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pkenney

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TimestampSince previousGamepkenney's comment
Dec 12 12:43:00 Fire Night Nice sense of panic in this one, and the mixed art styles and initial darkness contributed to the disorienting feeling of waking in the night to an emergency. The facial animations are a nice touch. <br/> <br/>I survived 152 seconds, and learned that you cannot survive a fire by hiding under your bed.
Dec 12 13:04:00 21m 00s keturi I like this a lot, there are a lot of good design calls, and the art and sound has a nice cohesive feel. <br/> <br/>I enjoyed the amount that you let me discover mechanics for myself. When a game is this small, I like when it gets extra value out of letting you experiment to discover the rules as opposed to a hand-holdy tutorial. <br/> <br/>Being unable to pass turns to let enemies come to me forced me to think ahead a bit more, as opposed to just bumping dudes, and the weapon charges gave it that classic RL feeling of "should I spend resources here or avoid the fight?" Many rooms I just carved enough of a path through to escape, but in others I would expend resources to clear and then harvest everything. The multiple exits from the room was also interesting - a nice fault-tolerant design that saves you from impossible RNG situations in a jam! <br/> <br/>So good feel, lots of good design calls, and nothing that got in my way. Great job! <br/> <br/>Is there a real ending, or have I won if I get past the numbered levels to where it just says "the room"? My strongest "build" was with the wand, I really enjoyed that feeling.
Dec 13 03:50:00 14h 46m Bag of holding Very interesting mechanic I haven't seen before! <br/> <br/>After a moment of confusion about the controls (I tried arrow keys, clicking, and WASD before I realized it was drag and drop), I quickly realized why you have the items snap to the grid and block each other while dragging! Some fun stressful organizing results, with lots of decisions to make about how to organize things. <br/> <br/>Nice job!
Dec 13 03:56:00 6m 00s Strexter NOT RELAXED NOW!! <br/> <br/>Nice game, the sense of urgency is totally there. You've got a strong simple graphical styling that really works, and the audio is a mood-setter. <br/> <br/>I would definitely have even played more if the restart didn't take me back to the beginning.
Dec 13 04:03:00 7m 00s Frank Shatner in The Helmet of Destiny Nice vibe! That was slick when the lights went out as the shit hit the fan. I was cracking up with the voice work, and appreciated the variety of stuff you threw at me. <br/> <br/>Dem lasers though...!
Dec 13 04:17:00 14m 00s Yetis and Unicorns Wow, cool crunchy feel in this one that runs through the graphics, the sound, and the gameplay! <br/> <br/>It definitely took me a little while to adjust. I was thrown off by the fact that the menus to start teach me to use the mouse but then the game is on keyboard. Then I was running for my life for a while. <br/> <br/>But after I learned how to sort out the preview arrow and make proper use of my attack, I went on offense and started mopping dudes up!! <br/> <br/>I got to the stage for protecting the baby, but it was a little more than I could handle. But I did make it to the end of a &gt;100 second "Survive" level which I felt pretty good about! <br/> <br/>Very nice entry, I enjoyed experimenting around with it and having fun.
Dec 13 05:21:00 1h 04m Utility Station OR-152 Hey! I remember the unique moods of Derelict and Wellspring Wandered, so I checked to see if you had come back to LD and sure enough here you are with a new interesting experience. <br/> <br/>This is another thoughtful game that's a change of pace from the usual - I knew I was in for something different when I had no idea what to do but a slew of buttons and status indicators to explore! You've packed so many little details into this. <br/> <br/>Took me quite a while to clear my first ship, well over ten minutes I think, and I got a few demerits on a couple after that. But by my last docking I had the various systems all figured out and was finally doing a bit of multi-tasking. I managed to clear a ship that wanted refueling, resupply, decontamination, course calculation, and repair in a touch over 4 minutes. I was able to queue up drone moves and multitask between that step and the resupply. I'm sure it could be done much better but I felt like I earned my paycheck that time! <br/> <br/>No wonder they promoted me.
Dec 13 05:41:00 20m 00s Interoom Cool game! My top score was 138 turns. I almost lost right around 100 because the board was totally out of control... but I was able to keep sneaking around to teleporters just barely and then the enemies were combined into large numbers. I managed to sneak in one awesome turn where I hit the X and killed everything all at once. That was definitely the high point, felt great! <br/> <br/>I struggled at first to figure out how the attacks worked, but once it was clear I got rolling. <br/> <br/>Nice entry with some interesting new ideas in hex gameplay!
