If any of you guys get really into the game and want to help us test/balance new patches before they come out, and give feedback, and argue about potential rule changes, feel free to sign up for the Auro Beta. You can do this by creating an account on the Dinofarm Games forums ( http://www.dinofarmgames.com/forum/index.php ) and PMing me there with your email address. Right now we're working on two patches at the same time, actually. 1.28 is a very modest bug-fix / polish patch. 1.29, or possibly 1.30 (depending on when we can get it ready) is a much more "big-deal" patch that involves big rule changes and rebalancing.
I love this game. Spent multiple hours playing it yesterday on an airplane and have barely been able to put it down. One suggestion that may or may not be stupid: I get that it's important for me to have a general idea of where the teleporters are at all times. With that said, even with procedural generation I think the layouts feel a little samey because I'm always moving from the upper left to the lower right. I think it might be worth trying out a simple flip of the map so that each one could have four possibilities (upper left, upper right, lower left, lower right). The layouts wouldn't change, you'd still be working your way diagonally to the goal, but it might feel a bit more varied if you were on the lower left and the goal was on the upper right, etc.
The game is truly special. Was stuck on tutorial 26 for a day. Must have tried 50+ times. It was so rewarding when I finally beat it. Now I'm on 31 ( last tutorial level ). Almost ready to play in the big leagues. ( normal game ) haha I hope anyone who has come across this thread buys the game! The art is just astonishing, truly unique. The strategy and depth is incredible. You guys should add a special wave mode. Basically each wave you complete you obtain a special currency. This currency can be used at a special shop store which allows you to buy cosmetics. Different auras, weapons, perhaps hats and wings? Just a small cosmetic / neat idea that doesn't interfere with balance.
Just so people know, don't feel like you have to beat all of the tutorial levels to play Play Mode. If you've beaten the 20-25th tutorial or so, you can pick up on the remaining rules while you play (or just look them up in the manual). The last 3 Tutorials in particular are like "challenges" really. In fact, I'll probably put them on another page and call it "challenges" at some point.
^ it's not bad! You should leave them as tutorial. If you overcome the last few levels your set to embark on your journey. I'm on the last level and I feel like I'm totally prepared to go into this with an iron fist Considering they were challenging and you really had to put what you learned in the first few levels of the tut to good use.
Really like the game, but although I love the visuals on my 5s, I somehow dislike the way it looks on my iPad air 2. I know this is pixel art, but it feels a bit like I am playing the iPhone game stretched out on my iPad screen.. It's all a bit fuzzy and jagged. But maybe it's just me.. Anyway Gameplaywise it is great so I'll just play it on my 5s
For some reason ALL the tutorial levels were easy for me (the last 2 took about 2-3 tries each) but in play mode I'm having a really hard time on rank 7 the hard mode, I only reach to 100 points every like 5-6 try's, any advanced tips that might make it more consistent ? And I also Really like that cosmetic idea, sounds really awesome. I would also love to beta text, I'll sign up later tonight, keep up the great work, game was deff worth the wait!
One of the devs here! There is a specific reason for this. Putting the goals north, south, or east sends an arbitrary extra goal/obstacle for the player that is unrelated to the game. "Explore/find the exit" could very easily screw you over even if you make good moves and bump efficiently. Knowing the general direction of the goal does not add that layer of chaff to the goal. It allows you to focus on what's important, which are your tactics and efficiency. Say you're doing really well, and you're making your way east, but the exits HAPPEN to be north, which you had no way of knowing. That's not your fault, yet you're punished by having to backtrack and lose your multiplier. Don't worry, the level generation, we believe, has adequate randomization to do its job. The more you get the ropes of the game, the more that kind of thing will move to the back of your mind. It has for me, anyway! Thanks for the suggestion, though and thanks so much for playing. Feel free to join our forums and join in beta testing or discussion. We're updating the game all the time! Dinofarmgames.com/forum
For some reason ALL the tutorial levels were easy for me (the last 2 took about 2-3 tries each) but in play mode I'm having a really hard time on rank 7 the hard mode, I only reach to 100 points every like 5-6 try's, any advanced tips that might make it more consistent ? And I also Really like that cosmetic idea, sounds really awesome. I would also love to beta text, I'll sign up later tonight, keep up the great work, game was deff worth the wait!
