Played v0.2.12 for 53min, afterwards played v0.2.13 for about half an hour.
Note that I never played this game before that, and look at it from the perspective of a total newcomer, without even any experience with 3D platformers. I believe this will be an accurate representation of how completely new players will experience your game. Here's a short SWOT analysis, which will be the basis for the conclusion.
Strengths:
- All UI aspects seem to be there on a technical level. While visual clarity is lacking, the main coding is clearly there.
- H-concept and integration seems well done, even though it fully lacks content.
- Good that there is a way to play without the time limit. Although you need to re-enable it every time and losing 80% of gold is a lot, making it not worthwhile in its current state.
- Enough mechanical depth to be long term interesting.
- Finished main gameplay loop, decently fun once you get used to the rooms. The fact that the difficulty increases automatically is also very well done.
- I didn't encounter any bugs or glitches, even minor move related once. So good job!
Weaknesses:
- Slow and confusing intro text (due to current lack of visuals, and similar looking names [???]). I'd be happy with just sketched placeholders to know what's going on.
- Music style doesn't fit (change between option menu and hyperactive one during gameplay), OK since placeholder, and a subjective opinion.
- The tutorial doesn't integrate well with the main game, so you may forget mechanics once you are in the game. Too many abilities are introduced at once. I'll come back to this in the conclusion.
- Jumping on vines feels weird. Jumping in general feels imprecise. Apparently you need to fiddle with the FOV, but new players aren't going to do that.
- Sound effects are clearly placeholder.
- Seals remained very unclear to me (not mentioned in the tutorial), despite the fact that these can be used to smoothen the early difficulty curve.
- Lost the first dungeon run extremely early on due to time loss. Very unforgiving for new players who don't know the room layouts.
- The newer version just made the first dungeon a lot more difficult. Not a good change.
Opportunities:
- Adult games always do well, and this has a different main concept.
- Just needs a lot more content (primarily visual, UI, and H-related), but main scaffolding is in place.
- There is a clean segregation between H and non-H content. This makes it easy to skip it for those only interested in the gameplay, and you can even release on Steam.
- The main reward system is obviously underdeveloped, but is a solid base for keeping players engaged.
Threats:
- I am missing (a start of) a workflow for the visuals. There aren't even even placeholders. This is an important aspect in adult games, and creating these visuals also takes a long time. This will certainly slow down the project and may even cause burnout.
- Additionally, I hope that the current 3D-models are placeholders, I can't really imagine pornographic scenes with those things. If they aren't, you'll probably want to move to a more ecchi, implied, style of game.
- There seems to be a certain scope creep related to the movement abilities, which is always a dangerous sign.
- Heavy focus on difficulty and precise movement can turn off players who are here for the porn.
Deep Dives:
I also want to focus deeper on two aspects which I seem like primary issues:
Tutorial:
Separating the tutorial from the gameplay is always a bad sign. By the time I jumped into the dungeon runs, I had forgotten all about the different jump styles, and for the entire remainder I only used the multi-jump. The tutorial also isn't fun, nor indicative of the actual gameplay. There are no timers in the tutorial, it focusses purely on movement mechanics. I would propose to spread the tutorial out over the main gameplay. Start the player with only the basic jump, and then introduce other styles later together with rooms that require their use. Currently even baby steps is a difficult leap for a new player, even after playing v0.2.12 I had trouble with it.
The same holds for the other introduction of mechanics. Seals for example are only explained via text when first entering the seals chamber. And you start with several of them already equipped. A more logical progression would be to start the player off without seals, and let the first ones during play to allow them to appreciate their effect. Seals are also divided into different categories without a way to just see all of them (and filter later once you get more). This brings me into the point of:
UI Design:
As an example, take the reception. You have a large amount of coloured buttons. There are no icons, and no explanation what anything means. Green doesn't necessarily mean unlocked, it sometimes means negative, etc... You should add icons, add more than colours (e.g. a lock over locked stuff).
Also, I wouldn't show everything at once. Start small, currently it is overwhelming. I don't need to see all races and racial aspects, let me unlock them throughout the game. Preferably in a story driven manner.
Take some inspiration from other management style games, or UI heavy games (like Paradox Games) that need to show a lot of complicated stuff to the player.
Conclusion:
It's a game with potential, and the core systems are in place. But the user experience and onboarding process is lacking. It is also unclear how feasible it will be to actually create the H-content for this game.
I did enjoy playing it eventually, but if I weren't replaying it for DD49 I would've bounced off of the game already. Additionally, there is no reason to keep playing since the main H-content isn't there yet.