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The cons are what I'll focus on
1 - Balance is lacking, they've yet to balance equipment and stuff... one fraction of a weapons add (gems that give skills and stats) can easily be better than every other piece of equipment your character can use, and you can get 10-15 of them on a weapon
2 - The number and types of spells / attacks are lacking, most still just have level 1 types, lots of things are clearly in the game planning wise but not in (types of damage)
3 - The balance between characters is sorely lacking... they range from passable to utterly and completely useless
4 - Enemies are often reskins of each other
5 - The world map is effectively reused 99% dead space
6 - Chests even in content now are giving you items that would be the diablo 2 equilivelant of a cracked sash... tucked away behind a cliff in a crack... an utterly worthless reward... every single time
7 - They drop mechanics that they've put in (the nekka cat search isn't really a thing, but even when it was it was to dig up useless items that you don't remotely need)
8 - They don't finish mechanics and quests they've put in (crystal shards, 99% of the quests not having any indication of where they are (well 25% now they've fixed a bunch))
9 - Story isn't really anything to write home about, its basically traditional RPG fare with an emo element thrown in
10 - Lots of bugs, lots of getting stuck bugs, lots of game crashing or getting locked into infinite loading screen bugs, lots of falling through the map, lots of fights where you can't reach the enemy and they can't reach you, lots of lots of bugs
This all sounds fixable with more development time. Doesnt seem too concerning.
TLDR : We agree there are some aspects that needs improvements : we're working on it.
1 - Bonus granted by the weapons are smaller than the sum of insetted gems, true. But it still amounts to the value of 5 to 6 gems (which varies depending on the weapon rarity.)
ALSO the level of the weapon, and the type of weapon directly changes the amount of possible gems to inset in the weapon, directly affecting the possible stats bonuses.
ON TOP OF THAT WAIT WAIT WAIT IT'S NOT FINISHED : every weapons has a different crystarium, with, often, different bonus on each gem slot (which also contributes to the weapon stat value)
Weapons and gems may seem superficial at first (=> "only gems are important") but they're not.
We will still check this balance before the release (and the balance of the game in general)
2 - We agree. More spells are coming! They're mostly done. We had hoped to be able to ship them for Chapter 6's release, but we had to prioritize the new character, so they wouldn't be bucknaked at the moment of their grand debut.
3 - New spells will probably change this a bit, but clearly we'll have to check the balance with some party members.
4 - More enemies are coming. For now, a rough count puts us along 70-ish different types of enemies. For some of them (mainly animal-type monsters) we've iterated different versions : young / adult / BOSS / Corroded. Like the Dunrrawn, Dunrir & Uralik & Corroded Dunrir. Boss versions got some extra polish (just check the Uralik! CHECK ITTTTT) but we can totally hear that there is some redundancy. We are putting active efforts to put more monsters into the game.
5 - 99% might seem a little harsh, but the last stretch of development will populate several areas with sidequests, npcs, and sidecontent. I obviously can't be specific on any kind of percentage here, but it will be addressed in several ways.
6-7 : yup, needs some polish. Putting every on-curve loot, manually, takes time.
8 : By now, all sidequest markers should show properly (except for some quests which need investigation/searching) In any case, if you notice some of them still missing their markers, please tell us.
9 : In all honesty, we are receiving a lot of positive appreciations on the storyline in our Google Form (which every player can use when they exit the game), so it'll probably stay as is. (Even if the "Inn Dialogue Scenes" will provide more insight into the story, characters, etc.) But then again, we can totally hear it if the story's not up your alley, and any specific criticism's welcome!
10 : We are fixing bugs. It takes time. But if you could help us with a bug report (on the ESC menu) it would be an invaluable help to us.
I hope this didn't sound too debunk-ish, but then again I jumped on this opportunity to be a little transparent on where we stand on these topics. We can't quantify how many quests, spells, monsters, etc. we will be able to add into the final game, but you can expect changes on these fronts.
We're still just a handful of people, aiming to do the best we can to put a cool JRPG for everyone to play. :3
Thanks for taking the time to write this (because it's useful ++ to us) and for buying and supporting the game, we really appreciate both.
So again to reiterate the above - the games worth a buy, it has some promise, but is not perfect, like many it has flaws
On a true scale of 1 - 10 (not the typical everything's a 9 or 10 scale that companies rate on, where nothing has ever gotten lower than a 7) but on an honest to goodness 1 - 10 bell curve scale, where 1 is abysmal and 10 is ground breaking with replay value
this is a 6 with room to grow.
Its better than average, worse than amazing and if you like to play RPG's this can scratch an itch
As for the bug reports, most of the ones I've mentioned have been bug reported through several patches and remain issues, not as omnipresent as before [where early in development it could be 33% of the battles unwinnable] but still issues.
