itch.io

Free Essence/Vigor

Okay, not "free" as in "unlimited". Rather, eliminating it from the card pool, partially anyway. My suggestion is to go the route of Pokemon TCG Pocket Energy and allow BASIC essences to be gained for free, with some caveats/modifications.

So Pokemon TCG Pocket makes energy its own spot with a guaranteed one at the start of each turn (except the very first). If a deck uses more than one energy type, the type is chosen at random. You can also see which energy will be given to you at the start of your next turn.

What my exact suggestion is would be to do the following instead. We have a spot for drawing "a new essence". That essence will be the equivalent of a basic essence card as they are now. Like Pokemon TCG Pocket, we can see what the current one is and the next one that will be available. However, we still have the advanced essence cards as well. In keeping with the 1 essence limit, playing those cards from the hand will consume/exhaust the essence card that's presently available to be activated.

By doing this, we can reduce the deck bloat that is essence draws and speed up the game a bit without totally sacrificing "which essence should I use?" Characters may even want to forego the free essence to make use of abilities (like Cinder as she is now). We can also make this a mechanic that's based on the played character, where certain characters can only generate certain essences. While it would somewhat restrict deck building, it adds a degree of strategy as well because certain advance essence cards could bypass that restriction as well.

Marigold's Ability

Right now, it's very unsatisfying and needs massive setup to do anything meaningful. Needing followers to do damage is just far too much of a handicap. And Cinder's clearing whatever followers Marigold can put up far too easily (a critique I've brought up before). 

My suggestion is that she can swallow (exhaust) an enemy Follower that is smaller than she is and gain a portion of their size when swallowed.

Since her style is to keep growing herself and her followers, it makes a lot more sense to make her more of a threat the bigger she's allowed to get. This changes her ability from a 4 Vigor 1 damage (worst case scenario, which is too often) to "I can eliminate any follower if you don't win quickly"; reinforcing her intended play style. Naturally, this would come at a higher vigor cost (my suggestion is 6 vigor 2 Green).

Some better cards for Marigold

This is partly because of the disparity I see with Cinder regularly nuking Marigold's followers far too easily. I know you plan to add more anyway, but for the sake of "give Marigold better odds", I think she needs a few emergency cards swapped in so she can keep up with Cinder's nukes.

• A Boa Lamia, a massive version of the Garter Lamia. Preferably with the ability to grow by absorbing a follower it defeats and recovering Lilumi in turn.
• A structure that recovers Lilumi and grows Marigold.
• A Talisman to reduce physical damage based on size.
• A Talisman that grows all followers present when played.
• some more draw power (Cinder literally has more and better draw cards)

Something for if/when the deck runs out

This can be something to help end the game, like stacking exhaustion. Or it can be "shuffle the exhaust into a new deck" so things can keep going without rushing. I think "end the game" is probably more favorable, but it is something that needs to be decided on, even though it's not really an issue currently with where the game is.

Some Hero suggestions.

Demon Queen
When a Mythic creature evolves, it permanently gains +1/+1

Sisyphus
When a Titan is buffed, it gets an additional +2/+2

Tiamat
Negate the Jealousy effect of Goddess cards.

Definitely needs more gameplay. Especially if the only thing the paid version unlocks is "unlimited growth".

The attacking doesn't seem to do anything.

The other slimes aren't a threat unless you willingly get absorbed.

Once all slimes are absorbed, there's nothing to do.

Slimes will occasionally stop following instructions and refuse to follow up.

Overall, I hope an actual direction is found and actual progress is made. I'm not spending $2 just to unlock unlimited growth, especially if there's no real gameplay to enjoy.

Honestly, the "strategy" didn't really matter in my games. Either Cinder bricked for the whole match or I was screwed. Too many cards were outright unplayable, meaning I rarely had a choice in how to handle what I was given.

I think that if Marigold had the ability to swallow (exhaust) an enemy follower that was smaller than her and inheriting some of that follower's size, it COULD give give her just enough of an edge to compete with Cinder's rather exorbitant damage. Obviously, the cost would be higher as well.

As it stands now, though, Cinder really does just get too much without really "burning out" as her play style suggests is possible.

I was referring to the screen where you click to get milked, because it will say how much "is ready for extraction". That is always at 0.

I like the premise. I understand the systems well enough. I am excited to see more of this with proper development.

