I think I can speak for all of us but it was great to see all the effort you guys put into making this game. The different aesthetics of the game, including some voice acting (the background song was certainly unique), dialogue boxes, and overall narrative of the game did help capture a unique feeling when I was playing. Besides the issues the others mentioned, maybe add a pause screen because the sequence of gameplay leading up to the final boss takes a little while and the boss itself takes a bit of time. So, it would be nice to regroup and take a break during gameplay. As for your questions, I thought the speed of the boat was a little slow, but I guess it's balanced with the added stamina (and how often the boats come by to refill your stamina bar). However, the boats do get in the way sometimes during the final boss and the screen does get cluttered somewhat because you have to manage all the enemies on the screen, avoid the boats, collect the floating barrels and treasures, and deal with the boss that's able to follow you really well. As a result, the final boss is actually pretty hard to beat. One way to deal with this is to keep track of how many enemies or objects are currently on screen and maybe cap how many things are present at a time (at least, during the boss). Maybe more treasure items to refill your health bar would help too. The stamina bar is a cool addition but I feel like it is used up too fast (especially during the boss) so maybe reducing the frequency of the ships and increasing the max stamina/decreasing the rate of stamina consumption would make us use stamina more strategically instead of spamming stamina. As of right now, the scoring system feels like a padded feature especially when we are busy with the enemies on screen and keeping our ship alive. Also, given that the game gives us the choice to decide how we progress (safe or destroy other ships to face the spawned shark miniboss), the score system sort of leans more towards destroying as many enemies as possible to get more points. The points could be balanced so that destroying a ship would deduct points or maybe provide some bonus if a certain amount of points is achieved. A final point would be to maybe have a bool to keep track if the player restarts the game so the dialog boxes doesn't appear again because it is a hassle to have to click through the dialog (or have a skip button). Overall, I thought the presentation of the game was great and it reminds me of RPGs I used to play.
For the issues I encountered, there was some weird stuff with the positioning of the UI elements, like the health bar, barrel above the ammo indicator, and text boxes since I use a larger monitor (not a big deal, though). For the text boxes, I can actually see all the other text prompts used in the game on the lower left-hand area so maybe put them out of view more. Also, for some reason, I can't see the text or the continue button in the dialog boxes on one monitor but when I go switch my main monitor, it displays it just fine. The game was certainly playable, but I'm just confused as to why there would be differences between the kind of monitor used (besides scaling to screen size).
Edit: just thought of this but it would be cool if we could just replay the boss scene with some set amount of ammo instead of having to go through the initial phase as an extra feature
this was a super fun game with a lot of charm! I adored the art and anime flair you put in with all the references. However, I found the ability to die by sailing off the screen an odd choice as you you consistently need to hold down forward or use stamina. I hope in an update that the screen scroll matches the boats speed or to have invisible walls at the edges. Additionally the dialogue boxes appear too frequently and are not very easy to close. If possible could you make an easier way to skip it after the first time you have seen them?
Dying when falling off the edge of the screen is quite unfortunate, I would recommend setting a minimum boat speed when the player reaches the border instead of killing them off. Additionally, I think it would be better to have all the dialog boxes go together rather than giving the player 2 seconds of control between dialog boxes. It's quite annoying to get disconnected and reconnected from the controls so rapidly. Bullets are only rare at the start as you can constantly fire an never runout after the first barrel. I think the boats, serpents and sharks are a well spread and make the game quite fun. The crab boss is quite challenging as its pretty impossible to dodge. I do find it funny that you can spawn two of them. Beat the game with 1 hp after destroying ~2 fishing boats max. Stamina bar wasn't super useful but makes fighting the crabs a bit easier.
Comments
I think I can speak for all of us but it was great to see all the effort you guys put into making this game. The different aesthetics of the game, including some voice acting (the background song was certainly unique), dialogue boxes, and overall narrative of the game did help capture a unique feeling when I was playing. Besides the issues the others mentioned, maybe add a pause screen because the sequence of gameplay leading up to the final boss takes a little while and the boss itself takes a bit of time. So, it would be nice to regroup and take a break during gameplay. As for your questions, I thought the speed of the boat was a little slow, but I guess it's balanced with the added stamina (and how often the boats come by to refill your stamina bar). However, the boats do get in the way sometimes during the final boss and the screen does get cluttered somewhat because you have to manage all the enemies on the screen, avoid the boats, collect the floating barrels and treasures, and deal with the boss that's able to follow you really well. As a result, the final boss is actually pretty hard to beat. One way to deal with this is to keep track of how many enemies or objects are currently on screen and maybe cap how many things are present at a time (at least, during the boss). Maybe more treasure items to refill your health bar would help too. The stamina bar is a cool addition but I feel like it is used up too fast (especially during the boss) so maybe reducing the frequency of the ships and increasing the max stamina/decreasing the rate of stamina consumption would make us use stamina more strategically instead of spamming stamina. As of right now, the scoring system feels like a padded feature especially when we are busy with the enemies on screen and keeping our ship alive. Also, given that the game gives us the choice to decide how we progress (safe or destroy other ships to face the spawned shark miniboss), the score system sort of leans more towards destroying as many enemies as possible to get more points. The points could be balanced so that destroying a ship would deduct points or maybe provide some bonus if a certain amount of points is achieved. A final point would be to maybe have a bool to keep track if the player restarts the game so the dialog boxes doesn't appear again because it is a hassle to have to click through the dialog (or have a skip button). Overall, I thought the presentation of the game was great and it reminds me of RPGs I used to play.
For the issues I encountered, there was some weird stuff with the positioning of the UI elements, like the health bar, barrel above the ammo indicator, and text boxes since I use a larger monitor (not a big deal, though). For the text boxes, I can actually see all the other text prompts used in the game on the lower left-hand area so maybe put them out of view more. Also, for some reason, I can't see the text or the continue button in the dialog boxes on one monitor but when I go switch my main monitor, it displays it just fine. The game was certainly playable, but I'm just confused as to why there would be differences between the kind of monitor used (besides scaling to screen size).
Edit: just thought of this but it would be cool if we could just replay the boss scene with some set amount of ammo instead of having to go through the initial phase as an extra feature
this was a super fun game with a lot of charm! I adored the art and anime flair you put in with all the references. However, I found the ability to die by sailing off the screen an odd choice as you you consistently need to hold down forward or use stamina. I hope in an update that the screen scroll matches the boats speed or to have invisible walls at the edges. Additionally the dialogue boxes appear too frequently and are not very easy to close. If possible could you make an easier way to skip it after the first time you have seen them?
Fun and Very Creative Game.
Dying when falling off the edge of the screen is quite unfortunate, I would recommend setting a minimum boat speed when the player reaches the border instead of killing them off. Additionally, I think it would be better to have all the dialog boxes go together rather than giving the player 2 seconds of control between dialog boxes. It's quite annoying to get disconnected and reconnected from the controls so rapidly. Bullets are only rare at the start as you can constantly fire an never runout after the first barrel. I think the boats, serpents and sharks are a well spread and make the game quite fun. The crab boss is quite challenging as its pretty impossible to dodge. I do find it funny that you can spawn two of them. Beat the game with 1 hp after destroying ~2 fishing boats max. Stamina bar wasn't super useful but makes fighting the crabs a bit easier.