Feedback and impressions

[Matruchus]

Really fabulous game, a bit hard, maybe even unforgiving in the begining until you find out which mech works the best for you. For me that's the flame mech with has a very big area damage. I think this is the best mech for beginners, after you upgrade it a bit there is nothing that can stop it. Played on normal difficulty on Linux. I died very fast in the beginning but after 1-2 hours the game became easy after you noticed how the AI behaves and how it moves.

So these are the things I noticed:

- Hydral intro message 11/11 text is overlapping the ok button which doesn't look good.
- There are some lag issues ( a bit less then a second jump but noticeable) be it in small, large or mini/big boss rooms. Occasional blurred, stuttered screen cause of lag. This those does not happen every time I run the game.
- Occasional door collisions when entering room (can't move or shoot), which you can get rid of by going backwards in one room before (happened a few times).
- Spikes aren't visible enough and don't look threatening so most players will just walk through them.
- Mini bosses are extremely easy to kill.
- In some multi arrow room, those arrows don't work as they should and allow you to move sideways instead of down where they are pointing. (attached picture below)
- Graphical issues with standing in the middle of the laser beam and not getting any hits. (attached picture below)
- Teleporters are too predictable in areas where there is a lot of them. Bottom left one always brings you to the top left or right one.
- Enemy unit behavior too predictable.
- A few doors that lead to nowhere. For Aesthetics perhaps?

It would be nice to see an option to be able to change the color of the aiming cursor cause sometimes in the middle of the bullet hell you can't see where you are aiming (basically the cursor disapears in the mess). Also it takes ages to upgrade when you get the upgrade notification. Maybe lessen the time to be able to press E and choose the upgrade. Now its about 5-10 seconds I think.

That's about what I noticed in 5 hours of play.

Edit: The music as usual is great. I don't know why but all the time I listen to it I have a feeling I'm playing Pac-Man

[Misery]

Glad you're enjoying it!

I'll give responses to what I can:

Hydral message:  Probably a known problem, it's been mentioned a few times by people.

Lag issues:  Okay, that actually sounds a bit strange.  If you could report this on Mantis, that'd help alot.

Door collisions:  Known issue, doors are a tad odd right now.

Spikes:  YES they do need more visibility, dont they?

Mini-bosses:  Well, they ARE "mini" bosses... they're not meant to be particularly tough.   How are you taking them out, exactly?  I have to wonder if there's an exploit that hadnt been found yet since I've heard this a couple of times recently.

Arrows: Yeah, they get a bit strange when there's alot of them.  I've mentioned it to Chris.

Lasers:  The reason you arent taking damage is because you're actually not being hit.  As with many games of this type, your hitbox is alot smaller than your overall sprite.  Your mech's head pretty much is where the actual hitbox is.  You're like, ONE pixel away from taking damage in that screenshot.

Teleporters:  Yep, that's how they work; it's their positioning, in relation to other teleporters, that determines where they send you.  Figuring out just how they function makes it easier to get around when you run into rooms that have alot of them.

Enemy behavior:  Predictable on purpose!  A game like this is generally hard enough without the enemies coming up with creative and new ways to eat your face every time.  Learning enemy patterns and mastering them is part of the challenge.   Soon, Hard mode will become available (when I'm done with it, which HOPEFULLY will be later tonight), if Normal is proving too easy for you.  Some enemies become dramatically more difficult in Hard mode.

Doors going nowhere: Yeah, another known issue.  Definitely a tad strange, yeah?

[Matruchus]

Well taking out boses is easy if you constantly circle around them so that you avoid their big attack walls. The same as with mini bosses. I just circle around very fast and they can't hit me since I respond fast. Like those two mini boses with balls of arrows. Just going left and right around them and that's it. I guess maybe the problem is that the flame thrower mech is a bit strong? Or I just upgraded so fast. I don't know. It takes about 20-30 seconds to beat a mini boss for me.

Edit: Just killed Hunter in 10 sec. About a minute for that rotating disc boss with four disc guardians.

[Misery]

Well taking out boses is easy if you constantly circle around them so that you avoid their big attack walls. The same as with mini bosses. I just circle around very fast and they can't hit me since I respond fast. Like those two mini boses with balls of arrows. Just going left and right around them and that's it. I guess maybe the problem is that the flame thrower mech is a bit strong? Or I just upgraded so fast. I don't know. It takes about 20-30 seconds to beat a mini boss for me.

Edit: Just killed Hunter in 10 sec. About a minute for that rotating disc boss with four disc guardians.