That said, holy heck you did NOT play test the deck balance... Played 6 or 7 rounds as Marigold (the Lamia). Won ONCE. ONCE! I guarantee that's not simply "bad luck" at that rate. It is extremely frustrating to see that I'm about to lose and unable to do anything that many times in a row. One of those losses was literally the enemy burning me down while ALSO brick drawing because her damage output is stupidly high.

Let's add that having a 5 vigor "one shot ANYTHING" in a starter deck vs starter deck should be a one-off at MOST. I got screwed so many times because multiple copies were played to delete my followers and create unwinnable situations.

Rant aside... I know balance is a tricky thing to deal with. It's not easy getting the damage vs self burn just right. If Cinder dealt more damage to herself with some of these things, it'd probably be far more fair. But the sacrifices she makes do not hinder her anywhere near enough. I also wish I could see the full deck properly, so I could HOPEFULLY find more suggestions on balancing the decks. Right now it feels like Cinder hard counters Marigold, which is not something players will enjoy if they want to use Marigold in the current state.

Again, I really do want to see this develop further. So don't take my current balance rant too harshly right now. This is obviously a very early state of the game, but something like this does need to be kept in mind going forward.

Oh, and one more thing, allow RMB to close a card that's been zoomed in on, as long as it's not over another card/entity/etc.

Definitely a good start. Would be nice if the Milk machine actually listed how much was ready to be drained (always at 0 regardless of how much you're holding).

Another thing that'd be good to consider is something indicating how much milk you'll produce before the pregnancy ends and you'll need to reset. Possibly with "max size" in consideration as well.

I would LOVE to see this fleshed out more. It's got a solid foundation, and definitely warrants being built into a more complete game, even if it's just "find more monsters, breed more".

If you get to a more full fledged development, here are my suggestions:

• Current/Expected/Max milk indicators
• Milking machine art changes depending on how full the character is
• releasing a grown monster allows bigger variants to come out (with appropriate bonuses for breeding)
• capturing a monster allows you to turn it into food for other monsters, leading to carnivore/herbivore/omnivore variants.
• more art of the protagonist at much bigger sizes (okay, that one's probably a given)

EDIT: Also, I think the breast-expansion tag is warranted, which will help give your game more exposure.

Ah. Alright. Also, dunno if you caught my edit on the defeat sequence not happening at all.

So... To make sure I understand this correctly. When a ship is sent out to collect, it brings back the same "growth amount" regardless of how many "converted tithes" are picked up? Well, that certainly changes how I'm gonna approach further runs a bit. At least until it's corrected. I personally enjoyed the idea of letting a ship gather as much as once, but if it basically doesn't matter then I may as well send it out constantly. 

I don't remember hearing a line on the slam, but at the time I had used it because a couple of pesky troops got too close. It just happened to catch some of the bodies not yet picked up. Still, I do think "palm slam auto absorbs" would be a solid late-game upgrade effect; reinforcing that she doesn't want to just use it because she needs the people alive.

EDIT: Found a bug. Defeat screen is completely skipped, no sequence at all. Just restarts.

Dunno if it's a bug, but I expected each of the direct upgrades to grant a size increase for a total of 4 stages (Base to Base+3). The first upgrade doesn't change size.

Palm slam also destroys "corpses", meaning they can't be claimed.

As for suggestions? 

• When the invasion is done, allow the queen to suck up everything at once and let her grow to the appropriate size BEFORE hitting the victory screen.
• Palm Slam automatically absorbs anything it kills (Or it's another upgrade, also solves the "bug" above).

Aside from that, standard "expanded features" like upgrading towers, more Queen upgrades, more units, and maybe an infinite mode.

A couple of things I think really should be added.

• Reset Button: Bad starts are annoying as hell. And when you're on the back foot from the start in a game where cards can PERMANENTLY snowball, it's annoying to sit through the game. Especially when running this in the browser.
• Remove permanent snowballs: Seriously, once one of those gets out of hand, if it's not yours you lose. Also vastly defeats the purpose of any strategy if RNG gives you one of those early.
• A little more variety in leaders. 
• Being able to move cards from field to bench.
• More rebalancing in general. The permanent snowballers were a massive outlier since there's no way to deal with them.

EDIT: Okay, I've run a few more rounds. Things are clicking more. If infinites are gonna be the general style, it still needs some rebalancing. And more effects should be added to help deal with or support them. Like "taunt" that makes a target a priority or other things along those lines.

