I played until day 15.
I kinda had all the units I wanted and I did not feel like it mattered anymore to improve my team.
I think the core concept is fun and feels fresh. It took me some time to figure out how to make money but then it was really fun to “trade up”.
The flash sales are a nice adrenaline kick and it really feels like you have that time limit like when shopping on ebay.
However I was playing using a touchpad and I struggled to click fast enough (especially if you need to sell something before).
I think the UI still looks kinda “buggy” but I did not miss any info.
I felt like the game was too easy and that there was not a clear goal for me to feel satisfied with.
Also the balancing for the fight listings feels very broken. They are so easy that there is no drawback or risk for doing them and the rewards are huge.
Overall the game and concept feel interesting to me.
I think you should develop it further and figure out solutions for the problems it currently has. :)
Also great work so far! Congratulations.
It is fun to play already
Maybe I can add a few seconds to the flash sales so it gIves a bit extra time to sell stuff before it ends.
Ah, you are right the fight listing are currently easy and no real risk, I need to work on that. ( If you have ideas for what could be at stake / what would we lose if we lose a fight listing , I am all ears ).
I need to think about some sort of goal to complete the game experience I guess. Maybe some sort of leaderboard or specific goals or boss fights et the end or something 😅.
I plan to add around 60-70 units and have deeper synergies / combos / strategies.
But indeed I need to fix those issues.
Thanks a lot for the feedback and glad that you liked the concept :)
About the goal:
I think there are already good games out there that show you how this could work.
For example in many autobattlers you have async multiplayer with a leveling/ranking system. So you play until you either get 10 wins or loose all your lifes. then you either rank up or down and get more difficult or easier oponents in the next run. I think this sort of dynamic difficulty could also work without the async multiplayer. You just make the oponents stronger for better ranks and weaker in the lower ones.
For the Fight listings I am not so sure. One Idea I have would be to add a time limit to the fight so that you need to finish them off quickly.
This seems like an interesting challenge as it might be difficult to guess beforehand if you can win. Also it might just cost something to do the fight.
The fights could also be much more difficult to just make it harder to win them. This would be kind of like the mechanic of “mini-bosses” in a lot of roguelike games. They are high-risk high-reward.
If you loose the fight It should have a negative consequence like maybe loosing one of your teammembers.
The idea of having many units is great. I would wait with adding them however. I feel like the current units are already interesting and allow for some interesting strategies. I would first concentrate on fixing the issues and only then add more content.
Again I think you should keep working on this. I like it a lot. :)
Ah yes. Scaling difficulty between runs, I did not even think about that yet 😅 can definitely do that.
Yep a bit like super auto pets ( which I played for inspiration haha ).
That could be interesting for Neutral fights, a timer to win, and the neutral being stronger and you lose something if you lose ( maybe a random item in your inventory ) that could make it more challenging and interesting I like that idea thanks.
Yes I'll keep improving my current version before adding the other units, it was just to tell you the next steps :)
Thanks again for the feedback, it's really helpful for ideation and motivation.
Hi, I tried to scale up difficulty over time, if you have some time to try let me know :) ( basically the enemy will start making better placement after day 9 )
Also, I wanted to ask you, do you think I should do something like that :
Every 2 weeks, add a " boss " and only allow the player to buy other factions after ? Like you start only with Humans, then you can get orcs in the listing and then elves, undead, etc ? Or should we have access to most factions ( weak units ) from beginning and just gets stronger units over time ?
( I still need to rework the fights in the listings )
Hi :)
I just played it again and it is still way too easy imo.
I had my build fully done by about day 10 and I never had any problem to win a fight.
I played again util day 15 and even though it felt like the fights were a bit tougher it still was not enough to make me loose a fight.
I think boss levels would be a nice idea. They should be a lot more challenging.
In general I think the pacing for the difficulty in general should be faster.
If the player can “finish” a full build in about 10 days then this should be the final level of the run and it should get more difficult quickly.
