High effort with graphics, animations, combos, effects and enemy variety, definitely strong points here. The difficulty though... Bats, your simpliest enemies, can kill you. I think they only need 3 or 4 hits to drain your health, all while you're stunlocked and trying to escape. Fighting back isn't really viable too, as your opening attack is relatively slow. The very first swing should be almost instant when enemies are so aggresive. I'm also not fond of all enemies spawning at the same moment when entering an area. Some of them are ready to attack before the spawning animation ends.
There's plenty of ways to dispose your enemies but I feel like there's too many abilities thrown at you at the same time. What's more enemies have pretty inflated health bars, which - at one point - is a must if you want to have crazy combos (and I think that's your intention) but at the same time giving us enemies that we have to hack away very first minute is a bother. I'd recommend introducing enemies sparingly and slowly at the begining, with lower health and smaller aggro. Give me some weak bats and frogs first, let me learn their attack patterns in semi-controlled environment and only then start showering me with more enemies, or stronger version of a weaker one. Let it be a surprise - kill couple groups of weaker enemies and then introduce only one, stronger, that is seemingly the same, but a little more vicious and with higher health. Right now being assaulted by couple of types of enemies at the same time that spawn at the same time and can kill you with just couple of hits feels too random, without rhythm.
I was going in all different ways, got killed a bunch of times, and one of my runs was going particularly well (leveled up to 5th level) and then, while walking to the last untraveled path I was assaulted so fiercely I died anyway! I had about 5 health flasks laying around, I was healthy and yet enemies suckerpunched me to death! The switching mechanic is good, but I definitely had to practice it more to use it more reliably, and yet I was defeated.
I still need to take a second attempt to try and kill the boss, (her attacks are weaker and much more forgiving than other enemies attacks).
I don't want to say that "make your game easier for my lack of reflexes" but I think my abilities are on par with the default gamer and a little 'easing up' could be beneficial for everyone.
I beat all of the wings on my 7th try, which I think is all there is to do...? I liked the combat a ton and it was juicy to bat. Switching characters felt good when you got the hang of it and each character had a good amount of abilities and each one felt good with a good cooldown. Equipment and passives added a good amount of depth that I enjoyed, but there were a few spelling mistakes along the way. The only other criticism that I wish to relay is that the rain and walls look a bit strange in multiple areas, and the rain itself probably should land in dark areas or on walls. But this game is super fun and I like the combat a lot, especially spinning and the summoning of the meteor. What are your plans for the game next?
Thanks for playing and the feedback! I'm happy you enjoyed the combat as I've been concerned that people don't really get it.
You missed the boss portal! (the red one in the room you spawn in). The idea is that you prepare as much as you want before the boss fight, and when you beat the boss you beat the game. I might have to clarify that in the game though.
As for the future of the project I'm not entirely sure. I've honestly thought a lot recently about doing an off-shoot from this project that's more focused on just controlling one character but I haven't made up my mind yet. If I keep working on this I think I have to find more ways to justify the fact that you control two characters and make each character more unique. I already have that if you throw a fire spell into the spin attack a fire tornado will be created, or if you cast an ice attack into the spin attack the enemy will get frozen. More stuff like that. Also maybe more defensive/utility stuff as well. Perhaps you can lift and throw heavy objects as the warrior, or the Witch has a teleport as her dash, which has a longer range but longer cd, so you might tag to her just to dodge a big attack.
Ah dang I can't believe I missed the boss. The future sounds awesome with more levels and stuff. One thing though, I forgot to mention after rereading my review is that you cast abilities when your equipping items and that was very annoying. But yeah either way, working on the same project or a similar one in the future, I will play your next iteration my friend!
This feels like a good start to a solid action game. Some of the wizard's abilities felt hard to use in the cramped areas and not in a "this is intended" way. It was frustrating that some walls matched the color of the floor so you'd get blocked by them unexpectedly.
Disclamer: personally I'm not a fan of games where you swap between protagonists on the fly, so during my playthrough I only played with one character at a time - take my feedback with that in consideration. Despite that, the game was still pretty fun, even if it's rather difficult playing that way.
The animations are nice and fluid, and especially the meteor spell is really satisfying to use, though I wasn't able to figure out what the trigger for it to be able to use it. On one hand, I appreciate the levelup perk selection waiting until the battle ends and not interrupting it, but on the other, the upgrade it can give might be good for the currently ongoing fight. I've also picked up equipment but wasn't sure whether it's just auto stat boost or if there's a screen where I have to equip the items.
