Okay, I'm done

[AceJaster67]

I have tried since the malicious towers were introduced to play around with them and have had less than 5 opportunities. This is over the course of many dozens of games played. The game simply REFUSES to give me the starting perk of getting malicious towers to begin the game.

You cannot take the jester tower on the first round. You will lose by round two. And whenever I get it later in the game I've already got a successful build going so the Jester would just get in the way.

[A Ballad from Nocturne]

They aren't good, even if you get the starting bonus it's super unlikely to get anything that allows you to survive long enough to craft a build. These towers are meant to be a hindrance, if you read the patch notes it says that they are supposed to be something that clogs up store slots on higher difficulties. Going by that I feel as if the Malicious towers simply aren't meant to be much more than a detriment, especially in early waves. Jester is indeed not a good tower early on (and it isn't later on either, to be fair).

At best they can be run in builds that already would win, I don't think I had a single game still where they contributed to the win, they just make things awkward and more difficult, what I assume is their purpose. Not sure what the purpose of adding Jester is other than give players a way to try out the malicious towers and get an idea how to avoid having runs destroyed by them, it's kinda odd in my opinion.

[AceJaster67]

Originally posted by A Ballad from Nocturne:

, it's kinda odd in my opinion.

It's not simply odd, I feel as if the game is going in a bad direction. But it would hardly be the first game to have a great premise and then go off the rails. It's already frustrating enough that you can stack the odds in your favor all you want and get screwed. And it's frustrating that you can lose slots to towers you can't even afford. But this is just a whole new level.

And to be fair I completely get that it's a game involving some random chance. But the game seems to actively work against any skill you have, and the malicious towers are just icing on that depraved cake. I don't understand what you're supposed to take away from the game when you get a perk you want, get starting towers you want, then get nothing and lose forcing you to wait another umpteen games before things line up correctly again. Adding in towers that sandbag you like that doesn't make the game more challenging, it just demands more patience from you. And it certainly doesn't make it more rewarding to win.

I just don't know. But until the next update, at least, I doubt I'm playing this game any more.

[A Ballad from Nocturne]

As far as the Malicious towers are concerned I definitely feel you. Going by what the patchnotes say though I'm not sure if Jester is even going to be a thing on normal difficulty once the game releases & the Malicious towers definitely aren't going to randomly pop up outside of higher difficulties.

Can't wholeheartedly disagree about there not being many reliable strategies, a lot of them require either luck or scumming the game by repeatedly quitting to the main menu to reroll either the rewards from the boss or to have another tower be rerolled into higher rarity.

The thing I take most issue with is just how many quite useless things exist in terms of boss rewards and starting bonuses, which also ties in with your criticism of stuff being too random. Randomness wouldn't be an issue as much if the different choices all would have the potential to forge a winning run, but they certainly do not.

[Ainz Ooal Gown]

some malicious towers can be good, IF teamed up correctly. milk tower + mosquito tower + Berserk tower. makes you have a better glass tower as mosquito tower can take multiple hits. since berserk takes 3 health and gives 2 damage. if you get the cow tower then you will also be increasing health per milk instead of staying at 1 health, down sides are your main tower will be at 1 HP too and only have 2 slots in the shop. don't know the strength of it later or level 2 or up.

[A Ballad from Nocturne]

Originally posted by Ainz Ooal Gown:

some malicious towers can be good, IF teamed up correctly. milk tower + mosquito tower + Berserk tower. makes you have a better glass tower as mosquito tower can take multiple hits. since berserk takes 3 health and gives 2 damage. if you get the cow tower then you will also be increasing health per milk instead of staying at 1 health, down sides are your main tower will be at 1 HP too and only have 2 slots in the shop. don't know the strength of it later or level 2 or up.

Yeah that would work if you get lucky enough (early on it just will make you loose quickly) and also requires a setup that would in most cases run better without the malicious towers. It's not that they are a guaranteed loss but they really don't do anything other towers can't do more reliably, with less downsides or even just outright better.

[Kraal FictionWriter]

I think some of you are being overly critical for no good reason. Like Nocturne said, the patch notes read "In the full version, Malicious Towers will spawn on their own in the Tower Store on higher game difficulties." Their presence in the *demo* version is to give you a preview of how they could affect you.

This game is going in the wrong direction? Please. It's so difficult to see what direction it's going in with the very short demo. Relax, and maybe come back later when there's more stuff to do.

[A Ballad from Nocturne]

Originally posted by Kraal FictionWriter:

I think some of you are being overly critical for no good reason. Like Nocturne said, the patch notes read "In the full version, Malicious Towers will spawn on their own in the Tower Store on higher game difficulties." Their presence in the *demo* version is to give you a preview of how they could affect you.

This game is going in the wrong direction? Please. It's so difficult to see what direction it's going in with the very short demo. Relax, and maybe come back later when there's more stuff to do.

That is also a fair point, some things clearly don't really have an impact in stage 1 and 2 yet & especially something like the Tower of Debt has a high potential upside, but there is no way to make it work within the first 2 stages (unless one is really lucky) as those usually are what it takes to craft the foundations of a winning run. Same with Jester for e.g., I won runs with it & Malicious towers but the demo literally ends just when they start to really get rolling.

[Wesley Sniper]

I feel like the detrimental towers aren't meant for the initial royal tower...They are probably meant for the necro looking royal tower, and they are just annoyance for the other royal towers like someone else said.

[A Ballad from Nocturne]

Originally posted by Wesley Sniper:

I feel like the detrimental towers aren't meant for the initial royal tower...They are probably meant for the necro looking royal tower, and they are just annoyance for the other royal towers like someone else said.

