itch.io

Hey!

I tried it on the steam deck. It works fine as a gamepad but I wonder if it is possible to enable the mouse with the touchpad. That would be much more enjoyable to play (consume :D).

It looks pretty great, you did a ton of work with your demo! I wish you all the best on the Next Fest!

Thank you for feedback and bug report!

I am still in "pre-production" searching for better gameplay so I was not trying to scale it. I am glad you like the concept, that's really helpful feedback for me!

Hey! I played your game for second time. You improved it!

I am still fun of your fiction, it's just classic PC game "dark" theme :D

I beat the first level and next one and next one. Game has pretty great progression. I really like how you design unlock system.

I like animations of death, I still think you could add more simple animations on engine itself without doing pixel art to just make it more alive.

Yes, tutorial was useful. I was able to understand rules and beat levels.

Game feels much more polished and I enjoyed playing it. You got just pretty solid foundation for classic tower defense game. If you want to develop it further I feel you just need more "excitement" by more animations, particles effects and anything that could it make more juicy. 

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Game has pretty good base for top-down shooter!

I feel progression is little too fast. I think just letting to destroy whole wave to start next one would help to slow down pace of the game.

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Unique idea! 

I would love to have some tutorial/slower beginning so I can understand the rules.

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Pretty great platformer, I like how you created vibe of gameboy game.

I would prefer to disable self-damage. It was sometimes too annoying when I killed myself close to end of level :D

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Game has a good vibe so I would be good idea to expand it further.

Currently I was not able to understand how to make progression but I see the potential.

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Hey! it's really solid submission. Game has good cozy vibe combined with management mechanics.

I like visuals and music and overall atmosphere.

What I would improve:

• UI needs some improvement, it's the most important thing because I constantly using it in the game
• Game needs more explanations, I tried but was not able to easy understand how looks game loop. Probably you need more feedback/tutorial to show what to do exactly in start scaling your production

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Hey! Game has good idea but needs some explanation how you can move in darkness. I tried but died every time :(

Hey! You’ve made great progress until last time I played the game. I see you still keep the same core game loop so I will comment on new things I noticed during gameplay.

What I like:

• Starting screen is a neat idea. I like how you highlight current game state and change log. Cool!
• Main menu music is probably new and match pretty great "RPG vibe". Cool!
• Main menu is polished, I like how you made small animations to make it alive. Links to social media is pretty neat idea.
• I notice goblin character. The character is outstanding. I would use him/she much more in the game. Cool!
• The city mechanic is neat, I like how you designed structure with simple list of possible places to visit. It's easy to use and scalable. Cool!
• I see you did improvement with art. It looks much better but still needs some work.
• Fight mechanic
  • Fight seems much faster and distance between them shorter. It's pretty good improvement.
  • "Fast looting" (right click) is pretty great. I would even make it default because it much easier than drag and drop and make game flow better
  • Fight flow is well design I know what to do and how it works
• Quest log and popup with notifications is good. Cool!

What I would improve

• If I died there is should be option to try again the same fight. I died on first boss and when I saw I need to start again from beginning I lost motivation to try again. I think roguelike mechanic could be problematic for this kind of game.
  • If you keep roguelike design I would disable tutorial popups when you restart the game
• During dialogue mechanic  I would add simple button "next" just for clarification. Now you can just simple forgot you need to click / press enter to move to the next dialogue.
• Fight mechanic
  • I would change "select" to "attack" to remind you will attack this target
  • I would add option to "swap loot" before a fight, just to give change to change something before. Player could be angry he didn't swap loot and now could lose the game. I would keep design of not allowing to swap loot during a fight.
• In previous version tutorial fight was obligatory (with possibility of skip). In current version you allow to omit it, that is good idea. Although I would add just simple prompt "Would you like to check tutorial to learn how to play". Other players could skip the tutorial and bounce from game because they don't understand the rules. 
• In city overview I am not sure what is about "map view". I assume it's to show you all buildings but probably you have some plans to expand this mechanic.
• Art 
  • Smile's idle animation seems too fast. I would just keep it lower frame rate now they looks like they have really intense lifestyle :D
  • Art needs shading improvement to look better, now it's pretty dark and "flat".
  • Shadow direction on assets seems random, probably just need rework to find the same angle

You’ve made great progress with the game. For sure you are close to demo of the game.

