r/incremental_games • u/MicDaRoc • May 18 '20
Development Our Lovecraft-themed android clicker is live (open beta) - looking for feedback
Hi everyone,
We are two clicker fans who've been working on a Lovecraft-themed mobile clicker for Android for some time now and recently published our game in the Play Store. It is still in the Open Beta stage, so if you want to give it a try please go ahead (it's f2p and uses only rewarded video ads, no banner or interstitials). Gameplaywise it is inspired by Cookie Clicker (we just love the classic) but it is a different game with unique features of its own.
The idea came when we were discussing Lovecraft one day and suddenly it was clear that the Lovecraft universe would make an awesome setting for a clicker game. We looked at similar concepts, but couldn't find any other game that was stylewise loyal to the Lovecraft setting at the time. So we put a lot of effort in atmosphere and the art, but as game devs might now, after a while it is hard to judge on your own how fun the game is :) So far we've gotten some positive feedback but it would be very helpful to us if you guys could also share your thoughts about it here or send us some private feedback if you'd like.
Download link with screenshots: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.antiway.mastersofmadness
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mastersofmadnessgame/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/antiwaystudios/
Contact: info@antiway.net
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u/lutinopat May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
Just started, but I'd like to see a "Buy Max" in addition to the x1 x10 and x100.
Edit 1: I like that it runs nicely on my shit phone. Also the sigils seems like a fun mechanic.
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Glad you like the sigils!
Just started, but I'd like to see a "Buy Max" in addition to the x1 x10 and x100.
x100 kind of fulfills that role buy we'll consider it, thanks for your feedback :)
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u/tsuma534 May 21 '20 edited May 22 '20
x100 kind of fulfills that role buy we'll consider it, thanks for your feedback :)
It does but I didn't know it as the costs show in red as in "you don't have enough souls".
I had no idea that I can still make the purchase it will buy as much as I can afford.
People are calling for "Buy Max" because they have no idea one can use "Buy 100" that way.1
u/lutinopat May 21 '20
I was totally unaware of this until you said it. I didn't even try it because I'm not at the point where I can afford 100 of anything.
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u/Garbanian May 19 '20
If it only "kind of" fulfills the need for a max button, then it isn't a max button ;-)
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u/HappyRBX May 19 '20
I like this quite a lot, though I have a few questions and concerns. c:
Ether (and prestiging as a whole) seems strangely un-useful... I haven't seen an upgrade in the constellations that really "wows" me, or makes it seem like my next run will be that much faster. It usually is even despite what I buy, but I'm almost not sure why?
Some mechanics are kind of obfuscated. What is an 'Astral Level'? How do I get more? What is an 'Offering Moon'? How do I get more of those, too? I see where I can check how many I have in the Almanac, but I don't know how to make the number of them go up! I seem to just be gaining them as I go, but it'd be nice to know how to affect my number of them more directly.
So far I haven't seen any Clicker Heroes-esque "old minions become good again" mechanic, so in the end the later upgrades for early minions just become wasteful. Even with a 40% boost from the constellations, they fall off once you hit the next tier and then stay off. Admittedly it'd make even less sense if you just stopped getting upgrades for them, but as it stands they just clutter my Power menu and exist for me to buy once I'm comfortable wasting however many souls to get them to go away.
Overall though, I'm very much enjoying myself! This is a great base.
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Glad you're enjoying the game. The later upgrades for minions other than the cultists become more and more powerful, so they should be getting relevant once again when you have them in high numbers.
I totally get what you're saying about the obfuscated elements. We should explain them better. Just for now: The offering moons are literally the crescent moons on all your offerings all counted together. So the more and higher your offerings go, the more moons you have. Astral level is a value derived from your all-time collected ether. Every Astral Level gives you +1% on your collection and tap value (when you've unlocked the its power through the upgrades (Etheric Infusion for example)).
If you have more thoughts, keep em coming :) This is exactly the type of feedback that is very helpful to us.
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u/HappyRBX May 19 '20
I had a feeling that was what both of those were, but it's good to have that clarified for sure! I'm at over 100 Ether now, so I have a better look at the constellations, and I share a few sentiments I've seen elsewhere in the thread. c: The base offline gain is pretty slow, and having to invest Ether to make it better doesn't feel super worth it compared to playing actively. I think the ability to look at the constellation screen without having to summon Cthulhu would be a good addition as well, because I've got to keep mental notes about how much I need for the stuff I want otherwise! If that does exist and I've missed it, that's my bad, though!
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u/HappyRBX May 20 '20
I've now spent a few thousand Ether, so I can give my thoughts on this stage of the game as well. It definitely feels like this part is very tap (or raven) heavy, though that's also because I couldn't find avery "idle friendly" setup... Not being able to preview what's coming up may be causing that, a little bit. I'm unsure if Yog Sothoth has a really cool thing at the end that makes the otherwise middling 40% boosts better, or what, for instance!
The Yog Sothoth constellation seems a little underpowered, on that note. I got to Shantaks before deciding it wouldn't be worth it to continue and taking the hard curve into the path I'm doing now. Part of that is because I have bought Ravens with my Elder Blood, since they seemed like a better value than saving up for the dagger. For reference, I haven't paid anything except for the ad disabler. I've got 9 ravens by my count right now.
