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cerno-b

Feedback comments for LD43

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Timestamp	Since previous	Game		cerno-b's comment
Dec 7 23:27:30		Slithering Dark	♥ 0	Could you set your game to "Windows Download" on your itch page? I would like to play it via Itch client but it shows as "not available on Windows".
Dec 7 23:27:47	17s	Into the abyss	♥ 0	Could you set your game to "Windows Download" on your itch page? I would like to play it via Itch client but it shows as "not available on Windows".
Dec 7 23:28:00	13s	Temple of the Blood God	♥ 0	Could you set your game to "Windows Download" on your itch page? I would like to play it via Itch client but it shows as "not available on Windows".
Dec 7 23:43:45	15m 45s	Cowboy Hell	♥ 1	Good job voicing the different characters. Sometimes it was a bit hard to distinguish between the boss and the protagonist. For the lines that repeat often it may be a good idea to record multiple variations and pick them randomly. Also for lines are played in quick succession, shorter clips may be helpful because otherwise the voices keep breaking off. Gameplay-wise I enjoyed the idea of having to level down instead of leveling up. I kept losing at the third opponent until I realized that you can increase your skills if you lower others. I found that a good way to get through the game is to increase attack and defense at the expense of health. That way I way able to get to the boss without losing any life points. I made the decision to fight and was unfortunately locked in an endless loop, since I always missed but the boss didn't hurt me. I'm not sure whether this was a deliberate thing to force the player to choose sacrifice but with my level choices I was stuck. I would have tried again but the boss's monologue was pretty long and unskippable, so I decided to leave it at a draw.
Dec 8 00:03:44	19m 59s	Dungeon Sacrifice	♥ 1	I liked the premise of having to juggle bodies and fighting enemies. Mechanically, I think it may have been better if there was a disadvantage to shooting and carrying humans. Like if you shoot a human the game gets harder (faster/more enemies) so you would have to strategize in which order you sacrifice the humans. If you carried a human, you could have added a disadvantage like slower reload or impossibility to shoot. I was going to recommend the Vlambeer video, but that has been done already. Faster movement (unless it interferes with your atmosphere), faster shots, larger magazine, more weaker enemies, are all methods you could explore to make the game more fun (again, unless it interferes with your atmosphere). I wish there would have been more significant changes between the checkpoints (new enemy types, new traps, something to keep the player entertained). Look up how you can make objects slide along walls, that would help a lot for your enemy movement. I think you made the right choice in having limited sight, and the bloodstains really helped to mark areas the player already visited. I also enjoyed that you put in a real ending, instead of leaving the game hanging. All in all it's a respectable first entry and I would encourage you take all the valuable feedback you're getting and making your next game even better. Great job!
Dec 8 00:19:24	15m 40s	H E R D	♥ 1	I have to admit, when I first saw screenshots to your game I thought this was a Jam game in the wrong category, the graphics were just too great. Then I saw your time lapse video and realized you're just a modelling and texturing wizard. Kudos to you, for a Compo game the visuals are amazing. The gameplay ties in nicely with the setting, although I didn't feel the difference between sacrificing a sheep and leaving it behind was really palpable. I understood the reference to the theme, but it felt a bit tacked on. The apple mechanics I think may have worked a bit better if you used it to lure the sheep in instead of shooing them away, since it was tricky to get the herd to stick together. Maybe a free "shoo" command and a limited "lure" command (with collecting apples) may have been a better choice. Using the apple to lure would also be the more logical expectation, unless it's meant to replenish the herders' energy. The music is nice, but unfortunately you chose "musical" step noises which created a second melody that grated a bit against the main song. Lowering the volume of the steps, randomizing their notes and using a more inconspicuous sound effects may have alleviated this a bit. I managed to save one sheep but probably won't make it through the winter. :( Nice game overall with outstanding visuals.