Dec 15 13:37:00 55h 56m Oner-OOM Nice all-around entry, with cool art and slimy sound effects... you even ticked the box on having music! <br/> <br/>Pretty tough, I only made it to level 3. If I could change one thing I would put a bit more feedback into getting hit. Sometimes I thought I was getting away with not letting them hit me, but my life bar disagreed. Since endurance seems to be the main challenge, it's really important for me to learn how to avoid getting hit. <br/> <br/>Nice work!
Dec 15 13:54:00 17m 00s One Step Back Wow great moody art, nicely done! I played a couple of paths, one ended at "goodbye" and the other I was in a room with some colored buttons that I couldn't get to open the door. <br/> <br/>The mood of exploration and the snarky humor was also nice. <br/> <br/>One thing that irked a little was the slow animation speed of pushing the buttons. The animation itself looked great but when I had to do a lot of experimental pushing it was tricky. I liked that you queued animations, for example searching boxes I was able to clickclickclick past a few (Yes I could improve my patience.....) . The problem hit me most when there were some roman numerals and I thought, perhaps I am meant to click this button 7 times? Except I couldn't queue multi-pushes of the same button, and I was waiting for the animations. This meant I was reluctant to perform additional experiments. <br/> <br/>Anyway, didn't meant to dwell on one small nit - the game looked really nice! Somebody mentioned sound in another comment, but I heard only silence. I played the WebGL version in Chrome on Windows.
Dec 16 04:43:00 14h 49m Combine Harvest Nice mood with relaxing gameplay and music that's a good match. I checked off more than half the stuff. I did wish the play area was a lot bigger on the screen - I would have fallen deeper into the trance.
Dec 16 04:58:00 15m 00s NPPTF - Nuclear Power Plant Training Facility At first I walked away after letting the plant melt down with no idea, and then finding the PDF and reading it. I got a nice laugh but could not summon the will to actually read/memorize and run the station. <br/> <br/>So I played another game. But... something felt unfinished. So I read the manual, and I applied highlighter to the color codes for faster lookup. I figured I would just memorize and highlight the first three or four, and pick easy. Because I'd get the first ones in the book first and rack up a few easy points, see? I'll show this game. I might have even picked medium. <br/> <br/>Well upon initiating my day at the station, and testing the sound effects for eating and drinking, an emergency came quite quickly and to my horror it was not one that I'd highlighted or memorized. I did have my PDF adjusted though, and got right to work scrolling and looking, and oh no it's the one where I have to play a whole video game! <br/> <br/>Fast forward a few moments later: my leg is stuck to the side of the final pit. I jam the jump button while holding D. Jump jump! I edge up a pixel each time, and clear the level! Crisis is past! I can relax a moment! <br/> <br/>Then everything started going wrong. I think I resolved perhaps three more events including hunger, but in the end I could not save the plant.
Dec 16 05:16:00 18m 00s Welcome Home I enjoyed this! It was ambitious to make a game within a game, and have dialog/story as well as the board game. Nice work! I played through to the end, winning the board game on my second time. <br/> <br/>In the board game, I got into a bit of cycle, where events would repeat themselves. I adjusted when I used my fireball and the new pattern was better for me, getting two skeletons over to dogpile him.
Dec 16 05:37:00 21m 00s Steamjunk Racers Nine Thousand Unique idea, I had fun flying! Couldn't really get a handle on catching enough to stay aloft for very long, but I enjoyed the journey.
Dec 16 05:50:00 13m 00s Last Wights Nice mood, although I had to turn down the sound effects a lot. I liked the mix of puzzle and timing, creating some pressure. The controls felt easy, graphics look good, and the variety of ghosts was nice. I made it past the upside down room, to the room with stacked sofas.
Dec 16 06:14:00 24m 00s Bugroom Tough to get a whole RTS in, but there's a lot here! I played long enough to grow a few guards and kill a few of the enemy.
Dec 16 06:22:00 8m 00s Nest Beautiful art, the main character is nimble and well animated! Looks like we both made games about slimy things defending their eggs, ha! <br/> <br/>You've got a nice action core here. A little more feedback when I get hit would be nice.
Dec 16 06:35:00 13m 00s Fracture Really fantastic mood with gorgeous graphics and music! Well done.
