I spent 45 minutes exploring Absentis and with some polish I think it could be an enjoyable roguelite. The flow of the game is spawn, find enemies to fight, possibly kill one skeleton, die and do it all over again. If you survive 5 minutes a portal will spawn that a UI element will direct you towards, so you can escape with your loot (which I never accomplished). If you die you only gain experience as all gold picked up is lost. This makes gameplay feel like a slog, as it takes several deaths to gain even a small amount of power.
I started with the Tutorial, which did not prepare me for what I would encounter when I started a Raid. The tutorial is short and covered the very basics, moving with WASD, how to roll, equipping weapons, how to heal, and that after 5 minutes a portal spawns to leave the Raid. There was no mention of the treasure chests or Shelter, which was an option on the main menu.
Pressing start begins a Raid and spawns you inside a tent in a wooded area, with no direction provided. Heading out in any direction will allow you to locate structures and points of interest that enemies spawn around in a puff of green smoke. Enemies usually make a bee-line to the player, but occasionally they would just run in circles after spawning. In its current state there is very little skill involved in combat, you just stand your ground and swing rapidly. Both enemies and the player seem to attack at the same fast speed, so fighting more then one enemy is death. Unfortunately, enemies usually spawned in groups of 2 or more, so you don't usually make it out of the Raid alive.
After dying a few times I explored the Shelter option in the main menu, which is where the games roguelite elements come into play. You can cycle through three locations, the Wardrobe, Smithy, and Healing Archives to increase your characters power. The currency used are gold coins with cranes on them, which I took to calling Crane Coins. Each of the locations in the Shelter can be upgraded with 5000 Crane Coins that unlocks the ability to purchase better items, better chances to unlock weapons, or increase your healing regeneration (which starts at 0) depending on the location you upgrade.
The Wardrobe lets you purchase new armor pieces for your torso, upper arm, lower arm, hands, hips, and leg equipment. I was only able to afford a few pieces of the next tier armor but the health increase was noticeable. Be warned, after purchasing equipment you must select to wear the item. I learned this the hard way and died without my new pants on.
At the Smithy you can select which weapons are on your inventory wheel. There are 12 swords to unlock but no real mention on how to do that. I had a Steel Sword and a Wander Sword in my Armory. The wanderer sword seemed to be glitched and could not make contact with enemies, even in the Tutorial.
The final location in the Shelter is the Healing Archives, which is likely where you can purchase healing potions but each level of potion was locked for me. There was no info on how to unlock the ability to purchase the potions or how much your regeneration could be increased.
Overall my time was a painful slog through overpowered enemies to barely make it to level 3 but I did enjoy my time. I look forward to what Absentis can become now that it is officially released.
[h3]Change Suggestions[/h3]
[list]
[*]Add a block/parry mechanic
[*]Slow swing speed way down
[*]Increase roll speed slightly
[*]Add additional feedback for when your hit connects with an enemy, the small spurt of blood is hard to see
[*]Decrease the amount of health enemies have or increase damage done by the player
[*]Add something that conveys how strong enemies are, I was picking fights I definitely shouldn't have been
[*]Each location in the shelter should have a mini tutorial explaining what it does
[*]Add option for resolution
[*]Add the ability to assign weapons/potions to hotkeys
[*]Add the ability to change hotkeys
[*]Split the volume slider into individual sliders for music and sound effects
[*]Small potions should refill up to 3 each time you start if you have less then 3
[*]Have the tutorial take place in the area the game takes place in and not a random dungeon
[*]Expand the tutorial to include some lore and define the characters motivation
[*]Add a bestiary that gives lore/stats on enemies based on how many you have killed
[*]Add some fanfare to celebrate when you level up
[*]Add a way to see what you recently picked up during a Raid
[*]Replace the shelter menu with a map that has clickable buildings on it to access the Wardrobe, Smithy, and Healing Archives
[*]Make the main character look less like Geralt of Rivia
[*]Make the trees taller so you can see locations easier
[/list]