Maybe day 10 is a boss level and after beating it the player unlocks a new class/faction for the next run.
With this you can make sure that new players understand the concept and do not get overwhelmed by too many different units. also experienced players will have access to more units and cool combos.
IMO playing after the build is finished feels boring. The fun part is assembling the team and trying to find the pieces you are missing in the listings. Once you have that there is nothing to do really. So I would make it so that it ends after this.
Also I now played with a mouse and the scroll speed in the listings panel was way too slow.
So in that case it would indeed make sense to add bosses or something every 10 days or so and add new faction after as a reward. So that each new " 10 days run " feels a bit different with new units and new synergies possible.
Ok I'll try to rework more the difficulty 😅
Thanks for the helpful feedback ! I'll also add you to a list of people I'll give a Steam key for release :) ( still some way to go before 😅 )
60 Day to get my last "Good" poison for the third Assassin x)
The game need a lot of polish (OMG so frustrating that we can't see gear quality when a char is in the team) but it's really fun this is a really strong base.
Like some people already said it's too easy and I think you don't play enough with the fact that they are toys, I would want to see "player" in the battle background, some tournaments for special reward, alternative set could be cool like a knight with a spear it's a little frustrating that every object have only one purpose.
Thanks for the feedback ! Yep I'll add volume control soon 😅 sorry for that.
Oh ok interesting, I was thinking that it's better without the visual scroll bar, but now that you say it, it's actually easier to scroll faster with the handler. So I will put it back, thanks :)
Yeah, I saw the game loop and what not and understood. Although it was weird, when I started, I had an archer automatically on the team, so I thought "Ok, let's pull them off and equip them with archer stuff," but as soon I removed them, they were gone and didn't end up in my inventory like other units I had bought. Any idea what that was about?
Yep I added it for test purposes but as I added it directly in the team instead of the inventory first when you remove it it disappear haha. I'll just remove him for next version of the prototype, sorry for that.
I'm not going to try to give specifics. Honestly, I think with your current scope art and gameplay I think you could release a fairly popular paid itch and steam game already with a bit of polish and trial and error based on large amounts of feedback. biggest thing is getting loads of validation through playtesters and change what is most requested.
I got a full collection within 10 days, but it was very fun to play. The teams don't really get any harder and I think it would be useful to be able to upgrade stats of your team members. Also, I wish there were items for the barbarian, necromancer, and slime (or if you could merge slimes to upgrade them that would be cool). I never really ran out of money and I didn't really understand how I always had so much.
All in all though, it's a really enjoyable game with a creative set of mechanics and cool art! Thank you for making it!
Actually for the money, I forgot to replace with the normal starting amount 😅 I put 1000 for some tests but forgot to change it back will update the build soon 😅
For the items for Necro and others it's planned, I did not have time before releasing this version but in the full game I plan to have around 100 different units.
For the Slime, I did not think about merging them but it's a cool idea ! Might add it :)
Another person suggested to add qualities to the items ( like cheap, good quality etc ) and to link that to start changes as Well, I think it could be a good way to allow to increase unit stats and adding another reason to hunt longer for good deals.
The scaling is definitely a lot better and I like the new thing where items can be bad or good quality, it definitely adds another dimension to the game which makes it a lot more enjoyable. It might be useful to scale down the characters in the fights though, because right now the fifth member of your team is cut off, making it hard to see your character's stats. Overall though, it's already improved so much and it's much more fun now!
No worries, it's been really cool to see it develop and honestly it's a pretty fun game to play in class (I should be working lol). If you need someone to search for bugs I'm very happy to help and I'd love a Steam Key when it's further in the developing progress! :)
So I played until Day 16, it was fun until I noticed that the enemy teams are not really getting stronger. They just keep being random constellations of enemies that dont even make sense in how they get set up so its just a needless killing, not once did they kill any of my units.
I had enough money just by killing the Necromancers everyday which give way too much money and arent really that strong so not needed on a team.