Dec 16 06:58:00 23m 00s We Must Protect Lich House! Nice work - a lot of content, and it looks, sounds, and feels nice. I was terrible at dodging the projectiles while baiting the foot soldiers. Curse that thief, too!
Dec 17 17:34:00 34h 36m Hitlers Cactus or only you can stop Trump Wow, very cool, this is an extremely interesting experience, and well put together. Nice work! I played through a bunch of times trying to change things, but I guess maybe the impact I had was a little low... I think I would have kept going if even the unhelpful changes gave me a little reaction. <br/> <br/>Great use of the theme!
Dec 17 17:42:00 8m 00s Exam Simulator Nice work on your first 3D game! I was a little worried by the name, but actually I enjoyed this. I passed the exam on my second try.
Dec 17 17:49:00 7m 00s Liquid Media Games Wow nice classy piano playing, and a nice visual backdrop for the space battle! I had a tough time getting the amount of leading right, but when I did connect it felt good. <br/> <br/>If I could change one thing it would be the way I have to click again and again for each shot. It's probably also not right to just hold the button and always fire forever, but maybe some middle ground.
Dec 17 18:21:00 32m 00s The Dash Club Wow, what a slick little package! Lots of nice little touches, and I really felt the groove. Nice work!
Dec 17 18:46:00 25m 00s Behind The Wallpaper Beautiful and really effective art. What a great idea for the theme. I have mixed feelings about the pacing, which had to be slow to draw me into the story, and I respect that. I maybe was in the wrong mental mode, playing a number of random video games in a lit room with the sun up. I think this could have been a different experience for me late at night in a more contemplative and open-ended engagement. I don't ding the game for that, but rather myself. I like that you challenged me that way, but I will admit to the buzzing background noise of impatience in my experience, which I brought to the table. <br/> <br/>I believe the game may have crashed on me, although perhaps it was just an abrupt end? There was trouble. My brother was speaking in his sleep. I clicked on a few things. The game was gone. Unsure if that was intended.
Dec 17 19:10:00 24m 00s Video Games Are My Life Pros and cons at play here. <br/> <br/>On the pro side, I really wanted to play this game more. I liked the setup, and the art style. The main character being paper on a stick and the background being scrawled onto a wall, it really worked impressively well. The moody ambient audio was a great additional touch, and I didn't even mind hearing the same vocal clips repeatedly. I had a preconceived idea of where the story would go but I was unsure and I wanted to find out. <br/> <br/>However, there was something very wrong with the controls which dominated the experience for me. I was pushing the jump button and not getting a jump. I tested a bunch to identify specifically why, but I could not. I do see that you don't enqueue a jump command if I hit the jump while not quite landed from the prior jump, which I'd recommend. But it was more than that. Something about processing horizontal movement keys seemed to interfere with the jump registering, but I could not ID it through testing, sorry. <br/> <br/>But effectively, the space bar only jumped about 60% of the time that I wanted it to in critical moments. Trying to jump-then-move didn't really work either because of the intense inertia applied to air control. So unfortunately, fighting the controls was the primary challenge, and that type of challenge gets me into a state of frustration. Combined with the total restart from beginning, I eventually lost my will. <br/> <br/>Still, this game is a good entry. I think this is a great idea for a game with some solid execution on the art style and and a unique vision. You got me hooked and retrying to get to the rest of the story. If you could clear the way for me by streamlining the platformer controls, I would have played to completion.
Dec 17 19:37:00 27m 00s FIIL Mark 37 Fantastic all-around for a compo! Graphics are excellent, as are the sound effects and music. <br/> <br/>I died the first couple of times before figuring out that I didn't need to wait by the non-project machines. I think I got confused because my first move was to work on the project, which locks you, and then I erroneously assumed all of the other machines were like that. <br/> <br/>Once I realized how to really play I was able to build the machine and experience the end. <br/> <br/>Really nice entry! Great evocative mood, snappy controls, and an interesting little set of interconnected systems to toy with. Well done.
Dec 17 19:52:00 15m 00s Fireskulls Outstanding for 30 mins! Controls are good, right on the edge of sloppy, which created a good feeling of it being my fault but also never being totally in control. Graphics, sound, and quick retry loop all helped carry the day. <br/> <br/>Nice entry!