Haven't ran into any issues, only some weird edge tiles floating in the black out of bound area, and corners generally looking weird. The skeleton archer also doesn't turn around if you go behind it mid-aiming, making it look weird as it tries to shoot backwards. Also, the witch has a hat in the portrait but not on the world sprite. (Also the hat is too small.)
Thanks for playing! You press F to get to the inventory/equipment screen. I really have to put that info in the game UI (other than the start menu, where I list all controls). I have so that it auto equips the item you picked up if you have nothing equipped in that slot, so at least you got some of the stats.
Great presentation, the animations are well done. The stamina doesn't behave like I expected, the basic attack is a three-hit combo and each hit drains some stamina. However, if you only have enough stamina for 1 attack, you can still pull off the entire combo.
I found the forward momentum of the warrior pretty punishing because often I my attacks would carry me into a pack of more enemies that are ready to attack.
I love the pixelart and the music for sure, the idea is solid for an action game. There's a couple of frustrating things like the character getting stuck around the map's hitboxes and enemies being fragged by the spin move.
The warrior felt much weaker than the wizard mostly because attacking forces you to stand still for so long.
Also I pressed T to see what it did and I NUKED a single bat with a giant meteor for 300 damage, good times.
Some notes I took while playing, It's all friendly suggestions, so don't read them as if I'm angery about them or anything.
-The default "use" button should be F instead of C, and the Character screen/Inventory should go to C (Which would also make sense since you know "C"haracter)
-I wish the camera didn't move while I'm fiddling with my inventory
-When dragging an item in the inventory, having which slot this item is usable on be highlighted would be very nice
-If I'm standing over more than one item and press the pickup key, everything is picked up at once, (personally) I'd rather having to press once per item, especially since the text can overlap and make it hard to read when everything is on the ground.
-Zoom-in after the last hit before leveling up is very cool, but maybe make it last just a bit less time.
-Run key feels a bit redundant. The character is plenty fast as it is, and I already have to care about a lot of other keys. Maybe just making the regular speed a bit higher, or do an automatic sprint after running outside of combat for more than 2 seconds or something like that to keep map traversal fast.
-If the potions are ONLY consumable and can't be stored in the inventory, automatic pickup could be better, although I get it if you think having to pick it up manually is better. But if that's the case do the pickup key F instead of C (please).
-After getting hit, it feels like you get invulnerability frames against the enemy that hit you, but not against other enemies, so I ended up taking like 3 hits right after being hit once. This feels really bad for this kind of game, I would heavily recommend giving at least some invulnerability frames against all enemies when getting hit. Also a visual indicator like blinking or flashing red/white to know how long that lasts. (After re-testing, something weird is happening there is flashing but it feels inconsistent because I can still take damage, I think. Again, maybe against other enemies instead of the one that hit me already)
-Basic attack consuming mana feels bad.
-Enemies colliding against each other feels a bit clunky.
-Movement speed for some enemies feels unfair and looks silly. I was being chased by a frog and he was zipping around like a racecar, way faster than its run animation would imply.
-Recovery on the basic attack feel way too long. Not only it intuitively feels like I should move way earlier, but also it increases the game difficulty in a way it isn't needed, and also feels at odds with how fast the pacing of the gameplay is otherwise.
-I feel like having a diagonal animation for my attacks instead of 4 directions only would be great, but I get that's a pain in the ass to make.
-I feel the initial area should be a safe zone and monsters shouldn't be able to follow me there.
-"Traditional" design for these kinds of games locks you in the room until you clear the enemies. I get if you intentionally want to ignore this and make it so I can freely move regardless, but I feel like some things like the teleporter should only be available/usable if I cleared the surrounding enemies. However please keep in mind I'm just thinking "out loud" and I get it if the design you have in mind is supposed to go a different route.
-The swordgirl's "Q" ability feels redundant with the Spacebar ability/dodge. (Unless it does something other than dashing that I'm missing)
-I feel like the character should be able to run past a wall when half the sprite or so is over it. I often feel like I get stuck in a corner because on little pixel on my foot is colliding with the very edge of the wall.
-The bats are very cute and the sprite is cool, but at first I thought they were like foxes or something because of the color (and because they are cute). Not really a big complain but wanted to share it nontheless
That's about it. I'm looking forwards to seeing how the game evolves. cheers!
The Q ability is a tackle and has a hitbox, but I wanted it to have a use as a mobility tool aswell so you weren't totally wrong there.
Yea I think I agree with you that the run-key is just too much when there are so many buttons. I'll probably remove it just to reduce complexity. I might remove the stamina use as well for the same reason. I added it pretty late in the project just to prevent people from using a single character and never switch out, so I'll have to think about it.