Thanks for the feedback ! Yeah normally there's a little scale system for enemies to be stronger but I made it too light so you don't really feel it ( and also it's mostly at the beginning, once you reach day 10+ it does not change anymore ) so I'll rework it to make it much more progressive and challenging :) ( and I agree currently the enemies teams composition is quite random in terms of " factions " as well 😅 ) I'll have to work on the balance, challenge and so on :)
But happy that you like the concept, that's what I am trying to validate with this early prototype
Very cool concept! I had fun with it for ~30 minutes before moving on. Definitely some areas that need polish (Catalog Menu). It took me a second to grasp all of the mechanics at first (didn't really understand what merging was doing and that collecting 3 pieces and a blister yielded a full figure), but I figured it out eventually and thought it was a nice piece of progression. Something that I would recommend, if not already planned, is for each piece (figure, accessory 1, accessory 2, and blister) to each have a quality/grade rating (poor, fair, good, excellent, pristine) and for each of these grades to affect their attributes. That way you can quickly throw together 3 pieces and get something serviceable, but you'll scroll through the listings everyday hoping for something better to assemble into a better figure.
Thank you very much for your feedback. I am super happy that you played that long :)
I think it's a great idea ( the quality / grade ) I'll definitely go that way to make it more interesting. I guess I should maybe also able to disassembling sets so that you can change parts with better ones along the way.
It's a great way to do more with less ( visuals ) so I really like that idea.
I just tried playing again, but there seems to be some bugs on the team menu because I couldn't remove anyone from my team and I also had to have my mouse really high on the characters to even select them.
Hi, sorry for late reply, I'll check that tomorrow, sorry for the bug 😅. Thanks for testing again, I'll reply again here to let you know when the big is fix, sorry for that.
I just tried again, and the bug didn't persist, so I wonder if it was just something weird that happened because it is in the web. Getting to play again with the different qualities was nice and adds a new "gambling" kind of mechanic where sometimes it's a question of do I buy 3x arrows hoping one is better than the one that I have, or do I buy this archer 3 pieces and see if it might have 2 good pieces on it that I can use. So, I think it is a nice addition.
Thank you very much for the feedback ! I tried to recreate the bug you described but could not see it yet, I'll keep it in mind still in case :).
Yes I think I like it as well. What I did is basically that if you buy an " underpriced " item there's more chance that it's bad, but still a little chance that it's good and if it's overpriced, there's more chance that it's good quality. ( It also mimics bit more buying and selling on Ebay or online marketplaces, if you do that with playmobils sets or Lego for example ).
I am going to try adding a few more units and fix a few more bugs before next build :)
Thanks again for the feedback ! I'll try to get you a Steam Key once I am in there.
Was it too hard / not enough, or just not enough different figs to make you play longer ? ( Trying to understand what people might like / not like about it 😅 )
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I played until day 15. I kinda had all the units I wanted and I did not feel like it mattered anymore to improve my team.
I think the core concept is fun and feels fresh. It took me some time to figure out how to make money but then it was really fun to “trade up”.
The flash sales are a nice adrenaline kick and it really feels like you have that time limit like when shopping on ebay. However I was playing using a touchpad and I struggled to click fast enough (especially if you need to sell something before).
I think the UI still looks kinda “buggy” but I did not miss any info. I felt like the game was too easy and that there was not a clear goal for me to feel satisfied with.
Also the balancing for the fight listings feels very broken. They are so easy that there is no drawback or risk for doing them and the rewards are huge.
Overall the game and concept feel interesting to me. I think you should develop it further and figure out solutions for the problems it currently has. :)
Also great work so far! Congratulations. It is fun to play already
Thank you very much for the kind words !
Maybe I can add a few seconds to the flash sales so it gIves a bit extra time to sell stuff before it ends.
Ah, you are right the fight listing are currently easy and no real risk, I need to work on that. ( If you have ideas for what could be at stake / what would we lose if we lose a fight listing , I am all ears ).