Dec 8 00:41:36	22m 12s	Expendibots	♥ 1	I love the bot design. It's part militaristic and part Wall-E charming. I like how the antennas wiggle, it's a nice touch. The music is good, if a bit repetitive. A low-key rumbling engine noise would have worked wonders for the atmosphere, especially if it rose and fell in volume with the number of tanks and their speed. I wish you could have pushed the premise a bit harder. There were only a few situations where I actually felt that I had to sacrifice my mini tanks, in the other cases it was just my lack of skills that led to their demise. The camera was a little unsteady which made the game a somewhat hard to control. On the other hand, I enjoyed how you constantly set up walls to help align the bots in order to get them across a narrow passage. That was well thought out. In the end I almost saved one bot, but I didn't manage to time the jumps right so they fell to their mechanical deaths right before the finish line. I think having higher jumps may have helped me here. If you had the time, a larger map with a few more button puzzles and obstacles, paired with checkpoints, would have given the game a bit more playability. Overall I think it's a good game that could benefit from a little polish. It's worth continuing to work on it.
Dec 8 01:07:03	25m 27s	Sacrifice Carrier	♥ 1	I love PICO-8 games, and yours looks amazing. I loved the final boss fight. There are a few game mechanics issues I would like to point out. I felt the game's economy is a bit out of whack. So you rarely take damage from enemy ships, and the only real danger of dying is to lose all your fighter ships. Since you get one fighter per rock and the number of fighters you have to expend on bosses is fixed, the core concept of the game is basically to collect enough rocks, which feels a bit out of place for a game that looks and feels like a straight SHMUP. The sacrifice mechanic could have been probably balanced a bit better, it felt a little tacked on. For instance, if the player had more fighter ships but the bosses would recover if they are not killed with a fighter (and the fighter would be lost if the boss recovers in the middle of the sacrifice) may give the game more urgent pacing and force the player to strategize with their resources a bit more. There are a few glitches. The hit boxes on the rocks are a bit off since some shots would pass right through them. You probably know this but there are no screen boundary checks so the main ship can fly anywhere outside of the screen. I felt the power shot, while cool, wasn't really necessary as a quick succession of normal shots would do the job as well, but this could be remedied by making the power shot look cooler and be stronger so it gives the player some bang for their buck. Generally it's not a good idea to use the x and y keys because the y tends to be in different places on international keyboards. Ctrl and Alt or WASD (unless you use them for motion) are a safer bet because these keys tend to be standardized internationally. All in all it's a sweet little PICO-8 game that looks great, and would benefit from a little more polish.
Dec 8 01:49:17	42m 14s	Ascend	♥ 0	Could you set your game to “Windows Download” on your itch page? I would like to play it via Itch client but it shows as “not available on Windows”.
Dec 8 02:09:44	20m 27s	The M.O.N.K.	♥ 1	I liked your game. It is a bit slow-paced but the idea is neat and the graphics are very nice. The ducking animation was a nice touch. As always I try to recommend not writing a lenghty intro screen explaining the mechanics with a wall of text. Usually I prefer having game mechanics explained during the game, or, if there has to be in intro screen, fill it with screenshots and arrows to get your point across. Many players will skip the text anyway and then try to figure out how to play themselves. I wonder, why did you opt out of the Audio category? I found the ambient music quite nice. Overall I think it worth polishing a bit more and expanding on the premise. Having multiple enemy units, more spells, maybe different factions whose inhabitants wage war against neighboring cities which you can control by strategically converting regions, and so on may worthwhile extensions. I see a lot of room for growth.
Dec 9 21:27:25	43h 17m	Goo Glow	♥ 0	I love your simple, yet effective visuals. I always found it hard to work with a green palette and you pulled if off really well. The blob is quite expressive, and I love the eye transition when turning from left to right. A few more animation phases, especially when jumping would have been a nice touch. I've seen the premise in games like The Unfinished Swan, but you tied it very well into the Sacrifice theme. What I particularly enjoyed is how you folded a quasi-tutorial into the game without explaining too much. Just let the player die once and unintrusively explain why. This was really great! I found the length of the game to be perfect for the material you had. Any more levels would have required new mechanics and I enjoyed that you didn't outstay your welcome. The controls are pretty tight, which is very important for a game like this. I would have enjoyed it even more if the wall-jump would have been polished a bit more, like for instance allowing the player to push away from the wall and then jumping so they wouldn't have to switch direction after the jump which I feel is always a bit clunky. The sound effects, although sparse, were well picked, but unfortunately music was missing which might have added to the atmosphere more.
