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Evan Minto

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Timestamp	Since previous	Game		Evan Minto's comment
Apr 24 03:23:48		Catching Crazy	♥ 3	I like this a lot! The switching back and forth has a nice rhythm to it and you did a good job making the rhythm game parts get harder and harder as it goes (especially when you start throwing all the distractions in). Good music too! I'd love to see a version that take advantage of the unreliable protagonist concept more.
Apr 24 03:32:27	8m 39s	Card Walk	♥ 0	I'm also running into the bug with the first level. The second one is the more playable of the two, but it's still pretty challenging. I think it's because of the high acceleration on the dog and the inability to progress once I hit a steep wall (I can't seem to jump high enough to get over it). I do like that you managed to animate the dog though (I didn't have time to animate my character when I did a platformer for a previous jam). I also wonder whether you could do more with the idea of a card game. Maybe the combination of selected cards or their order could be significant, like in a real card game? Anyway, this is a great start as your first game, especially as a solo dev. Would love to see more from you!
Apr 24 07:18:52	3h 46m	Arbust's Revenge	♥ 1	Took me a while to figure out how to shoot, but I think that was just my not reading the instructions right. I also wasn't able to find the wizard. Once I got the hang of balancing using my cards and shooting it got kind of fun, but the discrete turns made aiming pretty tough. It would help a lot to make the turns smoother.
Apr 24 07:22:42	3m 50s	Marco Polo	♥ 1	The turn-based segment could use an extra mechanic or two; once I ran out of money there was seemingly nothing to do but wait for the next shooter segment. I really like the balance between the two though. Things that happened in the turn-based segment forced me to change up my strategy in the shooter. A note on the shooter, though: I feel like the character moves and shoots way too slow, so I felt like I never had good control over the situation. Maybe that's intentional, not sure.
Apr 24 07:25:31	2m 49s	Brickris Tetout	♥ 0	Love the neon graphics and the music! I kept getting a glitch where the ball over-accelerated and became completely unpredictable, but in a way that made it even more entertaining. When I WAS able to control the ball I could start to be more strategic and use the ball to help with my Tetris play, but that didn't last very long. Overall this is a super cool idea though!
Apr 24 07:33:54	8m 23s	Rythm is Lava	♥ 2	I really really wanted to like this more than I did. The graphics and music are fantastic, and the level design and how it interacts with the two-at-once controls is really clever. Unfortunately I couldn't for the life of me figure out what was going on with the blocks of lava. It seemed like they were following the rhythm of the music, but I couldn't tell why my characters kept dying randomly. Was it because they had touched the lava? But why didn't they die immediately upon touching it? (When people say “the floor is lava,” it usually implies you can’t touch the floor at all.) Because of the difficulty in figuring out the lava mechanic, plus the fact that I kept accidentally going back to old rooms I had already beaten (not sure if that was an intentional part of the design), I didn't make it past the first four or five rooms. It sounds like you put in a ton of great content later on, and I wish I could have gotten to it. Not sure if it's against the spirit of the game to explain the lava mechanic, but could someone tell me how it works? I'm really curious now!
Apr 24 07:36:08	2m 14s	Frogs vs. Cats	♥ 1	Great concept, controlling a text adventure by platforming and going into doors. I’d definitely appreciate the cats being actual hazards. Also I couldn’t really figure out where to go to finish the level, but I might have just not been paying close enough attention.
Apr 24 07:51:13	15m 05s	Cowboys vs Aliens	♥ 2	There's a lot of deceptively deep strategy to this game. I like it! I had a lot of fun learning how to pick off individual enemies without triggering a shootout that would get me killed. The friendly fire is a nice mechanic too. I like how the weapons have different attributes and can be used as foils against each other. The pixel art animations are also really expressive.
Apr 24 08:01:13	10m 00s	Happy Quiz	♥ 3	The second genre is usually not something I'm really into but this is very well executed. Love the questions and the very creative ways you mix them up as it goes. Also some very... effective... design choices... later on. Don't want to spoil it for anybody 😉
Apr 24 08:11:49	10m 36s	The Adventures of Cake Man	♥ 1	Core concept's not bad, but it doesn't seem like it has much room for players to explore. There's a right combination of ingredients that the player needs to figure out based on their knowledge of real cakes, and then they need to platform to get the ingredients. Would be nice to give players a separate challenge to figure out what the ingredients are! And I agree with others that it's a bit buggy. I got stuck to the sides of platforms a lot, and one time the character basically slid off the left hand side of the screen so I couldn't see him anymore. The music's pretty good, as others have said.