Oh it's normal to plateau as a new player. The trick is, push your advantage! You gotta think about how to maximize kills per turn and keep your multiplier high. The way to do that may be to strategically eat health. Maybe even eat several health in one turn to push for that extra 4 pointer. Make your way to the exit in the nick of time and keep it rolling. Those little sack plays add up over time. Try to maximize productiveness/kills with your ultimate spells. That's what they're there for. Sometimes, use spells defensively. Like, use floe JUSt to freeze a lich so he doesn't damage you next turn, or that you can safely get a power tile to charge another ability. Use BLAST defensively, to escape a rough situation by blasting through a vortex even if you don't get any kills. Gotta start thinking outside the box and prioritizing the combo meter! That's where the real magic of Auro comes out!
Btw STREAM happening right now by our buddy LuditeSam if you want to see MASTER difficulty in action! http://www.twitch.tv/luditesam
To be clear, I understand why that decision was made. That's why I think that a simple rotation would make the levels feel more varied without actually making it more difficult to find the goal. If I start a game and I can tell I'm on the lower left edge (water to west and south) then I'll know to move to the upper right, etc.
OK, I bought the game, did all of the tutorial levels, but I'm a little disappointed. Remembering all of the details about what each spell does, how each monster acts, is most of the effort of playing the game. I'm sure this becomes automatic after some number of hours, but shouldn't all of this be available in-game somehow (e.g., tap and hold to bring up spell/monster info)? Limited visibility is ok, but you can still do this with some kind of fog or sighting distance and still at least let me scroll back to the areas that I've already explored. The scoring is not to my tastes, if the goal is to kill enemies I don't feel any more successful if I kill them with one kind of timing than another. It feels like a cop-out, to ask me to optimize the particular timing of how I kill enemies rather than to adjust the difficulty of killing them at all. Those are the main things that came to mind in working through the tutorial. And the graphics really could be a little better, the mismatch between the resolution of my iPad Air 2 and what's on the screen is just a bit much.
hmm...well i'm not the designer, just the artist. So I'll have to ask Keith. I assume, though, that if we have the same parameters, but the whole map is just rotated, technically that would just be visual because the balance/shape of the spells, etc would be the same. It's all kind of a "circle," in terms of spell influence so perhaps it wasn't included because it's not actually changing anything other than visual. Personally, I would be fine with either.
@DaviddesJ, Hey there! Lead artist here. Sorry about your iPad experience, but rest assured in the next patch or two, we're fixing that so the slight stretch will no longer be there. As to the game, well I can certainly say it won't take hours to internalize these concepts, but maybe another 15 minutes or so. Check out this tutorial video we made which hopefully will cement your understanding of the ropes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fkqi3f_IhNE Trust me. Once you get over the hump, it's a gift that keeps on giving. It has been for me, anyway. In terms of scoring, I'm not sure what you mean by "timing," as it's a turn based game. That said, you may be in a difficulty too easy for you if you find that winning is trivial. Keep playing and getting win streaks and it'll get harder. The points will start to matter more and everything will be nice and tense as long as you're playing in the right spot on the ladder. Just so you know, practice mode's rules aren't the same as Play mode's. Practice mode is just an infinite score attack. Just to play around. Take the placement test and start playing matches if you haven't already! Stick with it. Maybe you'll fall in love! =]
Well, it took me more than 15 minutes to do all of the tutorial levels. But that doesn't mean that I immediately recognize each enemy, remember what attack and special abilities they have, etc. I know this is all on the website, but I find it strange there is no way to have the information just pop up in the game itself. Similarly, the spell symbols all look very similar, remembering which spell is which and exactly what it does takes more than 15 minutes (for me anyway). It's just surprising because the design goal is to have all of this information known, so why isn't it easier to pull up this information in the game itself? I spend more time trying to remember "is this the enemy that does this, or that" than I do playing the game. Maybe it's just me. Timing is that your score doesn't just depend on what enemies you kill, it depends on what turn you kill the enemies on. If you had positive points for each kill and a small loss of points for each turn that goes by, that would be more to my taste. I'm just not that enthusiastic about setting up "combos" just for the sake of scoring.
