Magic Potion Explorer

A cute exercise in resource allocation, way too shallow for the asking price.

Very fun arcadey fantasy game.

There are some mixed reviews regarding the game, so I want to address some of the complaints with my own views:

1) "It plays like an idle game!" Well yeah. It is very much a menu-based idler. If you detest those, then this isn't for you. That being said, I'm not fond of idlers either but I found this to be very enjoyable. It actually has layers of depth and beating the challenges requires strategy. I've never had a menu game make my heart race before, which is saying a lot.

2) "It is short!" It is an arcade style game, meaning it's made to be played multiple times, honing your skills and tackling different challenges. If you intend to play it as a one-off RPG, you will be underwhelmed.

2) "It is easy!" If you play in normal mode, you can infinitely farm, making the game a joke. That being said, that's like throwing infinite credits at an arcade game and saying it's easy. Hard mode prevents you from farming altogether, and the game gets a lot harder if you bother trying to get all the achievements, such as achieving S rank and playing with restrictions.

The soundtrack is an absolute banger. Nihon Falcom style.

The only complaint I would point out is that the early game can be very frustrating at times. Your shots can miss and sometimes you'll be at the RNG's mercy.

Overall, the game is well worth the money I spent. Recommend.

Playing this was fairly underwhelming. Maybe I had my bar too high after playing One Way Heroics, but there's very little to do in this game. The character handles everything but upgrades automatically, it's just a matter of upgrading semi-strategically. The game would have some value if there was another level of depth beyond upgrades - but you just have to keep your numbers high enough to not die...not very hard if you want to crunch math or just repeat runs on normal mode.
Admittedly, I have not tried hard mode, but from the description of the mode, it is literally just a single-run version of normal (where your initial RP pool increases the more you fail). I presume that it could be fun finding multiple ways to win in hard mode (I imagine there are a series of upgrade "paths", dependent only slightly on luck, which result in victory), which might lend it some replay value, but I think you hit diminishing returns fairly quickly, here. I'll give the game credit and admit that the early game was actually pretty enjoyable (balancing my need to improve after-battle regen with the fact that my HP pool was high enough to allow for a focus on buying other upgrades for a while). If you want a game to pay attention to halfway for 30 minutes a few times a week, or want a game to focus on for two hours every few weeks, this game will do, but you might find more enjoyment out of other games. This game is far more about the journey than it is about the destination. If you like the upgrade system, the game has replay value. If you view the upgrade system as a means to an end, the game has no replay value.
The game could be terrific if you could choose paths to take (e.x. this one has a lot of enemies and yields a lot of RP, but this one is safer), and would have been really cool as a "mystery dungeon" type game (as-is, it feels like you only have access to one pre-generated mystery dungeon map that your character automatically follows a single path through - the only difference between runs is "leveling" your character). Heck, they could have even added challenges (such as "chaos potion locked at level 2, no upgrading it!") to add a whole new level of interesting complexity to the game, but it seems like you must have all potions at max level to win.
The story is okay at best - I'll give the game credit for making the names of a floor at the end related to "parental love", then suggesting that the witch was the character's parent all along, but even then the story was simple and the big reveal at the end was abrupt at best.
I had this on my wishlist for a while because I though it looked neat while browsing idly through the Steam store. I got this on sale for $5, and I'm considering getting a refund. I'm not sure if I'm satisfied with what I got for $5 or not...$3 might have convinced me to turn my review around. At the end of the day, the game was enjoyable to play, but I was disappointed in how shallow the game is. I've played for 96 minutes and beaten normal mode, and I don't feel like there's much more that would feel fulfilling to do. Frankly, if you're thinking about getting the game to do a run through - just go watch a YouTube video and save yourself a few bucks. If you're legitimately interested in the upgrade system and don't mind the game being very simple in casual play, I'd still wait for a discount before you buy it.

tl;dr
The game is simple...too simple.
The upgrade system is the only system. Once you figure out the math, do trial-by-error, or repeat enough runs in normal mode, you win.
Okay story, but you could watch a YouTube video and get everything you wanted from it.
This game is far more about the journey than it is about the destination. If you like the upgrade system, the game has replay value. If you view the upgrade system as a means to an end, the game has no replay value.

