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| Timestamp | Since previous | Game | Remco's comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 2 13:59:15 | Taent | ♥ 2 | I'm in two minds on this. On the one hand, you have a great atmosphere, with the simple shapes and (an eye for) good lightning effects conveying that wonderful slightly off feeling of a well-kept but seemingly abandoned enforced concrete apartment purgatory. On the other, the viewpoint moves really, _really_ slowly. Without a matching framerate drop (that I could notice at least), I can only assume this is intentional, to heighten the dread. This can be a double-edged sword --in fact, it just mostly frustrated me. A little less slow and I think you'd still have the effect, but I'd have been more inclined to try out different things, like trying to probe the depths of the darkened hallways, or try out which doors are unlocked if any. I could also swear it got even slower when [spoilers] the lights change to red. That _could_ just be my imagination though. I think the game hung when I got to [spoilers] the delivery of the final? package to room -999 (fun fact: I initially missed the minus, and thought something like 'with a programmer creating this game, I'd have expected a minus in front of that -- as we're the most likely to be familiar with the oddness of a negative number where you'd expect a positive ... ah no wait, there it is'). When I got to the middle of the room with the package (without the package, I could enter and exit the room just fine), it did a fade-to-black, and then it just seemed to hang. I don't think the logs showed anything out of the ordinary (as far as I can judge the logs for a program I'm not familiar with anyhow), except maybe `[15:03:20] HAZEL: TextureSerializer::DeserializeFromAssetPack` at the end. (I'm on Manjaro on a Thinkpad P53s should that matter. I like it when people use their own voice for the SFX. Really gives it that homebrew vibe. (Could maybe have used a little bit more effects, to disguise the fact that it's just a single human person.) All in all not a bad little (in the best sense of that word) experience. (Unless there's way more after room -999 that I missed out on because of the maybe-crash -- reading the other comments now -- it seems that there isn't.) | |
| May 2 14:39:09 | 39m 54s | The Mailman | ♥ 2 | Excellence graphics and sound. Very juicy, including the gameplay. Good little touches like the ammo being letters and the refills being mailboxes (and the doggos of course going to heaven). _Very_ short though, especially if you realize that you can mostly just outpace all of the enemies, and if they gain on you anyway, just take a nearby scooter. I don't have much more to say. It's a simple, tried and true concept, but aside from the low difficulty (or rather _easily circumvented_ difficulty, since a low difficulty isn't in an of itself bad of course), very well executed. (Oh almost forgot; The entire game is played on keyboard, but the menu's are mouse only. Bit of a pet-peeve of mine.) |
| May 6 21:28:22 | 102h 49m | Rogue 'n Royal | ♥ 1 | (Tried the Linux version, worked fine.) It's nice to see something this polished. It all played very fluently. However, I think they're also some issues with the concept as implemented as a jam game; namely that you're stretching yourself too thin. It's true that the sum is more than the parts, especially when it comes to this particular game, but the individual parts are threadbare -- any less and they wouldn't have functioned at all. I think this also shows the weakness of using AI (as it is right now). It's perfectly serviceable, but bland. I think I'd have preferred something with character, even if it had been worse. Possible bug: I could always give the king the skull, even if I didn't have it. The art-style is nice too, and the main menu is quite full-featured! ('Not the band' made me smile.) |
| May 6 21:28:56 | 34s | PRECIOUS CARGO (and some aliens trying to steal it from you) | ♥ 1 | I couldn't get the hang of it _al all_, but reading the comments seemed like it should be easier than that. With the remark that the browser mattered with regards to sound --and that this is a homebrew engine-- in the back of my mind, I switched from firefox to chromium. While it was a lot easier (no sound this time, but I finally go to see level 4), it also hangs when there's too much happening on the screen ... which happens on level 4. What I see is that there are usually more aliens swarming the truck on Firefox, probably because they're getting offed less often (I think the turrets had a harder time aiming). Anyway, enough of the bad news. I really liked how polished it all seemed when it did work. Like one of the better pico-8 games. The fat sound-effects where also welcome. What I think you could do to encourage people to use the other items, is unlocking them from the start (or throwing the unlock cost way down), they're expensive enough as it is anyway, so you can't use them from the start. Before I forget: A bit of a pet-peeve, but the price for reclamation is reduced w.r.t. the buy-price, and I wonder why? I accept that I can't do that in the real world, but what game-design purpose does it serve here to basically make the undo of the free-wheeling construction phase cost (in-game) money? |
