comments for Break the box
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I hope I can the space key to move forward, and in the upgrade screen the star required is under the star and it's really hard to read the number. But overall nice game :D
developer response: I will try to add key mapping to the game, for the "Click", the "Forward" and the quick hotbar items numbers action. And I messed up with the display requirements for upgrades, sorry about that, will fix it 🫡
It was quite fun. The rats taking half your scrap makes them basically a death sentence. And a bit annoyed my save got wiped. Its absolutely a good start for a game if you add more items and variation.
developer response: I'm really sorry about the save files, I failed to realize that using the "persistentDataPath" to save data, was in fact not persistent at all. I will fix it promptly. Thank you for playing and the nice words!
Just small text issue. The description for the Hazard box outlasts the box and cuts off early.
developer response: Thank you for playing and the heads up, will fix it 🫡
How do you play Im on a iPad and i cant break the box
developer response: Sorry, its not mobile compatible, I will try to make it so in the future, thanks for the interest on the game!
possibly the best nodebusterlike i've seen but i hate the rats and they killed a lot of runs, maybe make the indication for their infested boxes more visible if they have one in the first place? but i like this, fun, albeit not varied, but theres quite a few fun stuff to this. if you ever add something like achievements for whatever reason, may I suggest one where you go up to floor 3 whilst only breaking the full wall of boxes? gets easier as you go on, but a fun thing to add nonetheless..
If you continue a run it disables the ability to move forward. You can reenable it by creating a new path forward, but if you leave and continue from a fully wiped wall you are unable to progress that run.
developer response: Ye sorry about that, i'll fix it 🫡. as a heads up since is a visual bug, you can use "W" to move forward without having to rely on screen buttons, and use "1,2,3" to use items in the hotbar. Thank you for playing and reporting the bug!
This was just what my friday afternoon needed
developer response: Thank you for playing <3
I.. seem to have broken it by clicking on the 'ESC' settings button with my mouse click on cooldown, it kept firing, maybe with settings click, it might have been around the same frame as the cooldown reset, by holding it/the input buffering(clicking just before it cools down seems to stay as a click/still count, like a dark souls roll, which is sick) but yeah, exiting that menu keeps the menu cursor, which can't click on boxes. Great start until I broke it lol, incredible ascetics, can easily become a a full inscryption/unfair flips level of cult classic and full steam game, great idea to use places like this to start out and get feedback, the visuals here are so so good!
Forgot to message before after I played more, but here's a reply and also some more notes I had:
- 7-12 seconds is WAY too long for a game that is trying to get you to move so fast. It would also be nice if there was some way to manipulate the rats if you're certain there's one in a box. Maybe rubbing your mouse over a box will shake it instead of attack it to forcefully move the mouse somewhere else, with the tradeoff being the time you're taking to do that?
- There should be a way to upgrade the damage you do to the "touching" boxes, since they're absolutely not worth it for the amount of time it takes to break them, even with as much attack speed as I could muster. Maybe a "glove" item that increases touch damage, or alternatively have some upgrades in the tree for the specific boxes which increases the damage you do to them individually?
- It took me several runs going up to the 6th or so floors to realize that the items in the shops were actually better variants of the ones I already had, as I had been ignoring the shop since they were visually the same as the ones I had. They don't need new icons, but maybe a little visual indicator like a colored border or a small colored dot/chevron in the corner to indicate it's a higher tier variant? The best example for what I'm talking about that I can think of is the Quality system in Factorio's DLC having those colored dots.
Overall there's a lotta promise for the game, just needs some work.
- 7-12 seconds is WAY too long for a game that is trying to get you to move so fast. It would also be nice if there was some way to manipulate the rats if you're certain there's one in a box. Maybe rubbing your mouse over a box will shake it instead of attack it to forcefully move the mouse somewhere else, with the tradeoff being the time you're taking to do that?
- There should be a way to upgrade the damage you do to the "touching" boxes, since they're absolutely not worth it for the amount of time it takes to break them, even with as much attack speed as I could muster. Maybe a "glove" item that increases touch damage, or alternatively have some upgrades in the tree for the specific boxes which increases the damage you do to them individually?
