itch.io

did you figure out how to make money, because i cant figure it out?

very fun game, though it has a lot of problems: 

the food counter doesnt work. the death counter is probably the only indicator, that you have too little food, though idk if it works, as it never changed from 0.

zooming out to the max makes the cursor extremely inaccurate, zooming out fully and moving around is disorientating and hurt my eyes, as textures are constantly changing, which causes the screen to flash extremely.

the ui makes some land completely uninteractable or very hard to interact with. being zoomed out fully also doesnt allow you to see land at the edge of the map.

the year count doesnt work.

merchant trades dont work and would be extremely busted if they did, as i have seen trades for over 20.000 gold for not too many resources.

after buying land, the unlock screen still gives you the option to buy, even though it doesnt work anymore. you can also only buy the land to the north and south and nothing else, making the land ending impossible.

the tavern doesnt seem to work, as i cant place it down, no matter what. this locks me out of the reputation ending, as i cant get reputation without adventurers.

due to being unable to buy all land and unable to gain reputation, it is impossible to win...LOL.

overall a fun experience. the manual was kind of required due to the graphics making it impossible to read text or to recognize images, though once i got the hang of things, it was a fun time. realizing, that i couldnt get more land and had already used my three chunks to the fullest and that the game was unbeatable did leave me unsatisfied though.

this game is so amazing. its a real step up from the past games. especially the music was fantastic.

i love the fact that there are three endings, even if ending A seems to be bugged. i did hang up all paintings, did every quest and collected 522 orbs, which is the max that i could find, however i only got ending C. i would love to see what ending A is, but no one can seem to get it to work, which is sad, as ending A seems like the best ending, as you resolve the conflict of the ownership of the tavern.

cool game with a great concept, just sad, that trick or treating is broken. videos of this game are already rare and all that i saw couldnt open the doors. would love to see how a core mechanic of the game was supposed to work.

very fun game. though there is an easy skip to the moon, which allows you to win with just 00.12 dollars. it is also very easy to perform, to the point of me considering it the correct way to bypass the special gate. for some reason the game has 10.01 dollars, even though it is only supposed to have 10. the game also is easy to softlock, but because of how short it is, a reset isnt a problem.

what is the mr. rabbit lore you mention? where is that from? i didnt encounter any rabbits in this game.

this was an amazing improvement to the last game. it was so much fun to play. the music, especially the song at the end was amazing. while it did have the usual jank, it was all around a problem free experience without obvious softlocks or bugs .

the only problems were crafting being useless, as you could get everything necessary a different way, and also being a bad system, as it relies on limited ground resources.

also the system of shield, attack, shield from the last game was kind of replaced by the heal function, although it was a more balanced system.

i am just kind of confused on the lore. the last game established, that we were lod and had been turned into a mouse in the encounter with the dark lord. that also being the reason, why we want to save luna and why all the corrupted villagers blame us for what happened. but now we encountered lod. even weirder, he has the same brown cloak with red clothes underneath as us. in the end we become the final fragment of lunas heart to awaken her, so are we just a fragment of luna now? there was a memory mentioning lod finding, what luna saw him as. were we the fragment of lunas heart, that took the form of what luna saw lod as? that would explain, why lod is still around in the end credit scene, after we merged with luna.

also is there any other game/media of this world, as two of the final fragments, the priest and guy with blue hair and a sword, had never been mentioned anywhere before?

very fun, but also very jank. the evil god doesnt stop you from jumping into some lava pools multiple times, but then stops you from jumping into lava pools, that you never jumped into. probably because the god is programmed to lock certain pools, depending on how many sacrifices you have, even though you can sacrifice into any lava pool in a different order.

this game is nearly unplayable. there are a lot of bugs and jank and it is a challenge to not softlock yourself: 

your skills use mp. mp does not regenerate. hp and mp are not restored after battle. mp and hp can only be restored in battle by using potions. if you run out of mp and have too low hp, you enter a state, where you are essentially softlocked, as you need to enter battle to restore your stats, but you will die, before being able to restore them, forcing a reset.