I actually think I removed all the invincibility frames upon getting hit. Got the idea when I was playing wizard of legends where I really liked the idea of the enemies playing by the same rules as the player. Might have to tweak the stun values so you don't get stun locked too often.
Be careful with the removed invincibility since it might make for a REALLY bad UX. While it might work for other games, double and triple test it on yours to see if it really fits.
i don't think the mouse "aiming" helps this game. sometimes i move to the right, and i press the lmb or any other skill and instead of the attack happening where i'm currently moving towards to, it happens towards where my mouse pointer is resting at, which i instinctively don't really look much in this kind of genre. it kind of breaks the flow of combat imho
Character keeps attacking when clicking in the inventory.
A map would be nice.
Pretty easy to get enemies stuck on things:
I thought the game had frozen at first, but these buttons can only be clicked on the upper parts (also intellegence he-he):
I'm wondering if the sprint is really necessary, adds complexity for not much gain and enemies were easily kited with it. I held it down most of the time.
Boss HP bar doesn't move.
A character died on the boss (while switching), I lose when one dies? Lame...
One attack on boss' last phase is completely pink, missing shader?
Enemies stopped responding at all at one point and were walking in place until I got closer.
Somehow got these screens overlapping once:
Damage numbers on boss gets mirrored sometimes:
Playing through it a second time using just the mage, kiting everything and stacking armor for the boss it felt very easy. Facetanked a lot of boss hits.
Wow multiple pictures for my feedback! Really appreciate the detailed feedback. Don't have much to add other than I'll definitely look to fix a lot of these points. I think I'll prioritize so that you can continue playing when one character is dead. It shouldn't even require that much change in the code I think.
There's a lot of effort put into this, but IMO it's far too complicated. There are far too many buttons and options to pick from for each combat (exemplified by the addition of stamina-consuming dodge on top of everything). Complexity should be introduced gradually, and overall complexity should be toned down to something more like Hades.
Let me know what the balance feels like and how far you got. I kept tweaking just before I uploaded and it kept oscillating between being trivially easy and very hard.
Comments
High effort with graphics, animations, combos, effects and enemy variety, definitely strong points here. The difficulty though... Bats, your simpliest enemies, can kill you. I think they only need 3 or 4 hits to drain your health, all while you're stunlocked and trying to escape. Fighting back isn't really viable too, as your opening attack is relatively slow. The very first swing should be almost instant when enemies are so aggresive. I'm also not fond of all enemies spawning at the same moment when entering an area. Some of them are ready to attack before the spawning animation ends.
There's plenty of ways to dispose your enemies but I feel like there's too many abilities thrown at you at the same time. What's more enemies have pretty inflated health bars, which - at one point - is a must if you want to have crazy combos (and I think that's your intention) but at the same time giving us enemies that we have to hack away very first minute is a bother. I'd recommend introducing enemies sparingly and slowly at the begining, with lower health and smaller aggro. Give me some weak bats and frogs first, let me learn their attack patterns in semi-controlled environment and only then start showering me with more enemies, or stronger version of a weaker one. Let it be a surprise - kill couple groups of weaker enemies and then introduce only one, stronger, that is seemingly the same, but a little more vicious and with higher health. Right now being assaulted by couple of types of enemies at the same time that spawn at the same time and can kill you with just couple of hits feels too random, without rhythm.
I was going in all different ways, got killed a bunch of times, and one of my runs was going particularly well (leveled up to 5th level) and then, while walking to the last untraveled path I was assaulted so fiercely I died anyway! I had about 5 health flasks laying around, I was healthy and yet enemies suckerpunched me to death! The switching mechanic is good, but I definitely had to practice it more to use it more reliably, and yet I was defeated.
I still need to take a second attempt to try and kill the boss, (her attacks are weaker and much more forgiving than other enemies attacks).
I don't want to say that "make your game easier for my lack of reflexes" but I think my abilities are on par with the default gamer and a little 'easing up' could be beneficial for everyone.
I beat all of the wings on my 7th try, which I think is all there is to do...? I liked the combat a ton and it was juicy to bat. Switching characters felt good when you got the hang of it and each character had a good amount of abilities and each one felt good with a good cooldown. Equipment and passives added a good amount of depth that I enjoyed, but there were a few spelling mistakes along the way. The only other criticism that I wish to relay is that the rain and walls look a bit strange in multiple areas, and the rain itself probably should land in dark areas or on walls. But this game is super fun and I like the combat a lot, especially spinning and the summoning of the meteor. What are your plans for the game next?
