-inventory window and item windows are 2 small and too far away. Windows in general are too far away and no proper ux structure for the eye. i.e. the dialogues are placed weirdly to the text box itself.
-no take all button?
-blur is a bit much
-doors seem selectable but not openable, same with item boxes. I would walk around open everything. Maybe note if they are empty before i interact. For doors you could remove the gold handle for closed doors
-Player attacks are very slow, cool that it attacks from different directions but didnt find a use for it? or maybe i didnt notice.
-Is there a shortcut to close chest/item ui? Pressing rightclick or esc did nothing
-Dodge start-up is too slow to be useful, If i can see the attack coming i might as well parry it
-Parry doesnt seem to have a counter? I don't understand the point of it since their parry animation recovers so fast they barely get punished.
-I died, game didnt auto re-load, when i loaded manually my was gone and i ran around until i found a hammer in a chest.
-combat is clashing with itself i think, the enemies are relentless but that only works if you have a fast combat system. currently all i can do is back up and hope i can kite around a table for some lucky hits. especially if they are more than one enemy
-I think you can salvage it, the functions are there but the numbers for everything has to be tweaked. and it would be benefical to give the player moment of micropauses in combat. like a parry and riposte is a micropause, a iframe dodge is a micropause. if you don't want to speed it up, you need to slowdown enemy attack tempo. force them to take a break. because once they start swinging they dont seem to stop. i suggest a ticketing system for the ai so you dont have 3 enemies attack endlessly at the same time.
Very pretty game though, asset and mood is on point, i didnt mind the level layout either. But i would focus on getting combat right before doing anything else. If its going to be combat focus, retweak everything, if its an adventure game, dial the combat and enemy health back.
UPDATE: After a PC restart the game worked, but this was the issue I had before: "This seems up my alley, I wasnt able to give it an honest shot since as soon as I load into the first room my PC monitor and USB devices keep force disconnecting/reconnecting. I'm not sure what could be causing it but I've never had this happen before with any other program."
Now that im able to play it
the headshot is really satisfying
the dodge is pretty much useless, sprinting around is much better
I really like the directional attacks, especially the big bonk
healing items and items in general are pretty hard to spot in the environment
I liked juking the fencer, but I really wish I had a better way to chain attacks together
This game kind of reminded me of blade of darkness which was a tight game that also had directional based attacks
tried running past the 2 knights with rapiers since i was on a cheeto of health but the door was locked and i met my demise
combat overall seems a little bit slow after munching through 10 or so guys
I ended up backtracking multiple rooms trying to whiff punish attacks when fighting multiple dudes.
Enemies seem to have a lot of health, maybe a bit more than necessary
Seems like a solid base, keep up the good work! I'd personally like to see a bit more reward for a clean parry or some way to chain attacks together more quickly.
I like the flavor texts, they're well written. I'd even say the lack of UI feels weird when you have such nice descriptions in the menus and everything else looks so polished.
Some quick stuff about the menus: no hover effect, hard to get out of menus without esc/right click/click out of bounds
The art style is top tier, sfx are nice as well. I can pretty often tell who is where with that alone, which is really really good
I couldn't get too far because of some bugs you'll see in the video. after loading my save, I couldn't equip weapons anymore either, and couldn't load or continue from the main menu
The fights are okay, you need to think before you act, but I feel like enemies can dash away faster than the player in some cases. Maybe it has something to do with stats or equipment? I feel like dashing doesn't have a lot of upsides compared to just running away or parrying. Parrying isn't too hard, the attacks are pretty easy to read.
just make a sword the initial default weapon, i don't wanna fight with a table's leg. i noticed that if you have a slight elevation disadvantage enemies struggle to hit you, because they just swing above your head menuing and controls are still kinda weird. why would i want to grab a single ducat instead of all of them? if i press E with a chest open, i would expect the default to be grab everything. i like that you are adding lore and dialogue, the beginning is taking shape in a dialogue, i would also expect E (or space or whatever you want your default keybind to be) to pick by default the first dialogue option. the combat does not really work without iframes imho. if you want it to be hard le dark souls you need to give the player some proper tools to defend themselves. right now it kinda feels more like skyrim, except skyrim works because the player is usually overpowered compared to the enemies, here everyone can beat the shit out of you and there's swarms of them the stagger mechanic is just very punishing. you are basically being punished for being bad at the game, which leads you to being left open and receive even more damage, potentially leading even to stunlock chains where the player can't do shit, not even dodge since the dodge clearly has no iframes so it might as well not exist.
