Redoing this because it is being mean.
My thoughts on the submission (I am not an actual judge)
Gameplay: The gameplay was ok, but it gets pretty boring fairly quick. The main problem is it’s balancing and how it can be blown apart too easily.The aim of the game is to train your two units over the span of a year, which is a year in game (12 months). This can be fairly trivialized as the mechanics where activity points are tied to the lords CON stat, picking High CON classes to be in for the month so you can do more next month, and the mines pay out too much too often, and can lead to a slot machine play-style that works out too well. Here is the amount of money one can obtain as an example.
As a result you can buy skills and stat boosters in abundance, and can result in overpowered units.
Also buying the second seal crashes the game, I don’t know why or what it really does in the context of the class system, but can be fairly noticeable since the items can change upon reload.
Yes this can consistently happen, and given how it can re-randomize some items once you reload it was a little frustrating.
The Class system is a little odd but is understandable enough, the option to pick whatever classes you took up during the training months is neat however I do not know if what class you are in at the end of each month is what you are allowed to keep or if you can be neat for customization sake but I feel like it is too free as they don’t require AP in order to obtain. I respect the choice to have Lee be stuck with unpromoted classes and Athol with only promoted ones.
And the class provided skills can be kept on your unit even after they revert to their base from. So you can have a Summoning Hero if you wanted. (I do know if this is intentional but if it is pretty cool)
And the weaponry you can get at the end of the game is pretty cool but given the money problem it feels like there isn’t much of an issue of what to buy, Ex. the most expensive weapon being Audhulma. While it can be pretty fun to get a quick clear, there should still be some challenge to it. Maybe it would have been if I got a different objective (Mine was the Paladin Kill Boss map).
Making Affinities a purchasable item is actually a great idea and I think that’s really awesome, and is a cool gameplay concept. And making what would normally be promotion items into growth adjusters is a nice touch, though having Knight and Hero Crest being the same is a little odd (CORRECTION: It is not I misremembered in my notes).
The barracks can be arguably better than the Arena and probably should be applied the 2 AP as well, The Arena can be backed out of despite not being fatal isn’t something that should happen since it would be useless, if dying in the arena depleted your AP for the rest of the month maybe or gave a reduction next month it would be better. Also missing with Crits (pretty funny imo no complaints there)
The Fortune Teller will take 500g from you even if you back out of receiving her fortune (this is probably a glitch but is pretty funny).
Also I do not know if the engine is the issue or not but it is not possible to use the D-Pad only the Stick to control the game (Note my controller works fine with MGBA so I know that’s not the issue) Given how in order to experience the different map objectives you would have to redo the entire game again it might be a little bit before I go for a second playthrough since the setup for my initial one felt like a drag.
Considering all of this I would rank the gameplay a 5/10.
Presentation: I think that the presentation is really good! I like your choice of music for the different sections of the game, Some of the tracks reminded me of stuff like Peritune’s Vurdure 3 and somehow Wii-U/3DS results screen music and the choice of overworld and battle music *Chef’s Kiss* Magnificent. There is a case of looping in the Arena after you win as the celebratory jingle will keep looping if you sit there. (I do not know if this is something with the engine or not)I like the choices you used from the Repo as well but I do have some issues with them due to how the Script Log works as some mini-mugs work just fine but some don’t work properly or some don’t have a mini-mug at all.
This can be a little confusing when trying to figure out who was who (granted this feels more of a minor thing but it is still a part of presentation since each NPC has a different portrait) I did notice that the Critical SFX doesn’t play when you land a crit. (not really detrimental but a little odd) The UI is also pretty good.
Also getting to choose gender is nice, I like that. And the CG at the end, I love it when people include stuff like that.
Overall I think I’d rank Presentation a 4/5
Story: The story, I think, is just ok. It doesn’t really do much for me personally at the moment but it is a good start for a full fledged project which this is probably going to be. I think that the friendship between Lee and Athol feels thin, there something that is there but it feels underdeveloped given how fast it feels like to the viewer (with conversations occuring at the end of each season, and the player solely controlling Lee with Athol following right behind), there wasn’t much time to develop them, which given how this is about a year of planning before the actual map feels like it leave much to be desired .
Maybe it would have been better if Athol was the controlled character (since Athol is the Tutor and Lee should be following their lead). Also there isn’t much tactical study I would argue, I think a good idea would to have some talk moments with Lee where Athos would explain different objectives and map variants so it would give the player of something to think about for later and also give more character moments on top.
I would give story a 3/5. I like what is there enough I guess but it doesn’t feel like it’s reached it full potential.
TL;DR Here is my scoring
Gameplay: 5/10
Presentation: 4/5
Story: 3 /5
Total: 12 /20
For a one-chapter hack, I thought the story was pretty interesting and thought-provoking! I also thought the concept of a year-long battle prep was neat! (Kinda reminded me of FE3H’s White Clouds Phase.) I had a blast swapping around the protagonists’ skills and stats, and also testing my luck with the base activities!
I’ll do my best to get something like this added before the contest deadline
otherwise i wouldve loved to have implemented this!