Thanks for playing and the feedback! I'm happy you enjoyed the combat as I've been concerned that people don't really get it.
You missed the boss portal! (the red one in the room you spawn in). The idea is that you prepare as much as you want before the boss fight, and when you beat the boss you beat the game. I might have to clarify that in the game though.
As for the future of the project I'm not entirely sure. I've honestly thought a lot recently about doing an off-shoot from this project that's more focused on just controlling one character but I haven't made up my mind yet. If I keep working on this I think I have to find more ways to justify the fact that you control two characters and make each character more unique. I already have that if you throw a fire spell into the spin attack a fire tornado will be created, or if you cast an ice attack into the spin attack the enemy will get frozen. More stuff like that. Also maybe more defensive/utility stuff as well. Perhaps you can lift and throw heavy objects as the warrior, or the Witch has a teleport as her dash, which has a longer range but longer cd, so you might tag to her just to dodge a big attack.
Ah dang I can't believe I missed the boss. The future sounds awesome with more levels and stuff. One thing though, I forgot to mention after rereading my review is that you cast abilities when your equipping items and that was very annoying. But yeah either way, working on the same project or a similar one in the future, I will play your next iteration my friend!
This feels like a good start to a solid action game. Some of the wizard's abilities felt hard to use in the cramped areas and not in a "this is intended" way. It was frustrating that some walls matched the color of the floor so you'd get blocked by them unexpectedly.
Disclamer: personally I'm not a fan of games where you swap between protagonists on the fly, so during my playthrough I only played with one character at a time - take my feedback with that in consideration. Despite that, the game was still pretty fun, even if it's rather difficult playing that way.
The animations are nice and fluid, and especially the meteor spell is really satisfying to use, though I wasn't able to figure out what the trigger for it to be able to use it. On one hand, I appreciate the levelup perk selection waiting until the battle ends and not interrupting it, but on the other, the upgrade it can give might be good for the currently ongoing fight. I've also picked up equipment but wasn't sure whether it's just auto stat boost or if there's a screen where I have to equip the items.
Haven't ran into any issues, only some weird edge tiles floating in the black out of bound area, and corners generally looking weird. The skeleton archer also doesn't turn around if you go behind it mid-aiming, making it look weird as it tries to shoot backwards. Also, the witch has a hat in the portrait but not on the world sprite. (Also the hat is too small.)
Thanks for playing! You press F to get to the inventory/equipment screen. I really have to put that info in the game UI (other than the start menu, where I list all controls). I have so that it auto equips the item you picked up if you have nothing equipped in that slot, so at least you got some of the stats.
Great presentation, the animations are well done. The stamina doesn't behave like I expected, the basic attack is a three-hit combo and each hit drains some stamina. However, if you only have enough stamina for 1 attack, you can still pull off the entire combo.
I found the forward momentum of the warrior pretty punishing because often I my attacks would carry me into a pack of more enemies that are ready to attack.
I love the pixelart and the music for sure, the idea is solid for an action game.
There's a couple of frustrating things like the character getting stuck around the map's hitboxes and enemies being fragged by the spin move.
The warrior felt much weaker than the wizard mostly because attacking forces you to stand still for so long.
Also I pressed T to see what it did and I NUKED a single bat with a giant meteor for 300 damage, good times.
Some notes I took while playing, It's all friendly suggestions, so don't read them as if I'm angery about them or anything.
-The default "use" button should be F instead of C, and the Character screen/Inventory should go to C (Which would also make sense since you know "C"haracter)
-I wish the camera didn't move while I'm fiddling with my inventory
-When dragging an item in the inventory, having which slot this item is usable on be highlighted would be very nice
-If I'm standing over more than one item and press the pickup key, everything is picked up at once, (personally) I'd rather having to press once per item, especially since the text can overlap and make it hard to read when everything is on the ground.
-Zoom-in after the last hit before leveling up is very cool, but maybe make it last just a bit less time.
-Run key feels a bit redundant. The character is plenty fast as it is, and I already have to care about a lot of other keys. Maybe just making the regular speed a bit higher, or do an automatic sprint after running outside of combat for more than 2 seconds or something like that to keep map traversal fast.
-If the potions are ONLY consumable and can't be stored in the inventory, automatic pickup could be better, although I get it if you think having to pick it up manually is better. But if that's the case do the pickup key F instead of C (please).