Although since you've mentioned that the game is complete... I'll settle for a reset button.

Not bad, for something that's pretty basic.

Suggestions

• Have an indicator for when you have enough money to unlock the next food
• Change the reset to "inherit stat". Help mitigate some of the slog that is upgrading. Reward players who keep going for the legendary upgrades.
• Have all legendary upgrades listed as well.
• Have legendary multipliers apply after basic upgrades. So "fill count" upgrades don't feel as wasted after Legendary x32 Fill Count is reached.

Bug, Soft Lock: You can return to the planet after scavenging the maid doll. And you can't return to the ship if you do that.

I feel like the Devour glyph doesn't really live up to its name. You'd think it'd be good as a snowball that picks up damage the more you fail to stop it. But it just takes longer to stop.

I'd rather see Devour go "if it wins, it gains 10% damage instead", or something else along those lines. This way, more dangerous opponents who might use it prompt you to be prepared with a cleanse or defense rune to break it before it becomes a nuke. To compensate, it may be possible for a glyph to have "final" ratios that affect how much power they can gain (after materials) so getting that giant unstoppable nuke is harder to obtain.

Okay, more proper review:

If you've played the original, most of what you see will look and feel quite familiar. Although it'll still feel refreshingly new between the lack of grid locked movement and Lacto gaining the ability to jump. I am totally looking forward to the final product after the OG game has been dead for so long.

Even though I've completed what events the demo offers, I'm totally gonna see just how big I can get Lacto before something stops updating.

Individual critiques:

Auto Saves should only be dedicated to the auto save slot, not both the auto save AND the last manual save.

The dancing game feels like it's hitting me after I escape the hit box, which makes it slightly harder than it needs to be. Although this might be solved with an extra highlighted box to indicate where Lacto would be considered "hit".

A sprint toggle would be nice. Especially for trying to get back since a room change/teleport will stop sprinting and need a new button press.

Since milking machines outside of rest areas are limited use now, this sparked a suggestion in my brain when it comes to difficulty. Easy mode: All Milking Machines work infinitely. Standard: Milking Machines outside of rest areas have 3 uses max. Hard: You can only milk yourself in a rest area. Obviously, more factors can be included as well.

I feel like the recipe book for the Gluttonous Fairy could at least list the main ingredient, leaving Lacto to figure out anything else.

Tried to play the web version. Crashes as soon as I try to leave the first floor. Lots of errors.

Trying the downloaded version though, will make another reply once I'm done with that for more proper feedback.

Bug, the Dragon Female crystal produced a Dragon Male offspring for me. I haven't gotten a second crystal to be sure, but it was definitely not expected.

Any chance we can get the 0.2.0 version for download, rather than only being able to play it in browser? I tried to click "Download" from the announcement page but I can't get any version other than the 0.1.1 demo.

The Rat companion can be recruited multiple times. Just start up the dialogue with Belle at the shop and you get a new version each time.

EDIT: Even though you can get more than one, all of them will synchronize to the last growth type you selected.

A little amused that the slide can be used repeatedly for free growth stages. A shame that stage 6 wasn't accounted for (the highest I could get using the slide 3x first, then the others.)

Glitch. When Marika is unavailable, she will still show her "ready" image and dialogue instead of "I'm occupied with processing this" and the relevant image.

Powering up the boobs sounds excellent. Even if it's a mostly cosmetic thing (might need to widen some doors, though, like the offices).

 
Oh, one other thing I noticed, dunno what you want to do about it though:

Obtaining and using [Redacted 1] will arbitrarily set your max fill, resetting appropriate upgrades from [Redacted 2]. Max Fill ends up resetting to its base value when [Redacted 1] is turned off (does not undo the use of [Key Item]).

Mildly surprised (and annoyed) that you can't make use of the EXP until you've unlocked a very specific key item. But I have enjoyed the experience so far. I'm actually glad it manages to run pretty well on my potato laptop.

While not expected, I am hoping more updates come and add some more content for players. Like being able to have actual BE rather than full body as everything currently applies.

Still very much enjoyed what was there, even if it is a little short and simple. 

Suggestion: Change the "Health" upgrade on [redacted] to "minimum speed". Especially if that point is intended as a more sandbox experience.

Sadly, could use a little rebalancing on how levels work. Capacity out-scales production WAY too easily. Boost also feels less useful since it scales off production.

