wow, great job! i really love the spritework here, and the theme is integrated very cleverly (even though i spoiled it by reading the questionnaire first... oops).

my big complaint is the keyboard controls--not sure if this is a standard set of keys i'm just not used to, but my hands had a hard time finding a comfortable spot (especially since i was using arrow keys for movement at first). i would have loved to use 'up' or 'w' instead of space for jump, and maybe a different key for the dash as well. i missed out on the slash move completely my first time through, but that's my fault for not reading the controls :p

the boss's invincibility frames lasted a little too long for my liking, but i still beat it (though i cut it real close!) so i guess i can't complain too much. i loved how the health got higher depending on how much you died in the beginning-- really neat stuff!!

if you keep expanding on this, i'd love more powerups (obvi) but maybe optional powerups, too? i feel like there'd be a lot of interesting risk reward with which powerups to grab and which to leave behind, so the final boss isn't *too* overpowered with everything, but you can also still get to that point without dying too much. but this is already real fun for a jam project! well done :)

Nice! Cool game and nice twist that it switches up and you play as the boss! I guess it is part of our "Be the Boss" mini-genre then!

Don't have much feedback. Some of the platforming may have felt a tiny bit clunky, but I think that's pretty expected for a jam game.

Overall excellent job! Great work done by the team!!

Such a good twist! The platforming section is fun, and much larger than I was expecting with a nice bit of choice available with routes and some great tricky sections, without ever crossing over to being frustrating. I didn't read the description before playing, so was momentarily confused when I reached the boss, but had a wonderful "oh!" moment once it clicked :)

Some lovely pixel art, especially the final boss - big fan of that design! Thought the dash effect also deserved a bit of a shout out here, I loved how using a brief flash of light that resembled the alien species implies that even if you're taking a pacifist route you're still stealing from the alien species

This was a really cool game. I like the art and the music was well fitting

Some of the best art and animations I've seen so far. Really cool.

Dang, that some crazy good pixel art, fantastic presentation. If you couldn't tell from my own game  a big fan of pixel art

Nice job!  Honestly was a little confused on what the role reversal was until the end lol.  Neat interpretation of the theme, and I like the whole dying raises the health thing since that makes the second phase harder.  Controls for the first phase felt a little floaty, but thats pretty subjective so mostly just my opinion.

hah, called it! Graphics are phenomenal, music creates the perfect atmosphere, and gameplay is pretty cool. However, I must say, it was a letdown that the enemies claimed "I killed many of them" when I went full pacifist.
The only issue I found is the camera; it moves too fast, with the robot; it's quite disorienting.

I saved the race :-)

Nice approach to this topic. But it would have been more fun if you hadn't revealed the plottwist at the end in the game description. Knowing it I avoided upgrade and thus it was very easy to kill the robot at the end.

The itself runs smoothly and is very polished. Also it has a decent length of levels and overall. Great work!

Very nice game and super solid concept! Ironically enough, if this game’s concept was applied to regular metroidvanias, then you’d finally fix the end-game power creep they tend to have, haha. I had fun, and ended up doing 2 runs! Though I was a bit disappointed that the dialogue at the end didn’t change when I went through the whole game without killing anyone. The sprite work, especially with the boss, was very well done. And the music had a nice melancholic feel to it!

I’d recommend against using a cylinder collider for the player character in sidescrollers, or to increase their friction, as I often ended slipping off ledges, especially when landing. It ended up being pretty frustrating, especially on one of the jumps near the end. But outside of that, the game controlled well and doing a pacifist run felt very satisfying, with all the weaving between enemies!

Looks lovely and I love the idea of fewer powerups = easier bossfight, but the controls were very confusing! The keys felt like they were all over the place?

Great job regardless!

Very cool game

The twist was a very fun idea, however I felt like something was lacking. For a metroidvania it was very linear, while for a boss simulator it was not very boss-like with 2 pretty identical melee moves and a jump. Really this is one of those games that needed more time in the oven and more refinement to the formula to become good (like switching your alliegance every screen transition, and balancing not making one side too strong so that you can have an epic final battle, I'm imagining a small scale war where robots take over the ship, while the bugs reclaim it piece by piece)

Well polished game. Controls felt a little frustrating as I was using keyboard, and there were a lot of ceilings that my head bumped against which was very annoying. Sometimes the audio cut out and sometimes when I pressed the ranged attack button, the sound would play but nothing would shoot. The homing enemy felt frustrating since it didnt seem like you could kill it. Other than those minor frustrations, the art and the core gameplay was still pretty fun. The end boss fight was a cool idea too, I wish you had another move to mix things up other than just dash and melee. Good job overall!

Really polished game! I like the art and overall presentation. I quite liked the idea of making a choice to pick up abilities, which would in the end result with harder or easier bossfight. But I'm going to be honest, I couldn't make it to the bossfight. The platforming feels really tight, platforms are either very close or far apart and in the end it lead to frustration on my part. It also largely falls on the fact that I may not be the right audience, as I am not the biggest player of platformers, but I also think that my issues could be mitigated with either shorter levels or checkpoints. Other than that though, the game feels great. Could be expanded into a big and solid metroidvania. There are some very creative ideas in here in general. All in all, a very solid entry, great job!

Great art! Especially on the Leader character. The platforming was pretty good, you could get skilled at it, though there were parts that were a bit too frustrating, some head banging and slightly to tall platforms. I finished it without damaging the aliens and hoped for a different ending :< but it was still cool to play as the Alien Leader. Loved his character design but the dash attack was a bit weird, really hard to land. At first I didn't even know I had a second attack. Anyway I think that adding a jumping behavior to the robot character at the end would make the "boss fight" much nicer. Anyway, great little game! Liked the twist on the alien theme as well :)

i absolutely love the art and the music! so beautiful :)

quite a challenging game for me, i would be happy if the beginning was a bit more relaxing just to tune in to the right wave and to get used to the controls. mazbe one tzpe of enemies at first would also a good option :)

nice entry!

Neat little game!

Loved the narrative bit of it, as well as the art!

Had some fun with it!

The art style is phenomenal, but I have to admit that as many in the comments have already pointed out the controls are a bit weird. Regardless this is still a great game!

Nice metroidvania! The pixel art is all uniform and well-drawn. I also thought that the sombre music fits the theme of the game well.

Narratively, it was really interesting to take control of the final boss at the end of the game. I liked how getting more HP helps in the platforming section of the game, but then makes the boss fight harder. Interesting balancing choice!

The controls could've used a bit more polish. The short-ranged attack is a bit too short-ranged (no pun intended), and I'm not sure I like the way the in-game jump behaves. It is also generally not a good idea to move the camera vertically on every single jump, as it can quickly get nauseating.

Nevertheless, this was a great game to play!