itch.io

Attempting to end a run.

Also sometimes the keys for soul shackles don't work.

I win?

You can coin flip multiple times. 

Not sure what I am supposed to see here but I can't do anything but back and the checkmark. (Also your edges are off but thats cosmetic )

No more details were given

i tried playing graggle, I don't understand. I didn't understand game play. I don't kniw how the gane ends. I tried 2 games the first the enemy was gaining on their character. But I never gained on mine. I eventually sacrificed all my cards and didn't get a "you lost screen". My second. I got a few moves in when the enemy drew I think a 6th card and then never did anything else.

I exited out to have the run above but heard 2 set of music. i am assuming the music from graggle is still playing. 

#1

#2

I am glad to hear that the game play suggestions were already being looked at. Nice!

I understand not being able to afford full QA. Having something that sends the error logs to you automatically may be a good idea so you can see what happens the most. 

The sheer number of edge cases is also why I suggest handling them more gracefully. If you can get the errors wothout relying on showing them to the player, then handing them better can make them less disruptive. 

All in all, great game. I want to see where it goes. 

I found a valid solution (using as few tiles as possible: 29,  I think) for 17/18 but the win tile is not lighting up. 😕

This is truely an amazing game. It is fun. It is interesting. It has great replayability. But it needs some work. 

Bugs

First of all is the soft-locks and game breaking bugs. there are quite a few. I reported one earlier. I have seen a couple more. (Described below). Even if you cannot fix them they need to be handled better. *1

Suggestion: instead of crashing revert to the map either as passed the current level, or revert to before the current level happened. 

Suggestion: instead of softlocks and/or crashes there needs to be a way to end run in the middle of combat so there is a way to at least get your gems from the current run even if it breaks. 

Map

Having the same map every time gets a bit boring. It would be nice to change it up. (even if it is just a few different maps possible) *3

Items

I think there are a lot of interesting items.

having items that get auto equiped and decrease strength until you are only doing 1 melee damage each hit can lead to brutal situations. Especially since you cannot remove items without killing everything or taking damage. So far this has only been an issue in the first room. (Perhaps not allow items that have negative strength from being dropped in the first room?) *3

At the end of the round, you suck up all of the items on the board. I would have expected you get those items but that doesn't seem to be the case. (Bug?) *3

Healing consumable items will randomly heal you for 5 instead of 10. If this is intentional, the reason needs to be spelled out to the player. (Bug?) *2

The cannon item always seems to make my character overweight and is thus unusable. (Bug) *1

The relative sizes of items don't seem to match up with their usefulness. *2

Characters

unlocks: having characters that can only be unlocked by other characters makes some sense but leads to long chains that are tedious. I have a fair few hours in the game 10+ but only have sage, warrior and ranger unlocked. *3

Sage's ability is interesting but not obvious. Having some summary of his ability score changes in a room/life would be good. *4

Souls

I like the idea of souls but I really didn't understand how they work. You gain blue from damage and collecting exp. You gain purple by killing enemies. 

However I don't understand when it calculates souls. It calculates when I take damage and when I have enough potential to end the level. When I kill everything but don't have enough to end the level sometimes it calculates but sometimes not? If it does calculate, the growth is very slow and the level goes on too long. If it doesn't the level is over fast. (Based on balance, not calculating feels like the intended outcome) *2

Levels

I am guessing the blue orbs dropped by enemies are exp. I don't understand how many are needed for a level up. *3

In addition the use of levels and souls are counter to each other. High souls means many kills all in one soul drop, the level is over fast and exp is low. High exp means a lot of kills in separate soul drops and the level is over slow. One of them needs to change. *2

 Suggestion: get rid of exp and levels entirely. Make it so you have the same attribute bonus screen (same as current level up screen) after each level. Add at least one item to allow players to get a second attribute selection screen. Change sage's ability to be selecting 1 or 2 extra attribute bonuses per level. (Plus it makes safes ability far more obvious)

I love the fact that getting duplicates of one ability merges them to give you both/all as one ability. This is genius, and makes duplicates far more interesting. 

I randomly got a choice of 4 abilities one time. No idea why. (Bug) *4

The idea of the combo meter is nice but it feels slapped on. Not much use but also not really in the way.  By the time you fill it up most things have probably been hit enough to be dead anyways. *3

Suggestion: replace with a hit counter. Every hit enemy adds one, falling off map (with enemies on screen) subtracts a static amount, restart at zero on the next level. Adding an item to lower the max of the hit counter may be viable but it feels like explaining it to the player will be hard. Perhaps one character like rogue could have a lower max, backstab-esque. (Good since the character requires some playtime to unlock, and more space to explain.)

Minigames

I have yet to see any real benefit of the minigames. Especially compared to the shop. Perhaps I have gotten unlucky but they seem not worth it. Perhaps buff them or perhaps scrap them entirely. *2

The tickets you can level up in the forge seem to have no effect. (Bug) *3

Errors:

Stuck on this screen, after opening inventory during level end sequence

It is possible to get your character seeingly stuck in the launch pipe after falling off the screen. 

I have seen others but forgot to screenshot. 

Conclusion

This is an amazing game rendered nearly unplayable by the sheer number of bugs, crashes, and soft locks. Please get play testers / QA to help fix them. But please keep working on the game.

Appendix

I labeled issues/feedback by priority *1 is higest priority *2 is next, then *3 etc. 

*1: game breaking issue needs resolved immediately.

*2: major content issue, should be priority to be investigated and discussed. 

*3: niche issue but major when it happens. Or improvement that can be made over time.

*4 odd one offs that are weird but not breaking. Fix when you have time. 