Sensitivity and cooldown only need a couple levels each, these are fine.

I'd make production scale harder than capacity, so you are rewarded for bigger pumps. I would also make boost do percentage fill of capacity per second (I'd suggest 4 or 5%), so it's never wasted on higher levels.

All that aside, good premise. Aside from the rebalancing, it was enjoyable enough.

Slime Queen: Just outside of your house, jump above the front door. Hit "Up" in front of the rectangle.

Regarding the special door: Larry saying "jump in front of it to open it" would have been a huge help in making sure players had an idea of what to do. Also, the items inside are one-use only, and do not respawn alongside the agents when creating the "tie" scenario.

So apparently, in the event of a tie, you can't talk to the guy and he just respawns all of the agents. The game will not finish normally.

EDIT: Two bugs regarding the Special Game. 

First, once Larry is selected, Larry will ALWAYS be grown instead of Natasha. I don't know if this is fixed by playing a normal round. It is not fixed with a standard game.

Second, he says a special door is unlocked. And I think I know which one it's supposed to be. But no new doors are opened/usable.

Better find some of those milk cows hinted at in the milky trap ending upon landing.

So.... I managed to pull this off... I had triggered a teleportation secret in Level 5 that lead back to the starting elevator, but the elevator wasn't there. I walked off and.... This.

It is definitely an annoyance. My guess is that we're gonna get synced every few months rather than constantly.

My Cait got so big that her image is gone. For the record, this one is BE growth, so I suspect the last image is just missing.

Crafting could use a lot of work, IMO. Not just in clarification, but in functionality. Materials will also be included in this.

So for starters, not all multipliers will stack. I could use several materials with "times 2" multipliers and only one will apply to the odds. Similarly, I've seen many materials with only a "times 1" multiplier. Those literally do nothing as a result. The materials that do "Flat 0.2 stat" also don't seem to do anything useful.

I'm also noticing a distinct lack of breast-related materials, a LOT of them are just "size/fat multiplier". A little more variety would be nice in that regard. Even if it's just modifying existing materials.

The crown increasing good rolls is nice, but it doesn't seem to have a proper stat reflection as well. Many of the stats are confusing as a result.

I'm also wondering if allowing a few losses would allow for stronger materials to drop. Although I suppose I should wait until the current issues are fixed first.

Look for alien handprints on the walls.

Found a bug.

While bust animation is off (because high limits and blocking the screen), triggering the slime girl scene returns "TypeError Cannot read property '_opacity' of null". Can't retry or anything, it forces a restart.

That would do it. I didn't think to try them again since I've been following this game since the 0.3 version at least.

I am curious if any cheats are hinted at/shown in-game or not. If they are, I seem to have overlooked them (meh). I just want to know if I simply need to look harder or if I have to go to out-of-game places to find them.

Deleted my previous critique now that I'm understanding things a bit better.

Still having an issue with scaling. I have to zoom out to even see the buttons, but then it's too hard to read the cards effectively. I have to imagine half of it is the images used, but I'm not sure. While I could probably modify the style document to better shift everything, that still doesn't solve things long term.

Maybe set certain areas to a proportion, so that things can be more easily viewed without scaling.

I'm glad the update is bringing more content. I've played through the game and $15 felt a little pricey for what I got out of it (felt more like an $8-$10 game). I'm hoping the extra content will make the $15 tag worth it, but I'll have to wait a few months to find out.

Personally, I'm hoping to see more Breast Expansion content, particularly since the demo didn't feature any. (Something you should probably explain on certain other sites the game is being advertised on. The demo is tagged fine here.)

I saw the stairs mentioned in another comment, so I won't reiterate on those. I do think more could be done to indicate the thresholds for the level bonuses in the main menu. I had little reason to use more than the pistol in most cases, with the other cases being defaulted to the Jupiter Cannon. The Minigun didn't really fire fast enough to seem worth using over the pistol. The Glue Gun felt like it was essentially a melee with extra range.

Two major annoyances I wanted to bring up. The mostly invisible enemies are... They feel kind of uncalled for. Once you know they're there, they are less of an issue. But it's still a gut punch that isn't fun to deal with. I think they and the scientists should be excluded from the spawn list in the boss level. I get why spawns need to happen there, but the invisibility and how scientists attack are both quite annoying on top of everything else that happens.

I got the milk nun to 200 but she won't pass out from overload.