Sora (prototype) is pretty much as the title says a prototype that shows some good mechanics used and basic animations that made the game really fun to play even with the lack of polish. The rad and high tempo use of the music track that builds up during the boss stages work really well with what it is intended as an intense boss fight.
Magical Girl Concept:
Sora, a magical girl dresses as a priest, possess magical powers to slow down time as well fire a blast of penetrating air projectile. She basically fulfills the magical girl trait/trope but could use a bit more development in her design to make her stand out more like a magical girl.
Visual:
I find that the level of detail and 3D model art style resembles a PS1 era game where the medium to low image resolution and low poly models gives it that retro feel. Its pretty well implemented with that style as a beat'em up game and it matches the enemy design elements and context in the story. The effort put in to designing the level is commendable since there is a lot of attention to detail due to the various objects and textures used in the level environment. The character as well as the enemy models are animated sufficiently enough to make the game appealing but there is a lot of room for improvements in terms of smoothing the effects and the transitions between animation states. Lots of visual effects have been implemented into the game giving it a much vibrant look in the outcome.
Audio:
The music was used in such a manner that it gives an intense impression during the boss fight. The tracks were either layered or swapped into much higher tempo creating that intensity feel of almost beating the boss. I like the idea of the music being used in such a way to create that tense atmosphere though, it was a little of a let down when the game boss isn't finished at the end as the music got really good when it transitions into the last one.
Theme:
The developer picked Time Dilation and Entanglement where both themes were seen being used in the game mechanics itself. The main character, Sora can slow down time which is relevant with time dilation. For entanglement, the boss split into two with both of them sharing the same health pool.
Challenge / Engagement:
Th game is challenging in terms of having to constantly run around the game field and avoid being hit by the enemy mooks. Its challenging since the horde of monsters keeps coming and can saturate the movable area. There are instances that the enemy can group hit stun lock the player character in place making it unavoidable to escape. Though crowd management can be easily achieved by using the air projectile attack which can penetrate and to travel through several enemies in a group, causing massive group damage. Besides that the time slow and parry is mostly used during the boss fight where the boss only give a brief second to the player to attack after she is parried. The boss fight was really challenging with some surprise change up in the attack pattern but this can be curb by baiting her to initiate the attack at an early state. Besides that, the gameplay quite engaging with some cut scenes when reaching the boss fight. On thing to note is that the boss isn't complete so after reaching the third music track the boss would stay invincible and the health bar never depletes.
Overall:
The game need a lot more of development and polish in order to make the game a complete experience. Even though the game is still rough around the edges and unfinished, I can see that there is a lot of good effort and time invested int the game. I had quite a lot of fun with several play through of the game and hope to see it come out of the prototype stage and into a complete game.