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Feedback comments for LD36
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| Timestamp | Since previous | Game | Aurel Bílý's comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aug 30 18:16:00 | Temple Quest | I think you've heard it enough – the soundtrack is pretty nice :) <br/> <br/>BUT! <br/> <br/>I think (next time or whenever else) you should try to get out of your comfort zone a bit. It feels like you spent 95% of the time on making the music, and it's good, because you know how to do it, and you made 5 solid tracks in 48 hours. Then the 5% on the rest … The graphics and some parts of the gameplay hurt the overall experience, obviously. <br/> <br/>And I feel an unrated LD jam could have been the perfect occasion to try new things, getting into graphics, focusing on pixelart, hand drawn, vector, whatever. Trying to make the gameplay have that really satisfying feel to it, with screen shakes, good hitboxes, good feedback, on-cue sound effects, score and reward systems, etc. Polishing the menu system, investing time in having a nice layout for the menus, a nice layout for the controls (it is a bit all over the place). <br/> <br/>Just recommendations and nitpicking, I guess. :) Still, good job! | |
| Aug 31 18:25:00 | 24h 09m | Replicator | (Thanks for your comment) <br/> <br/>We played it with @Danae123 and indeed took a couple of minutes to work out what the terminal says and we tried a couple of words. I guess that whatever word you type is used as a 'seed' for the creature (?) that comes out? I wish there was more to it :/ <br/> <br/>The art style is not too bad, and the less random / squiggly bits are not that far from pretty, minimalistic pixel art. Also you should make interactivity more obvious, even / especially with a tiny game like this. If there's very little content, I think every detail matters. <br/> <br/>Good job :) |
| Sep 2 15:38:00 | 45h 13m | Stonehenge unleashed | Got some 18000, was fun enough. I don't think you need me to tell you that you could have added lots more content, music, etc, so I'll focus on more specific bits. <br/> <br/>The upgrade progression felt nice enough, I was a compelled to pick up as many orbs as possible, just to see what the next weapon is. I think the triple spread is all there is, though. The enemy progression was nice at the beginning, too, but then I quickly realised the patterns are gonna be the same just X times as many enemies in them. <br/> <br/>Unfortunately the latter introduced some serious performance issues. (The game tried to spawn a giant block of purple pyramids, was extremely choppy and I crashed into them :( ) <br/> <br/>The sound effects, while functional, are a bit too loud / strong, maybe more variance / subtler sounds? <br/> <br/>Anyway, it is a nice score attack shmup! :) |
| Sep 2 15:54:00 | 16m 00s | Dynasty | Pretty cool. I gave it a couple of attempts … It's good for Ludum Dare to make the 'rare' events (like the fireballs, sieges, etc) happen quite often so that people who only spend a short time playing know that they are there. However, I think these should be less frequent on subsequent runs, they seem too destructive too often. <br/> <br/>I also wish there was a bit more I could do. Some resource management, options to speak to my advisors / architects / workers, etc … Although I know that would be quite complex :) <br/> <br/>And the graphics were pretty, (although, a little pet peeve of mine – pixel-art games where the sprites don't line up with the pixels of other sprites !!!) <br/> <br/>Good job! |
| Sep 2 16:45:00 | 51m 00s | Hero of Alexandria | (Thanks for your comment; sorry za rickroll kámo :D) <br/> <br/>The screen shake is real in this one. <br/> <br/>It is indeed a fun SCB clone, even without the crates. The satisfying feeling of destroying the Romans and all the screen shaking would have been perfect with some sounds, even simple sfxr-made ones, and a little music loop. <br/> <br/>I see you must have spent *some* time on making the bullet bounces, because they ricochet off the walls. And yet, it's a detail that's barely noticeable in-game. It's nice to put in little details like that, but makes me wonder if you couldn't have spent your time a bit more usefully – improving the palette (it is a bit bland), adding sounds, making the bullets more visible and prettier with particle effects, etc. <br/> <br/>Also maybe an infinite mode (with more weapons, obviously) could be interesting for score attacks. <br/> <br/>Good job :) |
| Sep 4 17:58:00 | 49h 13m | Generation 0xDEADBEEF | Beat it at last! You saw me playing it a little bit on @Danae123's stream. Very nice game. <br/> <br/>(Not sure you've ever played these, but this game reminds me of those really old puzzle games you could find on LEGO.com. Inexplicably they got some real gems in their online games sections, including Spybotics: the Nightfall Incident, and there were some more programming-heavy ones, forever lost in the sands of time. It's the music, the atmosphere, the challenge. But I digress.) <br/> <br/>The puzzles are all nicely constructed, with the difficulty increasing slowly but steadily. I think there are multiple solutions to most levels, which is a good thing. Although quite often it was too obvious what the solution was 'supposed' to be, with the symbols exactly matching an important address. <br/> <br/>As