itch.io

Ooh, age of empires - I've heard a lot about the franchise but haven't played any yet, will have to add them to my ever-expanding list of games I need to play :p

I can definitely see how the concept would somewhat force you in an RTS direction, and I commend you for seeing the idea through regardless. I generally have a bit of an opposite approach in that I always try to iron out a gameplay concept first, and then layer appropriate visuals/story on top afterwards (Unforeseen consequence of having Aphantasia, I guess).

As far as balancing goes, don't worry too much about the numbers - that stuff is primarily for multiplayer games. Just make sure to keep it organized in such a way that you can make a backend for adjusting difficulty in the future. A super easy way to fine-tune the difficulty is to add a Postal 2 amount of difficulties (search "Postal 2 difficulties" if you're unfamiliar) and have people decide on a sweetspot for themselves. 

The one aspect of balance that I would be mindful about is randomization. Don't randomize features unnecessarily, as being rewarded for spamming "Restart level" isn't a particularly engaging feature (I'm looking at you, roaming enemies and pillories/stocks).

Aside from that, here are a couple of suggestions for you, as far as the current state of the game goes, in no particular order:

1) Try researching/messing around with Foreswing vs Backswing, as well as Hitscan vs Projectiles - Understanding more about these mechanics and their implementation helps a ton. 

Playing some Battle Cats can give you a good understanding of the importance of Foreswing vs Backswing, and Starcraft 2 helped me learn some of the niche differences between projectile types and hitscan. 

2) Try refining the Sex mechanic to feel more intentional/deliberate - maybe through tying it to either control groups or unit actions? An easy implementation might be to have a hotkey with 3 cases: (1, 2, and >2 units selected)

3) Having waves continue after you finish an altar seems unnecessarily stressful, especially for lower difficulties. Maybe consider an approach closer to the Sky Shield mission in Starcraft, where reinforcements are sent to each encampment after an altar is cleared. 

4) Include a "Sniffling" CG for some story characters, to bridge the gap from uncontrollably sobbing to cheekily smirking

This one is more of a suggestion than advice, but:

5) Some roguelite/metaprogression might be nice, too. For instance, maybe a set of perks that could give m/m, m/f, and f/f relations different bonuses

Maybe a perk with a downside of monogamous sexual relations might be interesting too

Feel free to take whatever you want from this autistic rambling of mine, and I hope I managed to inspire - even if it's the teeniest little bit!

Hey, been following this project for a while now, and I've got to say, I'm quite impressed at the progress that's been made (my procrastinating ass could NEVER)

I had a few questions, as well as (potentially) a little input - both as an aspiring indie dev and consumer of video games

I'm a big fan of a lot of the mechanics this game has going for it in it's current state (e.g. the distinct stages before & after claiming an altar, sexual "economy", necromancy, etc.), however some others need refinement (unit movement, attack animations, etc.)

I noticed a little bit of a trend (buggy unit control, lack of a "Real-time Strategy" tag) and I had a question: What games inspired the gameplay aspects of this project, and did you know that you would be making an RTS game when you started? 

(also, shot in the dark, been having difficulty applying myself to game development recently - any chance I could get a look under the hood sometime? you can totes ignore this part btw no pressure)

Played through this, and I have some input: 

1) Change character animations, as of right now they feel stiff and unnatural. Using references should work wonders.

2) The character portrait has a tendency to break horribly and either lower by about 50% to where you can't see half of it (bottom of the screen is slightly above the waist) or rapidly swap between the lowered and unlowered states.

3) I think the game gets confused if you have sex multiple times and stacks pregnancy, making some really odd stuff happen

I have a bunch more input that I could give, but most of it is tangential in nature, especially considering that this is an early build of the game. 

If you want, you can add me on discord (@Wurbleburp) and I can do some beta testing for you and help out with level design <3

on the start menu you have to enter a cheat code from one of the Castlevania games

the code has some characters exchanged for others, such as (') being represented as a lowercase i

you have to enter the full code semi-quickly, and holding shift isn't required

which cheat code, you ask? who knows!! but I wish you good luck in your secret-finding endeavors :3333

I'm honestly not even sure if that was the full version, definitely give the full steam/itch playthrough, it has a lot more content (I don't want to spoiler it here, but theres multiple, definitive endings)

Blood gems are found in the same biomes that contain focus gems, alter gems, etc, such as the magic island. 

(also if ya want, feel free to add me on discord (same username), i've played through this game way too many times and can give you pointers on it)

Fairly certain it can be, at least there's a multiplayer tab in-game and in the devlog there's an update on April 16th of 2020 titled "Connecting Via IP (Multiplayer)"

My suggestion is to look a bit harder

Game is listed as working on linux, but uses .exe files

It's easy enough to get wine and run .exe files regardless, but it feels kinda weird listing it as linux compatible when it technically isnt 

there are actually 8 characters in this version, one of the secret characters was left in :3