SAGE 2024 - Demo Angels & Demons: Demo #4

Geez, this is SO GOOD! Everything is overflowing with personality, from the lovingly animated sprites to the killer soundtrack, and even the menus. At first glance the battle system is like the one from the Mario & Luigi series, but this one has a lot of additions and tweaks that make it even better. Dunno if you plan on seeling the completed game, but I would gladly pay money for it.

EDIT: Ignore the following. My keyboard sucks. Not the game's fault!
Side note, maybe I'm an idiot but the jump button doesn't work while running to the right. Works fine when running left. This has led to some jumps being a lot more difficult than they should be. I've made do by utilizing the angel's dash a lot, but I have a feeling that will only get me so far.

TechnoSuperguy said:

Geez, this is SO GOOD! Everything is overflowing with personality, from the lovingly animated sprites to the killer soundtrack, and even the menus. At first glance the battle system is like the one from the Mario & Luigi series, but this one has a lot of additions and tweaks that make it even better. Dunno if you plan on seeling the completed game, but I would gladly pay money for it.

Side note, maybe I'm an idiot but the jump button doesn't work while running to the right. Works fine when running left. This has led to some jumps being a lot more difficult than they should be. I've made do by utilizing the angel's dash a lot, but I have a feeling that will only get me so far.

Spoiler

I just played through the dream sequence and watched the prophetic dream cutscene; no clue how long the demo is.

Click to expand...

Howdy! Thanks for checking out the demo, really appreciate the kind words!
As for your input issue, that's what the input test in the first-run sequence is supposed to check for, but I guess I didn't consider that jump/run buttons would be effected too. The issue is hardware related (Input Ghosting) so the only solutions are
1. Rebind your controls
2. Use a controller
3. If possible, use a better keyboard.

no clue how long the demo is.

Click to expand...

The demo contains 2 Worlds, and a small post-game area with a boss rush (and a special secret boss at the end.) So, you're about 12% of the way through the demo, if I had to guess. XD
The average playtime of the demo seems to be somewhere in the range of ~5-10 hours, depending on skill level and how much you explore.

If you have any more issues or questions, please let me know and I'll get back to you ASAP. Thanks again for checking out Angels & Demons!

Journoid said:

As for your input issue, that's what the input test in the first-run sequence is supposed to check for, but I guess I didn't consider that jump/run buttons would be effected too. The issue is hardware related (Input Ghosting) so the only solutions are
1. Rebind your controls
2. Use a controller
3. If possible, use a better keyboard.

Click to expand...

Dang, forget what I said about the jumping. You called it with #3. I'm having the same exact same issue out of another SAGE game that utilizes the Z/X keys for jumping/running. Guess it's time for a new keyboard.

I totally overlooked that controllers are supported, so I will definitely go that route as I continue playing!

I still have to finish the demo but I find the glutonny rockstar boss (whatever his name is) to be very unfair.

More specifically, there's one attack he does where he inhales several enemies then spits them back, and he spits them so quickly the character physically can't get out of the way quickly enough. There's a long delay before the player falls back in place and you can't make the player snap back to the center sooner, at least not to my knowledge. So the boss can just spit an enemy that makes you dodge up, and then the next enemy attacks where you dodged with no way to get out because the player is stuck on the direction you pressed until the delay ends.

The boss deals INSANE damage so it's not something I can overlook. It's just frustrating. I plan to beat the demo later but for now that's my feedback.

Some SAGE Enthusiast said:

I still have to finish the demo but I find the glutonny rockstar boss (whatever his name is) to be very unfair.

More specifically, there's one attack he does where he inhales several enemies then spits them back, and he spits them so quickly the character physically can't get out of the way quickly enough. There's a long delay before the player falls back in place and you can't make the player snap back to the center sooner, at least not to my knowledge. So the boss can just spit an enemy that makes you dodge up, and then the next enemy attacks where you dodged with no way to get out because the player is stuck on the direction you pressed until the delay ends.

The boss deals INSANE damage so it's not something I can overlook. It's just frustrating. I plan to beat the demo later but for now that's my feedback.

Click to expand...

In the Dodge! attack style, you should be able to input the opposite direction to return to a neutral position. If you can't that may indicate a problem with your inputs, in which case you should try rebinding them from the file-select settings menu.

As for the difficulty: If you haven't already, consider returning a few rooms to level grind? You could also check out the first few rooms of Dust'E'Canyon for two different equipable items that might help with the difficulty. Hope this helps, and thanks for checking out Angels & Demons!

Journoid said:

In the Dodge! attack style, you should be able to input the opposite direction to return to a neutral position. If you can't that may indicate a problem with your inputs, in which case you should try rebinding them from the file-select settings menu.