Dec 17 20:04:00 12m 00s The Archwizard's Room Never realized I could attack diagonal, so this game was a lot harder for me than the rest! <br/> <br/>I thought the graphics and sound were just awesome. <br/> <br/>The movement hops felt really good, but I did have a situation where I had woken something like five monsters but then backed off. Because the monsters move one at a time, and the game forces me to wait for each animation (even those animations which are off screen), then suddenly the pace of play dragged wayyyy down and it felt really sluggish and was tough going. After that I was more careful not to aggro a bunch of guys I didn't intend on killing. <br/> <br/>Really slick entry here.
Dec 17 20:37:00 33m 00s Worst Mixer Ever I tried this when I only had about 10 minutes, and that wasn't enough. I came back another time to experiment a bit more. <br/> <br/>I definitely enjoyed the vibe, and created some nice tracks. Like the other commenters I was unclear on the goal and it didn't become clear to me even with some experimentation, but maybe that's not so bad if I enjoy tweaking around in there. <br/> <br/>Aside from the goal, I think I could have used more direct feedback on the state of things. #1 feature I wished for was the ability to know where in the loop the mixer was. I would have liked the cube to pulse to a larger size as the beat triggers it, or to have a little hat hop along, much like the red light that runs along the beat with a drum machine. <br/> <br/>Because many of the musical elements were long-form, such as the echoes synth hit or the sustained bass note, their quantized position was a little less than obvious to me. I could have perhaps used a solo/mute pair of buttons per color, so that in addition to experimenting with the matrix itself I could isolate certain elements to learn and observe more in detail. <br/> <br/>The other indirection that got me early on was the multi-step rotation of the cube. If it simply flipped immediately to the destination state I might have ramped up into understanding a little more quickly, as the lingering ongoing changes confused me at the start. <br/> <br/>That's like, too many features to request obviously! <br/> <br/>I did have fun with this, treating it as both a puzzle and a mood piece, but I didn't get over the hump to truly understanding the computer's wish for my mix. "No green" was not the answer. ;) <br/> <br/>An intriguing and atmospheric puzzle box, nice work.
Dec 17 20:51:00 14m 00s Post Mail Package Mail Room Office Very cool puzzle game with a lot to dig into! Great work.
Dec 17 20:57:00 6m 00s Ultra Violet Humanoids Nice controls and animations! This game had one experience to sell and it didn't put any friction or fluff in the way. Nice job getting right to the meat. I liked how extremely clear it was when I got hit, which is critical in this sort of game. <br/> <br/>Audio was also a nice bit of cohesive ambiance.
Dec 17 22:13:00 1h 16m Will you exit ? I made a point of playing your game because you helped out that 14-year-old by fixing his bug and building a jar version of his game so others could play it. Very nice of you!! <br/> <br/>I enjoyed your game and I thought it was fun for such a simple set of interactions. I beat it after maybe 4 retries I think. My strategy in the final run was to get the tricky keys in the center first, and only after I did that successfully I went back for the early keys. <br/> <br/>If I wanted to advise you on a few easy ways to make small improvements, here are some: <br/> <br/>1. I found the color contrast between your background and foreground elements was not great, and so it wasn't super-clear to my eye. It's better when you can make important elements "pop" to my eye. The part that needed this the most here was the fireball from the turret guy. A common strategy for this in video games is to use a "de-saturated" background, so that is you have high-saturation colors for your foreground, and low-saturation colors for the background. Most programs allow HSL (hue, saturation, lightness) as well as RGB color picking, so try some experiments. <br/> <br/>2. Since you have learned to draw and code your logic, you are ready to start adding more "juice" to your game! I liked how you make the character bounce backward when hit by the fireball, for example. There is a fantastic video on youtube called "The Art of Screenshake" which has just a ton of really fantastic tips for tiny things that you can do to improve your game feel. <br/> <br/>Great job!
Dec 17 22:24:00 11m 00s The One Room Experiment Oh no, I think I got to the very last room with the final lantern and then died!! It was my 3rd or 4th run and I couldn't quite bring myself to do the whole thing all over again. So close! <br/> <br/>Really cool idea for the theme, and the graphics are outstanding. The claw was just about the right pace. <br/> <br/>Most of my hits were kind of just clumsiness with jumping. It took me a while to get the correct pacing of the jump down, and even after that it was slight jump flaws that mostly caused damage. This kind of pure execution/timing test as the primary challenge was not exactly my favorite aspect, but since everything else was so strong I still really enjoyed it. <br/> <br/>Nice work!
