Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD46 → Feedback comment stats → flyingbear
Feedback comments for LD46
flyingbear's games and stats for all events →
| Timestamp | Since previous | Game | flyingbear's comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 6 07:19:51 | One Tiny Plant | ♥ 1 | I really enjoyed the theme and really liked the look of the plant animating by bobbling back and forth. Unfortunately for me, tying the mechanics of the game to the bobbling made it too difficult to hit the bugs. I think it's already enough of a challenge with pulling back and aiming using the arc, adding the bobbling just made it frustrating. I think for the first level at least just a stationary place to fire from would've made the game a lot more playable for me. As it was, it gave me such an uneasy feeling trying to aim that I couldn't bring myself to try again after I'd lost twice, despite reading that people were having fun on the second level. Something else I might adjust is that it's extra punishing once bugs reach your plant. If I was having a hard time hitting them already, they were extra hard to hit when they're right underneath you. It makes less thematic sense, but perhaps making the bugs go away after chomping your plant some number of times would be less punishing | |
| May 6 07:29:01 | 9m 10s | MagniFire | ♥ 3 | At first I wanted to click to drop sugar cubes for the ant, but once I understood the controls it became a clever way to adhere to the theme "Keep *It* Alive" vs "Keep Yourself Alive". (I also interpreted the theme to mean that you couldn't directly control the thing you are trying to keep alive) I found I could easily run a loop around the edge of the screen without any threat of getting hit by the magnifying glass. I would suggest having fruit appear somewhere in the middle section of the screen so that the magnifying glass could be more of a threat. Beyond that I think you'd want to add some more gameplay depth, as the current game is perhaps too simplistic. The art is well done and very clearly establishes the theme |
| May 6 07:39:06 | 10m 05s | Needy Slime in a cozy house. | ♥ 1 | I love the premise of trying to fulfill a needy slime's needs, that's super clever! I noticed "press WASD" in your ldjam page, but I would put it on your html5 page too (at the beginning of the instructions) because I spent a minute or two not being able to figure out what to do. (I tried pressing z, x, and clicking on everything) If you have the time, simple in-game messages like "Use WASD to move" go a long way. I couldn't figure out what to do to get the food cooked, I tried bringing it to the oven and it looks like there's a minigame to get to get the food cooked. I tried clicking and tried pressing x or e when the line was over the hot dog but to no avail. |
| May 6 07:59:14 | 20m 08s | Feed The King | ♥ 1 | I appreciate the sense of discovery you get out of this game, when I managed to make my first blue and red egg monsters that was a real satisfying moment. The main thing I would suggest is there is a lot to teach in this game, I would perhaps break it up into levels and just let the player learn feeding level 1, breeding and entertaining level 2, and power ups level 3. (I didn't even get to using the power-ups because there was so much other stuff to take in) The shift-click to add to bank vs ctrl-click to feed to king felt awkward here in that it's near impossible to intuit that those were the controls unless you thoroughly read the help section. I would implement dragging goop onto your bank adds to the bank and dragging goop onto the king feeds the king. (Or clicking the goop banks it and dragging it onto the king feeds him) I enjoyed the art, it had its charm for sure. A minor nitpick is the numbers on the goop were difficult to see. |
| May 6 18:34:02 | 10h 34m | Penguin Panic | ♥ 0 | This is really cool! There's a surprising amount of polish for a game jam game with the ice extending at the end of the level, the lines that telegraph the eggs, and the tutorial. Sound, music, art are solid all around. I was also impressed by the variety of patterns eggs would come at you in. I only have a few minor nitpicks that don't really affect my score for this: 1. The penguin that eats your fish should be a different color, kinda like the enemy penguins. I was confused and thought I was eating the fish at first 2. The time between when you teach how to fight enemy penguins and when you next encounter them is pretty long. I can see people forgetting what key to press in that time. |
| May 8 08:46:46 | 38h 12m | Hatch The Plat | ♥ 2 | Wow, the character artwork for this game is just incredible! The parent and baby plats are just oozing with charm! The controls felt just a tad wonky at times, like I wanted the picking up and putting down of crates to feel less floaty/glide-y. Since it looks like you have physics implemented I would've liked to some expanding on that mechanics-wise. (I realize that with game jams time can be short, though) |
