Not too hard to notice where the inspiration for this comes from. Sadly the cards here (for what I've seen of em at least) don't have enough variety to make it all that interesting. And I hit a complete wall few levels in where I just can't do anything no matter what I try. I just can't get enough mana fast enough to keep up with the constant onslaught of enemies. Not too fun getting absolutely stomped and slowly losing all your deck with nothing you can really do about it. And it's so dang slow too. Doesn't really inspire me to even keep trying.
It looked very nice and moody. Not a huge fan of the font though, it's not very readable and the tutorial having loads of texts for you to slog through without really getting to play yet made it feel even worse. It did a good enough job to teach the mechanics but it wasn't paced all that well and wasn't really interactive enough for my liking. It really would have been better if more integrated to the first level.
Well, after some time off from it starting to write this feedback, I went back and few more tries in managed to luck through the level with some luckier starting draws. Then proceeded to steamroll through the rest of the game with no issues.
So basically all the stat boost cards are pretty much a trap and not worth it at all unless you have a surplus of mana and in those cases you are already probably winning and have some secrets to spend your extra mana on instead. The dark ritualish mana gain card seemed to be the best one I saw by far.
Placing the cards seemed a bit pointless. Didn't see any reason why you really would play your cards on anywhere else besides the furthest along the track you can. Just made it clunkier to play and seemed like "we gotta do it like this because StS does it like this". Would need more deep mechanics of having more defensive front line defending the more fragile ranged units and casters but even then it would be just wrong or right with no real strategy involved.
The audio work was very much on the lights side but even though it was simple, it somehow didn't get too boring and irritating. In fact, it's still playing there on the background as I'm writing this. But sound effects were lacking a bit more. Having some more actual noises of combat and so on would have made it more interesting to follow. The game was mostly just about waiting for the next available cast while watching to fight go on so might as well make it more entertainable.
The fights should always start you with at least some mana. That initial wait every round start felt horrible. All at the same time where sometimes enemies were already half way down the track before you were even able to cast anything.
But yeah, all in all, it was pretty enjoyable ride. Would just need pacing improvements, less duplicate and boring cards and more interesting ones instead to make the gameplay deeper and less about just blindly waiting for your 2/2 grizzly to throw in the mix.
Good job! 👍