it is, the game offers a lot for 72 hours of development. Still, I would be quite happy to see (or even contribute to) a full game like this. More levels, more commands / tools, more things to do. Multiple sloths in the level, literally being able to walk in the stack region, modifying the code more profoundly. Good job there! <br/> <br/>I know it might be detrimental to the gameplay or to teaching the player how to play, but I wish the stack represented the game state more accurately. Right now there has to be an address marked red, which is something the player cannot change, for it to mean 'laser turret'. If the 'objects' had prefixes meaning 'sloth', 'turret', or 00 for no more objects, then the player could modify these as well. Even breaking the level completely could be useful. Also I wish the stack pointer travelled over a continuous region in the memory. Right now it jumps every 4 bytes to stay in the column on the right-hand side. I imagine with a bigger game arena the stack could be at the bottom (or the top) of the address space, making the jumps unneeded. <br/> <br/>As for the graphics and the music – already commented on those, they create a very neat, somewhat dark atmosphere, as simple as they might be. However, I didn't feel the text bits / the story added much to the game. There are the clichés of the umptillionth generation reaching sentience, the AI seeking to understand the world, and the AI 'saving' the world by eliminating the human race. But these sound very abstract and are not connected to the game at all, maybe they contribute somewhat to the atmosphere. Also, there is no satisfying conclusion to the story. <br/> <br/>(A little bug I've noticed: 0x55 + 0x55 + 0x55 = 0xFF. In level 0x08, however, adding 0x55 to itself twice resets the value directly to 0x00. >= instead of > ? :)) <br/> <br/>But anyway! Thank you for this, one of my favourites this LD. |
| Sep 6 12:09:00 | 42h 11m | Watch for Falling Rocks | You've seen me get 5+ on @Danae123's steam, now 6.38 :) (thanks for your comment) <br/> <br/>If there's anything that really stands out in this game, it is the addictiveness! Something just kept me going for a number of runs, trying to beat my score. The difficulty curve over time is just right, the challenge seems very skill-based. The enemy waves aren't based on crazy RNG. All good! <br/> <br/>(Actually, there is one problem I have with the controls – in the later stages I often pick up a different object than I intended. Wanted the spike ball, picked up the egg instead – wasted a perfectly good egg that I really could have used later on. And vice versa. I think something highlighting which object is currently 'selected' would be nice.) <br/> <br/>Although you've managed the crucial parts of a game – the gameplay, the fun, the controls – extremely well, I still wish there was more to it! The graphics are polished enough, but very simple. The enemies and the weapons all play their respective roles, but I wish there was something more still. 'Unique' enemies every now and then (or at predetermined times)? Additional power-ups? Enemy debuffs? Stealthy enemies? And so on. Maybe the beauty of this game is in its simplicity, but it's hard to tell. <br/> <br/>The music is quite nice, seems more complete than the graphics. But I can see that this style fits the graphics you've got better than the usual chiptune sound. <br/> <br/>Good job overall! :) |
| Sep 7 16:01:00 | 27h 52m | anachroma | Interesting game. <br/> <br/>My first impression was that the graphics remind me of N (the game). Simple gray tiles with slopes on a light gray background. Unfortunately, that likeness only went that far. Right away I thought the movement is just terrible. Clunky, no momentum, gravity absurdly fast. Fall damage? Really? And the camera should have been much smoother. <br/> <br/>But, I played on, got used to the clunkiness a little bit, and eventually discovered the somewhat unique mechanics of the game. They do have potential. And discovering the little dialogue bubbles was also fun, made me smile a couple of times. <br/> <br/>Then I wished the game wasn't as chaotic. The only way to get a little bit of an overview is at the bubbles. Maybe this was done on purpose, but exploring the same bits multiple times (albeit with more powers) is not a lot of fun for the player. I know it's very similar to the core mechanic of exploration in Metroidvania games, but I think this game is missing something in that respect. It's not as satisfying to discover new powers, especially when it's not immediately obvious how and -where- they can help you. I know guiding the player all the time is also tedious, but this feels too far on the other end of the spectrum. I would consider <br/>- adding a map <br/>- having arrows pointing towards interesting areas <br/>- having an arrow pointing towards the original gravity direction <br/>- separating the game into smaller, more manageable areas <br/> <br/>The music is subtle, maybe too much so. It feels a bit overshadowed by the loud sounds. Also, collecting the colour triangles, I seemed to have too much red at once, making the graphics a bit painful to look at. Maybe add actual grayscale areas and only use the collected colours as highlights? <br/> <br/>But anyway … Although it seems like I only spoke about the problems, the game was still enjoyable. So I wish it could be improved :) Good job! |