Dec 13 20:17:30	94h 50m	Hunger Sings	♥ 1	I like it. The graphics and atmosphere are top notch. Pulling the player into the story as you do is an achievement. Great job!
Dec 13 20:29:57	12m 27s	Precedence	♥ 1	Five stars for mood. The graphics are simple but very effective. I love how the comet comes closer and the planet starts to boil and shake. The atmosphere is amazing. I have some comments on gameplay though. It may have been better to allow the player to move just a little faster. I know it's tough trading speed for atmosphere, but I feel some polish in that respect may have gone a long way. There was a very small delay between interacting with a house and being able to continue. That totally drained my motivation to save a lot of people. When I had around 10 I decided that's enough and escaped. I did play once more and tried waiting for the end of the world, that was very satisfying. Overall I think the game sacrifices gameplay for atmosphere which makes it less of a game and more of an experience. Maybe that was intended, but I wonder whether you could have achieved both. Anyway, easily one of the most atmospheric games I played so far. Great job!
Dec 13 21:06:27	36m 30s	Limbs are Limited!	♥ 1	That was fun. Nice and fresh concept. I enjoyed the combination of bloody violence and puzzle solving. The whole thing was quite frantic, but I often felt I was not in control so much. I got stuck in the level with the three walls after I could not find out how to launch the guy again after he landed. So instead I made this :D gif3.gif Good times.
Dec 13 22:02:39	56m 12s	Maze of Death	♥ 1	Wow, this takes me back. Incredible to see a retro game made in old tech in just 48 hours. The graphics are good for the technology and the game concept is solid for its era. The game overall is very hard since each step closer to the goal increases the game's complexity so this leads to a significant slowdown over time. Maybe a teleporter system could have alleviated this. I had no sound, which was a pity because I was totally looking forward to hearing the good old SID chip again. Whether that was due to some technical issue or whether the game has no audio I cannot tell. Overall it's a neat entry that took me back on memory lane. Thanks a lot! Unbenannt.PNG
Dec 13 22:15:07	12m 28s	Penance	♥ 1	Could you please set your game to “Windows Download” on your itch page? I would like to play it via Itch client but it shows as “not available on Windows”.
Dec 15 11:10:46	36h 55m	Total Party Kill	♥ 0	This is absolutely amazing. I can't praise this enough: Graphics, game mechanics, overall design, pacing, music, humor and even a fulfilling ending. Everything is polished to perfection! My first almost fully 5-star rated game in this LD. I did have to subtract half a star for fun because some of the keys do not play well with international keyboards. For me it was Z which is next to T instead of at next to X as for everyone else. Fortunately I was able to jump via the up key. I usually suggest allowing multiple input choices, e.g. Y or X for jumping, WASD or Arrow keys for movement, etc. This is not even about different input schemes to choose from, just bind more than one button to the same action. Controller support would have been awesome, but I don't know if Stencyl supports it. Another minor thing: I noticed you uploaded your HTML version to Itch, but didn't for the Windows version. You can also upload your sources there. That may help keeping all your stuff in one place and avoid confusion in lazy people (aka me) ;) Overall I think one of the best games I've seen so far. Kudos!
Dec 15 11:18:18	7m 32s	Infiltrate	♥ 0	Could you please set your game to “Windows Download” on your itch page? I would like to play it via Itch client but it shows as “not available on Windows”.
Dec 16 17:19:37	30h 01m	Graveyard Manager	♥ 1	The game was really funny! The song fits the concept and despite feeling a bit simplistic, it works surprisingly well with the overall black humour. The game is very charming with all these little backstories. I am not sure I understood the game well though. I played it twice and lost two times (once with with good and with bad karma). I suppose you can only lose the game because the taxes are crushing you eventually. Also I could only guess which corpses gave good karma, but I suppose it is like "more money = less karma". And I guessed that jobs with higher social standing gives you more money and therefore less karma. I would have loved if the game was beatable, having the player manage a balance between money and karma, so that the graveyard is both sustainable but also affordable for people with less money. With some extensions this could be a quite addicting strategy game. Some idea: - Communicate the economy clearer to the player, with permanent indicators instead of right-clicking - Extend the game through multiple levels and add lots to manage (introduce micro and macro economy) - Make the economy a bit more complex, like removing karma when someone is exhumed too soon - Add random events, like some star's fan who is outraged that their favorite celebrity isn't there anymore (public outrage = less money) or a family member who visits a loved one's grave that has been changed too soon with the opposite effect (less karma) - Some additional challenges, like two people who hated each other in life and may not be buried next to each other. All in all I think it's very clever idea that fits the theme well, good job!