Dec 31 18:41:00 332h 17m Tenement Rush Wow nice entry! Super-slick music that really worked, and nice graphics. <br/> <br/>The initial learning phase was pretty rough, and I hit game over about 6 times before I had any idea what the buttons did or why I was losing. I gave up and had to read the instructions and toggle the control mode. After that I lost a few more times before I figured out that you have to stand above something to pick it up. <br/> <br/>But once I got over the learning hurdle I was having some frantic fun! I steadily improved as I tinkered with some different organizational strategies. I know there's a much higher score possible, but the best I did was 14,800. <br/> <br/>Great job! I remember your crop duster game, you've got a very nice feel for a throwback aesthetic.
Jan 1 17:25:00 22h 44m ROOM 42 freaknarf - still remember your deathmetalslugs game which was crazy so I was sad to see just one review on your game, so I gave it a shot! <br/> <br/>Some feedback: <br/> <br/>It's bad that I have to install it on my computer instead of just running it like with most other LD entries. Normally if I see an LD game ask to be installed on my computer, I don't do it and I go play a different game. For you I made an exception, but I bet you lose a ton of players this way. <br/> <br/>The game started really really tiny on my screen. I hit alt-enter to switch to fullscreen and then it was okay. <br/> <br/>There is some kind of number counting down on top left of the screen, but I can only see a fragment of the last digit because the shadow circle covers the display. <br/> <br/>Otherwise, you have a nice interactive beginning to an adventure game here. I was able to walk around and the pathing worked well. I was able to interact with the NPCs and the doors just fine, so you have some systems here which are functioning well. I also liked the art, and the mood. <br/> <br/>If there was something to do like a goal, I didn't figure it out. I walked around and spoke to each NPC, entered each room, and at the end I got into the room which appears to have stairs going down but I could not figure out how to go down them. <br/> <br/>Overall I think this feels like a promising start but too much scope so you didn't finish. But maybe I just didn't get it, in which case it needs a bit more instruction!
Jan 1 17:58:00 33m 00s The Chinese Room What a very interesting and well-executed entry! Great work! I checked your entry out because you'd played my game billiard dungeon earlier this year, and I'm glad I got to experience this unique game you've made. <br/> <br/>I enjoyed the initial confusion since it's not like other games. I had some shock and lack of understanding at first about why I had to manually pump my heart and blink my eyes, and I enjoyed the way this confusion blossomed into understanding that drove the plot. Like, you never explicitly *told* me what's really happened, but respected me enough to let me figure it out from what the control scheme implies - very cool. <br/> <br/>I played through four times. In my final run I was able to get out alive, although I only accomplished one of my other goals. My shortest run was when I was totally honest. ;) <br/> <br/>Even after several runs one thing I never understood was the alarm that comes up around the stroke. I don't know if this is hard-coded or if I was mis-operating my lungs. I had a habit of steadily tapping the heart-lung-eye to keep my body stable, but about midway through this fails and I get an alarm I don't know how to fix. <br/> <br/>I would have liked to explore this more and play a bunch of times. There's a delicate tradeoff here between an immersive experience and too much repetition... I'm not sure you could have done better but eventually when I escaped alive I felt pretty satisfied, and my feeling of not wanting to repeat slightly outweighed my curiosity about the paths I had not explored. <br/> <br/>Overall this is a fantastic LD entry, with really novel mechanics I haven't ever seen before, and interesting mental space to explore. The execution was also spot-on... very impressed!
Jan 1 20:01:00 2h 03m One Room Resort I completed party of 9! I had really good scores until then, but for the 9 I got in trouble and a lot of guests were quite unhappy. At least nobody died though! <br/> <br/>I enjoyed the tone of the emails, which really carried me through the story. Nice connection of the theme to the humor. <br/> <br/>Good job!
Jan 1 20:21:00 20m 00s Back To Your Room Really nice job for a first LD entry! It's easy to make bad jumping physics when you're new to this stuff, and your jump felt pretty solid. It was maybe a tiny bit floaty but that wasn't a gameplay problem because your air control offered the precision required by the tight jumps your level had. This sort of compatibility between the controls and the challenges is essential and you made it work. <br/> <br/>I also appreciated that you gave full attribution to the sources you used so that I can see what was your work, vs the work of others. Nice! <br/> <br/>If I try to think of constructive feedback, I would say that the first time I encountered a lizard I got killed because I tried to jump on top of it. I think you could consider having the art imply the gameplay mechanics by putting spikes on him. <br/> <br/>Great job for your first time, with the intro screen, the story, the game, and the credits it all felt very complete.