I also labeled probable bugs as such. 

All of my play time and thus bug finding has been on mobile, browser version, running in duck duck go browser on android. 

No I won't join your discord. Sorry in too many servers already. 

Got the following error/crash when on the final boss (of the first world, if there are multiple worlds. Haven't beaten the boss yet.)

A bomb was blowing up, I think the boss was at low health but not 100% confident. Might have killed the boss with a bomb?

The page at "https://html-classic .itch.zone" says:

############################################################################################

ERROR in action number 1 of Step Event0 for object obj_pickup_common_2:

Pop :: Execution Error - Variable set 

failed bombed - read only variable? 

at gml_Script_bomb_process_damage

#######################################################################################

gml_Script_bomb_process_damage

(line -1)

gml_Object_obj_pickup_common_2_Step_0

dang you quick. 

Tooltips are much better for resources, either by blindness or lack of understanding I still don't see tooltips for use items or equipment. Anything I try just uses the item or goes through the equip steps. 

I tried tapping on things when the creation modal is up but also nothing like a tooltip appears.

Thanks for the help! 

Cute game. a bit stuck at the layer under ice. Just trying to get resources is slow-ish. Mostly finding myself short on gold. And gems get challenging

I know you said partial mobile support, it is really had to get the names and description of items on mobile, perhaps an examine mode where clicking an item forces the name and description to appear and stay til a second click. For use/equip items block using/equipping the item while examine mode is up. 

It would also be nice to know what items do before crafting them. Not sure if that is on non-mobile. 

No idea if this project is still alive but I beat the current version record: (according to description) 

You need something as an anti-poison or clock work heart is killed by poison nearly every time. 

Additionally taking clockwork heart seems to not allow you to keep any gains to max hp between rounds, which is very punishing. It also make max hp items virtually useless.

Finally if fighting the big boss and a watermelon spawn in the slot directly down from the boss it is impossible to select the watermelon. 

All that being said good game, decently well balanced

This is a really well made game. The mechanics are wonderfully intuitive but leave a lot of complexity open. 

I am at 18  kittens, 25 stars and 22 cryptids.  and I know there is more to do still. 

no, there is another way to broken warp.  what can be done with the third kitty?

I would recommend adding a bit more to the description on how to play, I nearly discounted the game as not having any working currency mechanic. 
For other who are confused: Click to shoot the laser, Point it with your mouse.
Shoot straight down to mine and gain currency. Shoot the meteors to defend your base, when your shield reaches 0 or lower you lose.

Also I would really appreciate a button to open the shop menu so I wouldn't have to drag my mouse up there and interrupt the defense or mining. 

The issue with a pre mission graphic is that a player is not likely to memorize that. But once they have had some time with the system they will have the knowledge built up to just know. Thus my thought for new game plus etc

I can understand the time pressure stressing efficiency over optimization. I don't think a timer is a bad mechanic. Just introduced too early.

This would be something that shows up during playtesting. which is always the hardest part of game dev. developers have gotten so used to the system they have forgotten how it feels for new player. So It is hard to keep that in mind. 

I like the game. But I hate the timer. 

Lets take level 6 as an example:

The intro. you are given 4 new mods that you have never owned before: red circle, red triangle, yellow star, dark blue star. Of those: yellow star and blue star you have never seen before. This level has a 60 second timer and 8 moves to win.

Start of the level: lets say turn 1 you want to move all 12 units. The animation of moving a unit takes by my timing a bit over a second. but lets round down to a second. that gives you 48 seconds to figure out all 12 moves and make the actual inputs. plus taking your three actions. Oh and you likely have to reread at least one of the modules available to you, because they are so new. Even the ones you have used you have only used for 5 levels, so you don't have them memorized yet. plus reading any enemy modules you don't know off the top of your head. and thinking about how that affects adjacent enemies.

Later turns you have to do all this again, plus strategize. Maybe you have less units but you have more decisions on how to react to each unique situation. 

In short: 60 seconds is not enough time.

By contrast if you already knew all the mods, and had played enough to have a general knowledge of what is good and bad moves, then 60 seconds would (likely) have been fine. But for someone new to the game, 60 seconds is not "challenging". it is silly. If you added the timer in a new game+ I would have no issues. I think that timers in later levels make sense. I think timers in levels that the user knows all the basics of and has a couple moves to make plans make sense. But not level 6. 

what is the effect of a timer in a game? timers make the player dumb. because they are rushed. they have to make fast decisions without thinking about the consequences. If your game need of strategy needs to make the player dumber to be challenging, than it is not a game of strategy.

3/5 stars good idea for a game. needs game balance, and play testers.

I want to like the game but without ever getting a run that might work I just cannot. I have not had more than 4 battles in a run and all my health places were gone. 

I struggle to predict what the enemies are going to do because too many are introduced too fast. I basically have to have my run die to figure out what kills me how. For all 28 different enemies. Nevermind the fact that some combos are basically impossible. Crystal and a skelly? no chance to do damage. 3 krabs? stunlock. 

What I would like to see:
A slower introduction. Levels with 1-2 stars, Tutorial on how enemies move and what cards are in their deck.
Predictability: Let me see what cards enemies have in their deck. That why I can make a strategy around what they are able to do. I think this is a good compromise over seeing an enemies hand. It will be important to be able to see the number to be drawn and number in discard. 
Visibility: let me see what all is in my characters deck, and when it is being reshuffled. so I can plan around what cards I should have soon. 

Windows version: I like the concept but completely unplayable due to a bug that causes placed tiles to visually rotate despite not programmatically updating. Causing mis-tiling and frustration.