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Feedback comments for LD39
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| Timestamp | Since previous | Game | danielilett's comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jul 31 15:46:34 | Don't be (the) patient | ♥ 0 | A pretty simple entry, but it works pretty well. I like the interpretation of the theme. I have a few bits of feedback that might help improve the game: -I like the sound effects, but they're a little quiet and relying on only audio feedback isn't the most reliable way of telling the player how long they have left. You could put a visual heart monitor along the bottom to go with the sound effect, then I think it'd be perfect. -The text on the instruction page is a tad hard to read because of the background. It might help to make the font a little bolder perhaps? Apart from that, it's pretty good. Your sprites are very cute and I didn't encounter any bugs. | |
| Jul 31 16:15:39 | 29m 05s | Turrets Turrets | ♥ 1 | I liked this, it's a pretty polished game. I did get to one wave where it threw tons of white ones at me and I couldn't handle it, but it was well-balanced until then. I have a couple points to make: -It took me a while to decipher what the UI on the left was saying. There's a lot of densely-packed information, so if it were possible to drip-feed that to the player it may help. -The laser sound is quite repetitive. If some of the upgrades changed the sounds made by turrets, that may help. -I clicked on an empty tile and accidentally pressed Y instead of T, and it took some funds and applied the upgrade despite there being no turret there. The same didn't happen if picked an empty tile and clicked the UI buttons. It seems like a reeeeally minor bug. I liked the graphics, such as the life and power indicators around objects and the turret models. In all, I think it's a solid entry. I think a variety of turret types to match the upgrades would make things look cooler, like adding a little solar panel on top of a turret when you use the solar panel upgrade. EDIT: The game's mechanics are also simple to get to grips with and I like the application of the theme. If you can work on this a little longer, I think it would make a very competent tower defence game! EDIT 2: Oh and making every upgrade also have a drawback is a very interesting mechanic, I love it. |
| Jul 31 16:47:46 | 32m 07s | D34TH | ♥ 2 | This is a solid platformer and the controls are tight. The graphics are really simple and cute, but crucially they're coherent so for that you score highly on graphics! My general feedback on how to improve it would be: -I didn't like the placement of the jump button. Personally, I would have switched the recharge and jump buttons, or better yet, allow the player to customise the button layout. -It gets a bit hard, but mostly because of the above control issue. That's not an issue in and of itself, but having to do the easy start of the level each time I die gets a little grating. Adding checkpoints mid-level would help mitigate that. -If you were to continue this, more enemy variety would be cool. Both the player and the enemies were only able to shoot sideways, but I would have found it useful to shoot in more directions. You seem to have been trying to make things a bit tricky, so a few other enemy types with their own quirks would achieve that and also be more interesting for the player. -Make a bleepy-bloopy fanfare tune when you beat a level! :) -One thing you may want to consider is making shooting bullets cost power. If you were to expand the game with more levels or whatever, you might want a scenario where you want to penalise the player for just spraying bullets to teach them to be conservative with them. I didn't get past Level 2, but I watched your gameplay video and the rockets in Level 3 are kinda funny. Not even remotely fair, but there are plenty of games that pull off the "rage-inducing unfairness" thing pretty well. If you want to go for that angle, then go the whole hog! Add platforms that open under your feet, for example. I also didn't encounter any bugs (or at least, nothing too noticeable), which is a huge bonus. This is a really good first Ludum Dare, great job. |
| Jul 31 20:16:23 | 3h 28m | Cell Battles | ♥ 1 | I love this! I don't think I really have anything bad to say at all, so great job! -I really like the blob effect. That, coupled with the basic colours and grey background, make for a striking visual style. -The controls are very simple once you get used to them and the game is easy to play and intuitive. I don't mind the control setup, although a couple other users noted difficulty with them, so perhaps allowing customisation would be good. -The music is great. It's very catchy, and the sound effects don't start to get annoying, which is common in LD games. -It's very addictive. There's something so satisfying about taking over whole portions of the map and watching your opponents try in vain to take back the spawners you just stole from them. The only thing to note really is that it's a bit easy, but that isn't really a problem. Although it might be cool to add a 'hard mode' with more advanced or aggressive AI. Great job with this game. |