Dec 16 18:22:50	1h 03m	Anno Luciferus	♥ 0	This is one of the most addictive games I have played so far. The visual and audio effects play very well together and it's a joy to play. I wasn't entirely sure when I die, I assume it's after three hits, so that could have been communicated better by adding a lives indicator. The rest of the game is communicated very well, though, so it is immediately clear what this is about, that you collect souls to enable the shot, how the hammer windup mechanics work and so on, great job! I also love the upgrades and the decisions that go with them. This leaves a lot of experimentation to get a particularly good high score. The score board adds so much to the experience, it's such a pity that the score does not reset upon dying. I would have loved to try getting to the top, but it feels like cheating now, so I quit. I think fixing this minor bug is allowed as per LD rules and you could reset the scoreboard to make it fair again. Should you do that, shoot me a message and I'll definitely play the game again to see how far I can get. It's a very good entry, and I had a lot of fun!
Dec 16 18:53:06	30m 16s	Death Wish	♥ 1	Man your game sounds awesome! Between the voice overs and the metal soundtrack, there nothing to criticize, full marks! Did you time the player's step length and the beat of the music or was that coincidence? If you did it on purpose, great job, that's a nice touch. The graphics are well done, especially the animation. That must have been a lot of work! I love the blood animation. It's pretty over the top but fits the tone of the game well. there was great variety in the enemies for a game made in 48 hours. You recycled your assets well and did not stretch out the game unnecessarily. All in all, the game was really fun and I made it to the boss, but was not able to beat it, unfortunately. I do have a couple of remarks: - I wish the hit animation would have been a bit faster, as that would have made the game a bit more responsive and controllable, it felt a bit laggy - Having an very short invincibility time out after being hit would help the game a lot. The way it is, if I get hit two times, then I get double the damage. I understand that it was probably so that fighting multiple enemies would become tougher, but I think the same could have been achieved by having them attack out of sync, so that the probability of being hit increases instead of the damage you get - The chicken drops were great, but the rng was a bit off. During one playthrough I drowned in chicken and was able to get to the boss, then the next attempt gave me a single one and I died during the first level. If I recall, most fighting games give you powerups at predefined places, either lying around or being dropped by specific enemies. That makes tuning the game easier and gives the player some more predictability. - It would have been cool to allow picking up enemy weapons but I understand that this would have taken a huge amount of work in the animation department. - The theme was a bit tacked on, but the game stands well on its own. Overall a fun game that could have used a little bit of polish, but is a solid entry as it stands.
Dec 16 19:40:34	47m 28s	Eldritchual	♥ 0	You made a very polished, and well-balanced game there. The amount of well-designed graphical assets is amazing. I love the expressiveness of the characters and their little animations. Everything is visually coherent and communicates well what is happening. The cultists' faces play an important role here. Full marks on graphics! It is generally very hard to get the player to understand a complex game like yours and although your tutorial is fairly wordy for a game jam, you set up an interesting atmosphere to get the player engaged and overcome that hurdle. The option to return to the tutorial was a very important decision that pays off nicely. The tutorial itself is great, using well-designed graphical elements to explain the game bit by bit. I half-read the tutorial, then jumped into the game and returned twice to clear some details but then it was a downhill ride as I got the game mechanics down. The difficulty is not too hard which is fine for a jam where players tend to have limited attention spans, and finding out how to beat the game is rewarding when everything runs in a stable manner. By the way, I love your sound effects. They don't seem to be made with an audio generator, did you record them yourself or did you find a clever bfxr setting? The soundtrack is also very good, remaining subdued in the background but setting the mood nicely. I only have a minor nitpick, and that is that the cultists' faces are a bit hard to see behind the books in the library, but maybe that was done on purpose. Overall a very enjoyable game with outstanding visuals
Dec 16 20:02:25	21m 51s	Reactor Overdrive	♥ 1	Interesting game. If I understand correctly, the more green target fields I have, the slower my shield regenerates, so I need so sacrifice offense for defense. I like the idea, but I feel that it could use a little more polish. I made it quite far by having only two markers, one in the middle and one below that. For me that got rid of most enemies and only let enough shots through to regenerate the shield. Maybe making the placement of the target fields a bit more strategic, maybe with tower defense-ish elements may give a better reward for placing them well. Graphics-wise I dig your pulsing background, but mixing pixel art resolutions is kind of a red flag for me, especially if they vary a lot, and in this case, there is a huge difference between your largest and your smallest pixels. Maybe a non-pixel art approach may have worked better, but that's just my personal taste. I do like the visual effects of the shots though. The background music sounds a bit random and becomes a little grating after a while. If that effect was not intended, I would suggest you start off with a simple regular beat and add a simple melody without too many jumps between notes for starters and improve from there. Sometimes it's the hardest part to know when to stop adding stuff, that's something I usually struggle with. I hope these points don't sound too harsh and that you find the criticism useful. It's a solid Compo entry, good job!
