Post Jam assessment

Okay so after hearing responses and after the game jam is finished, I wanted to go ahead and gather my thoughts.

Mostly, I've been told the combat system is difficult to understand.  Some said that the number of available moves was too much, and a lot told me that they resorted to spamming (something I was really trying to make unappealing).  

In the ones that made videos, there were two main things I noticed:

Players didn't engage with the TP gauge system, which is odd, as I didn't really mess with the system.  Players didn't use the standard attack or guard much, which would have really helped charge the TP gauge and access higher power moves quickly.  I didn't really explain it, but would having explained a basic system be worse?  Couldn't it be seen as patronizing, and lead to the player checking out?  Not sure how to explain that more without disengaging the player in the process.

Second, though related, is that players spent most of the play time using moves that were intended to be situational, leading to the players making slow or little progress, while the opponent took the offensive and started doing the actual damage.  Due to how it was set up, the low damage moves do single digits in damage, but had high stun.  They're cheap to be available when the player needs them, but this seemed to signal players that they were instead meant to be used often, and the high cost and high damaging moves sparingly (if at all).

I got some suggestions that the moveset should have been smaller.  Thinking on it, I believe two of the moves could be cut.  One is the lesser counter (in the neutral stance), which was supposed to be not as good as the one in solid stance by having less priority, meaning that it could be outpaced by faster moves from the opponent.  This aspect, while interesting for strategy, isn't stated, and would be unnecessary with other things to have on mind instead.  The other is the quick thrust, which is just mediocre at everything, which might be why a lot of people spammed it instead of using the standard attack, rather than being a safe standby if the player wasn't sure if they needed to try for stun on that round.

I got a lot of advice that my maps should be shrunk down, and I have to agree with the sentiment.  I often work in a top down fashion on the maps, setting their size, then building the basic structure before filling it, giving myself a bit of a sunk-cost fallacy where I don't want to reverse and rebuild what I've already done, though I, clearly, sometimes should.

SPOILER HERE, I guess

I got split reactions to the 'twist' ending, some liked it, some didn't.  I feel like this may be because, with the game being so short, I didn't get to set it up as much as I had originally wanted.  There is very little characterization for Carol, not enough to make it clear that the test of character is necessary, and the only foreshadowing is some of Kris' lines before the final fight.  I'ld like to think that with a couple of more scenes (perhaps by encountering other obstacles/puzzles on the way up the mountain) Carol's ego could have been more emphasized, making the secret test of character more reasonable, and giving opportunity to hint that there is more going on.

If anyone who tried this game would care to discuss some of this with me, or share any other thoughts or insights, it would be very much appreciated.  Either way, thanks again to those who played and offered sincere feedback.