Jan 1 20:29:00 8m 00s Nightmares Cool idea to make the intro that requires me to learn the controls. This was very effective. <br/> <br/>I killed 46 nightmares for my top score. <br/> <br/>Art and sound are very well done. If I could change one thing, I would try to remove the two-clicks and somehow make it work with one click per throw, even if it meant holding down the button (like click, drag to aim, release to throw). <br/> <br/>Anyway, nice moody entry!
Jan 1 20:41:00 12m 00s Harmless Titan Wow, awesome art, great sound, and tight controls, this is really well done. There were many small polished touches as well, for example the warning sounds when you hit important points such as 90 deaths etc, and the way the icon for your roar ability redraws along with your cooldown timer. <br/> <br/>Then there were even some tactical choices, like the tradeoff between waiting at the edges so you weren't surrounded, vs being in the center so that you could actually push the heroes out of the arena. <br/> <br/>Very nicely done!
Jan 1 20:55:00 14m 00s Santas Little Helper Heads up - the Win-Post link 404ed for me. <br/> <br/>Nice game, tight controls, simple premise, and a nice pace that kept me running all around without driving me nuts. The selfish alien was a nice touch! <br/> <br/>Another nice touch was the 2x button right on the title screen, that was a big help. <br/> <br/>Great job!
Jan 2 17:39:00 20h 44m One Room Dungeon Checked this one out after seeing your comments on a lot of games, including at least one of mine, and realizing that I'd never played one of yours. <br/> <br/>Wow!, nice entry! I got to 2 - 1/3 - 0/4, which was the fire zone. I felt pretty tense the whole time, and was impressed by the variety of enemies and environments you managed to get done. There were lots of close calls, especially at one point when I got down to 1 health and there were a lot of bats, which I barely survived. In the end my death was a little bit stupid, as I got caught by a bomb... pretty unnecessary, oop! <br/> <br/>The animation of the main character was a cool little trick. <br/> <br/>All around this was really well done, so I wanted to share a few of the tiny pain points that slightly dinged me as I played, but I mention this minor level of stuff only because the whole game is strong! <br/> <br/>- Initially I wished the control felt snappier, and was bothered by the way the character continues to move after I release the key. However I quickly got used to this and it was ultimately fine. Actually it worked pretty well with the mechanics, and every collision (both good and bad) felt totally fair. But "soupy=bad" is a kneejerk reaction I did have in the first room when testing. <br/> <br/>- The ghosts looked a bit too much like the main character, and I often lost 1-2 seconds upon entering a new room figuring out which one was me. I will say this did contribute to a sense of panic though, as I got my bearings! <br/> <br/>- The archers had a low contrast vs the background and they didn't really pop out. Their rate of fire felt really fair to me. <br/> <br/>- I was slightly annoyed by the way the bottom row of bricks was clipped by the lowest wall, it made it a little harder to read the room, tho not a big deal. <br/> <br/>- I was never quite clear on where I would end up after moving a room. Often my starting position seemed related to my ending position from the room before, but sometimes it wouldn't be. Maybe I was still holding the buttons, and it moved while the screen was blank or something? I didn't really test this well, but I didn't understand it. <br/> <br/>Again, this was really fun and I especially loved the enemy variety. Those bats were properly nasty, the archers could have been OP but instead were just right, and the chain-ball guy was very cool. <br/> <br/>The retry moment lost me, though... Once I'd gotten that far I didn't feel like a full restart from the beginning. Maybe going back to the start of the fire world would have tempted me to push on? Especially if I had a few hints about how much more content there was, or if there was a boss or anything. <br/> <br/>Great entry!
Jan 2 18:42:00 1h 03m Super Battle Cycle Very cool, I'm impressed by the number of features and the tutorial content here! I had a really hard time successfully swinging crates around with the grapple to effective deal damage to the enemies, though. I had more luck tricking them into smashing into crates... maybe there was some technique I never quite picked up. <br/> <br/>Still, a fun and innovative entry, nice work!
Jan 2 19:00:00 18m 00s Garden Chamber Nice moody piano fits the calm of tending plants. Although before I figured out how to water by reading the instructions I was playing an altogether less relaxing game! ;) <br/> <br/>Nice work.