| May 6 21:29:12 | 16s | Special Delivery | ♥ 0 | (Played the linux version. No problems.) Simple, but fun. The concept is familiar and done, but it's executed quite well. This wouldn't have worked half as well without the music (even though the song itself isn't something you'd listen to outside of a game). I got (mildly) stuck on some trees once (the row of trees in the narrow streets between the loose standing houses) where I think I should've been able to get through. The most fun I had was driving through the park, when the little scooter feels a little bit moto-cross (minus the jumping). |
| May 6 21:29:47 | 35s | Ultimate Package | ♥ 0 | Well that was nice. Would benefit from some coyote-time (a bit of slack between registering the player is off of the platform and still accepting jump inputs goes a long way). Also I think the camera snaps a bit too hard when entering new rooms. I do really appreciate that there are checkpoints! That unfortunately also introduces a bit of a 'problem' (not for the player though), in that the boxes don't really respawn, but stay defeated, or where they where, making it easy to skip past them when you reset at a checkpoint sometimes. Defeated the big boss package by just standing on its head. Just as well! Some good music as well. |
| May 6 21:30:21 | 34s | Deliver Us From Evil | ♥ 0 | Fortunately this particular crusader seems a lot more friendly than the real deal 😆 Anyway. Nice 'n crunchy, like a '9 bit' fantasy console is supposed to. For the most part it played smooth enough (liked the box-pushing), but I don't understand in what way precisely you take damage -- while it got easy enough to avoid damage eventually, when I did run into a mob, sometimes it seems I take damage, and sometimes not. I got into the wall on level 6 and of course tried out what happens when you get out of the level (actually I maybe thought it was a secret). Nothing much, but it does seem like I now need to restart the game. (I also liked that there are options and settings in the menu.) |
| May 6 21:31:01 | 40s | Deli's Whale Delivery | ♥ 1 | Got an error while trying to download the linux version _'An error occurred during a connection to w3g3a5v6.ssl.hwcdn.net.'_ I can still download other itch.io things, so it's probably not on my end? Anyway. This can be a very relaxing game in a way... The 'sickness' mechanic makes it a sort of enforced zen experience -- if that makes sense at all. The art is all over the place in terms of fidelity, but in such a way that it comes off as charming. The initial logo doesn't seem like much will be going on, then the whale is cute, but enormously pixelated, and then there are the more subtle 2d pixelart planets, connected with almost early 3D looking ribbons. If I where an art-critic I'd call it 'eclectic'. (Having to drag the packages to the wale is a nice diversion that helps hammer home the theme b.w.t. -- Music fits the mood.) I found that, while your score stays very low, if you instead of getting captured, make Deli sick (I should apologize to the whale, given what I did to them repeatedly...), you continue on with the next (stretch of) mission immediately, circumventing the pirates. This doesn't seem to be intended? I think it would make a bit more sense to have a complete game-over -- from the text I think that was maybe what was intended (what would probably also work; the loss of a single whale-heart ... or maybe Deli needs to slow down a lot when they get sick). |
| May 6 21:31:24 | 23s | Delivery City | ♥ 1 | It's a start! Always a bit of a hassle to properly get random generation going and balanced, and you got it done. I think I'd have preferred it if it way playable with keyboard completely ... all you'd have to do is assign the 1 and 2 keys to the tab-menu. Lastly, the placement is a bit finicky, sometimes you have to move _away_ from the location in order for it to register -- luckily, it only shows the street-sign when you _can_ click, so it's not _too_ frustrating. (The street signs popping up are a nice touch in any case.) (Side-note: It wouldn't start for me properly on Firefox, I had to use Chromium to get past the unity loading bar screen.) |
| May 6 21:31:54 | 30s | Grav Garb | ♥ 3 | What you expect from reading the text and looking at the images: A fast paced adrenaline action shooter, with a shop and progression. What the game is actually like: A slow but tactical game about avoiding too sudden turns, carefully displacing hazardous waste, one package-length at a time, while strategically managing resources like thrusters and repair-stations. With a shop and progression. I mostly enjoyed it after I got over my initial disconnected expectations. The slowness does disincentivize trying things though, you're not likely to take risks (or try the level too often again). Music is great for the mood. As for the art, I'm more into beefcake than cheesecake. Still, there's a large variety of space-junk and if you'd spent the same amount of detail there the game wouldn't be done until next year. |