I need to think about some sort of goal to complete the game experience I guess. Maybe some sort of leaderboard or specific goals or boss fights et the end or something 😅.
I plan to add around 60-70 units and have deeper synergies / combos / strategies.
But indeed I need to fix those issues.
Thanks a lot for the feedback and glad that you liked the concept :)
About the goal: I think there are already good games out there that show you how this could work. For example in many autobattlers you have async multiplayer with a leveling/ranking system. So you play until you either get 10 wins or loose all your lifes. then you either rank up or down and get more difficult or easier oponents in the next run. I think this sort of dynamic difficulty could also work without the async multiplayer. You just make the oponents stronger for better ranks and weaker in the lower ones.
For the Fight listings I am not so sure. One Idea I have would be to add a time limit to the fight so that you need to finish them off quickly. This seems like an interesting challenge as it might be difficult to guess beforehand if you can win. Also it might just cost something to do the fight. The fights could also be much more difficult to just make it harder to win them. This would be kind of like the mechanic of “mini-bosses” in a lot of roguelike games. They are high-risk high-reward. If you loose the fight It should have a negative consequence like maybe loosing one of your teammembers.
The idea of having many units is great. I would wait with adding them however. I feel like the current units are already interesting and allow for some interesting strategies. I would first concentrate on fixing the issues and only then add more content.
Again I think you should keep working on this. I like it a lot. :)
Ah yes. Scaling difficulty between runs, I did not even think about that yet 😅 can definitely do that.
Yep a bit like super auto pets ( which I played for inspiration haha ).
That could be interesting for Neutral fights, a timer to win, and the neutral being stronger and you lose something if you lose ( maybe a random item in your inventory ) that could make it more challenging and interesting I like that idea thanks.
Yes I'll keep improving my current version before adding the other units, it was just to tell you the next steps :)
Thanks again for the feedback, it's really helpful for ideation and motivation.
Hi, I tried to scale up difficulty over time, if you have some time to try let me know :) ( basically the enemy will start making better placement after day 9 )
Also, I wanted to ask you, do you think I should do something like that :
Every 2 weeks, add a " boss " and only allow the player to buy other factions after ? Like you start only with Humans, then you can get orcs in the listing and then elves, undead, etc ? Or should we have access to most factions ( weak units ) from beginning and just gets stronger units over time ?
( I still need to rework the fights in the listings )
Hi :) I just played it again and it is still way too easy imo. I had my build fully done by about day 10 and I never had any problem to win a fight. I played again util day 15 and even though it felt like the fights were a bit tougher it still was not enough to make me loose a fight.
I think boss levels would be a nice idea. They should be a lot more challenging. In general I think the pacing for the difficulty in general should be faster. If the player can “finish” a full build in about 10 days then this should be the final level of the run and it should get more difficult quickly. Maybe day 10 is a boss level and after beating it the player unlocks a new class/faction for the next run.
With this you can make sure that new players understand the concept and do not get overwhelmed by too many different units. also experienced players will have access to more units and cool combos.
IMO playing after the build is finished feels boring. The fun part is assembling the team and trying to find the pieces you are missing in the listings. Once you have that there is nothing to do really. So I would make it so that it ends after this.
Also I now played with a mouse and the scroll speed in the listings panel was way too slow.
Here is my build:
Hi, thanks a lot for the feedback !
So in that case it would indeed make sense to add bosses or something every 10 days or so and add new faction after as a reward. So that each new " 10 days run " feels a bit different with new units and new synergies possible.
Ok I'll try to rework more the difficulty 😅
Thanks for the helpful feedback ! I'll also add you to a list of people I'll give a Steam key for release :) ( still some way to go before 😅 )
60 Day to get my last "Good" poison for the third Assassin x)
The game need a lot of polish (OMG so frustrating that we can't see gear quality when a char is in the team) but it's really fun this is a really strong base.
Like some people already said it's too easy and I think you don't play enough with the fact that they are toys, I would want to see "player" in the battle background, some tournaments for special reward, alternative set could be cool like a knight with a spear it's a little frustrating that every object have only one purpose.
