I enjoyed it - fluid follow-mouse movement, an attack system that's hard to get used to but feels powerful, and a special move which is also hard to use but feels good when you manage to combo it together with the main attack.
The roguelite system of choosing powers/curses was okay, though none of the powers (except time burst charge count increase) felt immediately impactful. I've gotten maybe 20-30 waves in before dying, and didn't notice the movement, time burst duration or bullet time efficiency buffs at all. Maybe write down the % increases for powers/curses in their tooltip? (this would at least add a psychological effect that you're actually getting stronger in that particular area)
The attack system is simple but has some depth, which was fun to explore. For example - if you keep tapping the LMB and killing enemies to replenish your charge, the bullets will essentially stay in slowmo until you run out, and you'll have a brief moment when you can deal damage whenever you let go. It's very, very satisfying to take down many enemies at once while all this happens (either by dodging bullets gracefully or using time burst).
The only real complaint is how long enemies take to become vulnerable upon spawn - I guess it's necessary to prevent cheesy spawnkilling, but it kind of discourages aggressive playstyles. Maybe make them vulnerable a bit sooner?
Overall - really solid effort, considering you only spent 3 days. Shame you didn't spend all 10 though, I think the result would have been glorious. Congrats on finishing the jam!
Viewing post in Time's Remorse jam comments
Thanks for playing the game, I glad you enjoyed it. Overall this is fantastic feedback.
The descriptions could certainly be more informative, the effects themselves are about +10% in most cases, less in others. I'll look into making them a little stronger.
Overall it sounds like you've found and mastered a style of play I hadn't thought of, and I like it. However the down side (or I suppose 'consequence') of staggering the time slow effect the way you did is just as you discovered, increased invulnerability on enemies.
So funny thing about the invulnerability is that it only lasts for 30 milliseconds at normal speed, that's less than a 3rd of a second. But if you are frequently slowing time it can last up to 3 seconds since its affected by time's speed just as with the enemies themselves.
The idea was to both discourage spawn camping but also to encourage players into dropping out of bullet time as enemies spawn, then slow it down again when going for the kill. I'll look into the timings, but can't say I'd reduce it by more than a few milliseconds, 25 milliseconds or 1/4 of a second might be a reasonable compromise, I'll give it some thought.
As for time spent making the game, I didn't learn about the jam until there were only 4 days to go. I'd just reached a milestone on a long term project and was perusing the upcoming jams for some fun when I saw it. Overall I spent the first day deciding if I wanted to join so late in whilst brainstorming some ideas before spending the remaining 3 on actual development. Had I had the extra time, it definitely would have gone towards increasing and balancing the boon/curse pool, more enemy variety would have been at the top of the list of additions too.
Heh, well, that's one way to implement the theme :p I suppose with this playstyle it's necessary to wait until all targeted enemies spawn in fully, meaning they get to make a few shots before you can attack. A fair risk/reward payoff.
I think there's some potential with this design, with more dev time and a deeper boons system it may get really flexible as a roguelite. Will definitely revisit your game if you decide to work on it further.