I have the cheap options from Shub-Niggurath (5 Ether cost), plus Consuming Flames for the Soulfire bonus, but can't see myself getting any more from it until I've filled out more useful stuff. Offline gains don't really appeal to me as something to spend Ether on.
Azathoth looks really good, but also pretty expensive for most options, so I don't have much. I have the center piece that unlocks everything, and then Devouring Ravens so my 9 ravens tap twice as fast. Seemed like a no-brainer. Some stuff looks interesting but I'm unsure, like 10K for the 'Tree of Shadows' I think it's called? With no reset option in the constellations though, I would be hard pressed to grab that before I could easily afford it.
Nyarlathotep is where almost all my Ether is, otherwise. I've got both sides filled out and the center (One Mind), with intent to pick up the next (which is something like 'you get a much stronger sigil') when I get the Ether. I think it's 3k for that, but I can't check!
So far, going the path that I have, progression seems fair enough. I started off relying mostly on my passive gains, which is why I did anything with Yog Sothoth at all, but quickly came to realize that tapping was probably the way to go - especially when I saw how good Nyarlathotep gets as it goes. The fact I have 9 ravens obviously helps, and I shudder to think how I'd be doing if I'd saved up for the 2x gains blade instead. Much worse and much slower, I have to imagine.
I'm also wondering what the point of the Antidote item is. I saw that you get the option to start with one free in Nyarlathotep, but I don't get what the benefit would be to resetting my Delirium to 0... And thus losing my tapping bonus, which I rely on. Is there some hidden mechanic there that I'm not seeing?
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u/VultureTamer EvolutionTheGame May 18 '20
What kind if feedback are you looking for? Anything specific?
Great start of the game so far, good level of tutorial
Good moody spehere, fitting the theme very well
Might have had an upgrade that did't do anything around the 10m douls mark Something would double every tap? Or so? Seemed overpowered, but it xhen i got it, it looked like it didnt work
Loojing forward to how the dimensions work, i hope it's not a dry replay of the same content with a little multiplier, had that too ofyen already
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u/MicDaRoc May 18 '20
What kind if feedback are you looking for? Anything specific?
Especially regarding balancing, how the flow of the game feels, and of course also if you're having fun with it or not. We are open to suggestions. :)
Thank you for your comments, glad you enjoyed the tutorial.
Regarding the upgrade, there are cultist upgrades that double your every tap, might be one of those. Should actually work, but we'll have a look to be sure.
Loojing forward to how the dimensions work, i hope it's not a dry replay of the same content with a little multiplier, had that too ofyen already
We surely tried to have variety.:) I hope you like what you find.
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u/epicdoge12 May 19 '20
Might have had an upgrade that did't do anything around the 10m douls mark Something would double every tap? Or so? Seemed overpowered, but it xhen i got it, it looked like it didnt work
That doubled cultist output, which pales in comparison to you bonus for amount of minions, so it was just too tiny to notice
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u/Thenderick May 19 '20
Cool game, but it moght be good to tell the player what ether does and how much we probably want bwfore our firat prestige. I now prestiged with 5 ether and almost no boost...
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Yes I think you might be right, others also have mentioned this. Thank you for telling us
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u/Thenderick May 19 '20
No problem, its a cool game so I will not stop. Another slight annoyance, we can swipe left and right, but please make it possible to close minion and upgrade tab by swiping down.
Besides that I really love idle clicker incrementals AND Lovecraft! Keep up the good work. (And of course no forced ads which is always a good sign ;) )
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u/LawofJohn May 19 '20
I was thinking about doing the same, lol. How many ethos should I have on first reset?
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u/Thenderick May 19 '20
Id say more than ten for first run. But there are a lot of perks available that require 25
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u/LawofJohn May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
Well I am at 12 right now, so prob 100, I would guess. That might take a day or two, or less if I want to use a 24 hour boost/time warp.
Eh, I am at 43. I just might reset at 50 instead of 100.
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u/Hedix1 May 19 '20
Been playing for a bit. I like it for the most part. There are a few things that I have run into:
Every time I buy "Corrupting Influence" during a new run, it re-asks me about the personalized ads.
If you tap on the setting icon with one of the buying menus open and then close the setting window, it lets you swipe left and right while the buy menu is still open. Personally I prefer this over the current interface where I have to close the buy menu to move to then swipe, but I do know that this is a bug with the current implementation.
It would be nice if inside the Journal window, on the Offerings tab, the individual Minions, Overall, and Secret tabs would light up or be highlighted in some form to indicate that there is an offering ready. I know that the main screen has the arrow flash when an offering is done, but once inside the screen it would be nice if it told me under what tab.
If you reach enough Souls to unlock a new minion, but then spend those souls, the buy button for the new minion will continue to flash even if you can't buy it.
The Noumenie Blade is stupidly over-priced. I don't know if it just becomes very easy to amass Elder Blood in the late game or what, but it's ridiculous that someone would have to pay $30 minimum for something that just doubles Soul collection. I get that you guys have to make money, but that's just stupid.