Jan 2 19:45:00 45m 00s Building Contract #DE190290 Interesting take on the theme, and not quite like anything I've played before! <br/> <br/>I absolutely didn't notice whatever tearing or sync problems you were talking about in the warning... so no worries there! It took me a little while to realize that I wasn't supposed to hammer continuously, but that it was measure by measure alternating between showing me the pattern and then asking me to repeat it. Once I realized, this felt completely obvious because of course the board with nails was not even moving during the showing measures! I have no clue why I was being dumb about that. <br/> <br/>If I could change one thing, it would be to make the hammer really go down all the way to the board so it actually feels like it was driving the nail in with authority. Right now the way it kind of taps the tip of the nail and then the nail goes down by itself, it feels kind of disconnected, like the core action of the game isn't real. <br/> <br/>But an interestingly odd entry which I enjoyed - good job!
Jan 2 19:55:00 10m 00s Hypercell Wow, very cool game! My high score was 29. <br/> <br/>I liked the atmosphere, and the fact that you let me discover the rules instead of teaching them to me with a hand-holding tutorial. <br/> <br/>My favorite part was thinking a bit ahead and ramming myself into a section where I could quickly alternate and scoop up a bunch of points in a row! <br/> <br/>Every death felt totally fair, which is important in a game like this. Great work!
Jan 2 20:55:00 1h 00m Gentleman's Darling Randomly recalled your old sector.33 game and figured I'd check out what you made this time around... <br/> <br/>Another interesting entry with slick style! <br/> <br/>I played like 20 times, and I got both keys and nearly got back to my sweetheart that last time, but I couldn't quite pull it off. <br/> <br/>I think this is really solid but would have been great with just a bit more feedback. The animations and everything look really good, but the game doesn't do much to tell me the most important facts relating to the gameplay: when I get shot, when my gun is ready to shoot again, and when I successfully hit an enemy. If each of those three had some kind of audio/visual cue I think I would have had even more fun with it. On a lesser level, I could have stood to have the bullet path line be a different shade for the enemies, and maybe a bit more obviously directional... maybe even being RED after it passes through someone on a hit? <br/> <br/>But those are just minor nitpicks on a strong entry. Slick style as always, and a cool action game with a nice take on the theme... good job!
Jan 2 21:15:00 20m 00s Shush Prowler Whoa! And suddenly I'm back at my desktop. <br/> <br/>That was quite a ride; very interesting and really outstanding on making a mood and getting me to be curious about the room. I think I uncovered the rules at just about the right pace, and I really enjoyed the total lack of instruction. <br/> <br/>When the lightning flies out of the eye and into the mirror, that's the end, right? <br/> <br/>I checked this one out because here in the last few hours of judging I was thinking back on what games I recalled from previous LDs... I remembered enjoying your Sludge City game, and while this one here is very different I'm glad I came to check it out. <br/> <br/>Nice work.
Jan 2 21:38:00 23m 00s INFINIROOM Very strong entry here with a great polish on the graphics sound and catchy music, plus tight controls and an interesting mechanic. <br/> <br/>I never managed to get to 30 seconds, and I think there were maybe two things that got in my way. <br/> <br/>Because this game is so excellent and has great potential I'll dive into the problem I had, but this is not meant to say it's a bad game - it's only because it's a good game I go into detail here! <br/> <br/>#1 problem I had was effectively using the flip mechanic. 90% of my deaths were jump-jump-gameover I have no idea why. Even after playing for quite some time I still could not explain to you which traps will be destroyed when I flip. There's a lightning bolt drawn as I go, and I think it kills traps near where I leave, but also maybe long the way? Sometimes I thought it killed traps near where I landed, but then I kept dying trying to flip to smash traps so I soon learned not to try to do that. I even stopped playing for the goal a while just to experiment with flip-smashing traps but I still couldn't figure it out. I would recommend that you put a sub-second pause into the game at the moment of trap-smashing so the brain can pause a beat and learn. Or maybe some tighter association between the graphic and the gameplay effect... altho it flashes so fast I really can't tell exactly what it touches. <br/> <br/>I also wished the flip was a separate button instead of jump-twice, because I often got a little extra confused because of the effect of the pre-flip jump. <br/> <br/>Certain confusions were actually fun for me... for example learning why I cannot just flipflipflip was a nice moment. First I noticed I couldn't re-flip immediately, then I noticed the graphical trail as I ran, then I noticed the little ball. I never figured out the red zone though... sometimes it would expand the map, other times not. Sometimes if I was on it I died, other times I think I survived. Maybe I misread the situation to be confused about that. <br/> <br/>Exploring the mechanics was fun, and fortunately you made the smart design choice to have an INSTANT restart which felt totally excellent. <br/> <br/>Very strong entry, if you smoothed off just one or two small burrs I think you could really streamline this.
