Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD48 → Feedback comment stats → Carraka

Carraka

Feedback comments for LD48

Carraka's games and stats for all events →

Timestamp	Since previous	Game		Carraka's comment
Apr 28 12:40:15		Phantas-matcha	♥ 2	The game is so cute in its tone! I only wish there were more customers and gameplay. This seems like a good concept to expand into a longer game!
Apr 28 13:05:49	25m 34s	They Know We Know	♥ 5	The most horrifying walking simulator. When I got to the end and it said press Esc to exit, pressing Esc didn't even work, which was also horrifying. Not many games have voice acting, and this was top notch.
Apr 28 13:32:13	26m 24s	Blue Abyss	♥ 4	It took me a while to realize that the reason I couldn't move the ship at all was because I hadn't put anyone in navigation! This was a lot of content, very impressive. I only went as far down as the third level of pressure before losing from running out of oxygen, but I imagine if I replayed more I could get further since I would know the map better. It was pretty frustrating to have to start over from the beginning every time I died, and then doing the same thing as I did on the previous playthrough felt like busywork. The navigation controls could be a bit more forgiving, such as not dropping as fast so quickly. When refilling oxygen, the oxygen bar can go up quicker so you're not waiting as long to go back to the depths again. And a clearer tutorial, like others said, would help as well! I'm particularly impressed by the detail of watching people go to their new stations on the ship ... this is completely unnecessary for gameplay, but it's a nice touch. Hopefully it didn't come at the expense of too many other features.
Apr 28 13:40:07	7m 54s	The Chimney	♥ 1	It's a good thing Eric takes no fall damage ... I liked the humor in the tutorial. I do wish the tutorial had some time where you could practice aiming without losing any ammo, though. That would have helped because the aiming mechanic was very not intuitive. I wish I could've aimed with the mouse or moved while aiming. Also, I was very excited to find some extra ammo lying on the ground, but when I tried to click and drag it into my inventory, it didn't go there. That was a shame, since moving things around in the inventory seems like a fun game in and of itself. There also didn't seem to be any reward for killing monsters, so it was better to just avoid them or jump over them rather than waste ammo. I only got as far as the second area (pink area) before dying, so maybe Hard Mode isn't for me.
Apr 28 13:50:25	10m 18s	Sonder (a story)	♥ 5	What a beautiful game! I also encountered the error of not being able to move the camera when playing it for the second time. I played the Windows version. For replay value, it would have been nice to skip the intro. I did two playthroughs and didn't find the item on either of them. I'm not sure whether it's possible to actually find the item (maybe that's the point)? Either way, it's not particularly satisfying. I think it would be more satisfying if you had an indicator of why you're running out of time and how much time you have left. Then there would be some aspect of gameplay in trying to manage your time, even if it's ultimately a futile effort.
Apr 28 14:01:01	10m 36s	Defiled Reflection	♥ 2	So polished! I only wish I were better at it. I already can't tell my right from my left. So many accidental deaths with horrible screams to make me feel terrible for my little girl.
Apr 28 14:11:19	10m 18s	Stranger Fish	♥ 5	I also started the game with Azerty and thought the game was broken at first. Maybe an indicator on the main screen telling you which keyboard you're starting with so you know whether to switch? And a way to return to the menu to change options after already starting the game. I only found 2 out of 3 of the fish in each stage ... I swam around a lot too, but I guess I didn't have the patience. It would have been nice to be able to zoom in on each fish you find after you collect them. Some of them looked super cute and creative, but I wasn't able to see them for very long before my sharkmarine just gobbled them up. The light at the bottom was a nice touch. I like the above sonar suggestion. Other improvements could be making the environment more visually interesting or even dangerous, or having finding the fish give you something that would help you explore deeper. Did I mention these graphics are a delight?
Apr 28 14:27:45	16m 26s	Corla	♥ 2	Definitely some of my favorite gameplay so far this jam. I got to the Jack of Hearts and then when I tried to go another level down, the game froze while I was over the pit. Not sure if that was the end of the game. But well done, very smooth! Toward the latter half of the game, I had so many upgrades that it seemed like I could move anywhere, so the game wasn't as exciting, but there sure were lots of bright colors to keep me entertained.
