you'd just barely squeak through a real tough sequence of platforming maneuvers, only to be rewarded with another, probably even harder sequence - I just want a break to have fun platforming for a bit, man! 😅

badge hotkeys is a very rad feature! You can really get a lot of mobility out of dash, feather, and bouncy ball in particular.

really like the format, and the split between ship/captain gameplay - almost reminds me of NES blaster master

couple UX notes though -

you've gotta figure out a better way to handle the whole "which way will the cannon shoot" issue. "A" doesn't really mean anything to the player, if you equip a cannon to 'A' it's basically always a coin toss whether that means the shot is going to come out of the side you want it to or not. I do really like the inclusion of the 'broadside' type attack on a pirate ship, makes perfect sense... but you've gotta figure out a way to make it more obvious which side that shot's going to come out of.

I'm tempted to suggest something like "shot always comes out of the side closest to a valid target" but there will inevitably be situations where this isn't desired. Maybe you could allow the user to hold down the A or B buttons, to highlight the path of the shot, to be fired on button release? Maybe you could use the R-stick to point to the desired direction? I dunno. there's gotta be a way to eliminate that ambiguity.

only other small comment is it's annoying to toggle the ship whistle on and off - is there really any benefit to making it an equipable item, rather than a 'use from inventory' item? because as it stands now, it allows the absolutely untenable "oops I pressed the wrong button during a boss battle and skipped the entire window of opportunity to hit him while he's weak" turn of events, which - that shouldn't happen. as much as possible players shouldn't even be given the opportunity to hit the wrong button, you know?

anyway though, the music and graphics are so on-point, super impressive, and I wanna see more!! keep it up!

thanks for checking in on Squire and Corrupter, and... do take the time you need. it's alright, things are rough all over. 😉 

into it. glad to see the updates again!