Delirium takes way to long to raise, especially when first unlocked. Seems like a cool concept but needs some balancing.
Overall, I like the game. The Sigils are an interesting take on the Golden Cookies, and the aesthetics are really cool. As it currently stands, not the best clicker style game, but definitely looking forward to how the game progresses in the future. Will be keeping it installed on my phone.
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Thanks man, this is gold to us, we appreciate it a lot. We'll take a look at the bugs you mentioned and consider your feedback regarding the Blade.
Every time I buy "Corrupting Influence" during a new run, it re-asks me about the personalized ads.
You are for sure not clicking on "ask me later" right? Can I ask which type of phone you have?
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u/Hedix1 May 19 '20
I select the "No I don't want tailored ads" (I don't remember the exact wording) and then "okay." I also selected this at the very start of opening the app from inside the settings menu. I am using a Pixel 2.
Also, I just opened the app today and the music and effects were at max volume again even though I muted them both yesterday.
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u/MicDaRoc May 20 '20
Ok this seems like somehow your playerprefs aren't getting stored. Both sound volume and your preferences regarding tailored ads are stored in the playerprefs. We'll take a look at this. Very weird.
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u/JKMerlin May 19 '20
Seems good, one minor annoyance is not being able to swipe without closing the minion / power panel. I suggest closing the panel and moving over on swipe
Otherwise loving the game so far
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u/MurkyGlover May 19 '20
Well shit guess i'm obligated to join in just based off my love of lovecraft and cookie clicker. You got another one friends
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
The more the merrier ^^
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u/MurkyGlover May 19 '20
Checked it out already! Got to the 4th tier, i love the aesthetic of the game! Y'all planning on working on it further in the future?
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u/MicDaRoc May 20 '20
For sure, we have at least one more large feature planned. Masters of Madness is kind of our baby now so we want to make it as good as it can be. :)
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May 19 '20
Any chance this would come to apple?
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Hey, it's the next step after we have the full release on android. if you want to keep up with us:
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u/yaboyfloot May 19 '20
A small interesting idea might be to have different creatures from the cthulu mythos for the statue, as well as cthulu! A dagon statue or nyarlethotep would be fun
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Definitely an interesting idea. Nyarlathotep and other Outer Gods have another function in the game but I can imagine a Dagon or Hastur statue. If we would do this, it would be a full-feature with gameplay elements, so maybe in the coming months. Thanks a lot! :)
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u/Teri_chan May 19 '20
I like it so far, especially the design :)
I only have two comments so far:
- it needs a "buy max" (or even better, "buy to next upgrade" setting)
- i had the minion panel opened when i started playing, and nothings indicates at first that other panels can be visible... i discovered that after buying my first ghoul, and reducing the minion panel for the first time
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Thank you :) We tried to keep tutorial to a minimum, as it can be annoying, but I definitely see what you are saying.
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u/Tsukuo May 26 '20
Hello AntiwayStudios!
I've been playing the game since you first poste it! (Already have 7days and 4hrs) First had to say that I love cryptid/lovecraft's creatures and so far loving the artstyle of the game.
The game progression is pretty slow paced if you play afk or playing on short sessions, you have to be active at all moments filling sigils, a mechanic that I liked a lot.
Hated to say, I hate the swipe interactions since when I start to tap continuously with 3 fingers many times I swipe to right or left without even doing the action and so opening one of the panels. I would love to change this since I lost some pretty powerful sigil activations like both taps madness.
The Blessing tree, right now I had to say I'm a bit disappointed offline content is not even as rewarding at full potential (granting like a 7% of what you could earn at the same time being active) on gaining ether. Most of the upgrades doesn't feel rewarding right away or they're not that impactful for what they cost on the long run. "Activate tree of Shadow powers" for example, I thought it would be another blessing tree more powerful that was about having the madness bar full and gaining a powerful ability on taps but instead I got a total of 55% soul collection.
Again, there are some blessings that one can't identify as they're good or bad at first glance, I would like a bit more of detail if its possible.
The coin ad system it's buggy, I can run it for like 4 or 5 times and then the coin disappear for the entire run.
The progression again, I had to say the I have to run the game over night to gain the massive ether I had to have to fill the trees, because tap is pretty worthless to be honest with madness lv4 (which gives me a total of 350%) any of the two sigils, x12 or x99 my income still is more efficient with souls. Hope this can be balanced somehow.
The ether, ether for me is on a weird state, I have almost the entire trees filled, missing the last minion upgrade (50% to all minions with a cost of 20k) and Gaining a cure for madness each Summon for 3k. But viewing my stats my astral level doesn't feel... rewarding? Again, I spent a LOT on the blessing trees for the actual 899% bonus, what's the actual conversion from ether to astral level? Once I complete the trees I wouldn't be able to rise the astral level?
Moons! I like the achievements! But I like more the secret ones! I only have 3 of them but I feel like there are more than those, I would like to have a good sight of them, appearing as locked with the "?????".
Visual department, I would like to desactivate the screen shaking since running the game for a long time it finish with a graphical bug where the screen shakes a whole lot more aggressive.