-After getting hit, it feels like you get invulnerability frames against the enemy that hit you, but not against other enemies, so I ended up taking like 3 hits right after being hit once. This feels really bad for this kind of game, I would heavily recommend giving at least some invulnerability frames against all enemies when getting hit. Also a visual indicator like blinking or flashing red/white to know how long that lasts. (After re-testing, something weird is happening there is flashing but it feels inconsistent because I can still take damage, I think. Again, maybe against other enemies instead of the one that hit me already)
-Basic attack consuming mana feels bad.
-Enemies colliding against each other feels a bit clunky.
-Movement speed for some enemies feels unfair and looks silly. I was being chased by a frog and he was zipping around like a racecar, way faster than its run animation would imply.
-Recovery on the basic attack feel way too long. Not only it intuitively feels like I should move way earlier, but also it increases the game difficulty in a way it isn't needed, and also feels at odds with how fast the pacing of the gameplay is otherwise.
-I feel like having a diagonal animation for my attacks instead of 4 directions only would be great, but I get that's a pain in the ass to make.
-I feel the initial area should be a safe zone and monsters shouldn't be able to follow me there.
-"Traditional" design for these kinds of games locks you in the room until you clear the enemies. I get if you intentionally want to ignore this and make it so I can freely move regardless, but I feel like some things like the teleporter should only be available/usable if I cleared the surrounding enemies. However please keep in mind I'm just thinking "out loud" and I get it if the design you have in mind is supposed to go a different route.
-The swordgirl's "Q" ability feels redundant with the Spacebar ability/dodge. (Unless it does something other than dashing that I'm missing)
-I feel like the character should be able to run past a wall when half the sprite or so is over it. I often feel like I get stuck in a corner because on little pixel on my foot is colliding with the very edge of the wall.
-The bats are very cute and the sprite is cool, but at first I thought they were like foxes or something because of the color (and because they are cute). Not really a big complain but wanted to share it nontheless
That's about it. I'm looking forwards to seeing how the game evolves. cheers!
Thanks a lot for the detailed feedback!
The Q ability is a tackle and has a hitbox, but I wanted it to have a use as a mobility tool aswell so you weren't totally wrong there.
Yea I think I agree with you that the run-key is just too much when there are so many buttons. I'll probably remove it just to reduce complexity. I might remove the stamina use as well for the same reason. I added it pretty late in the project just to prevent people from using a single character and never switch out, so I'll have to think about it.
I actually think I removed all the invincibility frames upon getting hit. Got the idea when I was playing wizard of legends where I really liked the idea of the enemies playing by the same rules as the player. Might have to tweak the stun values so you don't get stun locked too often.
Be careful with the removed invincibility since it might make for a REALLY bad UX. While it might work for other games, double and triple test it on yours to see if it really fits.
Good luck fren
felt pretty hard.
i don't think the mouse "aiming" helps this game. sometimes i move to the right, and i press the lmb or any other skill and instead of the attack happening where i'm currently moving towards to, it happens towards where my mouse pointer is resting at, which i instinctively don't really look much in this kind of genre. it kind of breaks the flow of combat imho
Wizard of Legend with character switching? Cool!
Meteor is great.
Skeletons can bleed? Alright.
The warrior's skills feel a bit too similar.
Character keeps attacking when clicking in the inventory.
A map would be nice.
Pretty easy to get enemies stuck on things:
I thought the game had frozen at first, but these buttons can only be clicked on the upper parts (also intellegence he-he):
I'm wondering if the sprint is really necessary, adds complexity for not much gain and enemies were easily kited with it. I held it down most of the time.
Boss HP bar doesn't move.
A character died on the boss (while switching), I lose when one dies? Lame...
One attack on boss' last phase is completely pink, missing shader?
Enemies stopped responding at all at one point and were walking in place until I got closer.
Somehow got these screens overlapping once:
Damage numbers on boss gets mirrored sometimes:
Playing through it a second time using just the mage, kiting everything and stacking armor for the boss it felt very easy. Facetanked a lot of boss hits.
Wow multiple pictures for my feedback! Really appreciate the detailed feedback. Don't have much to add other than I'll definitely look to fix a lot of these points. I think I'll prioritize so that you can continue playing when one character is dead. It shouldn't even require that much change in the code I think.
There's a lot of effort put into this, but IMO it's far too complicated. There are far too many buttons and options to pick from for each combat (exemplified by the addition of stamina-consuming dodge on top of everything). Complexity should be introduced gradually, and overall complexity should be toned down to something more like Hades.
Let me know what the balance feels like and how far you got. I kept tweaking just before I uploaded and it kept oscillating between being trivially easy and very hard.