@Grapefruit So I finally came around to look at the demo for this game. I don’t have enough time to really beta test it thoughtfully, but I still want to give you some feedback to what I already saw.
First some little things you may want to correct:
I think you meant her.
Second about the game itself. Let’s start with something positive: I really like the characters, like I already liked the characters in Magikiras, you really have a talent to create characters that are at least for me interesting enough to want to play every single character and romance branch that exists. And the magical girl theme. I really love that.
What annoyed me: The huge number of customizations to choose from, but really only because there was not a single tip what everything does. That is especially bitter because the battle system expects from the player to act somewhat strategically. So it would be nice to get at least for the carebanet customizations some hint or description of what the hell this beret/or earrings /or whatever even does, before we ultimately chose which item we take. (I’m not sure if the style or club we chose in the beginning also has an influence on the stats, but if they do, I think it is okay, if that early choices are left without clarification, because only after we become a carebanet the stats get a greater meaning. But that’s only my personal opinion, others may want to know from the start what character they are building). Also it would be nice to get some description of the carebanet stats earlier in the game. Otherwise it feels like fumbling around in the dark.
And with that we come to the next point. I really had for some decisions the feeling to do exactly that: fumbling around the dark, because the game didn’t even gave me a hint to what to do. Prominently is the decision between the fun house/horror house/ storage room, and the question about the name of Nanas sister, though the last one only because Snow in some not clarified language is not enough to come to Yukine (it isn’t even yuki, what most people could come to with guessing and google, but Yukine?! Really?) . Maybe I just didn’t pass the perception checks but in that case those checks are pretty high…
So on to the next point where I’m honestly a little bit conflicted about: the battle system.
I see what you want to archive with that, it feels really rpg-like, but the problem is choice games are not really the same medium as classical rpgs. The biggest problem are the repetitions. In videogames you just look at a short visual sequence that’s repeated, while playing a tabletop rpg either you or the DM can give the repetition some variation, but text based games make that difficult. And I didn’t see if you have some variation in the game in form of for example critical hits, but it’s possible I just didn’t notice, because honestly I stopped reading the description for the same choices during battles after a short while. And people will have to choose the same options repeatedly, just to play to their strengths and to have even a chance to win.
Also, I like that I don’t have to start the game from the beginning just because of some bad “dice rolls” on the other side I had to start some chapters over again and again, because even while choosing strategically, there were many bad dice rolls. Like really many. It just seems very random for people who aren’t used to typical rpgs (Though it even seems in comparison to the rpgs I’m used to sometimes unreasonable random). For some players that maybe too frustrating and leads them to quite the game. So if you want to stay with the battle system as it is, may at least make it somewhat easier, or give people the choice for an easy mode or something.
And I noticed that the relationships stats seem to get not very high (I think the highest I reached was somewhere in the 40s?), so you maybe should adjust them somewhat, so that it is a least theoretically possible to reach something near 100% (I don’t know maybe that is already possible but it certainly didn’t seem like it). What also leads me to the question to the scene with Helen, when we have to bring her to fight with us. Is there some point when the MC has a high enough relationship with her, so that it’s literally impossible, that she will let MC go on their own? Because if not there certainly should be. Otherwise it would seem somewhat strange.
That’s all I can think of now. Anyway good luck with the game!
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