I've played to the third world map now. In general, the game is really great so far
I think the difficulty curve is very appropriate. It takes a while to get used to timing attacks and charges, dashing at the right time, etc. I'm an experienced player, but I didn't see a problem with the beginning being too slow or so.
I also don't think there needs to be more loot. There is a nice variety of ways to get the hats, which reward you every now and then when you don't really expect it, and only getting few, but rather important items through the chests is also nice.
But, I see some problems with the items in general: A lot of them just aren't that interesting. I lost interest in getting new armor when I found out that in the beginning, all armor you get does "+55% crit change for spell XY", with only the influenced spell being different. By now I've only found one different kind of armor, again with only the spell names changing throughout the different models. So, despite having found 10 or more armors, they are really only 2 different kinds (so far?).
It's better with the weapons, as there are no "clones", but I expected them to have a larger impact on the actual combat. This is actually why I first thought Mage Gauntlet might be similar to DS Castlevanias. I hoped the weapons would have different sizes and maybe just totally different kinds of attacks, but so far I only got two weapons with slower attack speeds, one of them with higher damage. That's already nice, but I think there is a lot of potential for more.
Lastly, the trinkets are a bit rare in my opinion. It's nice that you're able to influence what spells you might get, but so far I only have trinkets for a few specific spells, some of which I don't even want to use. So, at the moment I'm just constantly using the one which give you +1 heart, which seems to be by far the most useful one I have.
To sum that up, I don't think the game is really flawed as regards the items, but there is a lot of untapped potential for the planned successors
By now I am really enjoying the combat with the harder enemies, as you constantly have to think about when and where to charge, how often to attack before dashing away, saving up spells for just the right moment, how to most efficiently use them, etc. And that's just great for what this game is. But, I think if you want to motivate players for longer periods of time, there needs to be more variation.
My only bigger gripe are the secret rooms, or rather the enemies in them. And permanently locked doors. It's nice that there are secrets to find, and it's well done that sometimes you get bits of little stories, and at other times rewards like spells and hp. But, I find it very annoying that to get all 3 stars on a level, you usually have to find every single one of those rooms, because of the enemies that are often in them.
For this reason, I so often fight through an entire level, only to find out at the very end, that I missed one of the secret rooms, thus having to backtrack a lot. This is still bearable, but in the later levels, very often doors permanently lock behind you, while you are still unaware if you missed any secrets rooms. So, again, you fight through the whole level, find out that you forgot some enemies - only now you can't backtrack, but instead you have to retry the level if you want all stars. And, hell, even when retrying I still keep forgetting some secret rooms at times. That's really annoying.
Thus, if nothing else, it would help a lot if at least those doors would always open again after clearing a room, so that you can always backtrack through the entire level from the end. While that's still boring, at least it doesn't frustrate.
But, all in all, really: Great job on the game, which is also a fine foundation for whereever you want to take the series
One last thing, and this is not criticism: I noticed in some of your posts that you seem to be very concerned with what iOS-players will appreciate or dislike, what exactly they expect from their purchases, etc. This is very reasonable considering that understandably you probably want to make as much profit as possible. But, I hope in the process you don't neglect what kinds of games
you want to make, and what ideas
you would love to bring to life in these
Player