This prototype is really good.
Thank you very much ! I am happy that you played that many rounds in the current state of the game :)
Do you mean you would like to see gear quality in the team panel directly ?
Ah yes I think I can add hands at least that would " move " the toys during attacks phase to make it more like people playing with them.
I added some fights in the listing feed ( to win neutral units ) but Maybe I can try to think about tournament or something as well.
I plan to have much more units ( and let people feel more free to combine units and gears ) ( probably around 60-90 units ).
Thanks a lot for the feedback :)
Hi ! I started to add a more roguelite progression to the game , still early but I hope it's more enjoyable that way :)
A volume control would be nice, and visual scroll bar for menus like the shop would help a lot.
Thanks for the feedback ! Yep I'll add volume control soon 😅 sorry for that.
Oh ok interesting, I was thinking that it's better without the visual scroll bar, but now that you say it, it's actually easier to scroll faster with the handler. So I will put it back, thanks :)
Did you enjoy the game otherwise ?
Yeah, I saw the game loop and what not and understood. Although it was weird, when I started, I had an archer automatically on the team, so I thought "Ok, let's pull them off and equip them with archer stuff," but as soon I removed them, they were gone and didn't end up in my inventory like other units I had bought. Any idea what that was about?
Yep I added it for test purposes but as I added it directly in the team instead of the inventory first when you remove it it disappear haha. I'll just remove him for next version of the prototype, sorry for that.
good game! It's a great fantasy and I could definitely see a more in-depth commercial version.
Thank you very much ! If you have some ideas / feedback or anything please let me know :)
The plan is ultimately a Steam release ( to have at least a game there 😅 )
I'm not going to try to give specifics. Honestly, I think with your current scope art and gameplay I think you could release a fairly popular paid itch and steam game already with a bit of polish and trial and error based on large amounts of feedback. biggest thing is getting loads of validation through playtesters and change what is most requested.
Thank you very much for the feedback.
Yes currently the goal is to add around 90 units total. ( Maybe a bit less ) To have enough variety in items / units / synergies / Attak styles etc.
I will rework some visuals and UI and things like that as well.
I hope to have a Steam demo maybe in March and see how it goes from there 😅
Thanks again :)
yeah of course, have you tried proc gen to help you make your new units easier and faster to make?
Not yet actually ! Any resources about that ? I think I never gave it a try.
please make it so when we select multiple items we can sell them all at once :) nice game
Hi, ah yes sorry I forgot to add that 😅 will definitely add it for sure :)
I got a full collection within 10 days, but it was very fun to play. The teams don't really get any harder and I think it would be useful to be able to upgrade stats of your team members. Also, I wish there were items for the barbarian, necromancer, and slime (or if you could merge slimes to upgrade them that would be cool). I never really ran out of money and I didn't really understand how I always had so much.
All in all though, it's a really enjoyable game with a creative set of mechanics and cool art! Thank you for making it!
Thank you very much for the feedback !
Actually for the money, I forgot to replace with the normal starting amount 😅 I put 1000 for some tests but forgot to change it back will update the build soon 😅
For the items for Necro and others it's planned, I did not have time before releasing this version but in the full game I plan to have around 100 different units.
For the Slime, I did not think about merging them but it's a cool idea ! Might add it :)
Another person suggested to add qualities to the items ( like cheap, good quality etc ) and to link that to start changes as Well, I think it could be a good way to allow to increase unit stats and adding another reason to hunt longer for good deals.
Thanks for the feedback :)
Enemies should get bot stronger overtime now 🔥
The scaling is definitely a lot better and I like the new thing where items can be bad or good quality, it definitely adds another dimension to the game which makes it a lot more enjoyable. It might be useful to scale down the characters in the fights though, because right now the fifth member of your team is cut off, making it hard to see your character's stats. Overall though, it's already improved so much and it's much more fun now!