Even good games sometimes crash, but it generally isn't more than a minor annoyance as long as it is rare. But crashes in idle games without any sort of auto-save are much worse. This game need some sort of auto-save before I could recommend it.

So, I'm writing this review while the game is playing itself.

I lost at the end of a run, and now I have to let the game play back to the point where I'd lost.

Admittedly it does this relatively fast, but yeah. That's the first thing you need to know about this game. It's basically an economy sim, where you gradually accumulate resources, choose what to invest them in, and the game simulates all combat / resource gathering in the meantime.

There isn't huge depth here, but the game is kind of good despite that. The soundtrack is wonderful, and playing it is mildly hypnotic. As long as you're not looking for anything too deep, this is a fun way to kill an hour.

The underlying premise is also pretty novel, and I don't mind seeing more combat rpgs about healers.

EDIT: My playtime is reflective of a full, regular run of the game.

Also, there are a couple of spots built into the dungeon where you either have the correct loadout of upgrades to succeed, or you get sent back to the start. By the end of the game, you need to have all upgrades fully maxed, and I kind of dislike this design. It removes any real strategy from play, funneling you into a 'correct build' at all times.

Still, as a one-off experience, it's not a bad way to kill an hour.

Fair game, but far too short for the price.

little interaction, too easy, low graphics. wasn't worth the 5 dollars.

This game is WAY to expensive for what it is. Even with a 50% discount it is still WAY to expensive! The game itself is a bit to simple. You basically wait, then upgrade potions, then wait. You don't get to use the potions, you just upgrade them. It would be nice to be able to click on them for effects, but it's just to overly simplified.

The story wasy great, and made me laugh, but it was so short. The game took 14 minutes on easy mode. There is only two modes, easy and hard. With hard, the potions reset to lvl 1 upon death, and not with easy mode. There is no way to leave the dungeon, you just go until you die. Then you go again until you die. That's it. This game is worth $1, maybe two if feeling generous, but that's all. If you get this game at 90-95% off, then I recommend it. It will be a funny few minutes.

I was hoping to find something similar to Recettear, however this game (while similar in concept) is striped from almost any gameplay.

The exploration is automatic (and by exploration I mean moving the character from one rectangular to another, no difference between 'rooms'), the fight is automatic and the only thing that player is supposed to do is click on upgrates every 30sec-1min.

For this price I was expecting much more, as most mobile games have more gameplay.

Unfortunately for me this was a waste of time - especially for this price.

Had this in my queue for a while. Bought on special, 50% off. Was expecting something a bit lighter than Recetter, but found it to be much lighter than expected. Basically just a clicker game, the challange is simply to upgrade your character at the right times.

Once you break out the math, virtually no replayability.

An idle game that doesn't really know how to scale very long, so it caps all your skill levels and limits the number of floors in the dungeon. Short as heck, but darn it, I enjoyed myself. But get it on a sale; it's not worth full price.

(PS: Don't wear headphones. The volume balance of the BGM will make you dizzy)

Not a good game. Even getting it at 60% off I feel like I didn't get any value out of it. This is more akin to a semi-polished flash game.

Very, very little interaction with the game. You kind of just have it on in the background and check back every couple minutes.

No challenge or decisions to be made. Even choosing between upgrades doesn't really matter. You're gonna reach the same place no matter what you upgrade first.

Short, as well. There could potentially be some merit to be found in going for a "high score," but in order for that to matter you have to care about the game in the first place, and I can't imagine many will.

It's not really bad but should really be around 1$.
No graphics, almost no story.
Not an idle game, not a clicker, basically you have to watch the game and select an upgrade every 15-30 seconds -that's all to it.
Length is around half an hour, longer if you do the challenges for whatever reason.
The music is good but not included as open files, shame really.