Before steam next fest I would encourage to improve your capsule art. Steam shows them on list and it's your way to attract players to checkout your game among other games. At the start steam is showing games randomly so you got pretty good chance to catch some attention with a good capsule art.

I wish the best results! I really admire how much work you put into it, I know how hard is to develop a good game.

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Thank you for the great feedback (as always)!

I was fully focused on redesign game to shape much more clear direction for the game. I was bit lost in pervious iterations. I appreciate you notice planet gird design and potential to scale up game with missions and content overall.

My plan is to implement procedural generation of the planet with variety of missions to do. Now game has only one static map and misson but I appreciate you tried to make progress on the grid.

I appreciate all your notes about UI and gameplay (fight).

Sadly I did not any progress with dorid customization and UI around it since the last iteration. It's still a big thing to do but I wanted to focus on core gameplay (mission) before doing any rework here.

It's a great feedback about selecting droid. I will look for a way to indicate there is bunch of droids.

I played the game for the first time. It is really polished puzzle game but got some problems to find fun in the current design.

What important I notice there is bug: When you run game on widescreen you cannot see bottom "next" button on the starting screen. When I switched to full HD resolution i found the button.

What I like:

• Card mechanic is pretty great
• UI is clear and got pretty nice feedback. From UI/UX perspective it's pretty great.
• Music is well matched to the game, helping to get into state
• Tutorial design is pretty great

What I would improve:

• I don't like current game flow. I was surprised when to get my results I god some quiz to do. There should be some redesign to give much more feedback for player before.
  • IMO I would explore way of building puzzles when you trying to find matching puzzle and find out what really happened. You score player by time or mistakes but when I finish puzzles I got my answers. I know it's pretty hard pivot but I couldn't find fun in game.
• Game's Art looks "AI" way. I guess making so much art (cards) would be expensive but any way to make the game style more unique would be great. I would prefer simple art style but something more unique than AI look. It's my perspective and depends of audience there could be different reactions. Mabe some other models that could find different look?
• I got bug on tutorial with rereoll section. I canceled the view of card I couldn't open it again

I would encourage to take step back and analyze other games how they do that, how to improve game flow before you start doing any multiplayer stuff.

Congratulations on your submission. Keep working!

Thank you for playing and feedback!

I like how you notice you don't know what to do, I will try to find a way to make it more clear. Thanks!

Sorry if I made some mistakes in English, I was writing it quickly. Trying to improve but not my first language.

Hey, great devlog!

I can fully understand your position because I am in similar right now. IMO It's all about fighting scope creep. From one side you would like to ship unique game but it means more risk to take you don't really want to take for the first "steam" game.

For sure freely roaming would be much better but that means much more scope of the game and your thinking is pretty reasonable. I fully understand your debate.

I feel (IMO) options:

• Keep your current design, just search how you make it "fast and fun", keep digging how you could maximize player's dopamine about what's next loot
• Letting player to control your character in limited area just giving the experience (or imitation) of exploring. Giving you early option to extend it during development.
• Move into idea of "grid" movement where player move on grid instead of auto-scrolling. It's hard to explain to me but there is a great example: https://ace-of-4s.itch.io/gankenstein. I personally was inspired by this design and trying to use this concept in my game.

In my case I decided to "cut off" my unique idea and simplify game as much as possible until I feel it's something worth few bucks. Just shoot, loot, improve and repeat. I was in bad spot trying to find super cool idea and not knowing what am I doing, spending so much time on something that probably won't work as I would like to. There is sooo much to learn to be "effective" in delivering good quality games that making it harder by complex design seems not really great strategy.

My current approach is to think about your first "steam" game as "middle game" that will lead to some much better second/third game. You learn, build up mechanics and just make mistakes.

