Thanks for all the wonderful feedback! I'm glad you've enjoyed it so far.
I might've taken the whole Labyrinth theme a little too far on the 2nd stage you're right. Maybe checkpoints would be in order for longer levels because I can sympathize with how brutal losing to the boss might be and having to do it all again.
The boss of the 3rd stage, Descent, was pretty much intentionally designed to be annoying :D. Before I changed the attack animations they would specifically stand JUST out of range of attacks. The time until they attack is random each time, so you have to rely solely on reaction speed, which I admit is really tight and makes them, in my opinion, the hardest boss.
The adds in the final boss fight don't give XP, if you're referring to the blue text that pops up when you digest them, that's the Calories they are worth for the Weight Gain system if you have it enabled. Scrolling text for XP might be nice though and I might add that.
I'll be honest, I wasn't expecting people to grind levels in the game after they had finished it, but it seems quite a few people did which makes me glad :D. But I didn't really put much thought into methods to farm XP.
That action lock glitch with the repeated actions is one that's been plaguing me for a while now, it'll happen occasionally when inputting parry and another action in some peculiar timing. I've never been able to do it consistently but I'm hoping my next update will finally be the one that pins it down for good.
Thanks for the kind words! And I appreciate long comments, to me it means that you care about the game, and that's a good feeling.
Thank you for taking the time to help sort through my confusions! While I cannot speak for everyone else who has done some grinding in this lovely game. I can say that it just goes to show how well made it is. (Though I was also curious to see how OP I could make the protagonist.) It has left me with a desire to play more, yet of course. I, like everyone else, must wait patiently for further updates.
I also like the idea of a checkpoint system in this game. But feel as if it's not entirely needed, if that makes sense. If anything you could make it optional. OR perhaps in the form of an item?
1 last thing I would recommend is better balancing on armor/clothing. To be specific. It's a tad annoying to have every piece of armor being 'broad' in its coverage. I think it would be more fun to have specifics instead. In other words. Instead of having ATK, stomach strength, life and vore skill. It could be just ATK, DEF, life, and possibly rupture chance/DPS. That way people aren't hording 3 sets of gear. Because 1 set has good capacity and acid DMG but is muddled with rupture boosting stats. Another set has good ATK but doesn't have rupture boosting stats.
I'm aware it's also because of bad RNG. But it does feel as if none of my armor has explicitly. 'Boosts all vore related stats to better yourself as a stomach-based warrior'. Just broad coverage for all styles of fighting.
A neat idea to also toss out while on this subject. Armor that is a 'grade' above perfect, but isn't quite simply OP. In the event that all equipment remains broad in its stat boosting. You could at least add specialized armor's dropped by optional bosses. Best example I can give is of course, the optional boss of stage 4. Dropping an 'entire set' of rupture-based armor. Every time you beat them, they drop a singular piece of the armor. Which only boosts rupture chance and DPS. By a fair bit higher than what you might get from 'perfected grade' armors. That way it's risk/reward so to speak. Do you boost most of your stats for better survivability? Or go all in on specialized gear that forces you to play by its rules?
(I also think it might be neat/unique to add a function or skill. Where the protagonist can swallow a piece of armor. Which would temporarily boost their stats. According to the armor's 2 highest stats.)
This comes down to personal preference, but I actually like having so many different affixes that can appear on equipment. I know it can be annoying to never quite get that perfect item because it has some affix that's useless to you, but I enjoy that never-ending hunt for the perfect item. I would like to change it so that some items can't have some affixes, so that you don't have to find the exact same affixes on all your gear for the perfect set. But it'll require an overhaul of how items are generated and might be a bit of work.
I do plan on having 'Legendary' items that are rare drops from bosses but haven't decided whether they'll be just epic but better or be predetermined items with set stats. I am leaning towards predetermined items with special names too, I just think that'd be cooler.
Sets of items would be neat too, but I'd definitely want to have Set-bonuses to go with it and I might need a bit more time to figure that out.
I don't know if I'll add an eating items type thing, just because it'd be such a pain if you accidentally ate an item, so it'd need some special way to activate.
I fully understand. I also love hunting down the perfect set of gear in games. Plus, it isn't as if the other stats don't help in some fashion or another. I just do find it a bit annoying, to not have equipment that is geared for specifics. So having Legendary gear that has less mix-matching stats is a very welcome idea. It might also be a neat way to introduce 'side-quests' so to speak. As in, while exploring main areas you could run into notes/npcs. That tell you about a new area that is specifically much more challenging. But you only need to worry about clearing it 1 time. As the reward would be a full set of legendary gear. That way you could kill 2 birds with a singular stone. By (possibly) introducing lore alongside great rewards.
Best example I can give. The protagonist finding an old terminal. It speaks of another dawn-touched that was a savior of sorts to that planet. Telling a brief tale of their heroics and special ability. It then tells of a possible resting place for that dawn-touched. But no one knows for certain as it's infested with traps and powerful creatures. Once finished with exploring their current area, the protagonist can go attempt a new mission/area. Which of course, would lead to the legendary gear. That gives the protagonist the same special ability as the old dawn-touched.
As for the eating items/gear. You could introduce Special Skills that can be only activated once per mission run. These could also be rewards for clearing out specialized challenge areas. Going with the theme of eating gear, here is an example.
(By holding down a button for 2-3 seconds)
"The dawn-touched voraciously grabs and devours whatever is in front of them. Seeing the ravenous glint in your eyes and a starving smile. Even the strongest enemy's quake in fear at your approach."
"Should you devour something else in your maddened state. Such as a piece of gear you didn't see in your fit of hunger. In exchange for 'permanently' taking up some space in your stomach. Gain the stats of the equipment you swallowed. Until the end of your current exploration."