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Hi, thanks for playing, your feedback and for soldiering on through to the end despite the bugs! Seems like the new build I uploaded wasn't quite watertight, so I've reverted to the previous stable version for now and will patch it asap, thanks for letting me know. 

The blocks you encountered can be blown up with bombs, so if you are standing next to one select the bomb from your inventory and it will blow it to bits and clear your path, I probably need to make this a little clearer though.

Glad you enjoyed overall though, I will keep going with this though the bootcamp, best of luck with your gamedev also!

Nice job getting this out on time, the level of polish is impressive! I'm not an expert on card games but I was able to pick this up and enjoy it - I especially like the magic effects animations when you play a card, there is a cool one with lightning that looks great, I enjoyed the choice of music too, unusual for a fantasy game but I liked it. I think you've got the start of something special here, if you could find a way to replace a few of the bigger AI assets with hand-drawn I could see it being a commercial release, you've done a great job! Best of luck with your gamedev :) 

Thanks for playing, I'm glad you enjoyed it so much! I was unsure whether the 2D platformer viewpoint would work, was contemplating changing it, but I'm very tempted to keep it now and develop things further in other areas instead. Best of luck in your game development also!

Thanks, I really appreciate it, I'll keep going and see where it goes! Best of luck with your gamedev too :)

Nice :) thanks for your support! 

Thanks for playing and and for your in-depth feedback - I've been able to deal with a bunch of bugs and a few balancing issues thanks to your efforts which should make the next update play a bit better. You also make some good point on things I might want to address if expanding the game further which I will keep in mind. It's true that the turn-based RNG dungeon crawl formula can sometimes have issues in being repetitive, but then the challenge is to improve on these things  - I'm adding visual cues for enemy positioning and room types in the next update which will help with the risk /reward choices, but might go further and have enemies move around. Best of luck with your gamedev also! 

I had fun with this one, beat me a couple times but I came back for more and it paid off! At first I thought the character movement was a bit slow but then I got used to it and enjoyed the challenge it brings. One thing that stands out to me is how the choice of music fits really well with the art style and general vibe, and I enjoyed those chiptunes. All I'd say is maybe add a speed potion pickup or some other pickup item, like a power up of some kind. I think if you wanted to expand it to a bigger game you could make a cool vampire survivors type thing here, best of luck with your gamedev! 

Thanks for checking out my update, your feedback is very welcome - I was able to deal with a nasty bunch of bugs and oversights thanks to you spotting them! Starting stats or classes would be something I'd consider strongly when expanding the game further if that's the road I go down. It's also great to hear the new movement and sage tips are working nicely :)

Hi, many thanks for playing and leaving feedback, glad to hear you enjoyed the art, audio and general concept, I appreciate you sticking with it all the way to the boss.

You make a good point about grinding. I'm currently re-writing the RNG to avoid traps and enemies being grouped together too much as that is a major concern with this build. Some magics do double damage against certain enemies but I think you're right I need to make it more obvious with visual feedback when that happens.  On the boss lead-up, I had a plan to add different tile art when nearer the top of the tower, plus boss music, good to have confirmation that it's worth doing for future updates.

Best of luck in your gamedev :)

- Iain 

Hi, many thanks for playing and for your feedback - you make some good points, it's also great to hear you're enjoying the art style, vibe and battles! I've just uploaded an update with new style movement and hp bars for enemies as it happens, but I will continue with further improvements in future also. 

I think you've got a really strong game here, I'm just pretty terrible at it as a player, second attempt and I'm still bankrupt! I'm liking the character design and the art plus the dialogue you've created has a really cohesive look and vibe to it, the descriptions on the cards are a really nice touch too and add loads to the immersion - that kind of attention to detail is awesome. 

As a suggestion I'd say maybe add a few more hints in-menu for how to succeed at the haggling mechanics, or card trading system generally for those of us who really have no idea.

I'm going to have another go, maybe if I buy a few more of them I'll actually get lucky in my booster packs and have a card the kids want this time!

Hi, many thanks for playing and for your feedback and your support from earlier, I remember being on discord thinking 'I actually have to make this thing now'!

Really chuffed to hear you've enjoyed what I've put together so far. I'm working on the movement as a priority as many folks have mentioned it and then on to focus on the battles, so I might have an update you'd enjoy soon.  I often get drawn to the idea of UI based games too as they seem somehow 'manageable', but that could well be an illusion as we all know how easily over-scoping can creep in, they are fun though. 

Best of luck in your gamedev projects too :)

-Iain

Hi, thank you for playing and leaving feedback, you make some good points! I'm working on the movement for the next update so it should end up being smoother and faster, after that it's on to improving the battles. I can also quite easily add keyboard controls instead of just mouse click to interact with rooms, maybe E or Enter as default for that?  

