This is a great game. I think the learning curve is about right. I had only planned to try it out for a bit, and ended up spending an hour and a half until I beat the boss at the end. One thing I am wondering about is the viability of different strategies. The game gives off the impression that the different set bonuses and skill choices should all be viable, given different playstyles, and that may be true. I wonder how balanced it really is though. Getting a 3-piece fire set early gives STR a real boost, and the 2-piece wind set + berserk makes getting through the later stages quite manageable. I also ended up using hail and reflect, and this, along with decent item RNG, got me through the final boss the first time I reached them. It was a lot of fun and maybe I'll be back to try some other strategies another day. Maybe an INT based build using Execute plus a Sword skill would work... Great game!
Thanks for the detailed feedback :) One paradigm I employed was instead of worrying about total balance, I just wanted some things to feel stronger than others in certain phases of the game. For example the earth set is built on survivability, and lets you push far early on when things are still a big threat. Similarly, the stats waver in usefulness as well, depending on what builds are open to you at the time. I purposely kept max INT as a great end game strategy as a cherry on top if you made it that far and could figure it out. So you are correct in your observations! The balance is not totally around playstyles, but also/mostly around what phase of the game you're in. I personally enjoy that sort of dynamic vs say, picking a stealth playstyle because I like stealth and just sticking with it the whole game.
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Thanks for the detailed feedback :) One paradigm I employed was instead of worrying about total balance, I just wanted some things to feel stronger than others in certain phases of the game. For example the earth set is built on survivability, and lets you push far early on when things are still a big threat. Similarly, the stats waver in usefulness as well, depending on what builds are open to you at the time. I purposely kept max INT as a great end game strategy as a cherry on top if you made it that far and could figure it out. So you are correct in your observations! The balance is not totally around playstyles, but also/mostly around what phase of the game you're in. I personally enjoy that sort of dynamic vs say, picking a stealth playstyle because I like stealth and just sticking with it the whole game.