My Feedback

[PhotriusPyrelus]

Surprised to see it unavailable today, I was really hoping to get to play some more.

But after 4 hours I managed to unlock two more Tems.

I really do not like the starting water Tem. Forward-facing abilities aren't nearly as strong as you seem to think they are. Dude has *THREE* abilities that only face forwards. It might not be so bad as it is if controller support worked for me, but it didn't. It's a bit easier to flick a thumbstick 'backwards' then resume walking 'forwards' than to do that with WASD. Mouse controls felt REALLY weird and I couldn't get the hang of it.

Really wish the duration/cooldown bars had an option to be more central to the screen. And that they were more accurate. I would turn into enemies when the water shield ability's bar filled, and it would be 2 more seconds until it popped up.

The one really nice thing about the water Tem was his ult. I really missed that 'screen-clear' on the other two Tems.

The electric Tem's ult wasn't too bad, though.

The tech Tem's ult seemed pretty awful, though. And unlocks requiring damage from a seemingly entirely random, non-tracking AoE is an unlock I would never, ever get. That goes double for the dash which apparently causes damage, but only after some pansun investment?

Overall, the electric Tem felt by far the best from what little I played of him (meant to get back to him today, but so much for that). The tech Tem felt really tanky, but he didn't have nearly enough damage.

Unlocks really need tooltips on the post-game summary screen where they're unlocked. The proper unlock screen is *way* too artsy for me. I can't tell anything from it, it was 95% useless for me. Literally the only utility I got out of it was spending way too long on the screen to figure out how to unlock other Tems.

Limited to 4 gear slots feels really bad when you have SO MANY gear you can get. But at the same time, it is nice to be able to actually get the upgrades you want. Once you get all four slots full, it seems like you're so much more likely to get upgrades for what you have rather than new options to replace them.

Speaking of SO MANY gear, gear unlocking feels bad. It dilutes the pool of upgrades you can see in a game. You unlock Holster *very* early, and holster is extremely strong. So you actually get weaker (because you won't see Holster as early or often) the more gear you unlock. ...but this is a fundamental problem with Rogue Likes and I'm not sure how to 'fix' it, unless you give the player a 'deck' of preferred upgrades he is much more likely to see. Big enough to not guarantee his build, but small enough to not feel like you'll never get a build you like because you've unlocked too many things.

Level-up screen needs some kind of reroll function. Alternatively or additionally Pansuns could always be an option, so levels where nothing you want gets offered you still get some kind of benefit (instead of taking a gear you don't want and replacing it later, which is a complete waste of a level).

I still have no idea about the difference between white and green XP cubes.

The boxes for the objectives and bosses are *huge*! They offer so many upgrades it becomes very easy to actually max out your stuff if you go do them. It's very confusing to me why sometimes I get 2 upgrades and <50 pansuns, and sometimes I get 5 or more upgrades and several hundred pansuns. But still, it's always well worth the effort to do it.

The graphical style is charming, and very clear.

I don't really like most Survivors games (but I keep giving them chances to change my mind) and despite all my critiques, I actually did enjoy this one. I look forward to typing mattering, and if it does now, it needs to be more clear.

[Victory]

Forward facing abilities made the 2nd map boss near impossible. Took me almost 5 minutes to kill :)

[vehx]

Parroting your feedback; in general, there are far too many forced-direction and random abilities in general, especially since you are locked to elements on the temtem itself. Having some is fine but too many are like this. It would be one thing if the movement was much smoother and easier but everything just kind of felt janky.

Game looks fantastic and ran wonderfully and I appreciated the massive amount of meta-progression though.

I did notice that I never saw my Pansun count go up from picking up chests, at least in-game. Seemingly worked and added at the end but a small thing that could be fixed.

[Tam]

For your problem with gear unlocks diluting and worsening the poll of possible gears you get during the game:
Other games like this I played had the option to forbid a weapons (technique here i think?) and passives (gear here). That normally works by giving you a number of forbids, lets say 10.
Then an unwanted gear comes up as a choice, you choose to forbid that one and the choice gets replaced with another as well as the gear in question never comes up again (it is removed from the poll).
Does temtem swarm not have that?

[YaW]

We do have re-rolls and blocks (forbidding an upgrade so it doesn't get suggested again during the run), but those are unlocked later down the line in the meta-progression, they're not available in the playtest/demo.

The same happens with having 4 slots, there are up to 6 slots for both gears and techniques but they need to be unlocked.

[PhotriusPyrelus]

Originally posted by YaW:

We do have re-rolls and blocks (forbidding an upgrade so it doesn't get suggested again during the run), but those are unlocked later down the line in the meta-progression, they're not available in the playtest/demo.

The same happens with having 4 slots, there are up to 6 slots for both gears and techniques but they need to be unlocked.

Nice!

[shrewdlogarithm]

I'm coming to this as a 'survivors' player - I've not played TemTem - and I agree whole-heartedly that multiple "forward facing" abilities are a poor choice and not fun to play

There's also a massive lack of variety in the demo - even with the skilltree unlocked you're just adding small stats here or there - then repeating the same area for a BIT longer but with the same gameplay/build/approach again and again

Survivors games are about mixing styles of attacks attacks which have synergies - they're about herding enemies and defeating them en-masse - not spending long periods running away with the odd turn-back and - feels bad tbh

In fact this feels more like a 'single stick shooter' than a 'survivors' at this point - maybe that was the plan but the title sort-of suggests not??

