Wizard Within

Awesome little game! The progression is nice and that a pretty cool ending too!
I think the main issue is that first hint, I though it was great, but it's also the more complicated one. Swapping the order would have probably helped a bunch, since it would be easier to recognize the hint once the player knows how it works.

Other than that, to respond to your feedback, I think faking the shape recognition here is perfectly fine. Unless you try to break it it's not obvious, and there's really no reason to make something more complicated if it works. Plus the drawing effect is pretty cool. Also, I'm guessing there's a script to prevent completing the game too soon? Because that last spell would be to easy to cheat right at the start 😋

It took me quite a while to take the first step, but eventually I found out what to do lol. This here is a pretty unique concept. Nice art and music, drawing your spells was a pretty creative take on the theme. I couldn't really see the whole map on my screen because I couldn't resize the window, but it wasnt much of a problem. That ending tho

Damn that song is a banger. please tell your brother Riley that they did an amazing job with that!

And the game.. wow! What a super cool concept, and it felt amazing to cast those spells! The polish really helps with that. Awesome work.

The only thing that would've made my experience much better would be some more explanation or guidance. I guess I'm just not that good at games, but it took me a (super) long time to figure out what to do. Some guidance for the gameplay but also story-wise (I missed the person lying on the tree trunk the first time) would really help! But yeah it's a gamejam, I totally get why that wasn't your priority. Thanks for this game!

Incredible job on this one! I only have a few minor nitpicks, such as not being able to go behind the house (I didn't find the campfire for a long time because I didn't realize there was stuff in that direction), and also the view slightly lagging behind the player (makes it harder to see where you're going). The spell casting mechanic is great. The ending had me in shambles.

Casting spells by drawing runes is a surprisingly refreshing way to do the whole "spellcasting" thing - especially when the entire thing is put together this well. Really liked the ending as well, especially considering how unexpected it is.
Just one thing - looking into the house more than once (I think that's what causes it?) causes the game to get stuck at the screen containing the final rune.

I truly loved this game! Really fantastic work here. The art was good, the main mechanic was a lot of fun, the music was catchy (and I loved how you used either GM's or your own emanation system to have it fade out as you moved away from the center of the play area) - really not much to complain about here.

Great job all around!

I have to say: this is a very cool game. I liked art, animations, spell logic and also catchy music.

It would be better if some kind of tutorial was available (otherwise it is difficult to find out how to learn spells). But when I made a breaktrough the game felt really satisfying and that motivated me to explore more spells.

I want to ask: does the game end after entering the house? My screen got stuck on one pattern and I could not go outside anymore (no matter what key I pressed). If yes, then I rate the game.

Thanks for submission, I really enjoyed it.

I spent a lot of time not realising you have to use your mouse, which made me feel very stupid - I think some prompts in the game itself might have helped with that but in actuality, I just didn't read the description on the page properly so that's on me - I like the cutesy style and the concept of this one as well so it was a good game, next time I'll remember to double check the page description 😅

The spellcasting system was super creative, really enjoyed that part.

Took me around 10 minutes to figure out what the signs were trying to tell me though. The pacing could have been a bit smoother if the first sign was right at the beginning and really obvious just to "onboard" the player onto this concept a little bit.

Seeing the surprise ending was a great touch as well just the right amount of bittersweet.

I played though your game on stream : https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1628068563?t=00h55m28s

it was a nice time, I spent a good chunk of time messing around, and I soft lock my self once. really intresting magic system, and overall nice time.

Interesting! I might need a hint... I couldn't figure out how to cast a spell! I look forward to checking back later to give this another play through before I rate it.

Edit: Thanks for the hint - I played it through to the end and it was a great time!