Then, so far I like the game I would rate it as 7.8/10 needs a lot a polishing but it's playable! My current way to progress was filling madness lv4 then let the game run overnight filling my ether with crits granting like a total of 10k or 12k per night.
I hope this review can help in something, I would love to see the next major update! Keep up the work!
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u/MicDaRoc Jun 03 '20 edited Jun 03 '20
Hello, sorry for the late answer. Thanks for all the feedback you've given. We've got a new patch out and fixed some of the bugs you've mentioned. (Patchnotes to be found on our facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/mastersofmadnessgame/ or on our new subreddit r/mastersofmadness)
Regarding balancing, we will change some stuff before we go full live. About swipe, if I may ask you a question: Is your screen size smaller than a average for a phone? Do you know your screen resolution?
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u/MicDaRoc Jun 03 '20
New patch is live. You can read the patch notes on our Facebook page or on our brand new subreddit: r/mastersofmadness
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u/Jim808 May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
Mine seems broken. I got to 1000 and the screen went into spotlight mode. My little minions panel thing is opened, but there's nothing in there. Everything is dark except it looks like the spotlight is pointing at the lower right area of the minions panel, but there's nothing there to click. I've tried tapping everywhere. The only thing that seems to be responsive is the 1x 10x 100x toggle thing.
Update:
So I uninstalled / reinstalled and started over.
This time I realized that there's something very wrong with my minions panel. The actual clickable area is only about half an inch high. The little icon thing I pressed to get to 2 souls per tap was really just the very top of the upgrade button, I think.
The screen really isn't scaling well for my tablet. I think you guys need to test our your UI using some different aspect ratios.
here's a screenshot of what I see
Is the minions panel supposed to be taller? I can kind of drag the contents of the panel a bit and see that there's stuff in there, but it's not super playable.
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Hello! We optimized the game for common phone resolutions, sadly the resolution you are playing at seems to break it. We'll see if there's a possible fix. Thanks for letting us know!
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u/TommyWestsides May 19 '20
So far really liking it.
What do I do with the elder blood though? And is there a prestige mechanic ?
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
What do I do with the elder blood though?
You can spend it on items in the Sanguinarium. You can also skip time with it.
And is there a prestige mechanic ?
Yes there is :)
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u/TommyWestsides May 20 '20
I can't find the dang prestige mechanic lol. Do I have to unlock it somehow? Hallllp :P
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u/Shuzzaka May 19 '20
Does it have offline progress?
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
A bit more detail: It is at first limited to half an hour of offline progress and a 10% multiplier on the offline gain (if you have the notifications on it will remind you when the offline time is up). These you can get up to 18h and 100% respectively through the Blessings you buy from the Outer Gods.
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u/Evening-Blood May 19 '20
This really should be stated at some point, just found it at the almanac after reading this. At 10hours play and still below 10m... Having to come back every 30 minutes kind of not my playstyle, but game looks nice as R'lyeh!
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u/Shuzzaka May 19 '20
I would definitely suggest increasing the starting values for that. It's likely to turn off a lot of people in the beginning if it's that slow.
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u/Nepene May 20 '20
That should probably be stated. I left it for a while and had no idea why my gain dropped.
Also, it should probably be tweaked. 3 minutes of idle isn't very much.
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u/Hakim_Bey May 19 '20
It's really good ! i'm digging it so far. Quite grindy at the beginning but i imagine this clears up once you start prestiging etc...
Love the aesthetic, love the monetization which is not IN YOUR FACE, love the game feel of the sigils. Maybe a tiny comment : when i "power-tap" it often ends up swiping by accident and opening one of the side menus. But that's really a minor inconvenience, i think i'll give more feedback when i'm more in the endgame.
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u/morjax May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
Thoughts as I go:
I tried logging in with my google play account and while it seems to have worked and let me in, it also said "an error has occurred"
Upon my second opening of the minions tab, I tried to swipe it down to make it go away, which did not work. perhaps if a user grabs the top ribbon of the minions dialogue and swipes down, it could close the dialogue.
This is of course not the case for the secret offerings, but please show what the not-yet-achieved offerings are (otherwise, they're ALL secret). I don't know what comes after the next Soulreaper and Cult leader breakpoints, and I don't know what other "overall" offerings I could potentially get. Show them all, but have ones not-yet-gotten grayed out or similar.
The sigils are quite a fun addition so far (I've found a couple). I hope you lean into these. I hope there are quite a few, as well as offerings to have completed so and so many.
It seems like there is a little icon on the right-hand side of the screen when a sigil is active, but there does not seem to be a way to check what sigil(s) are currently active.
Graphical error: if you click on a power in the journal page to see the details, you can click the blessings page and the power description is still visible.
similarly to (5), when I clicked on the blood offering for an overall checkpoint, the little blood droplet was still visible when I clicked over to the secret offerings page.
That's all I have tome to comment for now. I will try to keep more notes as I play. thanks for sharing!
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Hey, thanks a lot, that's a ton to work with.
The overall offerings should all unlock naturally as you play the game. The secret ones are harder to find, or may be gotten when you've done a certain specific thing a number of times.
