The game is quite enjoyable, especially for a demo! My experience was generally positive, here are some thoughts and observations (important bits are
marked, rest is thoughts and examples):
-
The numbers on the UI are too small. I need to squint in order to see how much stamina or clothes durability a character has. Same for the steps.
- Regarding the steps, so far it feels like too much work for too little content. You spend 5 minutes battling enemies, 30 seconds or less on the event screen, even less if it's a reward chest. Then it's back to the battling. I don't mind the battling aspect, but
adding a few more stops along the way would definitely alleviate this feeling of the game dragging on.
- Also regarding the steps, make the UI pop a bit more and
make it clear how long it will take for you to reach your next destination. Is it 3 more waves, or 5 more enemies killed, so on.
- It is
hard to see how empty the durability bar for the clothes is.
- Add
options for game speed or animations. The current animation speed is too fast, so if you can't really see the split-second scenes. It works fine for a focused playthrough where gameplay is the goal, not so much for a one-handed gaming session.
- The
cursor for the ninja feels off when trying to click on something. I know the sickle is thematic for her, but changing it to a kunai or similar ninja tool would help the player know at what place the click will happen and not have to guess.
- The
breasts in the idle animations of the Ninja and Archer clip through their chests. Perhaps slowing the movement and range of motion a bit could improve that?
- It feels a bit
too much clicking in each round of battle. For a basic attack you need to: "Select a character -> Select basic attack -> Select enemy". This is fine when you have 2 or more characters to choose from, but the moment when you only have a single character left I think the selection should happen automatically.
- In addition to the previous point, perhaps add an
option for quicker play that automatically chooses the basic attack when you click on an enemy without having a skill selected. That would speed up the game by quite a bit.
-
Adding some place to offer rest for your characters would be nice, especially if some of them have gotten raped/have really low stamina, but haven't been abducted. A hot spring/bathhouse of some sort, perhaps.
+ EDIT: There is an NPC you can rescue that sells waffles that do the same thing, so that works. Still, adding a hot spring scene/location would be some nice eye candy, even if it serves a different function.
-
The dojo is a bit hard to find. The background or props (swords, skull) are more noticeable than it.
-
Make it clearer when an interaction begins because you have entered a new location on the map. The first S.L.A.V.E. interaction happened during a miniboss battle and left me very confused as to who this guy is and why he suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
- When reaching a new location,
make it so that you first need to click on it in order to visit it/open the chest, then selected your new destination. As it is right now, when you reach a chest you need to click on the next location first, then you open the chest.
Questions:
- Are there more main characters planned that you can swap between when beginning a new exploration? Perhaps different classes that offer different abilities, or changing the main class of the current main characters.
- Will you add different starting loadouts when beginning a new exploration? Basically beginning with a set selection of skills and a few items every time.
- Are you going to add a support character that jumps in when a party member gets incapacitated/captured, serving as a replacement while you bring them back? Perhaps a slime or a mimic that can fill in their slot in the composition and use their basic attack + items only? One of your party members going down usually leads to a slow and excruciating defeat as your enemies swarm you and you have less turns and attacks with which to deal with them.
Bugs:
- An enemy got stuck during the first mini-boss fight I had, soft-locking me. Screenshot attached:
- Is the item shop supposed to be empty?
- The options wheel does nothing on the camp screen before embarking on an expedition.
- After interacting with the picture in the Witch Tent once, you can hover over it, but clicking on it does nothing.
I really liked this demo, definitely looking forward to the next version! Keep up the good work!