| May 8 08:58:31 | 11m 45s | Feed It! | ♥ 0 | Neat little physics puzzler! I would maybe halve the number of banana boxes needed to pass each level, as once I had the levels figured out they would tend to be on the tedious side to complete (Especially the early levels tended to overstay their welcome) The sound used whenever a box hits something is elevated in volume disproportionately to how important it is. I would either leave it out and find other places to incorporate sound or turn that sound way down in volume. The main monster design is appealing and is what drew me to want to try this game out! |
| May 8 23:17:49 | 14h 19m | Josh Dumb | ♥ 1 | Best intro and game name ever! The premise is hilarious and the gameplay definitely has potential. I'm not a fan of Josh starting off already running and think the game would be just as interesting if you could set everything up the way you want it then press the "Josh GO" button. I also found myself fighting with the controls a lot. I knew what I wanted to do, but between pressing 1 to cycle and pressing 3 I was constantly not doing what I wanted to do. This frustration was amplified being on a timer with Josh starting off already running. Since you have mouse controls already, why not let the player directly click on the upper menu which would put the desired piece into the cursor, then click again to place it? Destroying rocks could be just another item on that menu (like dynamite) and with limited charges would make things pretty interesting. Like I said, the premise really sold me on this game and it's very impressive for your first game jam. Looking forward to playing more of your jam games in the future! |
| May 8 23:37:29 | 19m 40s | Botanophobic Zombies | ♥ 2 | I saw what this game was about and I HAD to play it! (I'm the creator of Plants vs. Zombies) The music stood out to me right away as being really well done. I'm not sure about using a diamond as a weapon. It didn't scream "weapon" to me. (Now here's where you laugh and say "Yeah, and Peas are??") I was thinking something like shotgun or throwing knives or even a yo-yo would say "weapon" more Once I realized I could shoot through the plant I just stood in place and the game got a lot easier. Too easy I think. The game is a bit too simplistic in my opinion, I would love to see an added element or two to keep the gameplay interesting. |
| May 9 03:46:06 | 4h 08m | Protect the Walnut! | ♥ 1 | I was initially drawn to this game because of the walnut. As someone who's spent some amount of time designing walnuts with faces on them, it just seemed so familiar... and then I saw the zombies lol. I have to give you kudos on the way you teach players the game. The text that's "stuck to the wall" is my favorite kind of tutorial for platformers because it gives you the info right when you need it. I was stuck for a long time on the first puzzle where you're trying to throw the walnut upward to hit a button. I was pointing it in the right direction but never could throw with enough force. It was only after maybe the 20th try where I figured out that the further you hold the mouse the further the walnut goes. I got permanently stuck on the tall wall puzzle. (right before the end of the first level) I thought that dropping the walnut would let me jump higher, so I double-jumped and dropped the walnut on the upper ledge first, then tried to jump unencumbered but couldn't make it up the wall any more, and the walnut was now out of reach Theme is great, it's hard to go wrong with protecting a walnut with a bow tie on it. :) |
| May 9 04:04:22 | 18m 16s | Shark Storm - Nom Nom Nom | ♥ 0 | Sound effects are top notch! They made everything hilarious. When I hit a rock I wasn't upset, I was laughing! I thought the sharks would go towards the free food when I placed it but that didn't seem to be the case. I couldn't figure out what the icon for the other power up was. Having clear icons and visuals for these game jam games goes a long way. For instance, for bombs, having the round black ball with a fuse lets us instantly tell that it'll explode. |
| May 9 04:31:49 | 27m 27s | Pupper Truckers | ♥ 2 | I was already pretty on board with this zany theme of yours and the puppy arms wildly swaying about in the intro sealed the deal. Art was really well done, and the soundtrack is just amazing! The way I was playing the game I didn't feel like I was making any meaningful decisions though, just jamming the e key and watching the vehicle grow. In general the game could've benefited from more visual clarity with the UI elements. I thought the things that appeared on the sides of the carts were guns at first, but now I'm thinking they were health bars? There were tiny numbers all over the place and I wasn't able to tell what pertained to what. Something else problematic is I spent much of the game not knowing how much scrap I had. (only later did I notice the tiny yellow number beneath me) I'm a big believer in having UI elements be bigger the more important they are, and I think the scrap count is an important one. In addition to making it bigger, I might've found a permanent UI place for it somewhere near the prices for the upgrades, the proximity of those two would help me associate them. Also when I died, it came out of the blue, as I didn't know what number amongst all the numbers that I was supposed to be watching. I think calling more attention to that number would've been a big help. |