| Jul 31 23:06:01 | 2h 49m | Flappy Jet | ♥ 2 | This game is really hard. :O I'd normally run five miles away from anything with "Flappy" in the name, but this is pretty good. I really liked the pixel art graphics and especially the music. Only a few other points to make: -I found that the wrenches always spawned in extremely tight spots, which is obviously intended, but I could never get back out! I personally think that makes it a tad too hard. -I also felt the hitboxes were a little fiddly, but maybe that's just me. In all I think this is a solid entry. If you were to expand it, you could try adding different themes or different obstacles. |
| Aug 2 12:58:16 | 37h 52m | From the Shadows | ♥ 2 | I really like the idea! I played the single-player mode because I don't have anyone to hand to try the multiplayer mode with, but checked the multiplayer mode for clarification on the game mechanics. -I have to agree with @huvaakoodia that it would be greatly helpful to have a visual representation of the shadow's turn in single-player mode. I too wasn't entirely sure how my people died sometimes. -Perhaps include instructions within the game? A tutorial mode that shows visually how each movement option operates for both teams would help. It wasn't immediately clear to me that level 1 shadows can move one space THEN they kill anything one space away from them including diagonals. -I did unfortunately encounter a bug twice. Not sure what it means because I don't use Game Maker, but here it is: Unable to find any instance for object index '100293' name '<undefined>' at gml_Object_oController_Step_0 Sorry that I can't remember the circumstances in which it occurred! The graphics are great, especially the animations. The animation of a human being swallowed by the ground is cute, even if it's resulting in their untimely death. :p The music is very catchy, and I'm impressed that there are multiple tracks for the title screen, the actual game and a little jingle when you lose (and I assume also when you win, but I didn't manage that haha). Just a couple quality-of-life fixes are needed I think, so it's most of the way there! |
| Aug 4 19:11:00 | 54h 12m | A Developer's Nightmare | ♥ 1 | I very much like the idea - blending two genres like this can go either way, but you've managed to pull it off - and I like the graphical style. -The controls for the platforming sections are far too floaty and slippery. A couple of times, I slipped off the side of (I think) the second jump because I kept the D key held when the character's head got caught on a platform and they floated further to the right than I anticipated. -Continuing from that point, perhaps space out the platforms that are in a zig-zag pattern so that there is more headroom for the player to jump. -I like the fact that the first puzzle is so simple - it works extremely well as a tutorial level for the puzzle sections. The mechanic is easy to grasp due to the inclusion of this introductory puzzle. Then, the next puzzle introduces different shapes in another safe and simple setting. -I liked the music, but it's a tad quiet compared to the other sound effects. -The coffee meter depletes so fast that if I made a single mistake on the platforming sections, I was already doomed. This isn't helped by the fact you have to start over. Or at least, I didn't get far enough to reach any checkpoint... I know I just praised the introduction level, but it gets annoying after the 6th time. :p -While I do really like the idea of the visibility reducing as the coffee meter depletes (it reminds me of when your eyes start to shut themselves when you're REALLY tired), the effect is perhaps a little too extreme here. I think that's just my opinion, but it's one of the many things that make the platforming difficult. -I do appreciate that the puzzle levels don't have a timer of any sort. I think the platformer sections ought to be a bit hectic (just toned down a little), with the puzzle levels acting as a well-needed cooldown period. It's a solid idea - it just needs a bit of refinement for the platforming sections. Why not try tweaking things a bit and upload a post-competition version? Also, an idea that just popped into my head: -When the coffee meter is low, you could try blurring the scene and adding snoring sounds or something? I think you'd have room to add something like that if the current eye-shutting effect was toned down slightly. It'd really feel like you're falling asleep then! |
| Aug 4 19:50:23 | 39m 23s | Coffee is Power | ♥ 1 | I like the idea behind this game, but as others have mentioned, it's a little bit confusing. I managed to get everything on the list crossed off, although I wasn't sure how I actually managed to get Brainstorming done. It just sorta... happened. Definitely very meta though, and I loved the "game jam programmer" humour. The choice of graphics was absolutely correct, and while the music was strange, I still liked it. -Someone else mentioned that it would be a good idea to have an 'interact' button so you don't accidentally use something you didn't mean to. -Maybe make interactable objects glow when you're near them so you know what you're using (or able to use). -I never did figure out how to make the progress bar fill up. I kept using the computer and it kept giving me the dialogue about writing if-statements. It also mentioned 4 hours passing in that dialogue, but that didn't actually happen - not sure if it's meant to. I was assuming using the computer a lot would increase your progress, but that didn't happen for me. -I'm assuming that you go to sleep automatically when you don't have any coffee for a while? Maybe add a sleep meter or some other kind of feedback to let you know how long you have until you need to sleep. I think you nailed the humour of the game jam experience though. I also spend a lot of time staring out the window at 3am during game jams. :p For a first time jammer, this was a great entry! |
