Judge feedback

Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.

• Fantastic. Like a more accessible Broughlike. Well done!
• Deep Breath is an unusual concept for a roguelike, and a fun enough game in general, which I have beaten multiple times. At the same time, the current version feels rather unbalanced: in particular, you may end up with open ladders near the starting position rather often, including on the later decks. Perk selection also does not feel balanced, with some obvious favorites. It is relatively easy to gather enough pearls to unlock all the perks by the time you get to the last or penultimate deck. Once you do win, the end message flashes by far too quickly and there's no leaderboard (only your highest score in the menu) - both issues I would like to see addressed. The game has fitting music, but only some SFX. It is very clean-looking - too clean, in fact, as the game never captures the sense of chaos it intends to portray. While the crewmembers and the sea creatures do battle each other around you, it feels very sterile - just some red squares you can't go to appearing on certain tiles during some turns, and then one combatant or the other silently vanishes without a trace. The addition of corpse graphics (or at least generic blood splatter), attack sounds, monster sounds, maybe even crewmember speech through voice clips/text bubbles - all of these would help a lot to make the game come alive. Choosing a more down-to-earth color for the crew may also help to make them feel less like abstractions. In all, a fun game you should try, but do not expect too much challenge or atmosphere from it!
• Deep Breath has a very unique premise - As a monkey escape a sinking ship while the crew fights sea monsters, collecting pearls as a form of mana/currency/final score without drowning. In many ways the gameplay feels like escaping a sinking ship, and that's when it shines the best. Aesthetically the game is pleasant and functional. The character art is unique, game state is clear. The flavor text before each run was a nice touch here. I was able to win a couple times, mostly staying ahead of the water and collecting keys to short cut past the last levels as quickly as possible. I ran into a few strange gameplay elements related to fast travel. It seems you can exit a level just by seeing the opening and clicking, as long as there is a path. I think it's not a bug, just the game not animating the movement (and the path is not blocked). I'm not sure all of the various abilities are balanced, but there were fun and different. Runs are in the 10-15 minute range, this is a great length, the game does not outstay it's welcome. It was fun being a monkey. Well done!
• Quite an enjoyable little game with truly beautiful art and well-matching action soundtrack. This makes it fun to play the game even when you don't understand much of what's going on - which was the case until I read the hints. I found the breath mechanics quite innovative, and the idea of two factions battling each other while I'm dragging my monkey ass to safety is unusual too. On the flip side, I ended up winning on 2nd or 3rd attempt without really understanding the rules of each enemy type, or optimizing the skills too much. I felt like the game failed to make me explore these rules in order to do well, as for example getting out of deep water in time usually turned out to be more important than maneuvering around enemies. Given that there seems to be a lot of thought put into both the upgrades and the enemies, you'd probably want to tune the balance in a way that makes them more important to understand, or find another way to reward the player for optimizing there. I also had a slight issue with the controls - the game claims WASD, but I found no way to use some of the special moves without a mouse. Overall, this was a fun entry - special thanks for sharing this gorgeous tileset with the rest of us!