Alchemical trial

The whole 3D world is built so neatly, well done! But i really felt a few things missig -

• The instructions are not so easy to understand, I mean only with a lots of Trail and error I was able to identify what to do
• Controls or Camera, I don't know what out of these two, is a little confusing or uncomfortable to use.

Enemies look really good, though.

I quite liked this one.
The graphics and audio both serve their purpose and are mostly pleasant.
(I appreciate the effort of including a hand which i always shy away from in jams)
The real hearpiece of this entry is the casting mechanic. I just wish there was a bit more depth to it.
I might have been great preparing a more involved spell to defeat an enemy in one hit.
Unfortunately the best strategy here is to just spam the same spell over and over.

good implementation, but sounds and controls a little bit annoying

I found the mechanics interesting and fun, casting spells is quite fun. The sound was a little harsh at times, maybe some better mastering could solve it, but it was the only thing that standed out, the sound themselves were good and atmospheric.

Everything feels a little off. The controls would do better if you allowed more movement. Right now it is very restrictiv to me. It feels challenging because of the controls and not because of the gameplay.
I like your day and night cycle and the whole 3D-Landscape. Looks like you worked a lot on that!

Nice game! I just wish the controls were better (using mouselook). The world looks very nice, it's a shame there isn't an incentive to explore. The base gameplay is fun, although a reason to use other spells and not spam the same would be nice.

Congrats!

@mampee @KorbohneD Thanks for feedback, i added new version when you use wasd normally and qe for turning left/right

@IDidGame That's true to some extent, fire elementals can be only defeated by spamming (although now with new controls, you can try evading attacks and attack from flank) but Water elementals can be one shoted by inferno/ flame strike spell (third recipe in book). And thank you for your feedback!

@chaos i added new version when you use wasd normally and qe for turning left/right. By annoying sounds you mean sounds when you are casting? I lowered them in newer version hopefully they will not be as distracting / annoying

@fullmontis Thanks for feedback, i casting sounds in newer version hopefully they will not be as distracting / standing out

@Walnoot yeah, for Fire elementals spamming is the best options (although now with new controls, you can try evading attacks and attack from flank) but Water elementals can be one shoted by inferno/ flame strike spell (third recipe in book). Yeah i was thing about gathering essence from environment to learn new recipes etc but i didn't have time for that. Thanks for feedback!

I also found the controls too… 1993. But the environment and effects look cool, quite impressive for 2 days of work! Gameplay-wise, it feels like something was missing. I only used the fire and water spells, didn't have a reason to try the other two. It would be cool if it tied into the day-night cycle and maybe weather patterns, for example, fire spirits only come out during lightning storms and water spirits only during the rain.

Edit: forgot to mention, the Linux version works just fine!

@Zeriver by annoyng sounds i mean AQUA, TERRA, IGNITHHH and so on, they don't actually bad, but i just don't like them. Controls works better now, but i whoud realy preffer rotating with mouse instead of keyboard, maybe i wrong about it becouse you need 1-st hand on WASD to move, 2-nd hand on numpad to cast and with mouse you also need 3-rd hand to rotate, but i think if game was controlled by mouse and casting was on 1,2,3,4 instead of numpad, it whoud be more comfotable to play(at least for me). I played new version but it still feels uncomfotable.

I like the concept, the fact that you can't see the enemies and look at the book at the same time keeps the tension up.

I can't get it to work on MAC.

Cool stuff, managed to beat it. Kinda reminds me of that spellcasting game idea that Jon Blow was playing around with at some point.

Dunno how you improved the controls on the win version. I played the mac version and they seemed a bit awkward. Strafing would have been nice (I guess you changed Q/E to turning and A/D to strafing). Also, some stuff was off screen so I guess you only designed it with a single aspect ratio in mind. Something to take into account in the future…

It was a bit easy because you could either just snipe the enemies from far enough that they wouldn't even do anything or just spam the spells to kill their projectiles before they could hit you. There wasn't enough use for all the spells. I cleared it completely with just 484 and 662. I did use the healing once but didn't find it too useful because I didn't take any damage. Didn't even try the fourth one…

Some kind of aiming reticle would have been nice. The trees had (or the spell projectiles) had weird colliders, quite often my spells fizzled on the trees even though it looked like they shouldn't.