It's a decent start, nicely done! I'm liking the hi-res look of things, the ship sprites and enemy sprites look really cool and I'm enjoying the projectiles and effects too! I play shmups a lot to relax and enjoy the genre, so I'd love to see this do well, so a few suggestions if you wanted to take things to the next level: 

- Big swarms of enemies! It gives a cool sense of power to the player when you can blast through ranks of weak enemies, in between fighting the tougher ones, go for almost constant action with hardly any breaks. Putting them in cool shaped formations helps too. 
- Higher player bullet speed, fire rate too maybe. Just increasing that a tiny bit makes things feel more immediate. 
- Super tight hit boxes. Always good to double check the collisions on a game like this, it's often best for the player ship's hit box to be a little bit smaller than the size of the sprite, you get more "that was a close one" type moments!

Best of luck with your development! 

Greetings! Many thanks for playing my game and also for your feedback and kind words, it's a great encouragement for me to carry on and build a full game out of this starting point. I am currently working on the movement to make it faster and smoother and of course will improve the battles too, so hopefully I will be sharing these things soon in the next few updates. I wish you the best of luck in your gamedev projects too :)
- Iain 

Hi, thanks for such great feedback and for taking the time to really play my game! I had a lot of fun drawing the claw wizard sprite, though maybe made them a little bit overpowered in the game, probably also my favourite enemy though :)

As a few folks have pointed out, there are balancing issues here with the supply of gold, the enemies, sequence of events etc, it's the first thing on my to-do list so hopefully I'll be able to share an updated version soon that's improved in this regard - you're right it's meant to be a bit challenging but not flat out unfair.

I intended to add a 'use item' branch to the turn-based battles actions but simply ran out of time and energy, however it is certainly also on my to-do list for continuing the project.   

You are absolutely right, there are stats that need more of a useful purpose. I intended the 'faith' stat to power up holy attacks to use against undead enemies such as zombies etc, or to resist some status changes (in this build only poison is a thing). Dexterity I thought could be used to dodge or counter, as well as traps. Once again I simply ran out of time, but I'll be coming back to this in future builds for sure. 

Thank you also for your kind words on the atmosphere and style, this was something I really wanted to get right, so I'm feeling encouraged and stoked to keep going.

Best wishes and best of luck in your gamedev projects,

-Iain   

Thanks for playing and for your feedback! It was a bit of a rush to get it playable in three weeks without getting burnout, but glad I stuck with it now.

Thanks also for the heads up on the ESC, as you probably guessed it's a shortcut used for testing that I can fix easily. I'll be refining the battle mechanics and UI in future updates so could see a lot of the things you mentioned soon. 

Hi, thanks for playing and for your in-depth feedback, it's clear you've given the game a proper playthrough and I really appreciate that!

Yeah I agree balancing and polish could be better, I over-ran in the beta so didn't get much time for it in wrap-up but I wanted to get the game on itch to see what I could do in the time limit. 

I'm currently working on the RNG to stop the battles/events clumping together one after the other like you mentioned, along with changing movement to a smoother type where the player is only affected by the grid when they stop moving over an event, so hopefully that will arrive soon in an update. 

Great to hear you enjoyed mix of influences and general vibe, especially the world-building as I've never attempted that before in a game, I'll certainly keep going with the project and see where it goes.

Hope you've had a great Christmas and best of luck with your gamedev too!

- Iain 

Feels like one of those games where you die a lot but makes you want to come back for another try.  Really enjoying the 90's anime cyberpunk vibe, the lighting and sound effects work great for creating atmosphere and those written notes are cool also.
I had a some issues with mouse control for the flashlight, but I plugged in an xbox controller and used the analog stick which seemed to work perfectly 

Nice!  Thanks for playing and for your feedback :) The movement and exploration is definitely on my to-do list for improvement, I'll keep going and see where it takes me

I had a lot of fun with this, the gameplay feels well crafted and does exactly what it needs to do, also the animation where the enemies explode into a shower of pixels is super satisfying especially when combined with the sound effect you use!

I'm enjoying the Lovecraftian vibes in this, the writing is fantastic!

Hi Gabe, 

Many thanks for taking the time to play my game and giving such insightful and actionable feedback, I really appreciate it so much! 

I'm especially glad to hear the atmosphere and dark fantasy vibe comes across as intended - I feel super stoked for further development now, hoping this will help build a good game surface. Being part of the Bootcamp helped me push through in Beta when at one point I thought I'd over-scoped badly, which was awesome.   

I will absolutely continue to develop the game further during the rest of Bootcamp and then alongside the FGGS course also (I'm in the Beta section now and it's super helpful).  

Hope you've had a great Christmas, best wishes

-Iain 

Thanks for checking it out, I really appreciate your support especially at this early stage, and Gauntlet rocks!

The quit button seems to be an itch-specific problem, probably due to the way html5 projects are embedded in the page so I'm working on another way to achieve the same thing

Hi, thank you for letting me know, and thanks for taking the time to try out the demo. I'm unable to replicate the problem on Windows PC using Chrome or Firefox, may I ask for a few system details, such as which OS you are running?

Many thanks for checking out the demo and for your thoughts too, it really is super helpful as development is very much ongoing and it's great to hear what works as well as what needs some work.  I'm a big fan of 40k and X-com also :)