I streamed your game. Overall I feel like this game has some potential, but really lacks a lot of polish.
Denko Chaser jumps right into the story with our protagonist pursuing a space pirate or something. However, the lack of polish already begin to rear its ugly head as our main protagonist guy is either too dense to know who the target they are there to capture is or this law enforcement agency is really poor at being a law enforcement agency, as our main protagonist guy doesn’t even know the gender of the person they are there to capture. There are a lot of things I can suspend my disbelief on, for example, the main protagonist guy having the authority to break formation, ignore orders from his superior, and go about his merry way on his own. Just anime things, you know? However, it seems strangely daft of this protagonist man to not know what the target looks like.
However, just like how the game just jumps right into the story, it also just jumps right into gameplay. This is a good thing. I cannot recall the number of times I found myself sinking deeper into my chair in complete boredom as Indie Dev #1,153,067 over indulges in a long intro filled with nothing of interest. So the fact that Denko Chaser can just get right to the meat and potatoes is a huge boon for the game. However, there are definitely balancing problems here; not in the sense that things are too difficult, but in the way of optimal strategies due to poorly considered numbers. But I am getting ahead of myself.
The game really likes to do text-dump tutorials and hopes that is good enough for players to figure it out. These text tutorials are usually out of context of when that information is needed. (For example, giving battle information when a battle isn’t currently active). This leads to a disconnect in the learning. I would also advise the dev on considering a “sandbox fight” which would be a fight where the player can comfortably and without worry explore what their kit can do. With a combination of more sensibly placed (and paced) tutorials, along with a sandbox fight, the game would be greatly improved in introducing the player to its combat.
The gear system itself is rather confusing as well, as there are way too many gear slots with way too many abbreviations to make sense of what anything is. You have these pick up single use items that deal damage and are told they do 9999 in a single attack, but they don’t actually deal that amount of damage, they deal rather pitiful amounts of damage; an amount of damage that I suspect will be quickly out-paced by player level.
Which brings me back to the combat; later when you get your other teammates, it becomes pretty apparent how useless TP attacks are; they take at least a total of 2 turns to charge and on the third turn, finally execute for damage barely more than a basic attack. Meanwhile, the magic caster can spend 1 turn charging his MP and charge enough MP to cast his magic attack 4 times, and his magic attack does more than twice the damage of the TP attacks, and more than the consumable damage item that promised 9999 points of damage.
There is a certain “anime” mood that I think it establishes quite well; it’s very assured in the world that it crafts, and it’s that confidence in what it wants to be that is where I see the potential lies. With some clean up in the things I mentioned, I can see some folks really enjoying this game.
If you'd like to watch my experience with your game, I've linked the archive below. You can click the timestamps to jump to when I start playing your game.
Hey NolanAlighieri, thanks for playing the game and taking the time to leave a review!
I watched your Youtube playthrough video and had a few good laughs out of it. There were several valid points made on the flaws of the game, and I do acknowledge that the game is far from polished in many aspects. Anyway, I would like to try to shed some light on some of the game mechanics and design choices made from a dev perspective, hopefully that can bring about some clarity to your player experience and make a little more sense out of everything (I won't be able to address everything as the list is pretty long).
▶ About the Lumentite Artefacts dealing 9999 damage
The infographic suggests that certain artefacts can potentially deal 9999 damage in the late game and is not specifically referring to the Woodcutter's Ax (which would be completely busted if that were the case).
The Woodcutter's Ax is an artefact designed to aid the players in taking down the Ravenclaws (the black crow monsters) as those enemies have a high evasion rate. There are many mechanics in terms of damage types that are not yet explained in the demo, but to expand a little further on this subject, you have your standard elemental weaknesses and then there's Absolute damage. Absolute damage is a certain hit type of damage that bypasses evasion and any DEF/M.DEF (except when guarded due to how guarding works in RPGMaker). E.g. if it indicates an Absolute damage of 500, the net damage value will be exactly 500. So while the damage is comparatively low to say a fire-type magic spell used against an enemy weak against fire, it can be situationally effective in cases where monsters have exceptionally high defense/magic immunity/evasion.
▶ About Magic being stronger than Tech
Magic is designed to be powerful in this game, but does not scale as well as Tech abilities. The demo is adjusted to be reasonably easy, to account for players who may be completely new to JRPGs. As such, most of the enemies including the first boss you face are weak against fire-type attacks (which explains why Ignis' Faerie Blaze deals so much damage). Ignis is kind of a glass cannon anyway, with very low HP and defense.
In the video, the gameplay stops before the airship exploration, which is where most of the customization takes place. The game gives the player the option of deciding who will be the damage dealer/healer/tank through allocating stats (Airship Bar) and assigning patches. Patches in the later part of the game will also change how quickly TP is gained. Combined with S-grade artefacts, Tech skills will unquestionably out-damage Magic skills in the later part of the game (It is possible to cheese through bosses by exploiting S-grade artefacts and Tech skills combined).
Do try out the rest of the demo if you are interested, I'll be happy to watch another video review of it!
(One minor thing to point out, Eva's Flash Edge actually deals 3 hits instead of 2 (timestamp 3:27:30 in the video 😅)
Thanks for the reply. I'm always glad to see devs receptive to feedback.
I appreciate you clarifying a few things. I'd still argue that the pop up for the 9999 damage is misleading; like a cheap pair of headphones with a sticker on the box saying "Professional Quality!"
Anyways, the stream isn't considered definitive - that's what the written review is for - since during my streams there is usually heavy drinking and it's usually late at night for me so my brain is nothing but soup.
