Pepi's feedback thread

[Pepisolo]

Hey guys

Just gonna be putting my thoughts up here bit by bit rather than play for a day and do an epic write-up.

Bug: Laser aimable with the right stick while menu is up.
Potential bug: Gamepad zoom mode analog click does nothing. Edit: After reading the explanation properly I realized that you are supposed to hold down left analog click and then use the right stick to zoom in or out.

Chris' questions.

1) How does it feel flying around?  Speed with and without afterburner?

Still playing around with it, but initial thoughts are pretty average. I haven't found the need to use afterburner yet, and when I do it doesn't feel very satisfying or useful. I'd like to test a version of the movement with a bit more physics and thrust.

2. How does the shot speed and firing rate to you feel in terms of satisfaction?

On the default ship it seems ok, but I need to find more special weapons to try out. The range of different ships that you can pick are incredibly boring. It seems like you've got some with normal shot speed and some with low shot speed, and the low shot speed ships are way less satisfying. I barely notice the movement differences. The only interesting change between the ships is that some have shields and some don't. I'd much rather 3 different types of ship with significant differences than 7 with slightly tweaked variables. For example, a ship with rebounding lasers, a ship with ice shots that cause slowdown, or a ship with circling multiples etc.

3. How does it feel to you in terms of how quickly enemies die, how many enemies are in each room, and so on?...

Still testing, but seems a bit chaotic at the moment. I've had some problems telling whether I'm actually hitting an enemy or not.  I think this actually might be a bug though. If an enemy is stuck and immobile then they don't flash when hit. I need to put more thought into this aspect before commenting further.

5. Any comments about enemies you hate or love, items the same thing, rooms the same thing.

There's only one boss so far that I've thought......hmmm pretty cool! The boss shoots waves covering the top half of the screen and then the bottom half of the screen alternately and you have to snake up and down in order to get closer. If there was a bigger reward for getting closer (perhaps greater damage dealt) then this boss would be a lot cooler. The enemies that leave trails are pretty good, very Binding of Isaac. Also, one of the enemy types that leave sort of tendrils that grow out look nice (yes...next time I'll try and screencap these enemies so you know what I'm talking about more clearly).

[Misery]

Still testing, but seems a bit chaotic at the moment. I've had some problems telling whether I'm actually hitting an enemy or not.  I think this actually might be a bug though. If an enemy is stuck and immobile then they don't flash when hit. I need to put more thought into this aspect before commenting further.

Oh, that's a.... well I dont know what it'll be called in-game, if it gets a specific name, but it's a "jumpscare" enemy.  It's inactive.... and invincible... until you get close enough, at which point it wakes up and then goes bonkers or something.  There are a number of enemy types that do this.

The enemies that leave trails are pretty good, very Binding of Isaac. Also, one of the enemy types that leave sort of tendrils that grow out look nice (yes...next time I'll try and screencap these enemies so you know what I'm talking about more clearly).

Oh yeah, I like the ones with the trails; not my design/idea, those.   The other ones with the tendrils are "Spiders", because I'm just so darn creative with the naming, originally the pattern they used was slower and used little purple bullets.  Chris went in and increased the spread speed, an idea I definitely ended up liking, and then gave them awesome new bullet sprites that had been added.  So they're MUCH more awesome looking than the original version.  They dont need any tweaking or anything either, I dont see the need to do anything else with them.

But yeah, pretty awesome looking, I'm liking alot of the art stuffs in the game so far.

[Pepisolo]

Oh, that's a.... well I dont know what it'll be called in-game, if it gets a specific name, but it's a "jumpscare" enemy.  It's inactive.... and invincible... until you get close enough, at which point it wakes up and then goes bonkers or something.  There are a number of enemy types that do this.

Oh, right. Doesn't really work for me, just looks like a stationary enemy and pisses me off that it's invincible. Maybe if it were to change colour when inactive like a gargoyle statue or something that'd be better. One other alternative is to have it attack immediately once fired upon.

So they're MUCH more awesome looking than the original version.

Yeah these look awesome. I'm presuming that there's a lot of work to be done on bullet sprites in general as most of them are extremely lacklustre. Flamethrower, for example, looks nothing like a flamethrower and is super disappointing.

In general, at the moment, I'm finding the power up system extremely dull. None of the weapons so far have been enjoyable and they all seem extremely basic. I'm still looking for my first standard weapon power up, lugging around the original pea shooter is a bit boring. Are there going to be any standard weapon power ups? Like firing rate boosts or per shot boosts or bouncing bullets?

[Pepisolo]

One thing I'm not liking so far is the power up system. It basically just feels like you've got the standard pea-shooter plus whatever energy based weapon you pick up -- all of which so far seem pretty sucky except for maybe the acid sprayer. Is there really no way to power up your standard weapon? No synergies?

For example, why not have a more Isaac style system of upgrades that apply to your main attack and which have the potential to create synergies with other upgrades? Let's make up a few: ROF up, power up, laser beam, bounce shot, triple shot, and homing shot. That's six different types of shot which could potentially have a large amount of synergies. For example, bounce laser, triple homing shot, triple laser shot, triple laser bounce shot etc. The more base types of upgrade you add in, the more types of crazy synergies that would be possible. Having a more synergy based system would really help replayability as players try to get that elusive Exploding Ripple Piercing Charge shot run.

At the moment, I have almost zero interest in the existing power ups.

[TheVampire100]

One thing I'm not liking so far is the power up system. It basically just feels like you've got the standard pea-shooter plus whatever energy based weapon you pick up -- all of which so far seem pretty sucky except for maybe the acid sprayer. Is there really no way to power up your standard weapon? No synergies?

For example, why not have a more Isaac style system of upgrades that apply to your main attack and which have the potential to create synergies with other upgrades? Let's make up a few: ROF up, power up, laser beam, bounce shot, triple shot, and homing shot. That's six different types of shot which could potentially have a large amount of synergies. For example, bounce laser, triple homing shot, triple laser shot, triple laser bounce shot etc. The more base types of upgrade you add in, the more types of crazy synergies that would be possible. Having a more synergy based system would really help replayability as players try to get that elusive Exploding Ripple Piercing Charge shot run.

At the moment, I have almost zero interest in the power ups.

I'm pretty sure that's what the shop is latter for. You probably can buy damage upgrades there and other cool stuff. So I wait patiently. Until then credits seem to be worthless.

[Pepisolo]

I'm pretty sure that's what the shop is latter for. You probably can buy damage upgrades there and other cool stuff. So I wait patiently. Until then credits seem to be worthless.

I'm not sure if the shops appear in-dungeon or out-of-dungeon. If it's out-of-dungeon then it'd be a shame to keep all the cool power ups in the shops. Rather than going on runs for the excitement or mystery of seeing what you can find, you'd go doing the run just to get credits. If the shops are in-dungeon and randomized like Isaac it might work a bit better, though.

[TheVampire100]

You can find shop rooms already in the dungeon. However on the upper right corner there is a message that tells you that shops are currently not in the game.
So there are in-dungeon shops planned. Just like in Isaac I guess.

[Misery]

You can find shop rooms already in the dungeon. However on the upper right corner there is a message that tells you that shops are currently not in the game.
So there are in-dungeon shops planned. Just like in Isaac I guess.

Yeah, most roguelikes or similar games will do this.

Though, frankly, I could see it working either way in this one, or even both.  A shop in-game, and a shop OUTSIDE of the dungeon too.... maybe allowing you to sometimes buy something to take into a run with you to begin with?  I dont mean as a "progression" thing, I mean as a one-time thing?

Anyway, just a quick idea.