Dec 16 20:36:51	34m 26s	Dungeon Runer	♥ 0	Wow, that was quite cryptic. I like the minimalist aesthetic and I think you made quite a bold move using runes for everything, especially where it counts (high-score and move explanation). This requires a very steady hand at explaining the basics to the player in a different, yet meaningful way, and I'm afraid you overreached a little there. So I found out that I can't touch the wiggly lines and there are two types of enemies and there are blockers. I can shoot everything but most enemies take more than one shot. There are upgrades, but I couldn't figure out what they mean, I assume they increase life, shot amount and shot speed or something like that. After a while the four corners of the target area start to glow so I can finish the level. If I touch the target before that, a dialog appears and I guess depending on my answer I die? I couldn't find out whether I get a benefit from picking up the round gray things though. There are only life replenishing runes on the boss level, but I died there on my remaining life. The game mechanics are solid, although the keyboard query seems to pick up on the keyboard repetition settings, so there is a slight lag at the beginning of holding a key. This can be remedied by reacting to "key down" and "key up" events. In between the down and up event you assume the key is held, and during the whole time, you perform the corresponding action at each nth frame. You will get much more consistent behavior. The shooting could have used some polish. I would have liked to have faster, more responsive shots with higher range and I would have liked the shots to reload faster. All this possibly at the expense of tougher and faster enemies so that it would have more of a cat-and mouse thing. I didn't get the sacrifice part at all though. All in all I found the game interesting enough to understand its mechanics, but it would have helped if it were a bit more approachable. It's definitely a very unique entry. Good job!
Dec 30 10:52:44	326h 15m	Omnibar	♥ 1	I finally got around to playing your game. Still very impressed what you pulled off at a little over 50k. I wasn't able to play the compressed version as my virus scanner immediately deleted it, which is likey due to the auto-extract executable, so I am reviewing the "large" version. Visually, I like what you did with the limitations you had. The archways look very nice and the water effects are awesome! I also liked the music which added to the atmosphere. I had been hoping for a classic chiptune soundtrack, but your choice fit the genre better. Unfortunately there were no sound effects. I wonder if it would be possible to integrate the bfxr code into the game so you would be able use bfxr sounds without having to store them as samples. Having shooting sfx in an FPS plays an important part in the atmosphere, but I guess you must have run out of time. Conceptionally, there are a few things I would like to mention. Having a ballistic weapon in an FPS is quite commonplace (e.g. grenade launcher) but if it is the only weapon available, I think a direct line of fire weapon might have worked better, especially since the enemies use this weapon type and therefore have much greater range. The enemy AI needs some tweaking. Most of the enemies don't fire at all, while some fire rapid shots that can insta-kill you if you are in the wrong spot at the wrong time. Maybe a second of invincibility after being hit may have been helpful there as well. I think if you had all enemies fire at a reasonable rate at the same time would have made the game very frantic in the beginning, but after the player survived the initial onslaught they would have been rewarded with the feeling of superiority as they could have started to pick off the remaining enemies one by one. All in all one of the more impressive technical entries this LD, great job!