overall the concept is great and the combat would be fine, if there was a pause button. skills leveling up on use is also such an amazing feature. it is just missing features to make it playable. during my playthrough i was more focused on not softlocking the game, than on combat, which isnt great. a big problem of this is the limited resources. there is only so much mp and hp in the game, as the only way to restore them is potions, which are limited. at the end of the game, i was almost out of potions and was close to losing at the final battle, which would mean a full reset, which was very stressful and not very fun. because of these limited resources i skipped some enemies at the end. if i hadnt done that, i would have had to reset and lose all my progress, which would have been horrible.

I want to preface this comment by saying that I really enjoyed the game. It was a lot of fun to play and it has got to be the second best game, that you made behind le chat fonce and the secrets of the clocktower. You mostly make games for game jams, which is also the case for this game, and so they are often unpolished. The ideas, that you have, however are outstanding and this game shows it. I will mostly be criticizing the game, not because it is bad, but because I can see the potential and am very invested as the game is a lot of fun.

Health bars briefly overflow into the negatives. This is apparent with weapons with big damage, as the opponents health bar will briefly flip.

The run animation is temporarily broken after entering a new area, until you move up or down. Moving left or right makes you glide around, this may be, as there is no sideways run animation.

Making money in the game is confusing. you sell the rings of sur to the guard next to the gate in querem (starting area) for 50 silver each. this was confusing to find out, as the shops have a “buy/sell" option, that only works to buy items. this had me tunnel visioned on them being the way to make money. also the option being called "deliver" had me assuming, that that was something from a later quest. calling it "bounty" or "sell" would have been more intuitive. this is also a bad system, as all enemies give 50 silver, making grinding money a long process of farming the enemies in the first area, though farming money is only required, if you want to test out all the gear in the game and isn’t really necessary to beat the game. 

I also somehow managed to get negative money.

your level caps out at level 20, though instead of indicating, that you have reached max level, it just says “xp/105” no matter if you have over 105 xp. This may be bugged, as unlocking all skill point unlocks would require level 35, which might be the intended max level.

the third row of items in your inventory consists of items found in the different areas. after exiting an area however those items are lost. this doesnt affect gameplay as the items arent of any use, but it is messing with my ocd/completionist mind

health/mana restoration is jank. most of the time you dont automatically restore them after battle, but you instead need to look at your stats, which restores them. its a kind of Schrödingers restore. you only restore them, if you look at your stats. also the existence of fried chicken and jugs of wine implie, that this restoration is a bug and should not happen, which is horrible as natural health/mana restoration makes the game more enjoyable. playing without it would be hell.

when it comes to game balance, classes are not balanced:

the sword is a horrible class and can barely make it past the three first boss fights with the right rng and over leveling, however it can not beat the fourth boss, the bandit leader. progressing past that point is impossible with it. at max upgrades you die in 12 hits, but need to hit the bandit leader 38 times. this is impossible, the bandit leader is too accurate and the sword class has no useful abilities to support it. upgrading your sword mastery is also a waste of silver. all that does is buff your attack up skill, which is a waste of a turn, and buff the bleed skill, which is so inaccurate and weak, that it has no use and is just a waste of turns to use. i would recommend switching to another class as soon as you can, as the class is bad and you will just struggle with a class, that cant take you far.

the rifle is a horrible class. the normal attack is useless and isnt intended to be used. you are intended to use the skills. the skills however are all centered around the weak shoot skill. while it never misses, the damage is poor and insufficient for the bandit leader. the damage can be increased with powder, though this doesnt seem to work and would be a weak increase, so being a waste of a turn. it has the accuracy up skill, which is useless on a weapon that cant miss. its final skill is reload, as you need to reload every three shots, wasting a turn. the three loaded rounds dont recharge after battle meaning, that you can go into battle and need to reload right away. a no-miss build with poor damage and without defense from enemies far stronger than you makes this a horrible class, that also costs silver every shot. mastery only increases the attack boost of the powder, which is useless.