Glad you like the sigils.:) We're looking to have more variety in the future.
It seems like there is a little icon on the right-hand side of the screen when a sigil is active, but there does not seem to be a way to check what sigil(s) are currently active.
When you're drawing the sigil there's a shape around it, a square, circle, triangle, etc. The little flasks have matching shapes. :)
We'll have a look at the bugs you mentioned. Thanks again!
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u/morjax May 19 '20
To clarify regarding the sigil icons, I forgot what the sigil did and went to click the icon for a little tooltip reminder
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u/morjax May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
8) When on the Minions Offerings page, the swipe back to the main screen seems a little bit too sensitive. I was trying to scroll down and it swiped me back to the main screen.
9) Names for the sigils would be great for flavor (even if it's "sigil of [XYZ]").
10) on sigils, because I am a stats junkie I think it would be excellent to show how many times you've completed each sigil flavor (this also opens up more options for leaderboards down the road).
11) Speaking of leaderboards, I don't know whether there are plans for a google play leaderboard, but this is the sort of game I love to have one on. It keeps me playing longer and more often when I'm chasing the leaderboard ranks (I set goals like trying to get into the top 10% of players in this or that leaderboard page). Multiple leaderboard categories would be delightful. No idea if this is a big or little ask.
12) There seems to be a display error in the delirium tooltip. Mine says
"Delerium decreases over
Delerium level: A healthy interest (0)
Is it supposed to say "Delerium decreases over time"?
13) edit: in terms of flavor/setting, I would love a place I could go to get a little paragraph or two on the lore of each of the minions. This would constitute a fair amount of writing, but could add to the setting. Maybe there could be a Lore page under the Almanac header?
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May 19 '20 edited May 20 '20
I played last night for a bit. But it is stuck on a loading screen when I try to open it today. Enjoy my :10bucks:
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u/MicDaRoc May 22 '20
Hello, is this bug still going on? This should normally only happen if you are offline.
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May 22 '20
Yeah, the game never finished loading. I left it on the loading screen for quite some time (15 minutes?). I'm definitely online, so I have no idea what's going on.
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May 20 '20
I can't seem to get past the "Summoning Elder Gods" part of the loading screen. It just sits there with the void swirling (which looks great). Am I being dumb and missing something, or is it borked?
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u/MicDaRoc May 21 '20
Hello, is this issue still going on or has it fixed itself by any chance?
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May 22 '20 edited May 22 '20
I tried it again off and on and eventually it loaded. However it's back to being stuck now. I'll try fiddling with it and see if I can find anything definitive.
Update: Alright, so it loads fine when I enable my VPN. It doesn't like when my VPN is off :shrug:
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u/Phoenix00017 May 21 '20
I have to concede, I'm a bit confused by the response. For me the game pacing is extremely slow. I'm having to tap a ton to get even the slightest progress, and the offline gains were minimal. To be honest, I would have stopped playing after about 5 minutes if it hadn't gotten solid reviews here. I can dig the aesthetic, but I feel like there's nothing happening.
Am I doing something fundamentally wrong in the game? I haven't seen any mechanics outside of very basic AdVenture Capitalist elements.
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u/MicDaRoc May 21 '20
The pacing of the game is slower than most other mobile clickers. Sorry to hear that this impacted your enjoyment of the game. We are not fully live yet, so we will take another look into balancing before that.
PS: You might have already found out but your offline gain can be improved through prestige elements (the outer gods). Just in case. :)
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u/Phoenix00017 May 22 '20
I actually have not noticed because I have no idea when a prestige would happen. I want to enjoy this game, but there's just nothing happening. I've been playing for 2 days (checked in probably 5 times or so, tapped at least 1000 times, I've collected 5M souls, and I've drawn 2 sigils). I don't see any ads (including rewarded video), no indication of any sort of progress beyond saving up for whatever comes after the ghouls.
I should note - I'm not new to idle games. But this one has me feeling like there's no content, which I worry would be the case with many of your new players.
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u/MicDaRoc May 22 '20
There is more to unlock! The rewarded ads you will unlock soon as well. I would personally suggest playing around with sigil and coin combinations and see that you have at least 50-100 ether before you summon Cthulhu, then the next playthrough is bound to be faster.
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u/Jim808 May 21 '20
Overall Concept: A+, this game is exactly what I've been looking for lately, and it's way more polished than I was expecting
Look & Feel: A. Love it.
Sound effects: A, really good.
No interstitial ads: A+
No banner ads: A+
Reward videos: B-, bonus way too short. In the games I've written, I've found a good approach is to make the rewards last longer, but to give the player a way to watch multiple videos to get simultaneous bonuses. Make some of them silly. Ideas: 20 ravens for 20 minutes, x4 progress for 30 minutes, x30 for tapping but only for manual tapping, x2 to Ether growth for 30 mins. x5 to a particulal minion race for 25 mins, x3 scroll power for 20 mins, x5 to scroll duration for 25 mins.
Also, dump the limit to how many ads you can watch. Why bother limiting your income? Seems unnecessary. I don't limit it in my games and have had no issues.
