Saw this game in a random video and thought it looked quite decent and gave it a go. Honestly, it's not bad. It's definitely Alpha 1.0 with the noticiable, and somewhat gamebreaking bugs, and some unpolished mechanics. But a good core is present. The main gameplay loop, while simple, is charming and fun, the characters will likley get much more personality and story in future updates, and the combat is a little simple, but works for the style of game this wants to be. Will certainly play more. Especially if some of the big bugs are fixed.
Not sure how to report bugs, the Discord Link in the game didn't really work properly on Discords end. (Pretty sure the game implemented it right, Discord just doesn't want to work for some reason.) Will just write bugs here, from Simple, to gamebreaking,
1) Resolution. This might just be a personal problem due to using a 16:10 aspect ratio monitor instead of 16:9, or the game just squishing (as 16:10 is taller, while the cut offs are on the sides) but the edges of the game screen cut off on the side sometimes, leading to cases where the "Open Portal" quick teleport home feature is almost cut off. This bug isn't too bad, the button is still partially visible, and still interact fine. But it makes it hard to see, especially if this is a first time player. Sometimes it fixes itself randomly or on restart.
2) Not sure if it's a bug or not, but when you trip, sometimes you trip 3 to 4 times in very quick succesion, and that feels unfair as you start moving after dealing with the first trip, to trip again and have it auto failed due to moving. Maybe add a grace period between tripping to ensure players don't end up tripping 4 times in a row... Also, if caught in combat while tripping, you still controll the tripping QTE whilst combat plays, and honestly, it's fine to keep this as a feature. (Maybe add a gameplay pop-up saying "Caught off guard" or "Caught Tripping" [Meme] as combat starts) It's funny as you can still Pass the QTE to proceed as normal then proceed to combat, or fail and get caught out with the battle.
3) Picked Mage, because it's a Mage, who wouldn't, and managed to get to Level 2 (Rank E) after a couple hours. And unlocked a new spell that allegedly doubles damage for your next attack [or turn (?) ] However, it seemed to do nothing, and just wasted a slot. It would be cool to see that fixed. Not sure about any other combat bugs yet, will keep looking.
3.5) Not sure if it's a bug or not, but enemies don't always drop the Substance to level up. Which makes progress quite slow. It's not awful, but it would be nice to slightly increase drop rates for vials (Like 30%->50% ) , and vary how much each vial gives based on enemy health. (Eg, a 31 HP rat would give 3 substance, 40 HP bird gives 5, and a 75 HP tree trunk gives 10 [2 vials worth 5 each, or always drops 1 vial, with a moderate chance to drop 2] ) This would make combat more rewarding, and makes progression feel quicker but not free. Have had runs where 0 subtance dropped, and a run where 35 dropped.. bit too variable.
4) You can enter a portal, and spawn on a Lilypad that damages you, and it seems like a bug, But it's honestly fun to keep this here [for realism], but limit it to only happen to players with high HP, as dying to this is cruel. It's impossible to react to due to the camera zoom out as you load into a new Room after a portal. So maybe start the camera on the player, and zoom out, or something.
5) Wood, Stones, and Food are used to donate to the Town to make it better. Stones work flawlessly, Wood half works. And Food doesn't work [more on this in Game Breaking bugs]. Wood has 2 types, small sticks which work like stones (And work perfectly), and larger logs, which can be clicked on in inventory, where they just dissapear and do nothing... Thought they'd give sticks to make more wood, or just give wood, but they just dissapear. Non-Donatable/Quests Items don't destroy themselves when clicked on, Food is consumed when clicked on (which gives HP), Stones and Sticks become the Donatable currencies when clicked on, but big logs just dissapear. Don't think that's meant to happen.
Now for some game breaking bugs.
1) Sometimes, when talking to an NPC, after ending the dialauge, the game fully removes player controll and won't let you move. The camera locks, and all you can do is click to open some menues that don't help. This is only fixed on restart, but as the game doesn't auto-save often, and relies on manual saving, this results in loosing moderate amounts of progress, and starting over. Have triggerd this 3 times. Once with Portal Girl, as she opened her portal (Could repeatedly talk to her afterwards, but doing so only moved the camera left, and still couldn't more.) Once with the Male Guard, just after exiting a level, and tring to go shopping at the market, closed his dialogue and couldn't move (had to restart and lose the loot)
2) This might be a bug, and might just be being foolish, but how does one donate Food? Wood and Stones break down properly, (With the Log exception from earlier), but food is either eaten when under full HP, or does nothing when at full HP. Meaning it's not possible to donate food, which is required to Upgrade the Town. Meaning we're stuck at a Rank F town. Which is a bummer as that means there is no real progress outside of the Character getting Giga Rich, or more stats.
3) Not quite gamebreaking, but definitely bothersome. When opening a portal to go to a level, the screen sometimes glitches out loading the assets, and 2/3rds of the screen are black, whist the last 1/3rd is a part of the main town flickering. When the level loads propper, it fixes itself, but it is jarring.
4) Selling to the market vendor doesn't appear to do anything. You can sell any item to Portal girl for Coin (SIngular) but everey item says they're worth something, and the Market Vendor seems like a decent play to sell items that aren't yet needed for quests. Having him buy them for a few gold would be nice.
This leads us to 5.
5) Broke Boy Softlock. If you suck, or don't know you can progress thorugh 5 propper levels to get a portal to take you home freely, then using the "Open Portal" Escape option for 6 coins can quickly bankrupt you in the early game. Leaving you unable to afford the entry fee to any Biome. Especially if you lose all items, and can't sell them to Portal girl for 1 coin, or to the Vendor for slightly more.
These bugs are normal, and do not make the game bad. But the game would be better if they were fixed. Pretty Great game otherwise!