- It took me several runs going up to the 6th or so floors to realize that the items in the shops were actually better variants of the ones I already had, as I had been ignoring the shop since they were visually the same as the ones I had. They don't need new icons, but maybe a little visual indicator like a colored border or a small colored dot/chevron in the corner to indicate it's a higher tier variant? The best example for what I'm talking about that I can think of is the Quality system in Factorio's DLC having those colored dots.
Overall there's a lotta promise for the game, just needs some work.
Playing on galaxy, game locks up sometimes when you press esc and then when you go back to game you cant destroy boxes or go forward, tooltips still work so its not a hard hard lock but you have to restart the run. Also the rats are super annoying you can have a great run and then poof all scrap gone in a sec, games like this you play semi afk watching a movie or something you dont have time to watch a tiny wiggle on a box or whatever it is that shows them, maybe add a gamble scrap or something as a sink instead.
protip: you can hold down the attack button instead of repeatedly hitting it to avoid carpal tunnel and other inefficiencies.
also don't bother with white boxes. unless it's literally floor zero, you'll literally lose more time trying to pop that than nuking an entire max-size wall of hazard boxes.
another thing: INVEST. IN ATTACK SPEED. EARLY!
also don't bother with white boxes. unless it's literally floor zero, you'll literally lose more time trying to pop that than nuking an entire max-size wall of hazard boxes.
another thing: INVEST. IN ATTACK SPEED. EARLY!
I think there's absolutely the bones of something really cool here. It's a "nodebuster" like but I like that there is a bit more strategy to this, choosing how long to stick around in a section if you can get more valuable stuff from the tougher boxes.
If I had any real substantial suggestions, I think a big one is a lack of variety. Items is an obvious one; definitely don't feel like there's much sense in rerolling when a lot of the items are quite boring and have pretty quickly diminishing returns; a flat +1 bonus to base damage stops being as enticing the bigger the number gets, and the box health feels like it outpaces me on that front too. I also personally think the consumables taking a consumable slot and a backpack slot is a bit much, on top of the regular scrap and tape cost. I'd personally make them cost more scrap, but no tape, in return for being, well, strong consumables. I also think some hotkeys for consumables would be a good move too. Items I think are good are things like the Knife, that item that gives you more damage for accumulating scrap, the box cutter that does more damage to blue/green crates, etc. Things that do more than just slightly improve damage.
I think the upgrade tree is kind of boring too, the skills aren't bad but they're quite plain - do more damage, do it faster, have more time. Early on you're only really getting 1 or 2 points at a time and it's hard to justify spending them on increasing the max scrap you get from a box especially early on where that's not really the thing killing my runs. I think some more unique interactions with boxes would be a good way to make that tree more enticing; touch boxes especially because of how they work very quickly become not remotely worth it because you only deal one damage at a slowish rate. I wouldn't be opposed to either upgrades or items that let us open them faster in some way. Other interactions could be like, a temporary boost to damage for blowing up a red crate, relative to how much damage it does? Or maybe even letting you jump over a box on a cooldown?
The rats are another big problem. A 7-12 second wait relative to how much time you have to work with is kind of egregious. The punishment for finding one is also really brutal; that's definitely something that could round out the skill tree or upgrade pool is ways to deal with rats. I don't think it needs to be super easy to find out, it's part of the risk-reward loop of this game, but I think perhaps it would be better to have ways to at least mitigate that risk.
On the whole though, this is all basically stuff that comes with refining a rough idea into something better. If you stick with this, I can see it easily being a worthwhile little game.
If I had any real substantial suggestions, I think a big one is a lack of variety. Items is an obvious one; definitely don't feel like there's much sense in rerolling when a lot of the items are quite boring and have pretty quickly diminishing returns; a flat +1 bonus to base damage stops being as enticing the bigger the number gets, and the box health feels like it outpaces me on that front too. I also personally think the consumables taking a consumable slot and a backpack slot is a bit much, on top of the regular scrap and tape cost. I'd personally make them cost more scrap, but no tape, in return for being, well, strong consumables. I also think some hotkeys for consumables would be a good move too. Items I think are good are things like the Knife, that item that gives you more damage for accumulating scrap, the box cutter that does more damage to blue/green crates, etc. Things that do more than just slightly improve damage.