Apr 24 08:19:41	7m 52s	Breackat	♥ 1	Phew, that was a doozy. I got down to four blocks after a couple tries. It's fun, but very hard. I agree that this seems a little too hard for one person. Maybe if you made the cat easier to control and the ball slower, it would be easier for one person to do both. I think you should try to make it work, because it's a really cool idea! I like the little squash and stretch on the cat too.
Apr 26 05:46:34	45h 26m	Final Click ZX	♥ 1	This is great! I got most of the powerups (except for the high-level Trophy ones). I like how you didn't just take the clicking part of clicker games, you also took the automation mechanic. Eventually I just left it running with autopilot on to rack up money, which was weirdly fun and satisfying since I felt like it was succeeding thanks to how I managed the resources. Good choices for the powerups. There's some room for player creativity in terms of which powerups to get when. The voiceovers are really funny too! I was a little confused about how Elite Enemies helped me. Do they make more money when you kill them? The Trophy powerup seems a bit strange too. I guess it's just there to tempt completionists after the first one? Also, in the late game I started to get performance (frame rate I guess) problems. The bullets were blinking in and out of existence. Probably too many particles.
Apr 26 06:03:14	16m 40s	Neko Drift!	♥ 1	A little tough to figure this one out. I guess my goal was to place towers to stop the cats, but when I did that the towers seemed to shoot out balls that got in my way as much as the cats did. I'm also not sure how intentional this is, but the driving controls are super slippery. I found the only way to control it was to very, very lightly tap the keys when I turned, or else I'd completely spin out of control. Maybe lower the sensitivity there. The concept seems cool though!
Apr 26 06:13:03	9m 49s	Bad Band	♥ 1	The only downside of this is that there's no real challenge (the optimal strategy is immediately apparent). But as a little mixer to play around with, this is awesome! I had a lot of fun bouncing back and forth between the genres, sometimes switching an instrument on for only a note or a measure at a time. I'd love to see an expanded version with more genres/styles! Oh right, and great music by the way!
Apr 26 06:34:40	21m 37s	Run and Plant!	♥ 1	Cool idea, and sort of fun to play. It's a little weird that you can only buy seeds after you die, and the level design feels like it's randomized (sometimes there were gaps I couldn't jump over or coins that were impossible to get). I really like the idea of making the level easier as a mechanic though.
Apr 26 07:02:50	28m 10s	Point-defense Hell	♥ 1	Love this idea, especially since I'm not great at bullet hell games so the ability to pre-plan a strategy makes it a little easier in some ways. I like the balance between the turret types. I played around with a couple different strategies. I think one issue is that as cool as the slowing mechanic is, it makes the bullets harder to predict since their speed keeps changing. Kind of removes the pattern-recognition part of bullet hell games, which AFIAK is what makes it possible for people to make sense of that many bullets. Anyway I definitely had fun with it. I'd play a polished and expanded version of this for sure. Good job!
Apr 26 07:25:04	22m 14s	King Circle	♥ 1	Kind of tough to get the hang of. The platformer especially, since apparently you can't jump while running. Having to stop before I jump was a bit of a pain. You're also not really using the screen real estate very effectively. There's a huge gap in the top of the platformer screen. Since I didn't notice anything happening concurrently between the two games, maybe just switch them in fullscreen rather than doing splitscreen. I like the concept of switching back and forth between the games and having powerups for one be in the other one, but it's hard to tell what's affecting what in-game. I think this needs some more polish for that concept to really shine.
Apr 26 07:38:26	13m 22s	Type2Flap	♥ 1	I agree that dashing and spitting didn't seem too useful but MAN this is a really fun idea. I'm absolutely terrible at it, but the mismatch in my brain between "playing Flappy Bird" and "typing" make it really funny even when I lose. This is such a perfect use of the theme. One of my only big issues outside of the some of the moves seeming a bit superfluous is that sometimes it seems like the game generates impossible obstacles. But maybe I'm just bad at it. Great visuals too! Good job on this.
Apr 26 07:44:12	5m 46s	Rhythm and Cruise	♥ 1	Phew, that was fun! I like games that force you to split your attention like that. The rhythm between the two halves gives some good opportunities to balance the two (i.e. I just left the boat running for a bit and paid attention to the rhythm, then checked back every now and then to make sure it didn't crash). I agree with @candlesan that it would be nice if the music and the rhythm game matched more, since that would make it easier to get in a groove and play a bit more by instinct. Visuals are great! Simple but very clear what's going on.
