I just spent an unintentional few hours playing this game; it's genuinely great.
I will say that some of the color combinations were a little punishing. White balls on a white background is a lot. Some of the perks have very murky upsides; having the ball change color isn't ever an advantage, so far as I can tell. It would be nice if the perks had mouseover explanations. Even after hours, there's still a few I have no idea what they do.
Every time I bounce a ball, there's a -1 that doesn't seem to impact the score. What's that about?
If the arcade version of Breakout had had a skill tree, Nolan Bushnell would likely be richer than Richard Branson today.
Some of the perks seem to be downgrades or maybe they require synergy.
Compound interest will tank you combo… unless you use magnetism (necessary) and viscosity (very helpful), at which point you get exponential bonus going.
The perk that gives you more bonus the more bounces your ball does seems like it could be good, but it resets your bonus when you hit the ball with your paddle, so actually it is streak destroying. But maybe there’s some hidden combo with another perk?
Yeah, there are a few footguns in here. Most bad perks are not so bad once combined with sapper+pierce+puck control ball + multiball + bigger explosions because levels finish in 2 seconds anyway
Speaking of finishing maps in 2 seconds—it seems to me that having the number of maps be the thing that determines the run length could be sort of limiting to your design choices in powerups. Enough kaboom and the run will just blow through the screens in an instant, and your run will be over before you can fully enjoy in your overpowered nature.
It could be interesting if time was a component to the whole thing instead. Look at Risk of Rain for inspiration, the game gets harder as time goes by. You have a finite number of power-ups that you can unlock per map, so the player is incentivized to try and keep progressing through the maps at a good rate.
In your case, maybe the player could “buy” a +1 map bonus for their run using coins. The cost in coins could be influenced by the current time and the map number. Then, the player will have to choose between strategies that slow them down but get more coins, and strategies that let them smash their way through maps.
It's also worth mentioning that pierce is likely OP to use gamer parlance. It was the perk I would consistently choose over all others, for good reason; nothing else comes close to upgrading from a knife to a bazooka.
I will say that some of the color combinations were a little punishing. White balls on a white background is a lot. Some of the perks have very murky upsides; having the ball change color isn't ever an advantage, so far as I can tell. It would be nice if the perks had mouseover explanations. Even after hours, there's still a few I have no idea what they do.
Every time I bounce a ball, there's a -1 that doesn't seem to impact the score. What's that about?
If the arcade version of Breakout had had a skill tree, Nolan Bushnell would likely be richer than Richard Branson today.