Much of the appeal of this game is watching pixels slowly filling squares. But when we're upgrading lower levels, we're just looking at a full square that occasionally flashes. It would be great if it always displayed the top-level pixels, with the color matching the level we've selected from the bar on the left.
Why progression slows: Every 25 gens you buy, production doubles, and cost increases x32. (Cost doubles every 5 gens.) That's an incredibly steep wall, so grinding isn't an option. That leaves Prestige. Prestige cost doubles every 10 Prestige points, and when upgrades cost 10 or 20 Prestige points, each upgrade costs 2x or 4x what the previous one cost. When an upgrade gives +5 to one Gen, that doesn't make a measurable impact on production, but purchasing that upgrade DOUBLES the cost of the next upgrade. To balance it, think about how much impact you want per upgrade, then make Prestige costs go up in line with that. Example: +25 to a Gen doubles that gen's production, which is +20% overall production, so if all Tier 3 upgrades were in line with that, then a smooth progression would have Prestige cost go up around 30% every 10 points, or about 2.5% per level (down from 7% now). Hope that sparks some ideas, and thanks for a fun minimalist game! (BTW I pitched in on your Patreon.)
One more balance suggestion: Gens 2-4 all produce around the same amount (with the same pixels invested in upgrading them). Gen 1 produces far less. If Gen 1 doubled every 25 levels, instead of every 50 levels, it would probably be balanced with Gens 2-4. (Gen 5 also produces far less because it doesn't have a doubling ability, at least, not that I've seen yet.)
Really slowing down at the very end of Teir 3. Part of the reason is Gen5 doesn't have a "Doubles every 25 you buy." If you added that in Teir 3 (perhaps in place of one of the "Free Gen 5" upgrades, which are too small to be impactful), that could help a lot.
With the update, balance feels pretty good. At 270 prestige, almost done with teir 3. Yeah, a little slow for the last few points of teir 3, but no grindier than other idles. Great game.
If auto-collect was on when I closed the game, please have it be on when I open the game. So frustrating to activate the offline boost and waste boost time realizing auto-collect is off.
Starting with free generators is actually really good. They double in cost for every 5 you buy, so +5 free gens is the same as "gens cost half price." +10 is "gens cost 1/4 price." This is also why the free Gen1 is good (once you get to teir 3 and it can buff the Gen2s.)
The center skill for Teir 3 promotions (Every 10 points of Gen 1 gives Gen 2 a +2 boost) -- it doesn't appear to do that. It boosts Gen2 far more. The actual result seems pretty good, but it would be nice if the text said what it actually did. Thanks for the fun game!
The power of prestige points is linear (once you've gotten the final skill in the upper left and lower right quadrants), but the time / pixels it takes to get them is exponential. This is one of the central problems, and the reason the game starts to drag. Adding another linear bonus tied to prestige points doesn't fix this. If filling a quadrant doubled the bonus, this would introduce an exponential and make the prestige points worth getting late-game (past 40 points).
Great concept. Enjoyed for a day. As everyone says, too much slowdown at Gen 4. Main issue really is that upgrades are too weak -- the Auto Collect and bonus per 10th and 25th Gen are great, but the other two quadrants are worthless, and an extra 5% or 10% aren't going to take you much further. If the clone was buffed (like double production for several minutes) and the upper right quadrant was replaced with something worth getting (like reduced cost of Gens), then we'd be able to advance. Still, fun game and great concept, thanks for making it!
(http://www.kongregate.com/forums/4-game-programming/topics/590137-gitd-50-voting)Sorry for the inconvenient, I will change it later. Voting rule is that you need to choose two games that you like and leave a comment in that thread, that's all.
Agile red doesn't seem to be working. I avoided all the light orange rocks, got past 500, didn't get award. Did it again, still no award. If "Barriers" means something different, text needs to be clearer.
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 "Reach the core"){kind=icon}
(http://www.kongregate.com/forums/4-game-programming/topics/590137-gitd-50-voting)Sorry for the inconvenient, I will change it later. Voting rule is that you need to choose two games that you like and leave a comment in that thread, that's all.