the blood dagger is the worst class. its base attack is weak and useless. the main gimmick of the class is sacrificing 30hp for a damage boost in the form of blood marks, with increased mastery allowing you to gain more blood marks. this makes the cut and impact skill do more damage. impact however is a magic skill and so doesnt miss and also does more damage than cut, so cut is useless. this also makes the accuracy up skill useless. the flaw of this class is, that the blood mark doesnt boost your damage by much and sacrifices a lot of your hp and a turn. the class has no way to heal itself and heal potions are useless, only healing 20hp per turn, so you are killing yourself for a slight damage increase. out of all classes this is the worst, as it does such bad damage and actively kills you.

the axe class is broken/overpowered and horrible at the same time. you are very inaccurate, but hit hard. this is pretty horrible, it is has the same issues as the sword, that being, that it does not do good damage, due to being inaccurate. its the skills make the axe class overpowered, as there is a way to never lose with it: the axe class has a stun ability. it stuns for two turns with a four turn cooldown. this would be balanced, if it wasnt for block. you can stun, attack, block, block, repeat to take no damage while slowly chipping down your opponent. with the low accuracy this is also pretty much the only viable strategy for doing bosses with the axe class. this is super slow, but unstoppable. you can also use sunder to speed this up. out of all the classic roberto romao no-hit-strategies this has got to be the worst as you only attack once every four turns and you miss a lot. This class is only for cheesing fights and has no viability outside of this cheese, as it trades the swords horrible damage for horrible accuracy. upgrading your axe mastery also doesnt help, as it only slightly increases the damage of the throwing skill, a skill that stops you from performing other skills and blocking for a turn, which are the only useful things in the axe skill.

The flute is a better version of the axe, as it is also broken/overpowered. The base attack does no damage and isn’t intended to be used. It is a magic weapon, yet it has the accuracy up skill, a useless skill for a weapon that cant miss. It has a healing skill, which is decent, healing 90hp with a four turn cooldown. The only form of damage of the flute is lullaby, a super weak attack, that deals between 1-4 damage. This damage however can be doubled with the skill madness, a two turn stun. The damage of this class is horrendous and is honestly second to none. The stun however breaks the class. Like with the axe, you can do a no-hit-combo with this stun and block. It is just way worse, as the stun has a six turn cooldown, instead of the four of the axe. This is balanced out with the flute mastery however. Flute mastery increases the lullabies damage, leading to it doing more damage per attack, than the axe. With the heal, you can also perform the combo: startcombo: stun, attack, attack, attack, block, block and then repeating the combo stun, attack, heal, attack, block, block, repeat, though the enemy may not deal over 45 damage per hit for the healing to outheal the damage. If the enemy does over 45 damage per hit the combo should be: stun, attack, block, block, block, block. This is a more complicated, yet more effective way to cheese all fights.

the staff is a good class and should honestly be the only weapon of the game, as it is the only class, that is viable, without abusing stun and block for no-hit-combos. it is very intricate and the mastery unlocking new spells balances it well. the normal attack is of course useless and should have honestly been set to a weak magic attack, instead of the pathetic attack, that it is. magic is powerful for mastery one and only becomes more powerful, the higher mastery you get. magic also miss, making the accuracy skill useless. i would honestly make this the only class in the game, as it is a great class and is intricate enough to form the entirety of the combat system. the normal attack would just have to be switched up for a slightly more powerful magic spell, with the mastery 1 skills getting moved to mastery 3. also the mastery 1 spells are all the same and should get effects, like burn, freeze and lifesteel to make them unique. However it has some issues, that break the balance of the class. Pyroblast is bugged and can only be used once, instead of on a four turn cooldown. Healing has a four turn cooldown, even though this isnt stated to the player. Frost soul however is also bugged and can be used an infinite amount of times. This makes you unkillable, as you have infinite mana and so can infinitely heal and attack. This breaks the balance of the class and was kind of sad to figure out, as without them being bugged it would have been a fun class, in which you manage your limited mana and try to boost up your pyroblast with fire soul, to get the most out of your mana, while healing to stay alive. Also, Skills on cooldown are usually greyed out, but for this class they are not.

