Darkness in general was pretty much the constant obstacle in the game for me, and I found myself reloading saves more often than most other jam games to help find my bearings (sometimes even rushing down corridors before the screen could fade to black to get a quick idea of the layout). Even with map drawing I'd often get completely messed up by fighting an encounter mid-turn and losing track of my direction (since the compass isn't visible either in darkness).
While I like the Skill-based solution-approach to combat, it made darkness combat a non-option when fighting anything that required more strategy than bats, since I'd often get mobbed while floundering to select the correct character and their skillset/escape without the UI. My heart sank after wiping out at the cockatrice encounter; not because I'd have to grind, but because I'd have to go through that damn dark corridor twice to get back to the save room and back.
I persevered though, and aside from the UI hiding, I never felt the game was particularly unfair or didn't give me the tools to succeed. I liked how you couldn't tell apart slime colors easily in the dark, and honestly felt that better monster hiding alone would make for an interesting challenge given the limited skill slots, rather than hiding the entire battle menu for several turns as well.
Thank you for enduring the tougher parts of the game. In past jams I have constantly battled with the worry that I'd made things too easy, so I left a lot of stuff "too hard" trusting that players would be able to sort things out, while throwing a few bones (the bonus payout is horribly broken and I never bothered to fix/lower it to my original intentions, darkness doesn't fall instantly letting you cheese a few squares, the "help" windows for skills still show up over the darkness during battles, analyze stats still appear over darkness as well so you can guess at what is on the board, etc).
Truth is, making a good dungeon crawler is HARD because the most interesting stuff (psyching out the player themselves) is also the hardest to balance, since you can't really determine how any one person might react to it, and the paradoxical thing where players who GET the tools needed to deal with those things are often not the ones who needed them to begin with. Let's not get started on the whole "is this even a good dungeon layout" question.
The battles aren't really meant to be too hard, except for a few deliberately designed to throw off the unprepared, and fights in the light aren't meant to take that much time. I would have liked to bump up the ATB/battle speed a bit, but kept running into bugs. Oh well.
Damn, what a fantastic journey. The dungeon crawling really reminded me of Etrian Odyssey, down to the drawing of maps. The exploration was tough to swallow at first, especially the darkness sections, but became better eventually once I realize how it works. (Got stuck at the first darkness section until I realize I had to press Z to enter doors and not the Up key like an idiot)
I played on Casual mode for the map, though I had to draw my own maps anyway since the in-game map was too small to tell your overall position. The skill system is fantastic! Love the customization it brings. Not sure if playing casual changed the battle difficulty but the balance was great. I managed to beat the game using only the basic spells since a bug restricted me from learning stronger ones. One exception was the difficulty spike with the triple Cockatrice battle which could stunlock and mute the entire team before they can act. Managed to beat that one with some grinding and using Wild Stomp.
Dialogue was minimal but worked to move you along. I find it mildly amusing how Johnny was yeeted out of the game at the beginning just like that and was pleasantly surprised to see Maura at the end! Can the Blue Moon Charm be used for anything? It doesn't seem to be equippable. All in all, aside from some bugs, it's a solid dungeon crawler I've had a great time with. Good job!
Thank you kindly for playing! And thank you for pointing out various bugs which I have now fixed.
I'm afraid that Maura's blue moon charm serves no special purpose other than as a symbol of friendship (and moreover, a symbol of the impact friendship has had on her own life and growth as a person). I know her appearance is a bit out of the blue, but it's a remnant of the original plan for this game which sadly got scrapped very early on in development. Maybe someday we'll see what this much older, less bratty summoner is up to.
Comments
Darkness in general was pretty much the constant obstacle in the game for me, and I found myself reloading saves more often than most other jam games to help find my bearings (sometimes even rushing down corridors before the screen could fade to black to get a quick idea of the layout). Even with map drawing I'd often get completely messed up by fighting an encounter mid-turn and losing track of my direction (since the compass isn't visible either in darkness).
While I like the Skill-based solution-approach to combat, it made darkness combat a non-option when fighting anything that required more strategy than bats, since I'd often get mobbed while floundering to select the correct character and their skillset/escape without the UI. My heart sank after wiping out at the cockatrice encounter; not because I'd have to grind, but because I'd have to go through that damn dark corridor twice to get back to the save room and back.
I persevered though, and aside from the UI hiding, I never felt the game was particularly unfair or didn't give me the tools to succeed. I liked how you couldn't tell apart slime colors easily in the dark, and honestly felt that better monster hiding alone would make for an interesting challenge given the limited skill slots, rather than hiding the entire battle menu for several turns as well.
Thank you for enduring the tougher parts of the game. In past jams I have constantly battled with the worry that I'd made things too easy, so I left a lot of stuff "too hard" trusting that players would be able to sort things out, while throwing a few bones (the bonus payout is horribly broken and I never bothered to fix/lower it to my original intentions, darkness doesn't fall instantly letting you cheese a few squares, the "help" windows for skills still show up over the darkness during battles, analyze stats still appear over darkness as well so you can guess at what is on the board, etc).
Truth is, making a good dungeon crawler is HARD because the most interesting stuff (psyching out the player themselves) is also the hardest to balance, since you can't really determine how any one person might react to it, and the paradoxical thing where players who GET the tools needed to deal with those things are often not the ones who needed them to begin with. Let's not get started on the whole "is this even a good dungeon layout" question.
The battles aren't really meant to be too hard, except for a few deliberately designed to throw off the unprepared, and fights in the light aren't meant to take that much time. I would have liked to bump up the ATB/battle speed a bit, but kept running into bugs. Oh well.
Damn, what a fantastic journey. The dungeon crawling really reminded me of Etrian Odyssey, down to the drawing of maps. The exploration was tough to swallow at first, especially the darkness sections, but became better eventually once I realize how it works. (Got stuck at the first darkness section until I realize I had to press Z to enter doors and not the Up key like an idiot)
I played on Casual mode for the map, though I had to draw my own maps anyway since the in-game map was too small to tell your overall position. The skill system is fantastic! Love the customization it brings. Not sure if playing casual changed the battle difficulty but the balance was great. I managed to beat the game using only the basic spells since a bug restricted me from learning stronger ones. One exception was the difficulty spike with the triple Cockatrice battle which could stunlock and mute the entire team before they can act. Managed to beat that one with some grinding and using Wild Stomp.
Dialogue was minimal but worked to move you along. I find it mildly amusing how Johnny was yeeted out of the game at the beginning just like that and was pleasantly surprised to see Maura at the end! Can the Blue Moon Charm be used for anything? It doesn't seem to be equippable. All in all, aside from some bugs, it's a solid dungeon crawler I've had a great time with. Good job!
Thank you kindly for playing! And thank you for pointing out various bugs which I have now fixed.
I'm afraid that Maura's blue moon charm serves no special purpose other than as a symbol of friendship (and moreover, a symbol of the impact friendship has had on her own life and growth as a person). I know her appearance is a bit out of the blue, but it's a remnant of the original plan for this game which sadly got scrapped very early on in development. Maybe someday we'll see what this much older, less bratty summoner is up to.