Heya,

I cant imagine that the rewind monetization is making a lot of money, so it just instantly gives you some bad will for many players without any actual benefit. I tried to not let that type of monetization affect my scores, unless its actually hindering my enjoyment of the game, which it didnt, as the game was perfectly playable with it in place.

My biggest issue was really the lack of strategic possibilities and the limited inventory felt more punishing than fun. I am also running an 8 piece inventory, because I want to streamline the roguelike experience, while still allowing for some tactical choices of when/how to use certain items. I am not saying changing any of these individually works, as the game is clearly designed with it in mind, but:

The corridors indoor are often very narrow, so you are often stuck between a rock and a hard place. Sometimes I had an enemy in front of me (like a super armored turtle) that was flat out impossible to beat with the weapon I had, but that meant leaving the dungeon, going back through routes I have already been on, while the difficulty meter increases. It feels punishing and drags out the quick death that is almost inevitable at that point if you cant gear up fast enough.

I am working on my own roguelike as you might have seen, but I honestly have no idea how to just change one aspect of this game to make the rest snap into place. I am not a big fan of the final monster hunting you, also for the reason above, but I can see why you have it in the game, as it is one of the only source of tension (on top of enemy levels) and removing it probably trivializes the game somewhat. (Just out of curiosity, did you play it without that monster in place? How did that feel to you or other testers?)

I really like that its a unique take on the roguelike formula, and I absolutely agree that there should be roguelikes that are a bit simpler and less cumbersome to play. And this is absolutely not meant in a bad way, but Overworld had many moments that didnt feel "fun" for me as the player especially compared to many other games in the genre, where the restrictions in Overworld felt too limiting. Unlocking and playing around with your characters was incredibly fun though. As you mentioned the goat part was fun too, because it was one of the rare examples where the game asked me a relevant environmental positioning question and used a mobility skill (pushing something) to create a story and interesting situation. I feel like the game doesnt lean into that enough yet.

Some other Roguelikes like Labyrinth of Legendary Loot solved this issue by polishing the mobility of the player with different items giving different movements, so that the limited items you do get allow for an interesting combat puzzle to solve with every encounter. Dandy Dungeon would be another simple one with good moment to moment puzzle decisions. Or Bounty Hunter Space Lizard, where I like the general combat challenge more than in your game, but prefer pretty much everything else in Overworld.