Spell Circle

Yeah, I don't have that much to say about this one.  I spent about 5 minutes with it before I decided "well, that's enough of that."

It's a top-down 2D adventurey type thing wherein you play as a wizard who shoots things at other things.  Once you kill a creepy forest critter, you can pick up a gem which makes your magic more powerful.  Seems simple enough.  Well, that's just the word for it.  It's simple, ergo, I'm at a loss for words.  There's only so much I can say about a game like this.

This game is built a bit like Rouger, but without the hilarious walk cycle.  Spell Circle is more streamlined than Rouger, to be sure, which is both a nice way of saying it got rid of 2 of the three attack methods that kept things interesting and an unenthusiastic way of saying it lets you stop that tedious process of picking up and putting down armor and weapons based on their numbers.

The big problem I faced with Spell Circle is the old Castlevania problem that you get knocked back every time you get hit.  In Castlevania, this usually meant you'd fall into a well-placed pit after getting hit once.  In Spell Circle, it means that if you get surrounded by a long, wormlike enemy, as you'll have to do in order to kill the darn things, getting hit once will start a disastrous chain of events wherein you'll be bounced around the many damaging segments of the enemy and have all your health drained faster than you can say "oops."

Now, I can't say that this is an objectively bad thing.  The enemies were obviously deliberately designed to be death traps and utter nightmares to kill, and I know a lot of people who would be gratified by a feature like that.  "It makes the game challenging," they would say.  Nothing wrong with punishing a lack of skill, right?  I agree with that, but there is something that I can say is objectively wrong: the hitboxes.  If the air around an enemy is enough to trigger the death cycle, the game goes from gratifyingly difficult to annoying very quickly.

The other main problem is that, simply put, it's not fun enough to kill enemies.  Seeking out their one weak spot and hammering them with spells for a minute is the kind of gameplay mechanic that really needs the assistance of hit sparks and satisfying sound effects.

That's all I got for now.  Until next time, stay murderous.

Links
C-I-R-C-L-E, Circle: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24667