The core idea seems fine, but I think the interface needs a lot of work to make it clearer what's going on. Also not a fan of the exploration cards. Spamming low-reward cards with no risk or much thought can make the decks feel bloated and less interesting. It's a nice concept, though, so good luck on development!
I played with a human rogue and recorded it, then a fairy rogue, fairy warrior and human assassin off-screen. Video:
I like the idea! Dominion but in a roguelike way. Dominion is an excellent game I think the way you are aiming towards making it a single player video game is very interesting.
I know it is a very early version of the game, but the cards are way too small on the screen. Even in fullscreen I had to go very close to my screen to read them. Also a lot of the times I was hovering over a card, clicked it and another card was selected. I noticed the undo function later on from the menu, but there should be a way to "confirm" that a card is going to be used in such a way that it doesn't disrupt the flow of the game too much.
Difficulty is a bit wonky. I managed to win with the warrior though it was a struggle. Meanwhile rogue was too difficult and I haven't found a good strategy yet. Off camera I played assassin and that was a breeze, you have everything at your disposal with +action, +card, trashing, card duplication, a lot of damage for cheap and even healing on top that cycles.
I hope you develope this game further, since it has the foundation for something really fun.
- I didn’t figure what Human’s strength is, but I felt the game was quite unplayable without the Fairy’s two Actions per turn.
- The locations are so predictable in what enemies you get, that like half of the game comes down to it. Just one example, flipping the medium monster card for goblins to reveal a healer that can totally be ignored while it’s alone. Once you know this, your sequencing becomes a lot different / more efficient. I feel this is so decisive and so nonrandom that it might be better to just reveal the choices upfront instead of flipping them. A twist could be that those choices which are randomized reroll their outcome every turn they’re not selected. –– Or at least show the *possible* outcomes on mousing over the hidden card. Idk, it all sounds a bit boring I admit. Maybe you just need more variable outcomes for all encounter cards. Or maybe all is fine, as the game otherwise doesn’t have much variety or new things to learn, so it must come down to each zone being a different metagame to learn.
- As can be seen often in the video, mouseover is bugged when holding a lot of cards. Also I got enough screen space, wouldn’t mind if the hand stretched out further in those situations.
- Going Glove -> Glove -> Payoff still only gave me 2x, not 4x. Criminal.
- Clicking "Play all Exploration" is annoying and I misclicked at least once. I feel these cards should just automatically turn in at the end of the round, also maybe just stack them up already next to hand, so there is a better overview of your situation.
I did play a few rounds of Dominion years ago, so I was somewhat familiar with this concept. But in my recollection Dominion did flow a bit better than your game, though yours is not bad. I think the assortment of cards you can buy is getting more or less randomized? This was frustrating, as a couple cards feel essential in getting the ball rolling, while many other cards feel like they just make the deck worse if bought too early.
But in general the balance was interesting. Pack was to my mind absolutely the strongest card, but on the other hand I felt that in the Goblin areas only the Fighter could really hope to plow through the wide enemy hordes. It’s maybe unfortunate that defeating the boss doesn’t win the game immediately (contrary to what the game page says).
Comments
The core idea seems fine, but I think the interface needs a lot of work to make it clearer what's going on. Also not a fan of the exploration cards. Spamming low-reward cards with no risk or much thought can make the decks feel bloated and less interesting. It's a nice concept, though, so good luck on development!
I played with a human rogue and recorded it, then a fairy rogue, fairy warrior and human assassin off-screen. Video:
I like the idea! Dominion but in a roguelike way. Dominion is an excellent game I think the way you are aiming towards making it a single player video game is very interesting.I know it is a very early version of the game, but the cards are way too small on the screen. Even in fullscreen I had to go very close to my screen to read them. Also a lot of the times I was hovering over a card, clicked it and another card was selected. I noticed the undo function later on from the menu, but there should be a way to "confirm" that a card is going to be used in such a way that it doesn't disrupt the flow of the game too much.
Difficulty is a bit wonky. I managed to win with the warrior though it was a struggle. Meanwhile rogue was too difficult and I haven't found a good strategy yet. Off camera I played assassin and that was a breeze, you have everything at your disposal with +action, +card, trashing, card duplication, a lot of damage for cheap and even healing on top that cycles.
I hope you develope this game further, since it has the foundation for something really fun.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2400371198
Pretty nice. Some thoughts:
- I didn’t figure what Human’s strength is, but I felt the game was quite unplayable without the Fairy’s two Actions per turn.
- The locations are so predictable in what enemies you get, that like half of the game comes down to it. Just one example, flipping the medium monster card for goblins to reveal a healer that can totally be ignored while it’s alone. Once you know this, your sequencing becomes a lot different / more efficient. I feel this is so decisive and so nonrandom that it might be better to just reveal the choices upfront instead of flipping them. A twist could be that those choices which are randomized reroll their outcome every turn they’re not selected. –– Or at least show the *possible* outcomes on mousing over the hidden card. Idk, it all sounds a bit boring I admit. Maybe you just need more variable outcomes for all encounter cards. Or maybe all is fine, as the game otherwise doesn’t have much variety or new things to learn, so it must come down to each zone being a different metagame to learn.
- As can be seen often in the video, mouseover is bugged when holding a lot of cards. Also I got enough screen space, wouldn’t mind if the hand stretched out further in those situations.
- Going Glove -> Glove -> Payoff still only gave me 2x, not 4x. Criminal.
- Clicking "Play all Exploration" is annoying and I misclicked at least once. I feel these cards should just automatically turn in at the end of the round, also maybe just stack them up already next to hand, so there is a better overview of your situation.
I did play a few rounds of Dominion years ago, so I was somewhat familiar with this concept. But in my recollection Dominion did flow a bit better than your game, though yours is not bad. I think the assortment of cards you can buy is getting more or less randomized? This was frustrating, as a couple cards feel essential in getting the ball rolling, while many other cards feel like they just make the deck worse if bought too early.
But in general the balance was interesting. Pack was to my mind absolutely the strongest card, but on the other hand I felt that in the Goblin areas only the Fighter could really hope to plow through the wide enemy hordes. It’s maybe unfortunate that defeating the boss doesn’t win the game immediately (contrary to what the game page says).
After unzipping it, whenever I try to launch game.exe I get this error. Had to try launching it via Powershell to get this screenshot:
EDIT: The panic log just has the same error, nothing else.
Fixed, sorry about that! Had an issue with the "build system" and accidentally uploaded an old EXE