| Aug 4 20:10:22 | 19m 59s | Running out of Power | ♥ 1 | I do like this game. The graphical style is a little basic but works well, and with a little refinement I think this game could be made quite pretty. -Once or twice, the game gave me a level that was already complete, or needed only one move to complete. To mirror what others have said, the level generator needs a little work. -Every level I had was solvable by making a straight line between the start and end. I'd have liked more interesting puzzles where I was required to make a weaving line around the level. -A great next step would be to implement 4x4, 5x5 etc levels. Having a larger grid gives you much more leeway with the level generation. -As already noted, the controls are a little unresponsive. If I click on a tile quickly after clicking the last one, it won't move. -An animation and sound effect when a tile moves into place would be cool, although as someone who doesn't make many sounds myself, I know how daunting that can be! -If you do implement larger and more complex levels, maybe change the colour scheme a bit for each difficulty tier? Some variation in the visuals keeps things from getting a bit samey. -Completely empty tiles with no "pipes" would allow for more interesting puzzles. -Thankfully, I never came across an impossible puzzle. It's a good entry and a solid idea, but the level generation algorithm needs a little more work. The rest of the game is constructed well and is highly accessible due to the simplicity of the mechanics. |
| Aug 4 20:33:58 | 23m 36s | Energy Juice | ♥ 1 | The mechanics of this game are very simple, so it's easy to grasp. I tried all the modes, and I'm rather bad at Hard and Pro modes. I've never been that good at typing... -I'll be honest, I'm not a fan of the music. It's a tad too loud, like others have said, but it's also just weird and high-pitched. Try that melody with a lower pitch and perhaps a different instrument and it might be a bit better! -At higher speeds, it's a bit hard to read the characters on each tile as they're falling. It might be because of the texturing on the tiles, I'm not sure. -Try adding different modes where the tiles fall much slower but there are several on screen at a time, similar to how Pro Mode works but more exaggerated, like maybe ten tiles on screen. It would feel more hectic, plus each tile would be more readable due to falling slower. So instead of increasing speed for each difficulty, increase the rate at which tiles spawn. I didn't realise how fat my fingers were until I tried Pro Mode haha. A good entry that just needs a few tweaks, I think. EDIT: If you really want to test people's skills, add punctuation and number tiles. Call it Hell Mode or something, because that would be truly evil. |
| Aug 4 20:53:32 | 19m 34s | The Last Light | ♥ 2 | I really like the visual effects in this game! The lighting around the ball at the beginning is a cool effect and the particles that spray out of defeated enemies are kinda cool. -You can't jump while standing still and there is no air control on jumps, so you sorta go flying across the stage sometimes. I didn't jump because of these reasons, although jumping isn't necessarily required in this game. -If you fix jumping a bit, then perhaps alternative levels with platforms or something more interesting to stand on might be cool. -Since the red enemy drops are meant to increase the flame's size, why not make them glow with the nice effect from the start? It'd help to make them more noticeable. -I'm a huge fan of the darkness aesthetic you've gone with. It's too easy to make a game feel too dark, but I think you've nailed it. -I like the sound effects, but mostly because they sound like you made some of them with your own voice. :p -The waves are a cool idea, and I managed to hold on through them, somehow. I did two Uber Waves and got to 200s, then I quit the game because it was mostly the same thing over and over. -Do include some spooky atmospheric music if you can - it would tie the game together very well. -My main tactic was to just spam shots, as you can imagine. I would appreciate an option to just hold the mouse button down to automatically shoot repeatedly - it helps reduce muscle strain for people's wrists. -Your trees look nice. -I'm not even sure what the enemies were supposed to be, but they look spooky so it works anyway. A really strong entry and a very fun game. There's something satisfying about watching enemies fall down over and over again! |
| Aug 20 19:36:17 | 382h 42m | Super Charged | ♥ 1 | I thought this was a pretty cool game. The graphics are nice and I really like the music. -I like the concept of one colour being good and the other being bad, representing + and -. -It was hard to tell when the triangle enemies were going to change colour, so they hit me a few times. -The fuzzy border around the electron also made it difficult to know which objects it would collide with. -I liked the simple gameplay idea. Having only one button was a great idea, although my only criticism of it is that it wore my hand out clicking so fast. A pretty solid jam entry. |