Hi CPOPE9141!
Your game looked great to me from the pictures. Once I've played it, I can confirm it's so good: the art, controls, animations, sound. You could improve some of the animated frames, but other than that, I can say this is one of the most impressive game projects on LWJGL I've known.
See, almost everyone is trying to do 3D stuff and from-scratch-renderers without focusing too much on the game itself. I don't personally think that is a bad idea. On the contrary, it's beautiful. However, people seem to loose the real focus: the fun of a game and all the feelings it can give you. I think your game precisely combines these two aspects so great. I mean, this is done from scratch, only with the aid of the LWJGL libraries. This must required from you a lot of time, and that is great because you learned a lot. One could think this is another experimental project, and while that possibly true, that is the essence of the indie game development: to create whatever is in your mind. However, that doesn't mean everyone must focus on the renderer part for instance, because that could be discouraging. But the fact you did it in that way, it automatically gives it more value, because it reflects passion on it. I say this precisely because there are some people saying "ah ok you did this with no engine. Then you've lost a lot of time".
At first I couldn't play it. "Couldn't create Vulkan instance". Clearly that computer didn't support Vulkan (it has 8 years of existence haha). Finally, I managed to play it. It achieves that good fighting vibes, like the ones from Street Fighter. I also value the fact that the animated models give it the feel of depth, kind of what isometric games do.
Don't worry too much at first with the distribution. In fact, I think it its well distributed. I didn't expect an extractor, but it makes the game easy to begin (is it also made with Launch4j?). Maybe there's another work-around: an installer. I've never achieved nor the former nor the latter. I cannot give you any advise because me (and I think many others) have faced similar distribution problems. In my case, what I usually do is to pack libraries and natives on JAR building. Then with Launch4j I pack it into an EXE file and then on the same folder I put every other resources. I couldn't find a way to also pack the JRE with Launch4j. I've seen you packed the JDK. Couldn't it be sufficient with the JRE? I think this is a contiuum problem for almost every people that works with Java and even more if we are working with natives... By the way, since you talked about Mac, the distribution problem gets even bigger on the window system from GLFW. That's another pending task for almost everyone that works with LWJGL.
In sum, your game is a(n) (impressive) game, not only some graphics testing. It is complex, since it uses Vulkan and I understood no library was used for physics other than JOML. At the same time it's simplified in a smooth and fun gameplay, that is, it combines those two areas usually hard to master: the technical/graphics/sound (engine) part and the game itself, to the extent it is even original on the former given the animated graphics.
I encourage you to publish it on
TIGsource Playtesting forum if you haven't already done it, so that you receive more feedback. I see you have a webpage. I can confirm you I now admire your work.