Advantage of your current design is just controlling by mouse. So beside Steam release you could just port it to mobile (touch) and try your best to find some audience there in premium model. On Android you pay only 20$ lifetime, no steam-like fee.

Here is pretty good blog about game marketing I like to learn: https://howtomarketagame.com/blog/ but I warn it shows pretty "rough" world where from financial perspective most of us fail (75%), BUT shows bright side as well!

Keep working!

Thank you for playing and great feedback!

Thanks for sharing, I hope you recover soon and keep working!

Hey! I played for the first time.

• Overall
  • It's solid foundation for good tower defense game with mechanic of economy and interesting dark fiction.
• Gameplay
  • It's classic tower defense and it's working as I expected. I am putting towers and enemies waves are coming
  • I got some problems to understand the game rules. I couldn't pass the first level, but I would love to because game looks pretty interesting. I see there is some concept of economy of "slave"? I assume you somehow exchange them for souls (money?). I tried but I couldn't connect the dots.
    • Probably it's the most important to help understand that so we could enjoy the game.
  • I like how you design each level unlocks new buildings, it's pretty solid design to motivate players to move on.
• Art
  • I like how you design the game map, it looks good. It's clearly you are learning the pixel art but I can see your effort put into that.
  • I assume you could make game much more better looking with using of light. Just checkout other games that use in-game engine light effect to make game more interesting looking.
  • I see you made some animations but I know how hard is to make them more, I think you could use engine to make some animations like walking (swinging on sides). There is a gamedev who shows how effectively you can improve visuals of your game with that kind of animations (he has similar style to yours) -> https://www.youtube.com/@FirebelleyGames
• UI
  • I like how you design interface for the game, using it was pretty obvious, tabs are great to organize more buildings. Tabs design is pretty good.
• Sound
  
  • There is lack of music, not sure it it's on purpose but any "dark" like music would make this game more interesting and easier to understand the mood you want to make with the game

Congratulations on your submission! Game has potential, I like your direction. Keep working!

Don't be too harsh for yourself about progress, we all know how it looks like to be solo developer :D, I appreciate your work.

Thank you for playing and great feedback!

I am really glad you like the overall concept

Sorry for the technical problems, I still have some mess in my code. Freeze is my bad, there is a bug in the loading screen logic, it shouldn't happen.  I uploaded version with the fix.

Overall long loading screen is not really solvable on the web version, it doesn't really provide a good way to precompile shaders. I am using it just to make game more accessible to give a try. From my experience it's not really possible to make bigger  3D game with VFX working well on web version, eventually I will be force to me move only downloadable version, but I will keep web version as long as loading screen won't last forever :D

Downloadable version will work much better because it uses different render with ability to precompile shaders.

Yes, I played in full screen but somehow WSAD and middle mouse is not working for me (chrome) :/

Hey! The game looks pretty good, core gameplay is enjoyable. I got idea of the game. I like how polished it is *clap*

Art style is good, lighting is working very well to make it more dynamic. Music is well match to theme.

UI is pretty great, responsive and didn't any problems to understand how it works. Tutorial as well is pretty good. I think problem could be that UI is pretty small, probably could be just bigger.

I got some problems with moving camera, I couldn't do anything. I have feeling camera was pretty far away, I got idea to display the whole level but someone with eye problems could not see anything, probably zoom in/out feature would solve it (maybe there is but it's not working for me)

I am not sure but I ruined my run by placing flag on wrong place so I couldn't place any other block there. I just thought that reverse move or just overwriting could just solve it.

Congratulations on your submission! For sure there is good potential! Keep working!

Thank you for playing and feedback!

I fully understand your feeling. The gameplay is still not here, I still prototyping with it. I am glad you tried to build houses and move around the command center!

Thanks for the explanation, for sure when you make clear positions it will be much better.

I died from asteroids but it's related to not understanding how to move to avoid them when I didn't shoot them

I like vibe of the game, i can assume you inspired by mario kart. It's solid core gameplay. I had some fun riding around, controls feels pretty good.