Oh I dis not even noticed that 😅 thanks a lot ! Will reduce their size 😅
Thanks so much for playtesting a lot the game :) I'll make sure to get you a Steam Key once it goes further in the dev process as well :)
No worries, it's been really cool to see it develop and honestly it's a pretty fun game to play in class (I should be working lol). If you need someone to search for bugs I'm very happy to help and I'd love a Steam Key when it's further in the developing progress! :)
Thanks ! For sure I'll need help with QA :) it's super helpful.
HI :) I started adding a more roguelite progression system to the game :) still early implementation but I hope it s more interesting now.
So I played until Day 16, it was fun until I noticed that the enemy teams are not really getting stronger.
They just keep being random constellations of enemies that dont even make sense in how they get set up so its just a needless killing, not once did they kill any of my units.
I had enough money just by killing the Necromancers everyday which give way too much money and arent really that strong so not needed on a team.
Fun concept tho keep going :)
I like the idea
Thanks for the feedback ! Yeah normally there's a little scale system for enemies to be stronger but I made it too light so you don't really feel it ( and also it's mostly at the beginning, once you reach day 10+ it does not change anymore ) so I'll rework it to make it much more progressive and challenging :) ( and I agree currently the enemies teams composition is quite random in terms of " factions " as well 😅 ) I'll have to work on the balance, challenge and so on :)
But happy that you like the concept, that's what I am trying to validate with this early prototype
Very cool concept! I had fun with it for ~30 minutes before moving on. Definitely some areas that need polish (Catalog Menu). It took me a second to grasp all of the mechanics at first (didn't really understand what merging was doing and that collecting 3 pieces and a blister yielded a full figure), but I figured it out eventually and thought it was a nice piece of progression. Something that I would recommend, if not already planned, is for each piece (figure, accessory 1, accessory 2, and blister) to each have a quality/grade rating (poor, fair, good, excellent, pristine) and for each of these grades to affect their attributes. That way you can quickly throw together 3 pieces and get something serviceable, but you'll scroll through the listings everyday hoping for something better to assemble into a better figure.
Thank you very much for your feedback. I am super happy that you played that long :)
I think it's a great idea ( the quality / grade ) I'll definitely go that way to make it more interesting. I guess I should maybe also able to disassembling sets so that you can change parts with better ones along the way.
It's a great way to do more with less ( visuals ) so I really like that idea.
Thank you very much for your help !
I added the quality thing :) now weapons and accesories could be bad normal or good quality ( and influence the stats upgrade ) thanks for the idea !
I just tried playing again, but there seems to be some bugs on the team menu because I couldn't remove anyone from my team and I also had to have my mouse really high on the characters to even select them.
Hi, sorry for late reply, I'll check that tomorrow, sorry for the bug 😅. Thanks for testing again, I'll reply again here to let you know when the big is fix, sorry for that.
I just tried again, and the bug didn't persist, so I wonder if it was just something weird that happened because it is in the web. Getting to play again with the different qualities was nice and adds a new "gambling" kind of mechanic where sometimes it's a question of do I buy 3x arrows hoping one is better than the one that I have, or do I buy this archer 3 pieces and see if it might have 2 good pieces on it that I can use. So, I think it is a nice addition.
Thank you very much for the feedback ! I tried to recreate the bug you described but could not see it yet, I'll keep it in mind still in case :).
Yes I think I like it as well. What I did is basically that if you buy an " underpriced " item there's more chance that it's bad, but still a little chance that it's good and if it's overpriced, there's more chance that it's good quality. ( It also mimics bit more buying and selling on Ebay or online marketplaces, if you do that with playmobils sets or Lego for example ).
I am going to try adding a few more units and fix a few more bugs before next build :)
Thanks again for the feedback ! I'll try to get you a Steam Key once I am in there.
Kind of cool, I had a full collection before giving up :)
Thanks !
Was it too hard / not enough, or just not enough different figs to make you play longer ? ( Trying to understand what people might like / not like about it 😅 )