Maybe it's just that TemTem - maybe others are more varied? If so, your demo isn't selling it to me...

[PhotriusPyrelus]

Originally posted by shrewdlogarithm:

Maybe it's just that TemTem - maybe others are more varied? If so, your demo isn't selling it to me...

I think only having one option to start with is a mistake.

The way I found to make the water dude work though is using Ki Aura and Scratch (might have the names wrong, but it should be similar). Ki Aura is great for dealing with the little guys who get close, and scratch - I think - hits the closest enemies. When you get Holster maxed out, Scratch does excellent boss and good minion damage.

I don't know if anything changed in the update, but I'm having a devil of a time with the electric Temtem this go around. All his abilities are "random nearby target (or worse location)" which is somehow even less fun than 3x forward-facing abilities.

I still haven't figured out how you're supposed to take the control point at like 6 minutes on the first map without taking oodles of damage. x_x

Game has promise, love the art style, models, animation, and music. But the abilities need to be reconsidered. Imagine - for a quick example - if the Toxic Spray ability shot 3 rotating poison sprays out of the TemTem, and Holster added beams.

[Mononon]

Ditto the starting Tem. Way too heavy on the forward facing abilities, and with no way to change direction, it doesn't feel great.

I was fine with the second Tem after some upgrades though.

I never really figured out how to unlock Tems though. Didn't even realize there was a third. That may need to be more obvious. Unlocking characters should be highlighted somewhere.

Not a huge fan of the skill menu either. Seems more confusing than anything. I'm not sure if there's logic to it, but it felt laid out completely randomly, and I wasn't really sure what I was looking at most of the time. It doesn't just have to be a menu, if you want to get fancy. But This strange, unordered blob of hexagons doesn't really do much for me, personally.

Really enjoyed the demo overall though. Not going to play more, since progress probably won't carry over, but I think it's a great demo and a fun start. Some small QoL stuff that could be fixed, but with some updates, it seems like it should be a great addition to this genre.

[shrewdlogarithm]

Originally posted by PhotriusPyrelus:

The way I found to make the water dude work though is using Ki Aura and Scratch (might have the names wrong, but it should be similar).

Yup - but you can't do much damage to the really big enemies with those so you have to fight the 'facing direction' skills which isn't any fun at-all

There are quite a few 'survivors' where existing games have been adapted to the format and which failed because they didn't understand what makes the genre work - it's ALL about being able to survive enormous hordes of enemies - even standing-still - by combining auto-targetting AND auto-firing skills - it's not an ARPG, you don't need to dodge/evade/time your attacks etc. etc.

I'm going to give it one more chance - see if another TemTem improves matters - but as-is, speaking as a 'survivors' player - it's not doing it for me at-all.

p.s. if the devs want an example of a similar game which does everything right - Goobies is the game they should play first - or just play Vampire Survivors perhaps ;0

[shrewdlogarithm]

Also - using a joypad improves the game quite-a-bit as you can 'whip around' more

I tried both mouse modes - nowhere near as good and keyboard just doesn't work for the 'forward facing' stuff AT ALL

I still think it's more "single stick shooter" than anything else - a lot of 'survivors' are closer to 'twin stick shooter' and that's OK >IF< the controls work but as-is, that starting TemTem is HORRIBLE to play on keyboard and not a lot better with a mouse (and bearable but still not that much fun on a pad)

[Ehva Taco]

I agree with the general statement here. Foreward-facing attacks in bullet heavens should be, or evolve into, some of the strongest attacks in the game, due to the inherent nature of this genre. You can't just re-align yourself to aim these attacks - their power must balance out their unwieldiness. And to top it off, they should be in the vast minority of skill types.

The fun in these games is becoming a bullet hell yourself. To dodge death and damage through clever movement or raw power. But this demo made me feel like I was trying to climb a 20-story stairway in a wheelchair. ♥♥♥♥ that.

[Sir Sunkruhm]

As an avid survivors player, I just couldn't stand this one. Random abilities... ok, sure, but make them large and able to hit multiple things easier, and just target random enemies, not completely random directions. Forward facing.. yeah. It's fine to have a stronger clear that is forward facing, but building with the starting Tem is just miserable. All the attacks are too small, weak, long cooldown, and unreliable for what they do, or are otherwise unsatisfying.

It's a shame because it's a very pretty game with a neat idea, but I don't see it going anywhere if they don't drastically improve how it feels to play. If the game doesn't feel good quickly, it will be refunded by a fair number of players. It's fine to lock stuff behind lots of progress, but what's there to START still needs to feel good.

[PewPew]

I can agree with the complaints here. Forward facing abilities are big no no. Devs please play holocure (free on steam) and choose any of the characters there and see what they do in that game. The ability to strafe and lock or control where you attack goes, is crucial if you want to make forward facing moves in a game like this.

[PhotriusPyrelus]

Originally posted by shrewdlogarithm:

p.s. if the devs want an example of a similar game which does everything right - Goobies is the game they should play first - or just play Vampire Survivors perhaps ;0

Goobies (demo) was a fun little 2 hours distraction. Thanks!

[solidwake]

Originally posted by Victory:

Forward facing abilities made the 2nd map boss near impossible. Took me almost 5 minutes to kill :)

Fair! I should have had it defeated but ally spam sucks.