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Thanks for the feedback.  I hadn't considered that for this game.  While the upgrades technically have a maximum of 999 there's no intended way to reach it.

Thanks!  It is flattering to be compared to Cavernous, it was definitely a big inspiration for this.

gg and thanks for playing!  Looks like you got really strong.

I'm not sure I fully understand what happened.  Are you saying one of the upgrades wasn't working when you bought it until you reloaded your browser?

Ok it should be fixed.

...  Ok literally I forgot to do that part.

Welp, it's going to get a lot easier soon.

Oh that is really perceptive than you for pointing that out.  I am looking into it.

Oh sorry if that wasn't clear.  They do give you full benefit every time!  You don't really have a "maximum" health in this, the bar is relative to the most health you've had that run.

Oh thanks for saying so!

I do feel like its biggest flaw is that it is too simple but  I really wanted to see what people thought of this general concept at least.  A bigger world with more things to do probably would be better.  I would have to make some fixes to this to support something larger but that isn't so bad.

The truth is I'm not really sure yet how to design something larger yet in terms of an overall gameplay system.  Maybe I could reintroduce some things from Idle Rock Remover as part of it.

I especially don't know what to do about the going forward and back.  I feel like there is no adequate way to represent it on the map view and if I allow it the map will just end up looking like unreadable spaghetti.

Hey nice job getting so far.  Well, you aren't too far off from the end, so you won't really miss that much if you quit now.  Did you try farming skill gems and leveling up the walking upgrade?  It might feel better if you max out the brooch before trying to do that part too.

That's interesting.  I was thinking of letting all the rooms be revealed at the start but I didn't think that would be as fun.

I don't want to make it too much faster the total run time isn't really that long.

Yeah that's fair.  If you don't find the power growth in it satisfying then you won't be the only one.

I don't know if it will help at all but I can explain more about what is going on at least.  MTVN is spent at a constant rate so reducing costs does make it go faster.  For the stats the permanent level is just a XP bonus for the daily level until you get the STAT skill, and at first the loops are short so the daily level won't go very high and it won't be very noticable, but when you get access to more flowers and can have longer days then you can see those stats build up and your speed increase more over the day.

That was the idea anyway.  If I make something else it will be easier to understand and feel progress.

It's both.

Let me paste the equations I didn't post them on itch yet.

The efficiency bonuses from stats multiply the costs by 1 / (1 + StatLevel / 50)

The XP bonus from permanent levels multiplies XP gain by 1 + ((Level ^ 0.8) / 5)

Most skills multiply costs by 1 / (1 + SkillLevel / 25)

MNST, FISH, and BIRD multiply the cost of removing rocks by 1 / (1 + Level*ResourceAmount / 100)

The STAT skill adds a flat 4% of your permanent level to your current level for each STAT level.

By default you get 100 skill XP per learn. The XP cost starts at 30-90 and goes up by the original cost every level. LERN gives 4 extra points per level.

Thanks I've added your instructions.  You are right people have been getting stuck on that.

Well the part that supposedly drags on for so long is like 1 hour to get rid of all the blue rocks in the middle.  It's actually kind of hard for me to empathize with that since 1 hour in the other game is like, 6 soulstones to add to my 1.2k and half a percent towards talking to the witch.  If that's really so long, and I make it even shorter than that then there's barely any of the game left after that, and the whole thing will be over in like 3 hours or the wall will feel even bigger and more sudden.

Wow yes that was totally untested territory.  Thanks for sharing!

TBH I'm not sure how much potential this idea really has.  I could try to smooth out the progression curve by making a larger world, then what, you end up doing 200 movement commands to follow a giant path of flowers?  In another game you can just add a gather command and set the number of times and at this point I'm thinking that was better.

Awesome, my first positive feedback.  Thanks for this!

I would like to make something with better queue management.

Ok I hear you and I think you are right.  It's not obvious enough at all how the stats work.

If you want to keep trying, the way to benefit from the skill trainer is to uncover one of the nearby blue rocks (the one below him is easiest) and you can get a resource to bring him from there, that will teach you a skill that will give you a bigger immediate benefit.

As for the stats, the permanent one is just an XP multiplier for the stat.  The daily level is the only one that impacts your power level (until you get the STAT skill).  So, the permanent level makes a bigger difference in longer loops which give the stat more time to build up.

I'm not telling you to accept any of that as a solution, I would definitely do some things differently now.

Well there is a NPC under the blue rock straight up from the start it can teach you a skill that will let you remove the rocks faster.

I did aim for it to take about a day or two to finish.

I think you are right about a sense of progress though, it would probably work better in a bigger world where it can ramp up more slowly.

I just love these little guys.

I used a few of them in a free game.

https://muzzl.itch.io/idle-rock-remover

Here is a spoiler of the revealed map if you just want to see the characters in it.

https://imgur.com/a/veuOQoZ

This is a great font pack for retro theme styles.

I used Centurion Bold 8x16 Monospaced in a free game.

https://muzzl.itch.io/idle-rock-remover

Really nice pack.  There are over 1200 items.