Jan 2 21:47:00 9m 00s Cockroach Reaction Very cool chain reactions! I was totally shocked when my first game was lost, I had a board-spanning position with lots of 3s, and instead of triggering it I turned one more 2 into a 3. Well, then the roaches took their turn, and BOOM the chain reaction was nuts and totally destroyed me and I lost. <br/> <br/>Once I saw how quickly I could be wiped out, I got it, and I won the next time. Really fun, with cute simple graphics that are getting the job done, and a proper focus on the one core idea of setting off chain reactions. <br/> <br/>Naturally it's hard to balance making the chains go off slowly enough that I can watch and see and understand why, but yet be quick enough that the game doesn't bog down too much. It's a tough balance but I think you picked a good spot. <br/> <br/>Very nice, especially for a first entry.
Jan 2 22:08:00 21m 00s KILLOBIT This game is awesome. The graphics have character and the feel is on point. And even though it's super-crazy-hard and you keep having to start over, it very cleverly avoids feeling repetitive by changing up the graphics and the weapons. Those weapons!! It's also slick that it gives the weapons twice before cycling, because that lets me acclimate a bit. <br/> <br/>So many nice touches in a strong entry here. <br/> <br/>I do want to give my one and only complaint though: I spent what feels like about 20% of my playtime staring at the GAME OVER screen. That would be a fast restart time in most games, but I often died in the first couple of seconds here, so that restart time eventually built up to like hammering-the-keyboard-in-rage slow for me if I caught a few bad deaths in a row. I probably would have played twice as long as I did if the restart was absolutely instantaneous. I wanted the difficulty, but the punishment eventually outweighed the crime when I screwed up (aka every time). <br/> <br/>It's fair that I might just not be good enough, though. <br/> <br/> <br/>Great entry.
Jan 2 22:50:00 42m 00s Dungeon Protector Nice - another hex-based turn-based game! <br/> <br/>You've got a slick look to this one, and some nice complexity that shines in the puzzle-type thinking it creates. <br/> <br/>I made it pretty far but after about 10 tries I couldn't solve the one where you have to kill 6 guys (5 rogues, 1 archer) that encircle you in the middle of the room. I came close but I know with 5 turns and 6 guys I need to lure them into at least 1 double-kill and I never figured out how to do it! <br/> <br/>Great job making something that really got me thinking. Looking at the screen shots I was ready to complain about purple guys on a purple background, but when actually playing it didn't matter. <br/> <br/>Nice entry! <br/> <br/>By the way I'm a big hoplite fan (have the atheist achievement) and I am surprised to see people comparing your game to that one. Your pace is FAR slower and more puzzle-like than hoplite, and the multi-move AP system takes it even further in a different direction, as does the multi-moving enemy rogue. <br/> <br/>If I could have added one thing it would have been some indication how close to the end I was, if there was an end.
Jan 2 23:34:00 44m 00s Pest Control Nice art and sound give a unique flavor to this one! Great job... the balance was nice, with constant danger yet it felt like it was my fault when I got hit. <br/> <br/>Great work.
Jan 2 23:54:00 20m 00s The Princess Trap Nice game! I enjoyed the initial moments of wondering what the heck was going on, until I figured it out. <br/> <br/>I reached a pretty steady state by upgrading the spring each time to buy time for my other traps... I made it to day 9 without taking a hit, so I guess maybe a bit more difficulty is required. It was a fun experience along the way, though! Nice work.
Jan 3 00:16:00 22m 00s Square Roots This was awesome in the audio, and the theme, and the mood they created together. The narrator was fantastic for an LD game! <br/> <br/>The game rules were kind of interesting, but I never quite clicked to really understand exactly what was going on. <br/> <br/>I had a fun ride along the way though! Nice work.
Jan 3 00:53:00 37m 00s Bat Cave Nice job, man! Game is tight with a responsive feel, and there are a variety of challenges to deal with... good job! <br/> <br/>Your last game I played was retro rebound and this one is definitely a tighter package, where I jump right into the action and I figure it out as I go. Nice work. Slight parallax on the bg was a nice touch btw.