Thank you for the absolutely amazing feedback! We really appreciate the time and effort you put into the review! This is our first game jam and my first time making a game and it's feedback like this that really helps us learn and improve for the future.
One of the lessons we learned that your review nicely highlights is that even on the tight deadline of a game jam we need to reevaluate some concepts and ideas when the scope of the game changes. Our vision for this was grand, we had crazy ideas like filling the game up with items, enough to require the whole keyboard to use all of it in one run, for the hell and fun of it, with enough NPCs to supply them and levels to try the items out and experiment. We correctly scaled it scale down to what will fit in the deadline, but did not take the time to reevaluate the game design to take that new scope into account. Leaving us using the top line of keys on the keyboard instead of shifting them to a more useable position.
And sadly the level design was very rushed to get it done in time, and suffered because of it. Also it didn't allow for all of the items and features to really get used and have their chance to shine. This I appreciate more now that I get to hear it from others. Having worked on it, I knew how everything worked (or is supposed to), but without a proper environment and levels to experience those features, they get missed despite the time we spent on them to get them just right.
We're going to revisit this and fix some of these issues, put that final polish on the game we feel it deserves, plus full screen so everyone gets to see the gorgeous art that Bertie made clearly!
I am very glad you didn't took my "little essay" not too harsh. I enjoyed the game a lot, which is why I wanted to help improve it in the ways that I can. Reading through your reply really makes me stoked for an updated version!
I thought the little ending Skit was quite Novel... In Germany we call it "Gesamtkunstwerk" :D It came together quite nice although I can feel the scope creep. My last Game Jam (Which was also my first one) we had so much going on... I was positively overwhelmed. We couldn't finish it in time although we managed to get it playable. This time we made a more concise and finished experience first and tried to add stuff afterwards, which worked much better! But since I had more time doing focused artwork I took too much of a burden on me once again. I designed the Starting area first (the general layout was already designed) and we both fell in love with the visuals and tried to create an entire map that looks like this and is varied.
I couldn't. So in a way I saw your game reflect that but from another point. Your artwork is better fitting and more focused than mine (I am pretty new to art anyways) but where we had trouble with the big varied map not looking like a mess of colors, you had trouble clamping the mechanics into a concise experience. Something to be learned from your game for me and you there haha.