Graphics were top notch. Really good ambiance and atmosphere. The models too were super well done. I really like that this game has a lot of writing, even though I habe a couple issues with it, I think the plague doctor guy repeated some information, and the overall writing could use a few more passes, but great effort. Things like the little world building items, the descriptions and all.
In terms of combat, I believe you want the combat to be very weighty and deliberate, but it felt super clunky to me to be honest. I was getting my ass kicked by the first guy in a way that didn't felt satisfying, it felt more like he was just wailing on me because the game didn't have a clean or responsive enough combat to allow me to defend myself, even though the tools were there.
I recorded a video I should be posting on the cord soon with my playthrough, but very impressed with the amount of work so far.
Really unique environment, I'm intrigued by future updates. Combat is kinda wonky and the evasion step is so slow that sprinting is a better option as evasion. I would make startup attack animation a bit faster, the poise system based on character equipment (was weird seeing those naked people not staggering) and the recovery animation after an evasion step much faster to make it as viable evade option.
Combat is getting more challenging and fun to engage with, not sure about parry timing, don't even know what parry looks like or what's the effect of it.
Sometimes enemy just rush you and spam kick + atk is a bit annoying, not un-managable tho.
I like the idea of many rooms, but it's a bit hard to orient myself with the mental map, might not be a bad thing tho, but it's a thing.
There's a bug, not sure how to trigger, but you lose your leg and you can't control the play to do anything anymore.
Played for about 20 or so minutes, here were my first impressions.
Movement and everything feels smooth and the combat was easy to understand. I don't know if I missed something, but the only thing I was confused about is the inventory. Pressing C opens what I assume is a crafting menu, but I can't equip/drop/use from there. That didn't make much sense to me. I pressed every other button and the only way to equip was to find a drawer or chest first.
Combat and enemy AI was decent too, but the melee range (was using hammer and candleabra) felt a bit too short so I was commonly trading hits with the enemies. This made fighting more than one enemy at a time really hard, they don't get stunned long enough so I was getting hit and getting stunlocked in return.
Rest of my problems (UI is a bit small and doesn't seem to be a way to increase the size, and there was a nonsolid window I accidentally walked through in the room with the plague doctor) are just that the game is in development though.
i left the broken crafting menu by accident. in the starting room there should be a hint telling you to press tab to open the inventory. maybe its not clear enough?
The menu needs work. There's a load option but no save option? I like the graphics, reminds me of dungeons and dragons online. It's pretty neat that I can destroy and nab just about everthing in this game.
Comments
Thoughts as i played through.
-inventory window and item windows are 2 small and too far away. Windows in general are too far away and no proper ux structure for the eye. i.e. the dialogues are placed weirdly to the text box itself.
-no take all button?
-blur is a bit much
-doors seem selectable but not openable, same with item boxes. I would walk around open everything. Maybe note if they are empty before i interact. For doors you could remove the gold handle for closed doors
-Player attacks are very slow, cool that it attacks from different directions but didnt find a use for it? or maybe i didnt notice.
-Is there a shortcut to close chest/item ui? Pressing rightclick or esc did nothing
-Dodge start-up is too slow to be useful, If i can see the attack coming i might as well parry it
-Parry doesnt seem to have a counter? I don't understand the point of it since their parry animation recovers so fast they barely get punished.
-I died, game didnt auto re-load, when i loaded manually my was gone and i ran around until i found a hammer in a chest.
-combat is clashing with itself i think, the enemies are relentless but that only works if you have a fast combat system. currently all i can do is back up and hope i can kite around a table for some lucky hits. especially if they are more than one enemy
-I think you can salvage it, the functions are there but the numbers for everything has to be tweaked. and it would be benefical to give the player moment of micropauses in combat. like a parry and riposte is a micropause, a iframe dodge is a micropause. if you don't want to speed it up, you need to slowdown enemy attack tempo. force them to take a break. because once they start swinging they dont seem to stop. i suggest a ticketing system for the ai so you dont have 3 enemies attack endlessly at the same time.
Very pretty game though, asset and mood is on point, i didnt mind the level layout either. But i would focus on getting combat right before doing anything else. If its going to be combat focus, retweak everything, if its an adventure game, dial the combat and enemy health back.
good job!
UPDATE: After a PC restart the game worked, but this was the issue I had before:
"This seems up my alley, I wasnt able to give it an honest shot since as soon as I load into the first room my PC monitor and USB devices keep force disconnecting/reconnecting. I'm not sure what could be causing it but I've never had this happen before with any other program."