Apr 28 14:38:53	11m 08s	Devil's Deep Dish	♥ 2	The writing at the beginning was hilarious! I wish there had more of it throughout the game. I spent a very long time trying to figure out why I needed Depth or Heat. Eventually I started to think that I needed to gather enough depth to complete the game, but just when I was getting tired of doing that, I found the bottom. So I guess gathering those was just for the score at the end? I also couldn't figure out whether the mushrooms were just there to annoy me, since you always wanted to go down, not up, and when you dropped down onto the mushrooms suddenly, it was very disorienting.
Apr 28 15:34:56	56m 03s	My name ?	♥ 3	Pfft, that abrupt ending tone shift. Aside from the puzzle with the bugs (I just couldn't figure out what order to do the numbers), I didn't need to look up the solutions. I couldn't figure out the puzzle with the clock hands. Some of the information we were given, such as the time and the periodic table, was unnecessary, since I was able to complete the game without using those elements. Perhaps they were meant to be important, but weren't implemented. Figuring out the final puzzle with the weather was very satisfying! I only wish I could figure out what this all had to do with the theme. Were the three people related?
Apr 28 17:02:48	1h 27m	Corporate Mole	♥ 2	Dum de dum de -- I SAW THAT SILENCE THEM omg the graphics Anyway, on the last level, it caught me off guard that there were new tasks appearing one at a time. When I infected the three computers, I kept running around trying to find if one of the computers had become uninfected. So maybe the new tasks should always be appearing one at a time. Also, once I realized that all the worms were going to go crazy at the end, I just killed them all ahead of time. I appreciated that I could not make small talk with dead worms. Though that would have been funny.
Apr 28 17:25:31	22m 43s	Diving Heroes	♥ 3	It took me a very long time to figure out that there were menus to upgrade equipment other than just pressure. Then all the resources I could grapple stopped spawning, except at the bottom of the screen. Maybe have an option to disable coop at the beginning so that the camera can stay centered on where the player is instead of both players? Such cute art though. Makes me want to collect things by smashing them into each other!
Apr 28 17:34:33	9m 02s	Down the Machine World	♥ 1	I tried really hard to figure out where the cubes go (after the first level with shooting enemies), and I still can't figure it out. It's a shame ... it looks very polished. Agreed with the other comments about dashing in a different direction than where your mouse is.
Apr 28 17:47:38	13m 05s	Deep Way To Basement	♥ 4	Loved the dog at the beginning! I only realized there was a Level Up button because I was reading the other comments before I published mine, so I hastily went back and played the game. After leveling to 10/10, I'm still not sure what leveling up does, whether I was actually controlling the ragdoll mid-fall or not, and whether I'll ever find the food my dog needs so he stops kicking me into the basement.
Apr 28 17:58:40	11m 02s	OVERDRILLED	♥ 3	The graphics look gorgeous. Definitely needs a tutorial. Took me a while to realize that I had to mine the ground for resources on my own. And most of the time that I died, I'm still not sure what caused it. Also maybe I was supposed to be spraying the bottom of the drill and not the top? Or maybe that made no difference.
Apr 28 18:03:27	4m 47s	One More Cellar	♥ 3	Great gameplay loop! I really wish there were some sort of health indicator to see how many hits the monsters still need ... sometimes I felt like I was throwing straw at them ... they just didn't react.
Apr 28 18:23:09	19m 42s	Aquarial	♥ 2	Lawl at this credits sequence. I enjoyed the sequence of quests, but it doesn't seem like I was going deeper and deeper as much as just swimming to the next lake over and borrowing a flashlight.
Apr 28 18:29:43	6m 34s	A Psychic's Interview	♥ 1	I threw the sponge over the edge of the world. I think I failed the interview. D:
Apr 28 18:37:00	7m 17s	Roses are Deep	♥ 3	What an adorable game! I'm a little annoyed at the idea that a good poet would be able to come up with poems on the spot ... that seems like an unhealthy idea to spread, because there are plenty of poets who are not improvisers. I really liked this interpretation of the theme, though it seems like you ran out of time to get to the "and deeper" part of it. As for the word, it would be cool if some of them were a bit more unusual and you could learn their definitions too, just like reading a dictionary. Great ideas for a start!
