Not a great start honestly

[Elveone]

Spend about an hour in the game, a significant part of that time messing with the options trying to remove crap that I do not like and not being able to. Unfortunately at this time playing the game is more of an annoyance than a pleasure.

In terms of gameplay...

Played on the highest difficulty and I cannot say that it was difficult really, just that enemies took a huge amount of time to whack with a stick or a significant less time to throw or throw things at. It was early game and I didn't really expect things to be truly difficult but the balancing threw me off - if the difficulty is just getting to hit the enemies more time then there isn't much point to it.

Melee feels extremely weak for no reason and the defensive options feel a bit slow to execute. The animations are pretty but they do not covey a sense of power. The magic is a lot more powerful but at the same time the system so far feels pretty clunky to use in combat. Consider adding a quick cast button to cast the spell you have equipped at the target you are aiming at at the moment. For telekinesis(and potentially other spells) you can have two different modes depending on how long you hold the button - a press would chuck a nearby rock at the enemy while a longer press can pick up the enemy itself.

The ice spell's reservoir runs out way too quickly and when you have to solve a puzzle with it it is chore to wait for it to reload. The spell itself feels more like a foam spray than magic ice - why does the ice not extinguish fire instead of having to make islands to jump on when there is a burning ground?

The telekinesis is surprisingly unwieldy to aim and there is a weird delay between picking stuff up and being able to throw them. I enjoy puzzles that employ different elements and carrying things around but so far picking random things and throwing them at other things seems to work pretty well on everything which is not a great puzzle design. I was particularly disappointed with an ice structure that you had to dismantle to get an item - initially I did throw a fire plant at it and it was slightly destroyed but not the whole of it so I proceeded to just pick up parts of the structure and throw them at the structure itself. In the end I felt stupid for tracking a fire plant initially and bored for having to repeatedly chuck ice chunks into an ice structure.

The resource carrying limitations are nonsense that bring nothing of value to the game except player frustration especially when you fill the inventory beyond its limits in the first possible zone and the game keeps throwing new types of resources at you. The reset of the instance and the progression of time when I got back to the camp to drop off the resources was not just frustrating but also confusing in terms of what it meant for the game. Later on I got more of all the same resources again including the ones in the rare looking chests that I had previously looted so the system in place seems to be there to just artificially waste your time as there is no such thing as resource scarcity in the game.

In terms of options - there should be options to disable antialiasing, bloom, blur, ambient occlusion and basically all non-essential screen space effects. Currently the game is a bit headache inducing no matter what options I use for it because of the effects. Also allow the player to just clear out an assignment without assigning something else to it - there is a huge redundancy in functionality in the controls for different people which is great but it

In terms of style - it is too late to change this at this point but the different styles between the graphics, the cinematics and the dialogue art is just jarring.

I'm not going to criticize the story or the writing at this point but I would say that the interactions in camp with the members of your party feel kind of artificial because of how the dialogue options are presented. Also the game started with way too many unnecessary cutscenes that destroyed any pacing in the introductory part of the game.

[yellowbrickgames_devs]

Hey there! Thank you so so much for the detailed feedback.

We are working on an action plan to address the feedback we've been receiving on combat and inventory, so please stay tuned!

As for anti-aliasing, bloom, etc. - we've noted this down with the team, as well.

Thank you once again for your detailed thoughts - it helps us immensely when it comes to improving our game! We really appreciate you taking the time to give these insights to us and for giving our demo a try. 😊

[Elveone]

Originally posted by yellowbrickgames_devs:

Hey there! Thank you so so much for the detailed feedback.

We are working on an action plan to address the feedback we've been receiving on combat and inventory, so please stay tuned!

As for anti-aliasing, bloom, etc. - we've noted this down with the team, as well.

Thank you once again for your detailed thoughts - it helps us immensely when it comes to improving our game! We really appreciate you taking the time to give these insights to us and for giving our demo a try. 😊

Thank you! I will keep an eye on the game!