Now that im able to play it
Seems like a solid base, keep up the good work! I'd personally like to see a bit more reward for a clean parry or some way to chain attacks together more quickly.
sneedback directly on discord
I like the flavor texts, they're well written. I'd even say the lack of UI feels weird when you have such nice descriptions in the menus and everything else looks so polished.
Some quick stuff about the menus: no hover effect, hard to get out of menus without esc/right click/click out of bounds
The art style is top tier, sfx are nice as well. I can pretty often tell who is where with that alone, which is really really good
I couldn't get too far because of some bugs you'll see in the video. after loading my save, I couldn't equip weapons anymore either, and couldn't load or continue from the main menu
The fights are okay, you need to think before you act, but I feel like enemies can dash away faster than the player in some cases. Maybe it has something to do with stats or equipment? I feel like dashing doesn't have a lot of upsides compared to just running away or parrying. Parrying isn't too hard, the attacks are pretty easy to read.
GREAT art style and atmosphere
just make a sword the initial default weapon, i don't wanna fight with a table's leg.
i noticed that if you have a slight elevation disadvantage enemies struggle to hit you, because they just swing above your head
menuing and controls are still kinda weird. why would i want to grab a single ducat instead of all of them? if i press E with a chest open, i would expect the default to be grab everything.
i like that you are adding lore and dialogue, the beginning is taking shape
in a dialogue, i would also expect E (or space or whatever you want your default keybind to be) to pick by default the first dialogue option.
the combat does not really work without iframes imho. if you want it to be hard le dark souls you need to give the player some proper tools to defend themselves. right now it kinda feels more like skyrim, except skyrim works because the player is usually overpowered compared to the enemies, here everyone can beat the shit out of you and there's swarms of them
the stagger mechanic is just very punishing. you are basically being punished for being bad at the game, which leads you to being left open and receive even more damage, potentially leading even to stunlock chains where the player can't do shit, not even dodge since the dodge clearly has no iframes so it might as well not exist.
Graphics were top notch. Really good ambiance and atmosphere. The models too were super well done. I really like that this game has a lot of writing, even though I habe a couple issues with it, I think the plague doctor guy repeated some information, and the overall writing could use a few more passes, but great effort. Things like the little world building items, the descriptions and all.
In terms of combat, I believe you want the combat to be very weighty and deliberate, but it felt super clunky to me to be honest. I was getting my ass kicked by the first guy in a way that didn't felt satisfying, it felt more like he was just wailing on me because the game didn't have a clean or responsive enough combat to allow me to defend myself, even though the tools were there.
I recorded a video I should be posting on the cord soon with my playthrough, but very impressed with the amount of work so far.
Really unique environment, I'm intrigued by future updates.
Combat is kinda wonky and the evasion step is so slow that sprinting is a better option as evasion.
I would make startup attack animation a bit faster, the poise system based on character equipment (was weird seeing those naked people not staggering) and the recovery animation after an evasion step much faster to make it as viable evade option.
The env arts is really nice as always.
Enemy walk cycle is a bit off, looks awkward.
The tutorial is really nice.
Combat is getting more challenging and fun to engage with, not sure about parry timing, don't even know what parry looks like or what's the effect of it.
Sometimes enemy just rush you and spam kick + atk is a bit annoying, not un-managable tho.
I like the idea of many rooms, but it's a bit hard to orient myself with the mental map, might not be a bad thing tho, but it's a thing.
There's a bug, not sure how to trigger, but you lose your leg and you can't control the play to do anything anymore.
i got hit so hard me legs disappeared and i couldnt attack or dodge anymore so i just ran passed all the enemies and got into the backrooms
Played for about 20 or so minutes, here were my first impressions.
Movement and everything feels smooth and the combat was easy to understand. I don't know if I missed something, but the only thing I was confused about is the inventory. Pressing C opens what I assume is a crafting menu, but I can't equip/drop/use from there. That didn't make much sense to me. I pressed every other button and the only way to equip was to find a drawer or chest first.
Combat and enemy AI was decent too, but the melee range (was using hammer and candleabra) felt a bit too short so I was commonly trading hits with the enemies. This made fighting more than one enemy at a time really hard, they don't get stunned long enough so I was getting hit and getting stunlocked in return.
Rest of my problems (UI is a bit small and doesn't seem to be a way to increase the size, and there was a nonsolid window I accidentally walked through in the room with the plague doctor) are just that the game is in development though.
Keep it up!
i left the broken crafting menu by accident. in the starting room there should be a hint telling you to press tab to open the inventory. maybe its not clear enough?
The menu needs work. There's a load option but no save option? I like the graphics, reminds me of dungeons and dragons online. It's pretty neat that I can destroy and nab just about everthing in this game.