Apr 26 08:00:15	16m 03s	Eilza	♥ 2	Great concept, great art and music, all around really good job on this. The kind of whimsical tone of the art/music juxtaposes really well with how dark the game is, and the animations are a fantastic touch (Eliza hiding under her books or covering her ears is heartbreaking). This game evoked a genuine emotional response from me, which is honestly not very common in jam games. In terms of constructive criticism, I agree with others that the patterns get kind of easy to predict, but I think the game makes its point very well despite that.
Apr 27 14:52:23	30h 52m	Type-Zero	♥ 1	I got 03:41:76! Cool idea, and pretty challenging. After a while I got the hang of the timing and the right way to slow down before turns. I did notice that the ramp and the sidebar things didn't do anything. Was that just because you ran out of time?
Apr 27 15:08:00	15m 37s	Battle of the (Mostly) Brains	♥ 1	Hah, this is a pretty fun concept. Didn't understand the free typing part, but I guess that was the point. Great job on the writing. Definitely kept me guessing. Reminds me in a good way of some of the stuff in Undertale.
Apr 27 15:14:05	6m 05s	Shoodoku	♥ 0	Fantastic idea, but unfortunately I'm no good at sudoku! Adding the shooting mechanic makes it almost impossible for me to keep track of the numbers. But this seems like a ton of fun for people who are better at sudoku. There'a lot of interesting challenge to balancing the need to kill the enemies with the need to control the numbers. I agree with other commenters that it could use some music/sound effects.
Apr 29 01:48:09	34h 34m	CardRacer	♥ 1	I couldn't figure out how to play at first, but based on the comments I assume it's just random card draws. Definitely agree with others that it would be great to be able to choose your cards and put together some kind of strategy. I like the use of the theme.
Apr 29 02:01:50	13m 41s	Block Destroyer	♥ 1	Great concept, though the execution could use some work. You should figure out a way to make the player choices for when and where to shoot more meaningful. I couldn't tell if the different block colors meant anything, for example. Maybe you can add different block types for the player to aim for? And for QOL stuff: One is to allow players to hold down the shoot button. I had to tap it rapidly, which got old fast. You also might want to allow strafing. Only allowing turning made it difficult to change directions while shooting.
Apr 29 02:19:48	17m 58s	The Bonding of Isaac	♥ 1	I also really like the pacifist "combat." Keeping track of the hitboxes on the lines of text was a little difficult since I couldn't visualize the gaps between them like you do in most shooters. But it's definitely cool that the combat manages to tell a story just through which dialogue the characters shoot at each other. The tear animation is definitely a nice touch.
Apr 29 02:40:31	20m 43s	Shoot-E-Pet	♥ 1	Definitely an interesting idea. I'd love to see it with more pet mechanics, such as having multiple pets or manage or have to buy ammo/items for each type of "attack." Also needs a bit more visual polish. The text stats in the top left are very basic, and sometimes there were visual glitches when shooting certain weapons.
Apr 29 02:52:34	12m 03s	Blind Vision	♥ 1	Fantastic work. I do web accessibility design/dev in my day job and I've been thinking for a while about how cool it would be to play a game that made sensory disability a part of the mechanics. The hovering mechanic is really simple here but it adds a great layer to the puzzle platforming. Especially in the last level, I had to really pay attention to figure out what the right order of events should be. My only real issue is that some of the earlier levels just sort of work out automatically without the player needing to pay too much attention (i.e. I hit a switch and an enemy I didn't know existed sets off another switch). Also kudos for the first scene where you hover to read out the text. Very clever way of introducing the mechanic. Edit: Oh also, an interesting thing to pursue for this would be a blind-accessible version (not sure if it already is)!
Apr 29 03:03:11	10m 37s	Shuttle Launch	♥ 1	Hard to figure out what to do but man this is a pretty surreal game. The visuals are really rudimentary but kind of remind me of a lot of early computer graphics tech demos in terms of the weird mix of spacey futurism and classic architecture. Nice music too.
Apr 29 03:12:30	9m 19s	Typographythm	♥ 1	Ahhh I love this. Probably my favorite Compo game. You really combined the typing and rhythm genres perfectly, and I like the variety of speeds and modes. I was really impressed with the level of audiovisual variety and cohesion you pulled off too. The glitchy style is really consistent and I love the hands enemy. If I had to give some constructive criticism, it was sometimes hard to tell which mode I was in (typing on beat or really fast). I only realized later that the metronome starts spinning when you're in the latter.