[IchigoMait]

Ambient Occlusion is shadows -.- in the corner of objects where there is/should be less lighting.

AA setting you do not want to disable in unreal engine games, unless you like play on a small monitor with 4k or use 150-200% scaling while having no fps.
Basically all unreal engine 4/5 games look aliased garbage without TAA or TSR when using 100% scaling.
But you do you.
I rather enjoy smooth image, with no aliasing, with fps to spare so I can max everything out.

Post Processing effects are:
Bloom
Chromatic Aberration
Depth of Field
Lens Flare
Motion Blur (2 types)
Vignette

Game seems to be an unreal engine 5 game, so you could just adjust
[ConsoleVariables]
r.Tonemapper.Quality
in engine.ini to disable all the post processing effects
unless the devs locked the settings or it's constantly overwritten or it's "setbycode".

[Elveone]

Originally posted by IchigoMait:

Ambient Occlusion is shadows -.- in the corner of objects where there is/should be less lighting.

AA setting you do not want to disable in unreal engine games, unless you like play on a small monitor with 4k or use 150-200% scaling while having no fps.
Basically all unreal engine 4/5 games look aliased garbage without TAA or TSR when using 100% scaling.
But you do you.
I rather enjoy smooth image, with no aliasing, with fps to spare so I can max everything out.

Post Processing effects are:
Bloom
Chromatic Aberration
Depth of Field
Lens Flare
Motion Blur (2 types)
Vignette

Game seems to be an unreal engine 5 game, so you could just adjust
[ConsoleVariables]
r.Tonemapper.Quality
in engine.ini to disable all the post processing effects
unless the devs locked the settings or it's constantly overwritten or it's "setbycode".

There is really no need for the condescending attitude here - ask yourself if I would be asking to be able to disable something if I didn't know exactly what it does. If you like what you see then more power to you. I do not and I do not really want to have to manually edit config files in order to change something that should be a basic configuration in every game. I'm not saying that I would not but that I should not have to hence why it is something worth mentioning as a minor point in a big feedback post.

[IchigoMait]

Originally posted by Elveone:

Originally posted by IchigoMait:

Ambient Occlusion is shadows -.- in the corner of objects where there is/should be less lighting.

AA setting you do not want to disable in unreal engine games, unless you like play on a small monitor with 4k or use 150-200% scaling while having no fps.
Basically all unreal engine 4/5 games look aliased garbage without TAA or TSR when using 100% scaling.
But you do you.
I rather enjoy smooth image, with no aliasing, with fps to spare so I can max everything out.

Post Processing effects are:
Bloom
Chromatic Aberration
Depth of Field
Lens Flare
Motion Blur (2 types)
Vignette

Game seems to be an unreal engine 5 game, so you could just adjust
[ConsoleVariables]
r.Tonemapper.Quality
in engine.ini to disable all the post processing effects
unless the devs locked the settings or it's constantly overwritten or it's "setbycode".

There is really no need for the condescending attitude here - ask yourself if I would be asking to be able to disable something if I didn't know exactly what it does. If you like what you see then more power to you. I do not and I do not really want to have to manually edit config files in order to change something that should be a basic configuration in every game. I'm not saying that I would not but that I should not have to hence why it is something worth mentioning as a minor point in a big feedback post.

You should try to read what you write.
Maybe try to imagine someone wrote that to you.

[Concrete]

The level 2 Ice wall last much longer. You simply have the weaker version of it.

[Elveone]

Originally posted by IchigoMait:

Originally posted by Elveone:

There is really no need for the condescending attitude here - ask yourself if I would be asking to be able to disable something if I didn't know exactly what it does. If you like what you see then more power to you. I do not and I do not really want to have to manually edit config files in order to change something that should be a basic configuration in every game. I'm not saying that I would not but that I should not have to hence why it is something worth mentioning as a minor point in a big feedback post.

You should try to read what you write.
Maybe try to imagine someone wrote that to you.

Dude, not sure what your problem is but you should probably follow your own advice. Have fun!