Apr 28 18:41:37	4m 37s	Mind Fall	♥ 0	There was an error when I played it, where the mind moved off the screen and I couldn't find it again, but I continued to fall safely all the way to the end of the game. This made for a meditative experience, though I'm not sure it's what was intended. Definitely once you get to the 400m mark, there ought to be a music change to something less calming.
Apr 28 21:44:07	3h 02m	The Chasm	♥ 2	These were some good puzzles! I didn't get the feeling that we were going deeper and deeper, though. Sometimes we were actually going up! Whenever there is a death, it would help to start nearer the beginning of the puzzle or even looking at it. There were a few times after I died that I got disoriented and ended up walking to the previous puzzle. It was also be nice to get an indicator that you actually died. I thought at first I had somehow succeeded and jumped to the next page. I'm very bad at platformers, heh.
Apr 28 22:31:15	47m 08s	Deep Diver	♥ 1	What a cute, colorful, fi--AHH I'M DEAD Definitely would've liked some indicators that you were getting hurt. It was hard for me to tell which types of fish would hurt me. I suppose the bigger ones do and the smaller ones don't, but could they also be distinguished in terms of coloring or brightness or something else that warns danger? Also, the game was so tall that it didn't fit on my screen, so on my first playthrough, I didn't realize there was UI at the top telling me how many lives or coins I had gathered. It looks like you already have the right idea for how to improve the game (biomes) so I look forward to seeing what other art comes out of this!
Apr 28 22:46:02	14m 47s	Neckdeep	♥ 1	Such a heartwarming story! Definitely one of the most original interpretations I've come across so far. Lookit this doggo I will wade into customer service hell for you, puppers, won't I, puppers?
May 1 22:04:24	71h 18m	Stock: A Tale from The Pages	♥ 1	I got Ending 2/3. What a mood ... once I realized that there were changes each time you went through the loop, the game was a lot more enjoyable. I did feel that the logic of the story was missing though. Maybe I just clicked all the wrong choices, but it was never clear to me why the lake is silver on some playthroughs and black on others. Or why sometimes when you look at the tree it's fine, but later it's burning. Or why in earlier playthroughs you don't find your dad's box. Also I never used the peanut. The confusion made me feel that I wasn't solving any puzzles or understanding what I was doing or why things happened, but just selecting random choices until I reached an end, which is perhaps why it's fitting that I got Ending 2/3.
May 1 22:22:16	17m 52s	Bad Faith	♥ 1	Ooh, a text-based story! I love reading! Unfortunately, from the very beginning, I couldn't sympathize with the protagonist. I didn't know who had died or how or why it mattered. The protagonist was very upset, of course ... which is understandable, but I didn't feel her grief. The explanation of who had died (where Virginia Is for Lovers is explained) still didn't hit home. It was as though Connie spent more time being sad than thinking about the reasons for her sadness, which is what would help me identify with her. What does it mean to lose someone? How does it hit at you at the most unexpected moments? What gap did that person fill? I often felt like I was watching a film of Connie grieving, but never able to peer into her mind. I still know barely anything about who Connie is or was other than a woman, a victim, and a grieving person. Which is the advantage the written form provides over the visual - the details of what's going on inside. Later on, I think the story became about making a deal with the devil? I was a bit sad that I couldn't just let Connie ignore the devil and instead work on self-healing. I ignored him all the way to the end, until I chose the "Accept destiny" option and then was very annoyed that "destiny" just meant making the deal, because that was not what I had meant at all. But hey, I admit I'm not a fan of stories with clearly demarcated good and evil, so I'm just not your target audience. I see a complaint above about lacking graphics, but I think that's missing the point. Still, I did notice after a while that I didn't know what Connie or Hector looked like. I also am always forgetting to describe things ... gotta write myself reminders. Happy writing!
May 1 22:32:18	10m 02s	Wisdom of the Ancients	♥ 1	What a simple and delightful story! I was surprised that all of my more complex commands still worked on first try. I guess I do remember how Inform7 works. I second what was said above about how having different types of scrolls made commands confusing. And yes, the game is very short. I actually don't think it needs to be much longer. It would be nice if there was a little bit more to do on each floor, rather than just one item and then the way down. But I would actually rather have more fleshed out description to imagine the world and these hapless philosophers rather than more puzzles.
