Hmm, I thought maybe the smileys would show it, but yeah, I really liked it, other than the immediately high difficulty curve! ;) But, the fact that you can do all actions by clicking something VISIBLE on the screen pretty much negates that. EVENTUALLY, if a person just experiments, they can figure it out. That's an awesome attention to detail. :)
Sorry if the part about the text and levels sounded like a negative thing. I should have mentioned that you might have thought of them already, because I completely agree that they should be the first thing to cut when on a time constraint. ;)
YOUR CORE MECHANIC WORKS GREAT! So your polish there is definitely seen and appreciated!
Near the end, I was just remarking at how I kept learning more and more as I fumbled around = I tried to play it more and more because I started to survive for longer even though I kind of suck. I feel like that really is saying a lot. It is DEFINITELY not an easy feat to get a person that sucks at something to want to keep playing it to get better. And it's like MULTIPLE TIMES more difficult than that to have them feel accomplished WHEN they get good at it. In some games it isn't a WHEN, but an IF. Making a turn-based strategy game definitely helps with that WHEN; and I think because the grid is small, it makes it both manageable and challenging for new players. I can see the grid getting bigger for high level players.
I'd probably keep playing this if I didn't have more games to rate!