Music is super great match! I love change of tension close to the end of race.

I got some problem to catch enemy if i am behind and i assume items will be collectable in future.

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Game has a good vibe! I really like a cat and animations!

I think you should work to put player into flow state as fast as possible, it's repetitive game but you could use it as advantage. You have a pretty great main character and overall cozy vibe. It should be like a tiktok, constantly something popuping up in front of you so you cannot stop running :D

What I would improve:

• Speed up the game by default, i was expecting some fast paced game by genre. I fully understand it could be problem for other ppl so maybe some way of choosing difficulty level?
• Game is currently roguelike, i feel there could be 3 life at start and just simple way to restore it (some snacks etc)
• I wasn't expecting that pigeon is an enemy that would kill me :D

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Hey! Game looks interesting but i got some problems to understand movement mechanic, so i can just only warp around and cannot just move? I couldn't pass the game to boss due dying too early not understanding how to move properly. Maybe it's just my issue but just sharing my experience.

Visuals are pretty good it's a good direction for this kind of game, didn't have any sound 

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Not sure but did you upload the game build?

Hey! I played first time.

The gameplay is good but maybe too hard. I stuck at second wave. I died mostly by fish that just fly pretty fast to kill it.

I like how you design the shop mechanic and overall UI

Hey! I played second time but still got the same problem of freeze when trying open the classroom door :(

Not sure about progress in the main menu but I it's look pretty neat

Hey! I played second time

• kick physics - is it fair? does it feel "in control"?
  
  • It works much better then in the pervious build, it was easy to hit a package (no problems with aiming). Overall controls of the game feels good, I like walking and kicking
• package physics - does the package movement and bounciness feel balanced?
  
  • It feels ok but I fell there could be option to choose power (like a golf game) so I could feel more control. I think it could be good design to give player tools he can master by time.
• which debug settings did you use and find more fair/satisfying/balanced?
  • I tried only to change my kick power but I didn't find any good results
•  Is level layout clear and readable under time pressure?
  • I assume there is one level, it's pretty clear for me. I assume you work on other levels
• Does current artstyle fit the game vibe?
  
  • Yes, it's great fit

Thanks for the feedback!

Thank you for playing and detailed feedback! 

Thank you for playing and great feedback! <3

It's pretty good base for turn base tactic game. Mechanical it's working pretty well, I know how to move and attack. Camera work is pretty good.

I was not sure about RPG part of the game, how to mage your team and level up them. I was not sure what it was difference between characters. For sure it's pretty hard think to make but it's part of RPG games to create interesting characters.

Art has something wrong about the game probably it's just problem of no cohesive. I would prefer 8px characters but cohesive with the rest of the game.

Music is not matching the game so there could be improvement.

I am not sure but somehow I felt that game could be made by AI. Just saying that people could feel that way and push game away. Probably is just related to art and music.

Congratulations on your submission!

Hey! I played the uploaded version. 

It's looks pretty interesting, not sure why I stuck on the classroom door. I unlocked it but game freeze for me and I cannot do anything :(

I like visual graphic, intro and music

Cool game, it has pretty good potential as educational game.

It was pretty clear for me. I like UI of the game. Clue system is ok, I got idea how it works.

I would love to have some sound or more SFX when playing.

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

I like the game idea, it has a really good potential.

Somehow I was really bad at this game I didn't survive long. Not sure but I couldn't find a way to keep them together.

Music and art style is good, really chilly.

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

Hey, It's good mobile game!

I like how you designed tutorial I got the idea pretty quickly.

Gameplay is good, game could be challenging when you want to do this quickly but I sometimes got feeling there could restriction how wich direction you must point with your shoes not only two option.

I feel there could be more variety in the game after few levels you start loosing motivation because game is too repetitive, but core game loop is a good base.

Visuals and music are great! Feels good!

Congratulations on your submission! Keep working!

nope, I got to the final "jump" section :D

great job! wishlisted!

I saw information about NG+ but I thought it's only placeholder not a real thing :D