Just a clicker. Cute consept, but really nothing much to do except buy upgrades. Was hoping for more for this price.

Well first off its not a clicker. Its just a upgrade idle game ...2nd Its so short you can play free games else where with more content than this. Its amusing for about two hours when you max everything and just let it run to the end. Less if you have played idle games. Has 0 replay insentive other than to get a s rank and it starts you all over to do this not worth the price at all when compared to what you can play for free even here on steam.

Get it on sale if it ever gets to $5. If you like incremental, idle, and upgrade games, then this is for you. I personally am an achievement whore and played all I could from it. However, a casual 1-time play will only net you an hour or so.

Needs a better replay system. The current one to get better times is great and all but a higher system than just 99k and lvl 10. New game+ could take it to level 200 and then some.

Steam why cant you give me a neutral button. The graphics are great and so is the sound track. The game is fine in its tiny form but could be much better to suit the price tag on it.

At 5$ its a good price.

Having bought this game, I don't think it was really worth paying anything for, at all. This has less content than your average idle game on Kongregate.

A really simple game to spend some time with

The goal of the game is simple, Reach B99

During your desent downwards you'll fight monsters and collect items for RP, which are used to make potions/buffs for your person, the collecting and battles are all auto so you only need to manage the potion aspect of things.
Should you fail and die, you are sent back to B1 and have to wander back downwards again, however there are difficulty settings for this, on Normal should you fall you will keep all your upgrades so you can nuke your way back down to where you were, on Hard however should you fall, you lose all your upgrades but are given a small amount of RP in exchange, continue to fall and the RP rises more.

The game is fairly easy to understand and the music was really good *for me at least*, however the game can be beaten fairly easy on your first run, you can also try to speedrun the game but other than that i feel like its once you finished it, then thats about it, nonetheless its a really fun game to pass the time with.

Should you find it in the sales i recommend picking it up, this game in my eyes is rated 7.5/10

So, while this game is rather short (beat it in 90 minutes) and would be better off at a lower price (maybe $5), it's nice to have a nice, quick, in-and-out game once in awhile.

This game doesn't have very much at all in the way of actual combat mechanics, as it's basically choosing what upgrades you should get when, but that doesn't mean it isn't fun. It's a nice game to play, with great effect quality, and (definitely not leaving this out) AMAZING music! For a game with very little action, it has very good music that I found myself enjoying immensly!

As stated above, it's an extremely short game (although longer with the hard mode), but it's definitely one to look for when on sale. Heck, it's on sale for a dollar off, and while I wouldn't recommend it too strongly to others at that price, I'm definitely keeping this game.

If you're unfamiliar with the genre of Idle/Incremental games, you may want to do some research before buying this game.

If you are, and you like those games, this is probably right up your alley.

The art, music, interface and all the other little details are well polished.

The game is fairly hands off. You automatically proceed through the dungeon and only interact by purchasing new upgrades.

So far, the content seems a bit limited, I don't know if it's worth the full price. On sale, it may be a more palatable purchase.

One thing about this genre though is that there are often surprises. If I get a few hours in and find that it really opens up, I'll update this review accordingly.

Edit:

Looks to be about 2 hours of gameply. I don't have much desire to play it again. Maybe they'll improve it in the future.

Something little like a bonus perk every time you complete the game would go a looong way for replayability.

Fun but short cute little game! There's actually not much interactivity, it's kind of like a slightly more interactive Progress Quest.

Gameplay is as follows: You send the main character, Pastel, in to the dungeon and she will automatically kill things and gather reagents as she travels down. Whenever either of those actions occurs she gains RP, which can be spent on various skills from bonus damage to more health to bonuses against specific enemies. Every 10 floors or so there will be a boss battle, which is basically just an enemy with more HP.

That's the whole game. And you can max out and beat it fairly quickly, before getting all the Steam Cards even! I thought it was cute and idly fun enough to be worth the price, but that is up to the individual.