The Patch Notes say they are meant to be a thing that is tied to the difficulty settings. If anything they will probably be different for each tower (the current ones all are kinda fairytale themed, like the royal tower) but they are just supposed to be a nuisance, though they can do things for the run under specific circumstances.

[Sepidaceous]

I've played this game a LOT. I work remote and as long as I can stop and play at anytime it's fine if I multi-task and game a bit with something like this. I've been interested in learning game development and have thoughts of participating in a Game Jam sometime. So I've been devouring demos recently just trying to do some research while enjoying a variety of games. I've played dozens and dozens of demos and I'd say... this one has top potential from what I've seen so far. The issue is... there's barely any of the game to really base that opinion on. I'm just going off potential.

However... the Malicious Towers are a flop. I understand the premise of it... but it just doesn't work. There are too many towers and not enough slots to draw. The RNG makes Jester synergy... horrible. Out of hundreds of games I've only been able to get the Jester/Malicious combo twice... and it wasn't worth it. The Jester is not good enough of a unit to justify Malicious Towers wasting space and causing debuffs to you on the field. The rewards just aren't worth it. Even if Jester was getting +5/+5 I don't know if it'd make much of a difference. There's just too many other good combos to worry about wasting time with Malicious Towers and Jester. It just needs to be expanded on and tweaked a bit before becoming viable.

However I just ignored them... because the game barely has any content. Maybe it'll become more realistic to use with other builders once those unlocks or maybe there will be more added to it or different game modes. No idea... but for the purpose of the demo -- I wish it wasn't added. Just takes up rolling space and wastes your RNG.

[Pedra]

Originally posted by AceJaster67:

I The game simply REFUSES to give me the starting perk of getting malicious towers to begin the game.

there is a bug. if you select your starting perk. but you go back to the main screen before the towers spawn. you will get a new set of starting perks. use this to select the run you want

[Wesley Sniper]

Originally posted by Sepidaceous:

I've played this game a LOT. I work remote and as long as I can stop and play at anytime it's fine if I multi-task and game a bit with something like this. I've been interested in learning game development and have thoughts of participating in a Game Jam sometime. So I've been devouring demos recently just trying to do some research while enjoying a variety of games. I've played dozens and dozens of demos and I'd say... this one has top potential from what I've seen so far. The issue is... there's barely any of the game to really base that opinion on. I'm just going off potential.

However... the Malicious Towers are a flop. I understand the premise of it... but it just doesn't work. There are too many towers and not enough slots to draw. The RNG makes Jester synergy... horrible. Out of hundreds of games I've only been able to get the Jester/Malicious combo twice... and it wasn't worth it. The Jester is not good enough of a unit to justify Malicious Towers wasting space and causing debuffs to you on the field. The rewards just aren't worth it. Even if Jester was getting +5/+5 I don't know if it'd make much of a difference. There's just too many other good combos to worry about wasting time with Malicious Towers and Jester. It just needs to be expanded on and tweaked a bit before becoming viable.

However I just ignored them... because the game barely has any content. Maybe it'll become more realistic to use with other builders once those unlocks or maybe there will be more added to it or different game modes. No idea... but for the purpose of the demo -- I wish it wasn't added. Just takes up rolling space and wastes your RNG.

Jester could have some potential if he got +x/+x when you put a malicious tower on the board being X their atk/def...

[LaQcaracha]

Originally posted by Pedra:

Originally posted by AceJaster67:

I The game simply REFUSES to give me the starting perk of getting malicious towers to begin the game.

there is a bug. if you select your starting perk. but you go back to the main screen before the towers spawn. you will get a new set of starting perks. use this to select the run you want

I wish this wasn´t a bug, but a feature. Playing without it would waste a LOT of time with 'fight to round 5 and restart' runs and honestly also take a lot of replayability out of the current demo.

[Pedra]

that one time i made a malicious tower work
other than that they are pretty hard/useless to use

https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198006774768/screenshot/2538423216302861240/

[AceJaster67]

Originally posted by Kraal FictionWriter:

This game is going in the wrong direction? Please. It's so difficult to see what direction it's going in with the very short demo. Relax, and maybe come back later when there's more stuff to do.

The game seems to be going in the wrong direction because of the poor implementation of the malicious towers. You're technically right that it could shape up. But heuristics are a thing and you can't dismiss my experience just because you don't see the dots I'm lining up.

This game doesn't seem to be terribly complex and the developer seems to have some solid ideas. But development seems slow. Would be far from the first game that had a good demo or launch and then petered out. First red flag. And miss me with the "the dev has a life and things to do" That's the point. If we never got another update this game would be in a pretty sad state.

The game also has some balancing issues around stats and RNG. Some towers early on are just an immediate win. Obsidian or Butler on the first turn is pretty much a win. Unless you are just outrageously unlucky. Other combos exist but making them work is tedious or impossible. You need so many things to line up and it gives the game so many opportunities to deny you that it hollows out the victory. Anything is possible with enough time, that's not an expression of skill. That's a second red flag.

Finally, the malicious towers. This is a deterministic game with some element of luck. Very little of which can be influenced by you. So the malicious towers offer very little reward for a lot of needless risk. As they stand they just don't work well and you're better off ignoring the. But THAT is the issue. Now there is slightly more stuff... and you just ignore it because its not worth it. A malicious tower can easily end your run for a bonus that wouldn't have saved you. And this ties in to what I said before about not getting the towers you need. Now there are even more towers to get that will be a straight middle finger if you draw them. We don't know how they will be implemented. But we also don't know that the developer won't turn this game into a first person golfing simulator on the next update. And if you say, "That's ridiculous. That won't happen", then you are probably using the same heuristic methods I am to come to that conclusion.