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Hey there,
I streamed your game. Overall I feel like this game has some potential, but really lacks a lot of polish.
Denko Chaser jumps right into the story with our protagonist pursuing a space pirate or something. However, the lack of polish already begin to rear its ugly head as our main protagonist guy is either too dense to know who the target they are there to capture is or this law enforcement agency is really poor at being a law enforcement agency, as our main protagonist guy doesn’t even know the gender of the person they are there to capture. There are a lot of things I can suspend my disbelief on, for example, the main protagonist guy having the authority to break formation, ignore orders from his superior, and go about his merry way on his own. Just anime things, you know? However, it seems strangely daft of this protagonist man to not know what the target looks like.
However, just like how the game just jumps right into the story, it also just jumps right into gameplay. This is a good thing. I cannot recall the number of times I found myself sinking deeper into my chair in complete boredom as Indie Dev #1,153,067 over indulges in a long intro filled with nothing of interest. So the fact that Denko Chaser can just get right to the meat and potatoes is a huge boon for the game. However, there are definitely balancing problems here; not in the sense that things are too difficult, but in the way of optimal strategies due to poorly considered numbers. But I am getting ahead of myself.
The game really likes to do text-dump tutorials and hopes that is good enough for players to figure it out. These text tutorials are usually out of context of when that information is needed. (For example, giving battle information when a battle isn’t currently active). This leads to a disconnect in the learning. I would also advise the dev on considering a “sandbox fight” which would be a fight where the player can comfortably and without worry explore what their kit can do. With a combination of more sensibly placed (and paced) tutorials, along with a sandbox fight, the game would be greatly improved in introducing the player to its combat.
The gear system itself is rather confusing as well, as there are way too many gear slots with way too many abbreviations to make sense of what anything is. You have these pick up single use items that deal damage and are told they do 9999 in a single attack, but they don’t actually deal that amount of damage, they deal rather pitiful amounts of damage; an amount of damage that I suspect will be quickly out-paced by player level.
Which brings me back to the combat; later when you get your other teammates, it becomes pretty apparent how useless TP attacks are; they take at least a total of 2 turns to charge and on the third turn, finally execute for damage barely more than a basic attack. Meanwhile, the magic caster can spend 1 turn charging his MP and charge enough MP to cast his magic attack 4 times, and his magic attack does more than twice the damage of the TP attacks, and more than the consumable damage item that promised 9999 points of damage.
There is a certain “anime” mood that I think it establishes quite well; it’s very assured in the world that it crafts, and it’s that confidence in what it wants to be that is where I see the potential lies. With some clean up in the things I mentioned, I can see some folks really enjoying this game.
If you'd like to watch my experience with your game, I've linked the archive below. You can click the timestamps to jump to when I start playing your game.
Hey NolanAlighieri, thanks for playing the game and taking the time to leave a review!
I watched your Youtube playthrough video and had a few good laughs out of it. There were several valid points made on the flaws of the game, and I do acknowledge that the game is far from polished in many aspects. Anyway, I would like to try to shed some light on some of the game mechanics and design choices made from a dev perspective, hopefully that can bring about some clarity to your player experience and make a little more sense out of everything (I won't be able to address everything as the list is pretty long).
▶ About the Lumentite Artefacts dealing 9999 damage
The infographic suggests that certain artefacts can potentially deal 9999 damage in the late game and is not specifically referring to the Woodcutter's Ax (which would be completely busted if that were the case).
The Woodcutter's Ax is an artefact designed to aid the players in taking down the Ravenclaws (the black crow monsters) as those enemies have a high evasion rate. There are many mechanics in terms of damage types that are not yet explained in the demo, but to expand a little further on this subject, you have your standard elemental weaknesses and then there's Absolute damage. Absolute damage is a certain hit type of damage that bypasses evasion and any DEF/M.DEF (except when guarded due to how guarding works in RPGMaker). E.g. if it indicates an Absolute damage of 500, the net damage value will be exactly 500. So while the damage is comparatively low to say a fire-type magic spell used against an enemy weak against fire, it can be situationally effective in cases where monsters have exceptionally high defense/magic immunity/evasion.
▶ About Magic being stronger than Tech
Magic is designed to be powerful in this game, but does not scale as well as Tech abilities. The demo is adjusted to be reasonably easy, to account for players who may be completely new to JRPGs. As such, most of the enemies including the first boss you face are weak against fire-type attacks (which explains why Ignis' Faerie Blaze deals so much damage). Ignis is kind of a glass cannon anyway, with very low HP and defense.
In the video, the gameplay stops before the airship exploration, which is where most of the customization takes place. The game gives the player the option of deciding who will be the damage dealer/healer/tank through allocating stats (Airship Bar) and assigning patches. Patches in the later part of the game will also change how quickly TP is gained. Combined with S-grade artefacts, Tech skills will unquestionably out-damage Magic skills in the later part of the game (It is possible to cheese through bosses by exploiting S-grade artefacts and Tech skills combined).
Do try out the rest of the demo if you are interested, I'll be happy to watch another video review of it!
(One minor thing to point out, Eva's Flash Edge actually deals 3 hits instead of 2 (timestamp 3:27:30 in the video 😅)
Thanks for the reply. I'm always glad to see devs receptive to feedback.
I appreciate you clarifying a few things. I'd still argue that the pop up for the 9999 damage is misleading; like a cheap pair of headphones with a sticker on the box saying "Professional Quality!"
Anyways, the stream isn't considered definitive - that's what the written review is for - since during my streams there is usually heavy drinking and it's usually late at night for me so my brain is nothing but soup.