I think the upgrade tree is kind of boring too, the skills aren't bad but they're quite plain - do more damage, do it faster, have more time. Early on you're only really getting 1 or 2 points at a time and it's hard to justify spending them on increasing the max scrap you get from a box especially early on where that's not really the thing killing my runs. I think some more unique interactions with boxes would be a good way to make that tree more enticing; touch boxes especially because of how they work very quickly become not remotely worth it because you only deal one damage at a slowish rate. I wouldn't be opposed to either upgrades or items that let us open them faster in some way. Other interactions could be like, a temporary boost to damage for blowing up a red crate, relative to how much damage it does? Or maybe even letting you jump over a box on a cooldown?
The rats are another big problem. A 7-12 second wait relative to how much time you have to work with is kind of egregious. The punishment for finding one is also really brutal; that's definitely something that could round out the skill tree or upgrade pool is ways to deal with rats. I don't think it needs to be super easy to find out, it's part of the risk-reward loop of this game, but I think perhaps it would be better to have ways to at least mitigate that risk.
On the whole though, this is all basically stuff that comes with refining a rough idea into something better. If you stick with this, I can see it easily being a worthwhile little game.
This is a pretty interesting mix of nodebuster/roguelike that I haven't really seen before. Nice job!
I really expected some kind of ending screen to pop up after finishing floor 5
it does not seem feasible to get much further
it does not seem feasible to get much further
How are you supposed to deal with the rats? It doesn't feel like there's any real way to handle them, you just see them and then you either do or you don't lose all your scrap and it's really annoying.
Maybe the boxes they're hiding behind can have their tails poking out from under them occasionally or something you need to kinda look out for?
The best way I can describe it is like trying to figure out if a chest is a mimic in DnD or Dark Souls, how there's usually a visual indicator that's really small but still noticeable if you're looking for it.
Maybe the boxes they're hiding behind can have their tails poking out from under them occasionally or something you need to kinda look out for?
The best way I can describe it is like trying to figure out if a chest is a mimic in DnD or Dark Souls, how there's usually a visual indicator that's really small but still noticeable if you're looking for it.
developer response: I added a small box tremble every 7-12 seconds that gives a hint of which one has the rat, so it forces either to take the risk and break it or wait to see the tremble, thank you for playing and the feedback 🫡
I fucked up the save files, and didn't realize it wasn't saving across builds because of how the web builds work. I'm sorry if this was an inconvenience to anyone who was enjoying playing and then just got their progress wiped out. Will do better 🙇
developer response: Should be fixed
Can't spend my 2nd WP point, doesn't say why in console or on screen
A few issues I had:
* No indication that I can use W to move forward unless I'm missing something. I had to check the comments to see that was possible.
* I can kind of gather what some of the other boxes do but it's not entirely clear to me still. An in-game encyclopedia after the first run would be helpful.
* If a number of resources is required to move up to the next floor, that needs to be indicated before reaching the end of the level, right now it just feels bad when I didn't collect enough resources and didn't know what the requirement was. Made me frustrated and I stopped playing.
* If possible, need a way to disable ||some of the CRT-like effects that show up for the run. It's VERY tiring to my eyes and I always turn off CRT-like effects in games. I spent way too much time looking at actual CRT's way too close and it doesn't feel good. ||
That's all I got for now. I'm very interested to see what comes of this in the future days. Any plans for Steam?
developer response: Thank you very much for the feedback! Will look into it 🫡
About two of your points I may have misunderstood:
*About the encyclopedia concept, I gather that you think the menu with all the boxes description + upgrades is still too unclear, or is just something you haven't found yet? (my bad for making it hard to find)
*About the CRT effect, once again it may just be a misunderstanding, but is the slider in the configuration that says "CRT vfx" not working for you?
Besides this two points I will try to make everything else more clear, thank you very much for playing and for the feedback <3.
And about Steam, currently I am working on another game for Steam(is narrative, nothing to do with this one lol) and I did this one in 3 weeks because I was feeling burnout from my main project, so I don't really know if I'll keep working on it until it becomes "Steam worthy", but depending on the reception, who knows. I can imagine a lot of stuff to add to it, but I have fear of sidetracking too much from my main project. I have done that too much already lol. Thank you regardless <3