I am back. I did play it with two players and recommend it that way. I played with two different people and the one that's usually bad at games picked it up faster so I don't know what you did but good job. Even if the other player was the one I got the furthest with. Over the hour combined I played with both of them, we did beat the boss once and it was by finding the room and re-entering it with full health by using the gate. We tried the hardcore mode but we couldn't do it. They both agreed that the spiders were op xD. But they were much more manageable with two people. It still felt like there was too much damage and not enough healing though. You have to get lucky with minimal spiders to have a good run. It was a while ago so I don't have a ton of details, but it was significantly more fun. I know it is a demo, the only new thing I have the upgrades from sensei guy don't reset for the second player, they just stay. Which is good for grinding, but not great for playing with new players. Oh and sometimes when you get webbed and use the dash attack you still can't move until the web disappears.
We had a small problem with lag again, but I honestly think it's my pc, no idea what it is but game pretty much runs smoothly. Still checking for updates, can't wait for the epicness that follows.
ImPot8o
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This is going to be a long one, but I love the game and want to tell you about my experience.
I played it solo with a bluetooth xbox controller for about an hour, it started getting pretty laggy at that point. I wouldn't rule out my computer because it's been doing that a bunch lately; 3070ti, i7-12700k, 32gigs of ddr4 ram, it was running on an external ssd, but it was fine for the first hour.
I have a small amount of game dev experience, next to none in 3D, but I like to critique things. So take this whole review with a grain of salt, it's your game and this is just a community review to give you some feedback. I also get if this is a lost hobby project that isn't undergoing major development.
First impressions:
I'm very impressed for a free demo, I enjoyed it a lot while frames lasted. From my slightly unskilled experience, I wasn't able to beat the boss in the first level, and only cleared every room but that one once. I also only found Sensei what's his name (definitely not the Cobra Kai dude) and no other villagers. Maybe he's the only one in that level? Or a demo thing? It just felt kinda boring when I'd bought all the upgrades from Sensei.
Thoughts:
It feels like you lose health fast, like you go into a room with more that 2 enemies and it's hard to not lose half (or more) of your health.
Dodging and blocking feels semi-unresponsive. You have to stop and give yourself a sec before it dodges. I guess the thing here is it's hard to chain things together. Attacking is prioritized so if you're spamming attack then need to dodge, it might be too late, maybe it's a skill issue. It's less of a thing with the block, I really enjoyed the projectile bounce back blessing.
The spiders. I like the stick you in place, but it feels too constant. You're sat there trying to get close, and he just keeps sticking you. You can do the dash attack, but waiting for it to charge he could get one or two of the red shots on you. Pair that with an archer and it hurts.
Leveling up also feels slow. At most you get 3 blessings per run. The free one at the beginning, another dragon thing, and the blood sacrifice (looking forward to the possibility of a cool animation for that.)
I did like how going back to the level with the gates give you less coins, but all in all there's really not that much incentive to use it when you can't get past the first level.
Final thoughts/amateur's suggestions:
Lots of fun, and keep in mind this review was written from a single player perspective who didn't even beat the first boss. And someone who doesn't play many top down games.
My roguelite experience is Risk of Rain 2, Vampire Survivors, and 20 Minutes till Dawn. All of which you level up decently quickly which changes the game often and makes each experience feel fun and new. More players might help this (assuming both of you get a blessing,) more characters, and more variety and frequency of blessings.
You also have the added difficulty of a theme.
A ranged attack would be nice too, but I'm sure that'll come with the new characters.
The bomb confused me, when I used it to get to one of the blocked chest, it placed it in the middle, not where I was standing. Which is where it seemed to go every other time and it rolls around a bit (which I did enjoy with the chests). The bombs also had the same problem as the dodge and block, you can't do it while attacking, you have to stop first. And I'd love to be able to throw them, even if that means some of the players velocity is given to it to launch forward a little.
I think the enemies are great, the archer having multiple attacks is awesome, and the basic dude and wolves are great too. As far as the spiders go, maybe one attack that does a little damage and slows you down or stops you. Or a longer cooldown. I picture them kind of as a support, not really a damage dealer. I had no idea how to deal with the bosses arrow attack, but every time I got there I was at 50 or less health.
More healing would be nice too. I did end up switching to the Sushi dish instead of the Bombs
I really enjoyed the parrying with the perfect blocks, that was fun to get the hang of and use purposefully and accidentally. More stuff like that that feels like another ability would be very welcome
I also don't have a numpad on my keyboard, so when I first started I had to rebind everything, but eventually moved to controller which played a lot nicer anyway.
I'm going to play this with two players sometime in the next week and a half, and I'll leave an update then and maybe join the discord. I do love the game, that's why I'm leaving a review, even wishlisted it on steam. I'm going to keep following it for updates and I'd love to keep playtesting it.