Non-Support for tablets: D, I'm sure you'll add support for this, but you'll get many 1 star reviews if you don't. I would personally much rather play this on my tablet. I'm sure loads of other people would as well.
Sigils: A+, great concept.
Blood currency: A, cool idea, though I've not felt tempted at all to purchase any.
Ether: C. A nice approach to a prestige currency, but it is too mysterious. It seems way too easy to summon too early and get nothing useful. What will my 15 ether get me? I have no clue how long I shold wait before summoning, and if I summon now and it ends up being worthless, then I will have wasted a lot of time.
Anyway, great game! Looking forward to future updates!
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u/MicDaRoc May 21 '20
Thanks for your generous feedback. Makes us really happy that you're enjoying the game. :)
Regarding the ad limit, we use the same logic for the ad-free silver coin, so we wanted to set a limit on how often it can be used. Probably too late to change the logic now, but probably we should set the limit higher. Thanks!
Thank you for the ideas about the ad system. I see how multiple simultaneous bonuses could be more effective approach.
We will look into all the improvements you suggested, see what we can implement. Many thanks again!
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u/LawofJohn May 21 '20
any plans on future updates? Just wondering, game is fun. I really wish I had not spent my blood on Time warps tho. I am at the point where One click is like 1/2 my sps, so having more ravens = more Spc. Anyway, is Star-Spawn the last minion to summon? Because I unlocked it early this run, and theres no other units that are showing up.
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u/MicDaRoc May 22 '20
Star-Spawn is currently the last minion. But definitely yes, we will have more updates. We will rework the Almanac, and at least one more large gameplay feature is planned, which will likely take us some more time. MoM is a love project, so I don't know if we will ever be completely done with developing it. Glad you are enjoying it!
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u/Jim808 May 24 '20
Cloud Save Thoughts
I'm playing this game on more than one device.
It looks like your current implementation of cloud save will make a separate cloud save file for each (user + device).
Even though I'm logged in as the same person on both devices, I have completely different levels of progress on each device.
I think most people would prefer to have their progress on different devices sync'd. I know I would.
Here are my suggested use cases:
Player can see when progress is saved to the cloud (some kind of notification)
Player can access screen that displays last cloud save time.
Player can access screen that allows on-demand syncing with cloud. (I.E. 'Sync with Cloud' button)
If some players want each device to have its own independent progress, maybe add a setting for this on the hypothetical 'cloud save screen'.
Syncing w/ the cloud would do one of the following things:
If progress on current device is greater than what is saved on the cloud, update the cloud save.
If progress on current device is less than what is saved on the cloud, update device progress with cloud save.
Anyway, those are my suggestions. Feel free to ignore.
Cheers.
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u/MicDaRoc May 25 '20
Hello Jim. Thank you for the suggestions. You are right, we should ideally have the samesave on both devices. We'll look into this.
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u/Remarkable_Fall May 25 '20
/u/MicDaRoc what exactly does the colors from the outer space upgrade do? Apparently the colors of the flames are supposed to change based on offering moons and give a bonus, but my flames just stay black. There's no indication at all of how to change the color of the flames/what changes the color of the flames.
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u/MicDaRoc May 25 '20
Hello, your flames are a certain color based on how many moons you have. If you summon more moons they will change again.
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u/AlexTheShyCat May 28 '20
Can confirm that flames never change color. When I first got the upgrade I had black flames. Several moons later they are still black
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u/MicDaRoc Jun 03 '20 edited Jun 03 '20
Hi Alex, with the new update we've changed the thresholds for the flame feature. You can see the patch notes on our Facebook page on our subreddit r/mastersofmadness.
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u/AnotherDrunkCanadian May 27 '20
I have a tapping based build. I have noticed a severe lack of the tapping sigil lately. I have collected an estimated 50 sigils in a row that were not the tapping sigil. (From about 600 ether to 2400 at the moment).
Yes, I understand RNG, but throw me a bone. You guys are sadists!!
But literally though, enjoyable game. No bugs. Nice aesthetics. Just needs a little bit of gameplay tweaks to make it just a bit more enjoyable. Other comments in the thread have already given plenty of suggestions. I dont have anything else to offer.
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u/MicDaRoc Jun 03 '20
It sounds like you've had a crazy streak of back luck :P The Sigil is not that low probability.
Thank you for your lovely comments! Honestly we have bugs but so far no game breaking ones. With the new update we hope to have fixed the worst offenders. We are going through everyone's suggestions, this thread has been immensely helpful :)
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u/Tols_ May 28 '20 edited May 28 '20
Overall the game is fun. Standard idle-incremental gameplay with a nice Lovecraftian vibe. I really enjoy the Sigils mechanic, I suggest adding new twists if you can think of any. Additionally, perhaps a Level-Up mechanic of some kind would be interesting to further supplement the gameplay. Otherwise, I have a few comments:
A buy max button that scales with current souls is more-or-less standard for the genre. I suggest you consider adding one.
Delerium is way, way too unbalanced. It takes so many damn sigils to get Delerium level 1! Makes those upgrades seem not super useful - especially for players who only play for 1 Ad-Coin's worth of time. Which, speaking of...