The fact, that out of all six classes, three classes can not progress past the bandit leader and beat the game, two are only viable through stun-cheesing and only one is actually balanced, but the balance is bugged, making it broken, is honestly impressive. I like the variety, but the lack of game testing is apparent, which is understandable for a game jam.  But even for a game jam, this is extreme. You cant have play tested the game, or else you would have quickly figured out how broken the class balancing is. As a core part of the game, having no “normal” way to play is sad. The only way to progress is by using the axe, flute or staff and abusing the fact, that you cant lose with those classes as they are broken.

And now to the ending…Like what was that? After defeating the bandit leader we just talk to Gomez and the game is done. One of your biggest issues is often ending games abruptly. I had no idea, that I was so close to being done most of the time. Like we never went to prontera. It is crossed off on the map, but we went to every other location. It almost feels like there was an intended ending, but you ran out of time. The ending just left me empty inside, as my expected experience was abruptly cut short.

While the themes and style are very different, is “Magic: Vernandi” the sequel to this game? While the storyline was very different, we do chase down a mage on a dark island. It is a very loose connection, as Vernandi has its own storyline about the energy source and this game is about the dark book, but I could see some relation between the two.

Now this was all pretty negative, but as I said, I wouldn’t put in all this effort in reviewing every aspect of the game, if I didn’t like it. It is just a very rough gem, as you tried to realize a fantastic and expansive game concept in a limited time, which is honestly par for the course for you. It was a lot of fun to play and it was a lot of fun, figuring everything out.

nice game, but after winning the round wont end sometimes and esc doesnt seem to work, forcing a reset, making it impossible to clear the map.

the ingredients on top being in the correct column explains, why there are two mint slots.

i think, that i have it figured brewing out, but it just isnt working. for healing potions, it is clear, that i need mint, healers leaf and to boil it, but no matter what order i set, pressing k does nothing. i have legit spent half an hour trying out every possible combination of items and elements and orders for every potion, yet nothing worked. is there something you need to do before being able to brew potions? does your cursor need to be in a specific spot to brew? im starting to think that the game is broken.

random thing i found while pressing every key in hopes of finding a different keybind for brewing, as k seems to be broken is, that g dismissed all your active quests.

very fun game, but it is very hectic. a pause button would be very nice, as events happen so quickly, that you are never given enough time to look at the new things, that you unlocked or other things like your resources.

also there does seem to be an ending reached by getting 5000 farmland, but i have not found a way to get it, as the normal ending, which is triggered either after you reach either a certain amount of gold, population or power, idk which, will inevitably trigger before reaching that amount, as your farmland will increase those values to the amount that triggers the normal ending with no way to stop it. the best i got was around 2500 farmland, by just spamming farmlands and nothing else.

the 5000 may also just be a cap on the amount of farmland you can get, but the fact, that it is seemingly impossible to reach, along with the fact, that the /5000 only appears after reaching 1000 farmland would make it a very strange cap.

very fun game, though it has some problems. the biggest problem for me is the map, as it is just awful. you are never, where the map says you are and the map is just flat out wrong in most locations. like why is there a blue room on the map, if the room is more of a red color and has a desert heat affect. why is that room marked blue??? also the ending is kind of sudden.

have you figured out the brewing system? if so, plz tell me how it works.

the game seems very cool, but i can not figure out how to brew potions. i think that i have the right ingredients, but nothing is happening, no matter what i try.

for example, i tried making a mana potion with aether leaf and boiling it, mixed with every possible combination of elements and herbs with every possible order, yet nothing worked. i also tried making a healing potion with healers leaf and boiling it and mixing it with all possible combinations, yet nothing worked

also i softlocked myself by exiting the blacksmith while also triggering the dialogue at the same time, forcing me to reset the game.

those end sequences are so good. you are good at making those