This game, while interesting, feels very clunky right now. The controls and and the buttons for maneuvering menus feels unnecessarily obtuse, IE multiple buttons to confirm multiple things, sometimes it would just make more sense to just have one button to confirm things instead of 3 or more
The navigation and movement of the game feels very player antagonistic, there were so many times that I went into an area without knowing i couldn't go back or mistimed a jump that would both lead me to areas I didn't want to go to yet and forced me to continue instead of being able to backtrack and get some collectibles i missed. This is because of the way the map is created, multiple collectibles will just be out of your reach even at the beginning of the game, or if you mistime a jump once, you're forced to continue the game unless you go back to a previous save in order to attempt a single jump again, disallowing any kind backtracking or exploration if you mess up. If the players jump was extended, or if they had an extra way of increasing their Hight in the air on their own, this could fix the issue itself. And lastly for the map design is that sometimes there's just... intangible walls... or floors... and it doesn't even look like you can tell if they are or not, you'll mostly just end up finding out the hard way with them, especially with the floors, If there was a way to tell the difference between floors and walls you can pass through, I wouldn't mind it much
And lastly... I'm not sure i see the poupous of the melee attack? this isn't a major issue as it is, it doesn't feel necessarily as strong as all the other ranged options the player can get. Not sure what to suggest to fix that though sorry.
Viewing post in Aria's Dreamland Dissonance comments
Heya Roundkights!
I just have the extra set of keys as a backup just in case you accidentally rebound your keys to something uncomfortable while navigating the menus. Then you'd be able to rebind your keys using the backup. (The ones displayed on screen)
In terms of the 'no backtracking', that was intentional to try and keep the pace of the game moving forward. In the completed game it will have more unlockable movement mechanics to help with getting the collectibles. For example, one of the upgrades allows you to grab ledges in the current non-demo version of the game.
I'm unclear on what you mean with the intangible floors/walls. Some of them are intended to hide secret paths to reward you for exploring and the forest area the darker green tree branches should always support you while the lighter green bush-like canopies are meant to feel unsecured and unreliable so it feels like a risk to be in them and encourages you to instead rely on the dark green branches.
In regards to the melee, I do plan to rework it to feel less sluggish later down the road, but the intent to melee is the unique power of destroying some enemy weapons and armor in one hit. (Some enemies aren't staggered if they have armor on) I'm not sure if the demo has it, but melee can also destroy many projectiles. (In the current version at least)
Anyway, thank you very much for playing and leaving me some feedback! As I keep developing the game I'll try to improve it more!