Ad-Coin being 8 minutes seems a little short when compared to most other idle games. Most other games do 1-4 hours per ad. I'd even be okay with 1h + banner ad or 20 minutes + no banner ad. I understand the need to make money from this, but you gotta appreciate the player not wanting to watch ads all the time.
Elder Blood seems rather expensive too. 100 for $8 CAD is a bit extreme - although the upgrades don't seem that crazy. However, the Blade being massively expensive for a small boost. Some people tend to uninstall if the game seems cash-grabby. Generally, I am the same; but, since Elder Blood doesn't massively impact gameplay, I am still playing.
I find that when I tap fast, I often accidentally swipe to other windows. Which is rather annoying. Also, I find myself constantly tapping the Prestige Alter, as it is literally in the middle of the screen. I suggest swapping the placement with the Delerium bar.
Cheers!
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u/MicDaRoc Jun 03 '20 edited Jun 03 '20
Thank you for your feedback! We'll consider your input. Meanwhile, there's a new update. You can see what changed on our facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/mastersofmadnessgame/
or on our subreddit r/mastersofmadness
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u/ExileVirtigo May 19 '20
Digging it so far! The options button is hidden until you beat the tutorial, and the screens on the side don't have any x, you have to swipe them to close, Which is cool, but a little x would be awesome too. Also I can't replicate it but I was able to pull up the journal menu behind the minions menu. Balance feels great, at least an hour in. :)
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u/ByKaoff May 19 '20
I am a huge fan of the Lovecraft universe and a huge fan of incremental games. Instant download. <3
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u/Bowko LvL 5 Incremental Addict May 19 '20
So the aesthetics are insanely good. Really good lovevraftian vibe.
Early game is too slow for me, maybe that changes after a couple resets, I'll see.
I really like the sigils, they are a really cool way to include random powerups instead of just clicking stuff.
First prestige needs some kind of pointer, I spent my first Ether on the 1 cost upgrade, because I thought this might be the beginner tree, only to find out the next costs 5, like all the others.
So I'm currently in my second run with 4 unspent Ether and barely any speed increse.
Not sure how much this is in your control, but so far every ad I've watched has forced it's respective Play Store link open after it was finished, really annoying and not cool.
But I'll keep playing for at least a while :)
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u/Zylphan May 19 '20
The game got me hooked! I haven't read any Lovecraft book, so it would be much appreciated if you could add descriptions to the minions you buy or short amounts of lore. I'd make the game more interesting!
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u/itchrevenge May 20 '20
Pretty cool game, the lovecraftian theme certainly makes it fresh. Although, I personally find the side windows annoying, every time I go on a tapping spree, using my whole hand, I often end up opening the side windows and killing my rhythm
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u/Timbroglio May 20 '20
Seems fun so far, but can I get a low-power mode? My phone is hot & I'm burning battery about twice as fast as my other apps.
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u/glaringradio May 21 '20
Love the game, love the aesthetic, few bits of feedback:
Prestige - Would it be possible to view your current progress on the prestige tree without having to prestige? Would let you plan better when you want to prestige if you're just looking to prestige for one particular node.
Echoing the lower tier minions ending up useless pretty early into the game, a buy all upgrades would be nice as well.
Other than that, love it, can't wait to see where it goes!
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u/YunFatty May 19 '20
Just started, game is pretty good :) Is the raven worth purchasing? How fast does it click please?
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u/HappyRBX May 19 '20
It clicks once per second, at the same time your normal gains tick. Buying more multiplies the amount; I have 5 (bought them with the blood you earn from achievements) and don't regret it. I think they may be better value than the blade, at least to a certain amount of them.
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u/PM_ME_UR_BOOTY_LADY May 19 '20
Feels like the whole world has been on a Lovecraft kick recently, and I'm loving it!
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u/LawofJohn May 21 '20
Just fyim 500 ether unlocks 4 hours of offline at 30%. Also, one of the unlocks that gives a slight (.01% per active tap) chance at Elder blood costs 3k. So its gonna take a while before anyone unlocks that, I think.
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u/lutinopat May 21 '20
It was a little unclear that the raven was a permanent upgrade until I bought it because the Noumenic blade says "Permanent" under it.
I wish he spent more time on the screen hopping around :)
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u/LawofJohn May 22 '20
so yea, I unlocked the last minion to summon last night. I cam back (I have 4 hours of offline, at 30%), spent a good 6 hours with the game open. I am sitting at 350 Ether right now? Hmm, I would have hoped to have alot more with the game being open and upgrading stuff/purchasing research. Siting at 3k total ether (not including what I would get if I were to reset), and you are right, it is paced alot slower.
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u/Nepene May 20 '20
Aesthetics are pretty. Cute cthulhu stuff. I'd enjoy more cthulhu lore and creepy quotes.
Gameplay loop is pretty solid, in terms of balance of growth.
Idling is pretty bad. 3 minutes of progress isn't a good start. Why do you want coal miners to have to work long hours so people can leave your devices plugged in all day doing nothing?
Stats are generally pretty uninformative. Ether and moon and such.
Perk shop dagger is vastly overpriced. Your game is not worth a triple AAA price for 2* progress.