Most of the crashes, softlocks, hardlocks, have been addressed but a few more keep getting put in.
As for story, I consider most games to have poor to barely adequate story, I've read a lot, watched a lot, played a lot and written a lot, so my bar might be higher than some. The other downside to playing a game in a fragmented EA form is that you don't get the whole of the story at once, you get a chunk, wait 6 months, get a chunk, wait 3 months, get a backstory chunk, wait 3 months get a chunk.
99% might be a bit of an under statement, lots of areas (like most games to be fair) are linear paths from story fragment A to story fragment B without much of a detour in between. But the new map content put in is almost entirely devoid of content. It gives the world size, but makes it feel empty and not lived in. Aside from scripted random world events (of which their are what 4? that cycle and are pretty similar to each other) you won't see any hint of life in the world.
No random animals going about, no hunters out hunting, no battles being fought in the distance. Its one of those world that revolves entirely around the player character (as is so often the case with anything tagged RPG)
What really makes it stick out is that you accomplish nothing from being in those areas, no hidden chest behind the waterfall (and if their was it would be a basic healing potion), very rarely do you find a special monster encounter,
It's a good post and actually addresses some of my concerns as a holiday sale buyer. I did want to further clarify some of your points if that's ok.
I personally enjoy the weapon leveling, my issue right now is that new, quality weapons are extremely rare. I'm still using the same sword and staff I looted in chapter 1 because I have yet to find anything higher level. I even crafted a shaman staff and it doesn't provide anything approaching the damage output of Selene's current focus staff (also I got the recipe to craft the shaman staff back in chapter 1 and haven't gotten a single weapon recipe since).
Even when I find a decent weapon its crystal paths seem to be extremely limited (such as the shaman staff). I get there's an element of risk reward to changing out weapons but weapons from the first hour shouldn't still be head and shoulders above anything you can find or buy 2 chapters later.
I do think a huge part of the combat balancing issue is that for so long you have to fight with just 2 characters, and many of the random encounters seem balanced for a full party. Having such a limited ability to heal and do damage makes grinding out encounters a chore (not to mention dangerous).
At this point in development I'm not expecting a full overhaul of the combat system but please at least consider updating movement to allow us to use certain items or skills after a move so it's at least a bit smoother and faster. So many fights right now are just running in circles and trying to squeeze off occasional attacks or, worse, dying to an area of effect you didn't see coming because enemies seem to get 2 attacks for every 1 you can pull off. Some of the fights almost feel designed to troll the player. I read a review that said the game will presumably be adding yakkedy sax to the battle sound track and it was spot on.
Also since mercenaries seem to be a thing in the world would it be a viable option to temporarily hire party members? They wouldn't level up, change equipment or crystals, and wouldn't be useable in certain main quests but could at least make getting across maps and fulfilling side quests a bit less tedious before you have a full party (which is an incredibly long time in gameplay compared to similar games).
To respond to the OP:
I think the game's early access development shows. Party members are very limited for a huge section of the game and the swap out members option in the party screen just sits there, taunting you with the promise that if you hold out long enough you too may end up with such a glut of options to use in combat you could actually have a reserve. It's pretty clear playing the game which mechanics and characters were added later in development and just kind of pasted over the initial releases, if that makes sense. It also feels like certain chapters have gotten more of a second look than others now that the game is hitting late development.
It's overall been a good game so far but the flaws are beginning to make it a chore to play now that I've hit chapter 3 with the same 2 characters, weapons, and spells as I had in chapter 1. The writing is actually pretty good though inconsistent (I honestly dislike the protagonist) and the voice acting almost universally spot on. Boss design is just straight up bad and apparently hasn't improved much if you go back through discussions on this forum, but other than that and some needed improvements to existing systems it's actually a really nice love letter to JRPG's. Visually stunning and a nice soundtrack.
The open world is almost too big with how little is going on, a lot of time is spent running between points on the map, and the sprint function has limitations so it doesn't help much. That said I do like the sleep mechanics and energy bar although, like so many other things it should get a bit more of an update. It seems like cooking would be very easy to add, with herbs, campfires, and eating in inns already in the game.
Personally I'm hoping there's an update dedicated entirely to side quests and minigames because there just isn't a ton to do other than fetch quests, hunting, and chasing down the main quest.
You may be best off buying it while it's on sale and waiting to play for the .5 update which will hopefully include some optimizations, rebalancing, and new skills, and maybe even liven up the worlds a bit. If money is less of a concern than a (mostly) finished product then just wait to see what people say when that update releases.