May 1 23:59:36	1h 27m	Little Lost Sheep	♥ 3	I really enjoyed this story, especially the twist at the end. The dialogue was snappy and made me laugh out loud at times. The well did seem to be more of an excuse to put in the theme (really it's time passing, not going deeper), but the story was so enjoyable (or grim) that that was just a blip. I do think the story would benefit from a little bit of clarification on the Djinn's rules. Presumably the player character has tried just telling their friends their names or telling them that they made a deal with a Djinn, which would give their friends more of an incentive to try to remember. But since the story doesn't say this, I kept wondering why they hadn't tried those obvious routes. I loved the varied soundtrack and how it changed in each level. Also the gloomy feeling of falling down the endless well. A few things got in the way of the mood: * The faces of the friends. Especially when they started following you. If you just turn around and watch them follow you ... it feels like a horror game. It might have been better for them to have no faces to avoid the uncanny valley. * In the third level, I loved the scary music as soon as you see the orange world, but then every time you speak to someone, the music mellows out to something calm and uplifting. I was left very confused as to how I was supposed to be feeling. Thanks for the guide, because I had no idea where the mountain was. The whole valley is surrounded by mountains. Also you can jump off the mountains and take no fall damage! I appreciated that, because it would have been a long walk back down. It's pretty sad that even though Dude/Mr.Wizard/etc. gets a name, he still can't interact with his friends because they've all faded away into the environment. D: Why was Mr. Treble a math teacher and not a music teacher??? BIG QUESTIONS!!! Otherwise, I do wish there had been a bit more gameplay. Other than choosing your own name at the end, the story is very linear. Though it's still an excellent story. And the running theme of making everyone just wanting everyone else to be happy was a good touch.
May 2 01:13:01	1h 13m	48 Tons	♥ 1	I killed a canary sob. I should've known. I should've known ... The humor is strong with this game. There wasn't much content (I'm guessing you ran out of time to implement), but what writing there was was hilarious. I played all the way to Level 11, at which point the game crashed, so I guess I'll never know a) what the corporation was hiding and b) why they would be willing to grant access to their secrets to their employees. I guess I'll keep saving up for that ticket home.
May 2 11:25:32	10h 12m	One Shot in the Dark, Now I'm Dead.	♥ 1	I played this right before going to bed and I had a dream that I started to see these articles. I realized that the game had been a way to send these articles from the future to help us prevent the apocalypse. So that's what your game did. Great sound design and graphics. Absolutely fit the game. I wasn't sure whether I had to read as fast as possible, so I tried to speed read and probably missed a bunch of details. That wasn't as much fun, so maybe there shouldn't be any time pressure, especially to let slower readers play. I wish there had been some more decision-making on the part of the player rather than everything being spoonfed. I'm not sure where this gameplay could have been introduced, though. The simplest thing I can think of is having the player select bits of information from what they find and adding it to the package of information that they're going to send. There wouldn't be any time to implement checking whether this package is actually good information, but at least there would be more interactivity?
May 3 16:11:09	28h 45m	ThaumOS	♥ 5	I summoned Thoon. 10/10 would summon again. I'm wondering if there were other endings, but when I restarted the game and all the passwords were different, I fear I lost the will to replay to figure out if I could've summoned anyone else. I stumbled upon the first puzzle by accident, when I logged out and then didn't even realize I was logging into someone else's account because I didn't remember who I was. It took a bit too long to make that first leap. I think if the log out button were more prominent or in a part of the screen that the eye wanders to, it would have been easier to find the puzzle. Before that, I was wondering whether I had to purposefully fail tasks to continue the story, which would have been annoying since I had nothing to do between tasks. I wish there were a way to stay logged in to someone else's email after completing a task. Often I would be perusing someone's email, get interrupted by a task, and then when I went back, I had to log in again, or my clipboard hadn't saved, etc., and that was a bit annoying. Still, I suppose I am very grateful that CTRL+V and TAB and other such shortcuts actually worked. Saving some time!