| May 9 06:50:42 | 2h 18m | Hermann the German Dough | ♥ 1 | This was an adorable game! This is why I love playing and giving feedback after game jams it's to discover unique games like this that you'd otherwise *never* get to play! Sure, it's a little rough around the edges, (the weight doesn't seem to reset between restarts) but I feel like this game taught me about culture (German culture *and* yeast culture!) and did so in an adorable way. |
| May 9 08:27:16 | 1h 36m | GRDN | ♥ 1 | There's definitely something that drew me in and made me want to keep playing until I beat it! I did feel like I was getting better at it with each retry, so that's a good thing as well. I do wonder if some rock formations just make it impossible to beat? Overall, impressive job on this one! |
| May 9 08:45:52 | 18m 36s | Don't Let The Party Die | ♥ 0 | The art for this game is quite good, I loved the looks of all the different creature party-goers! It was fun to figure out where in the party everything was at, but once I was past that, the gameplay felt a bit shallow. Also, thematically I feel like I should still be able to queue up more music while my hands are full (I get that the trade-off makes gameplay more interesting) |
| May 9 08:57:21 | 11m 29s | Robot Battery Dig | ♥ 1 | This was quite enjoyable, I can see it potentially getting quite addictive with the right additions! One thing that seemed odd was that to get the highest score (my impression is that it factors in most time elapsed) the right strategy might be to just sit there and let your time run out once you're low enough on battery power and you can't see any batteries to pick up. Scoring "how far down can you dig?" instead would let you avoid that weirdness. |
| May 9 09:14:21 | 17m 00s | Lightlife | ♥ 1 | Very cool premise! Fresh concepts like these usually require lots of teaching but the theme was so well integrated that it feels very intuitive (everyone knows you point the light at the plant to keep it alive, for instance) I did manage to get stuck inside some between some glass and a ledge Maybe it was just me falling off that ledge repeatedly, but as a first obstacle I might've put some more area to stand on after that first spike. It felt abnormally difficult for something so early on to hop over the spike and land on the sliver of space to the right of it before making a larger jump. |
| May 12 19:56:17 | 82h 41m | Queen's Rose Garden | ♥ 0 | Pretty great puzzle game you came up with here! With some polish and additions I could see this becoming one of those puzzle games people get crazy addicted to. It's extremely satisfying to fill a space perfectly. Some random notes: -On lvl 1 I was thinking "I really want to rotate!" and you gave it to me on the very next level. Nice! -I don't know if the alive % chart UI is necessary, and it initially had me thinking there was more to it than it was. There might be a better way of displaying this or perhaps not displaying it at all is the answer. -I liked the way the game ramped up, I found chapter five (confrontation) was the sweet spot where the game got really good for me. That said, the last level was a step back for me in terms of fun. I get that the last level's supposed to be very difficult, though. -letting the player reply with "Very Well" upon losing fits the flavor of the game perfectly -The three point triangle pieces (with gaps in between each point) and to a lesser extent the 2 vertical roses with a gap in between were problematic for me. Even after using them for awhile I could never get the hang of which of the two triangle variants I had, and would "try out" a triangle piece, rotating it through all the rotations before figuring out I had the wrong one. A few approaches on how to solve this: 1. Make these pieces very rare. If I encounter them less then I spend less of the game being frustrated. 2. Remove them altogether. 3. Remove one of the variants. Perhaps with one of the variants missing it makes it easier to learn that shape. 4. Combine the two triangle pieces into one. Instead of having the triangle piece cycle through after 2 rotations(180 degrees rotation), combine the two and alternate between them, creating an uber-triangle piece that cycles through in 4 rotations(90 degrees each rotation). You end of with a piece with a lot more versatility and likely relieve the frustrations I had |