Wait, are you talking about circling one of the actual STAGE bosses?  The ones that open up the yellow door when beaten?  Aside from Crystal Mother and.... Crystal Mother, that shouldnt be possible.

Minibosses yes, it does work on them as they dont fire that much stuff, but if you're somehow just running in circles like a maniac around an actual stage boss and it's WORKING, something is off.

[Matruchus]

Well essentially they just seem to slow to me. That disc thing is easily beaten going around his cage and shooting at him with the flamethrower while evading the fire from the four guardians. He doesn't have much defenses. The Terminus though had me almost bitting my nails just now. But ok since I have 44 health its not an issue killing him.

I don't know will make another run tomorrow since I finished this one. One thing was of though. I think Crystal Mother repeated at least once in seven floors I played.

[Misery]

Well essentially they just seem to slow to me. That disc thing is easily beaten going around his cage and shooting at him with the flamethrower while evading the fire from the four guardians. He doesn't have much defenses. The Terminus though had me almost bitting my nails just now. But ok since I have 44 health its not an issue killing him.

I don't know will make another run tomorrow since I finished this one. One thing was of though. I think Crystal Mother repeated at least once in seven floors I played.

Disc thing.... Oh, you mean Labyrinth.   Actually you're defeating that one as it's intended to be beaten.   Most of the bosses are very bullet-hell sorts, so Labyrinth is meant to.... not be.   I wanted one that would be a bit different from my usual style to break things up a bit.

So that one is working as intended, heh!

Though, you cant run around QUITE as easily on higher difficulties.  It's guardian turrets gain additional abilities.

And yeah, the bit with Crystal Mother was a glitch I found and already pointed out to Chris; bosses werent appearing on the right floors and it could cause repetitions like that. Wasnt supposed to happen.   That should be fixed with the next released version as he said he was able to fix it super fast.

[Cinth]

I've already mention the doors issue (.900) on Mantis.  It's something they are trying to kill off

There isn't anything wrong with the one way arrows if you think about it, and is something that has been used to make puzzles like that for, well, forever.
The only thing the arrows stop is movement against the direction they face.

[Matruchus]

I've already mention the doors issue (.900) on Mantis.  It's something they are trying to kill off

There isn't anything wrong with the one way arrows if you think about it, and is something that has been used to make puzzles like that for, well, forever.
The only thing the arrows stop is movement against the direction they face.

The problem in this room is that on certain arrows you can move differently then where they are pointing at. If you could only move as the arrows show in the attached map you could never get to the middle. But it seems those white section walls between the arrows allow you to move differently then what the arrows show. That was what I meant.

[Cinth]

If the arrows were truly one way then you would only be able to enter them from the back and cross with the arrow.  Essentially, these tiles block movement in one direction (one way blocked).  You can't move against the arrow.

[Misery]

There's a way to the center of that room?

Coulda fooled me...

[Cinth]

There's a way to the center of that room?

Coulda fooled me...

Puzzles like this are a classic staple.  How can you not know how to do this?

[Matruchus]

There's a way to the center of that room?

Coulda fooled me...

Not really hard to do. If you come from top you go on the first left arrow (pointing down), move once down, twice left, go right down to the end then right and up. That's about it.

Also tried posting on mantis about that lag issue but couldn't log in. Do I need another account there?

[Cinth]

Also tried posting on mantis about that lag issue but couldn't log in. Do I need another account there?

Yes

[Misery]

There's a way to the center of that room?

Coulda fooled me...

Puzzles like this are a classic staple.  How can you not know how to do this?

I tend to be like that.  I can do things like solve a Rubik's cube without algorithms, same with a variety of high-order and/or bizarre puzzles of that type, like an X-cube or a 3x3 Mixup (this being my other hobby), but then I'll go and get totally locked up on things like that room there.

I dont even bother trying to make sense of why it happens.

[Cinth]

There's a way to the center of that room?

Coulda fooled me...

Puzzles like this are a classic staple.  How can you not know how to do this?

I tend to be like that.  I can do things like solve a Rubik's cube without algorithms, same with a variety of high-order and/or bizarre puzzles of that type, like an X-cube or a 3x3 Mixup (this being my other hobby), but then I'll go and get totally locked up on things like that room there.

I dont even bother trying to make sense of why it happens.

I like these because it's more of the see past what's actually being shown to you, sort.  It's very abstract in a way.

There's 3 ways into a one way tile and 3 ways off a one way tile  (that confuses people).