Runic Moon by pke1029

Under a shadowy sky, a young witch and her cat work tirelessly and ever faster to keep the moonlight full... In this relaxing spell crafter, send the right runes to the cauldron, or burst bubbles to destroy them! Whatever happens, don't let the darkness overcome the RUNIC MOON.
Instructions
Drag and drop matching rune into the cauldron. Manage your rune inventory by double clicking to destroy duplicate or unwanted runes.

Credits
Music and SFX by starling Twitter
Cover art by Gs_presents Twitter
Programming & pixel art by pke1029 Twitter
Ratings
| Overall | 360th | 3.784⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 699th | 3.378⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 491th | 3.5⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 863th | 3.514⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 131th | 4.405⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 165th | 3.959⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 856th | 2.661⭐ | 33🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 345th | 3.811⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 28🗳️ | 38🗨️ |
Wow this game is an absolute delight. There's so much going on here with the art and the atmosphere. I feel like I really got dragged into this world. Big points to the theme. The graphics and audio though, now those are where this game really shines through. It's pretty to look at, and the music is really amazing. It feels like it could have been an actual track from an old snes game. I love it. As for the gameplay, I like it well enough, I think it makes good use of the theme. What adds to it is the runic moon looming over you, creating a sense of urgency that a number or energy bar can't hold a candle to. Overall really cool game. I wonder if maybe either of you have any plans to update this in the future?
@mira Thank you for trying out our game (15 is plenty). I would spend more time on balancing the difficulty given more time!
@gord10ahmet Thank you for the high ratings. The game is meant to be challenging, but I think I might have accidentally made it too difficult!
I didn't catch from the instruction that it's possible to double-click to get rid of the bubbles, so at first I thought that this is the "inevitable" part where I run out of correct symbols and I'm forced to place the wrong one in the cauldron - a small on-screen prompt would help a lot here!
Only on my 2nd playthrough I noticed the timer on the top - at first I was not sure why I lost! I think it could be more visible as now it blends with the background a lot (or some kind of a low-time warning?)
Good job, nice entry! :v:
@spice-cabinet I agree with you that @starling did an amazing job with the music and SFX. I am sure she will be delighted to hear that. Thank you for playing!
@indiepixel Thank you for the feedback. The main idea of the game is to have the phase of the moon to act as the timer, the time is up when the moon is fully covered, hence the name of the game - Runic Moon. The blue bar at the top is the secondary visual cue for the timer, which is why I made it less prominent. As for the double-clicking mechanic, I wish we had more time to include the instructions in the game. We didn't have the time, so the instructions is moved to the description. A low-time warning is a great idea too! I'd definitely like spend more time on the instructions in the future.
@smttz Thank you for playing! I hope you enjoy playing it.
Oh well, it fits the theme nonetheless.
Very nice job! I enjoyed it!
In terms of gameplay, I personally wish there was a little bit more going on from earlier in the game - perhaps the difficulty could ramp up more quickly or start at a higher level, as I didn't really have that sense of urgency from the start... But overall a great job, well done!
Loved the palette you went with and how reminiscent the sparse texturing was of exactly the kind of games that inspired fantasy consoles like TIC-80 in the first place.
Great work! :grin:
I could feel my eyes going crossed as I played. A pretty simple concept, but executed very nicely, well done!
Took me a while to notice that the shape above the cauldron is the one that I'm supposed to be putting in there.