@saneangle Worked for me on a mac. Are you getting some kind of error or what? Didn't do anything special, just unzip, right click the app and select open (to get around the osx unknown dev permissions thingy).

like KorbohneD said. Everything feels a little off

The collision seemed a bit buggy at times, as I managed to walk inside mountains. At least I'm safe from the foes in the rock! I liked was fun to create the spell combinations. My favorite was the close range fire spell. I liked to run right next to the foe and set up a little fire. Too bad it didn't work for the water foes. :P

A nice detail was that the player turns a bit when a projectile hits it. The changing lighting environment was a good touch as well. Also, the losing text was funny. It was surprising that touching the water foe did not do anything except that I could push it around the map. :D

I don't have a separate numpad, so I had to resort to num lock. Fortunately, it didn't override any of they keys the game used.

The mid-air spell hit was a nice twist to the combat. On the other hand, sometimes the foes that cast the spells in pretty much random directions, and the projectiles are slow, so it's quite easy to dodge them. The movement in the "non-fixed" version made that a bit harder, though, as you couldn't see where the spell is going.

Passing the game was easy, as I can just spam one spell from the distance and dodging the slow projectiles is not hard. Furthermore, even if I happened to get hit, the healing spell made me pretty much immortal. Thus, for possible future features, there could be a rate limit and something like resource system for the spells.

How did you manage this much graphics and gameplay solo under 24 hours?

Wow, I'm jealous.

I managed to beat the game, and while the controls were a little rough, it was very playable once I got the gist of it. I liked the sound effects too apart from the sound the enemies made that sounded like a dogs bark.

@thomastc that's actually pretty cool idea about enemy elemental getting stronger / appearing when it's raining / it's night or something. Who knows, maybe one day i will expand this game and this could be a cool feature. About controls, yeah i kinda aimed for old school feel and on Window version i added q and e for turning left/right and ad is used for strafing. And thank you for your feedback and letting me know that Linux version works fine!

@chaos thanks for taking time and playing my game again, about using mouse to cast spell is pretty good idea but i was planning on adding more elements and some people use mouses with less than 4 buttons (at least i know two people)

@Filo Yeah i wanted to make player nervous when they forget formula and quickly have to open book to check the recipe

@saneangel Hmm as Antti Haavikko said it works fine for him, and to be honest i don't know how to fix problems with MAC build without testing it quickly, sorry for that :/

@anttihaavikko Yeah, there might be slight problems with different resolution than 16:9 i will try to remember checking other resolutions in future. Enemies are indeed a little 'dumbed down', perhaps i made then a little too easy. Thank you for so detailed feedback!

@Haoron Yes

@Tegu Yep collision are really a mess :D With more spells i wanted to make combat a little bit more dynamic and tactical but i didn't have time for that so i 'dumbed down' enemies, perhaps i made then a little too easy. Thank you for so detailed feedback!

@bradur Well i cut a lot of corners, there is only one tree model just scale differently, same goes to mountains around and inside 'area'. Yeah the enemy sound was just low pitched pig sound :P i was running out of time. Thank you for feedback!

The game looks and sounds pretty nice. The casting system is fun. Nicely done, especially for one man job!

Played the fixed version.

The graphics are nice, no placeholders in sight! I like the audio too as it creates a strong atmosphere.

The controls are somewhat stilted, tanky! Whenever I think of spellcraft controls Arx Fatalis comes to mind, i.e. drawing the spell icons with the mouse.

Combat is too simple as the enemy elementals are very passive. I'd love to see them shoot multiple projectiles at the same time with a spread, forcing the player to move around.

More magic than alchemy, still passable take on the theme even if not very original.

Ok entry. Good effort for 24 hours especially!

O 6, G 8, A 8, G 5, O 3, T 5

Hi! We played your game with Danae on this twitch channel, and now the video is available on YouTube. Feel free to check it out :)

Danae plays: Alchemical Trial

Fun game. I included it in my Alakajam #1 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look. :) https://youtu.be/fRBZG2NbaE8

Fun game. I included it in my Alakajam #1 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look. :) https://youtu.be/fRBZG2NbaE8