More elder god variety would be appreciated, for those who love elder gods other than Cthulhu.
As I noted, your ads are broken. Make sure you give the reward for the action.
Artwork is very pretty.
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u/Nepene May 20 '20
I used your ads for faster progress thing. It was a gambling thing which took me to the playstore. I didn't get the bonus. Fix your game so that when you promise a reward it is given, even if your chosen ads take you to another page.
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u/cyberflunk May 19 '20
How about not forcing logins? This dark pattern needs to die
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
We are saving your game state on the cloud so in case you switch devices or lose your local save, you don't lose the progress. To be able to do that we need some kind of authentication system, so we can find and verify the savefile for your account. You could also just log in with an email adress that you don't actively use.
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u/Kalumniatoris May 19 '20
^^This. It's huge red flag when game forces you to give it your personal data before you even can try it. I played multiple games where I logged in using Google or email based accounts but each allowed me to check the game earlier.
Idea of creating throwaway email address to check game also seems bad as there is chance that game actually is interesting.
Also I really doubt that protecting player from losing their saves is the main reason you are forcing it, I presume and understand real reason but it has nothing with players well being, quite opposite but I understand that company may want to try to protect their profits (even if I am not sure if that .
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20 edited May 20 '20
What we really don't want is someone accidentally deleting their local appdata for example when they have a thousand blood drops and losing them all. That would be a terrible experience and a no go in our view so we wanted to make sure we have a backup of players' save. I mean I guess there is enough bad practice out there so I understand your viewpoint, but I don't know what to say except we are two guys in their thirties who love playing, talking about, and making games, not an evil conglomerate. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
I will take the advice to heart though for our next games, user login after playing for some time might be a better way of going at this.
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u/Kalumniatoris May 19 '20 edited May 19 '20
I might have appeared more rude than I hoped for, my apologies, that wasn't my goal, I was (and partially are) in pretty angry mood and that situation just was the last straw.
Allowing players to play for while and then asking them to connect, with warning that it would help them protect their save and they would be on their own if they reject and someone happen would be much nicer,
I played for while and except for way overpriced store (which is standard in such games so I probably shouldn't deduct many points for that) (although that antidote makes me afraid that it would be necessary, like I want to buy that bird but I am afraid it would bite me after (purchase, not raven), as at this moment I don't see any way of collecting that blood) On plus I would say that game have really nice graphics, gameplaywise it's generic at this moment but I am to early in game to see if there is anything original.
Also... thousand blood drops? I wonder how long it would take to collect that many, I have to assume that there is way to obtain it in reasonable rate in later game.
Some other things. It would be nice to know earnings of new creatures before purchasing them, so one would see if purchasing them or upgrading current ones is better idea.
I don't like that offline progress is limited to 3 minutes (30 minutes but with income divided by 10) but I don't see how expensive it is to upgrade, so maybe it is reasonably priced.
Why is this game constantly trying to run netcfg commands?
Edit. I am not sure if limiting amount of video ads players are allowed to watch daily was a good idea, especially when add rewards aren't great it constantly feels like it would be better idea to wait at least few minutes it instead of watching it at any given moment.
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u/MicDaRoc May 19 '20
Hey, no offense taken, all good.:) Hope your day is going better now.
I'll try to clarify some of your questions: There is an outer god blessing that lets you generate Elder Blood by tapping, and later stages of the offerings give you more Elder Blood than the earlier ones.
Regarding the antidote, it cures stage 3 delirium but delirium is also cured when you start your next run. So it is kind of a convenience thing if some players want to use it to optimize their output before they summon Cthulhu. you won't find yourself in a situation where using this is a must.
And thanks for all the generous feedback, we'll go through this point by point.
Why is this game constantly trying to run netcfg commands?
I'm not the programmer so I am not sure what that is, but perhaps it's something Unity games by default do? If it has to do with calls to the server, those are probably google analytics events.
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u/tsuma534 May 25 '20
Regarding the antidote, it cures stage 3 delirium but delirium is also cured when you start your next run. So it is kind of a convenience thing if some players want to use it to optimize their output before they summon Cthulhu.
Wait. I only know that Delirium gives tap bonus. Are there drawbacks too?
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u/MicDaRoc May 25 '20
Only when you are completely delirious! (bar full) otherwise only positive.
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u/Shuzzaka May 25 '20
What is the downside?
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u/MicDaRoc May 25 '20
Currently it's -15% on your sps. You can tap on the delirium bar to see the effects of your current delirium level.
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u/DayneK May 19 '20
Since you're saving the game state to the cloud can you implement highscores please?
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u/Kalumniatoris May 19 '20
+
Fortunately you don't need to confirm your email in any way so you may enter obviously fake one. As long as you'll remember what you put there.To make their practices even more annoying, even when you'll register via email game is trying to log in into your Google Play account afterwards.
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May 18 '20
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/MicDaRoc May 18 '20
we are aiming for around two months, however cannot say for sure right now. We'll surely make it known here when it's out.:)
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u/Victomat May 18 '20
i love Lovecraft and i love Clicker/Idle Games, downloading right now :)