As for the difficulty: If you haven't already, consider returning a few rooms to level grind? You could also check out the first few rooms of Dust'E'Canyon for two different equipable items that might help with the difficulty. Hope this helps, and thanks for checking out Angels & Demons!

Click to expand...

I tried what you said and yes, I'm able to snap back to the center by pressing the opposite direction. I don't remember the game teaching that, but I admit I most likely missed it because I played the demo during a call and I was very distracted.

As for going back to grind... no chance, this is not how I roll. I hate grinding. With enough skill I suppose I can beat the boss without getting hit, so it's all good. I'll give a more detailed review once I beat the demo, thanks for the attention.

TL;DR: Simplify the combat, improve the story, consider removing the rhythm minigames, make the wall jump better, and make healing more generous.

Now here's my fully elaborated thoughts on the demo:

Overall, I think the game is fundamentally bloated. It's trying to be a platformer, a turn-based RPG, and a rhythm game at the same time. While I can appreciate the overworld being fun to navigate with the platformer mechanics, I honestly can't see the point of including rhythm minigames. I'm sorry, I just don't think the soundtrack is that good. I'm not very interested in playing the game's songs in a rhythm game.

The combat is also bloated. The Jump and Dash options accomplish the exact same thing (damage flying enemies), as well as the Speed and Melee options (damage spikey enemies). They're not even that different in terms of required inputs. The game also has an Act function, which is rarely used.

It comes across as if the game has a philosophy that variety of options automatically means the game is better. But I don't think that's the case if all of these mechanics are shallow and similar. I don't think the Mario & Luigi series, for example, would benefit from having two versions of a jump attack and two versions of a hammer attack, which is exactly what this game is doing.

Besides praying for better stats, something I'm not sure is even necessary (although I admittedly never tried it), I don't think there's enough going on for the Act options to justify its inclusion. It's not like Deltarune, much less like Undertale, where you have multiple options that allow you to engage with your enemies and familiarize yourself with their personalities. It's just an insta "kill" option since you just need to talk to the possessed enemies once and they immediately give up. In Undertale, Act feels like a fundamental aspect of the game's themes and story, while in this game it's just kinda there for the sake of it.

Navigating the overworld is nice, but I have one complaint - the wall jump feels very unresponsive. I imagine the player only enters in a "wall slide" state once its vertical velocity is negative (or positive, whichever option is equal to downwards in this game's engine). I think you should be able to slide in a wall once you're getting close to start falling, as opposed to only once you're already falling. Changing the "if speed < 0" to something like "if speed < 5", assuming that's how it works.

I also think you should probably get fully healed once you end any battle. Your party only gets fully healed once you level up, which to me makes no sense at all. Your punishment for losing a battle is to just immediately be allowed to retry it with full health, which I really appreciate, but it has a side effect of encouraging a party suicide as a mean to easily get a full heal.

If you do make so the party is fully healed after any battle, this would make healing items mostly useless, but either way I think the consumables should be balanced around keeping yourself alive during the one current battle, as opposed of it being about keeping yourself alive across one save point and the other. In other RPGs, dying could set your progress back a bunch, which is not the case here at all, hence why I suggest this change.

Finally, this is going to be more subjective but I think the story is very weak. There's no obvious stakes, no obvious characters or worlds to root for (at least no worlds or characters that the game successfully convinces me to care about), and overall I just don't fully understand how this whole "dimension-breaking" affects the main character and the town he lives in.

Still talking about the story but in a much more nitpick-ish way, I think it's really lame how the way you unlock new skills in the game is "how can we get across this? oh wait I have an idea!". It gives me the sensation these skills were so easy to learn you might as well have them all from the very beginning of the game. Obviously that's not what I want, I assume I just want the new skills feel more "earned", like how Mario and Luigi get their new skills taught to them by various teachers in Superstar Saga.

This is all of my feedback. I enjoyed the turn-based combat, as bloated as it is, and the platforming was pretty fun. I think these are the two things the game should focus on, I really couldn't care less about the rhythm game (but if other people like it then it's worth keeping it in, I suppose).

I actually like the game's art style. It looks a bit unprofessional, but in a very "late 90's/ early 2000's Clickteam Fusion" kind of way, which I find oddly nostalgic.

The game has potential, I just think it needs to be more focused and streamlined. Wish you and your project the best!

Oh yeah, I forgot to tell... I didn't finish the demo. I reached a point where I had to deliver a letter from a king, talked to a camp counselor, saw a dream about the future (apparently) and then had no idea of what I had to do next. There's no walkthroughs for me to find out what I missed so I'm just stuck.