| May 6 21:32:21 | 27s | Sendburg Delivery Service | ♥ 2 | Day 13 never ends ... :laugh: (I think it's also the same puzzles as before instead of random ones?) Anyway: Other than the image for the key overlapping a box where it isn't really 'present', and the frustration of the last two stars of day 12, this is a very nice experience! (Though left dragging and and right clicking at the same time threw me for a loop in the beginning.) Sure, it's 'just' a [tetr|pent]omino puzzler, but it's dripping with charm! (Try doing the art and music as well, some time, it's very satisfying to work with your own assests, even if they end up looking worse.) |
| May 7 10:26:54 | 12h 54m | Foggy Day on Mulberry Street | ♥ 1 | (Tried playing against myself. At least I didn't have to pretend not knowing the other players' state with this one.) Well, it's not clear to me that there is a dominant strategy, even with 2 players, so in that sense it's very clever for such a simple ruleset, where everything is open as well. On the other, so much can change with even the last card (after all, the sequence only needs to be 1 off, which by necessity is determined by the last card even), that, as a human player just picking the game up for the first time, you can't really say much about the game in the early to mid state. On the one hand (pun not intended, but appreciated nonetheless) this leaves the eventual endgame (where each player just has a few cards left) open to anyone not actively trying to loose, which is good. But here is where it falls down for me a bit; since there is effectively _nothing_ I feel you can do to properly set yourself up in a direction, it just feels like the only thing you're doing for a lot of the game is only _setting up for_ the interesting make-or-brake situation at the end. (Kind of like if setting up the chess board, or those chess-puzzles in the papers, was/where half the game.) (I have the nagging feeling that I'm overlooking something though -- not in the rules, but in ways this can/should be played.) On situation that I thought of, a tad more likely to come up with 2 players, is that they might run out of cards before the street if full of houses (say in a situation where houses get lots of letters). |
| May 7 10:27:58 | 1m 04s | Apricot Kernel | ♥ 1 | The interface metaphor feels very clever -- especially since it seems so cluttered at first. When I do comment, most of the time I have more to say, but this isn't about the particular mechanics, graphics or music or what have you. Words always seem to definitive to describe something as multi-faceted as emotions. So I suppose a short message about that it made me 'feel something' (even though I'm like 99% sure I'm cis) will have to do. |
| May 7 10:28:49 | 51s | Sheep Delivery | ♥ 1 | This concept is a good one to expand on. The mix of idle game and side-scroller is clever. However, since the numbers are rare anyway, I don't think it pays to wait for the second iteration of that number to get the baby sheep in there. So, I think the dominant strategy is just to go for all the numbered sheep, which can make it boring. |
| May 7 10:29:37 | 48s | Poppycock's Perfect Packages | ♥ 1 | Very polished, much attention to detail, like the trucks filling up pixel by pixel, not just a score, but a rank, etc. I understand the controls in theory, in practice ... I don't care how bad an actual automated system would have been in this world, but it's hard to imagine it doing it worse. |
| May 7 10:30:22 | 45s | Isles Express | ♥ 1 | I couldn't control the speedboat very well. I like the intro-music though! The interface is also quite clear. The manual transmission indicators at the top are a cute idea. |
| May 8 11:05:10 | 24h 34m | Schooled | ♥ 2 | Coming late to the party in a comment section is always a bit difficult. All the good criticism (both positive and negative) has been said in one form or the other already. You've cultivated some good 'quality over quantity' type feedback here! Anyway. Saying (mostly) the same things in my own words will not hurt. One thing that I didn't see a lot of in the preceding commentary, is people struggling with the controls: My fish ended up nearly embedded in the pond-floor a great number of times, because my aging brain apparently can't let go of the notion that 'W is forward'. (My ideal control-scheme, oddly enough, would probably be just 'the same, but with WASD replaced with the mouse'.) I also had a little trouble picking up fish, but it helps a lot if you don't think of each as individual cases, but go towards a bunch of 'm. In any case, when I could get it to work for me, yes ... the free-floating, expansive feeling you have when in the middle of the pond, traversing from a just 'depleted' spawn-ground to the next, dodging fish-cubes and cube-fishers is amazing. It would've been great on it's own already, but the music really gets you in the right mood. Which brings me to another point; once you've brought at least one fish to the new spawn plant, it's best just to wait until they've bred, and then keep adding them to the same plant. (Or same with close-by plants, those are often more than enough.) So you've mostly only engaged with that previously mentioned 'wide' feeling when you're going to the next breeding grounds. (It was nice to have a small surface based one as a white one as well one time -- I think the smaller plants 'go out' earlier?) I like the evolution mechanic, it's just the ribbon that ties everything together. |
| May 8 13:01:42 | 1h 56m | Mail owl | ♥ 1 | That was a short, but very sweet experience. I usually like my puzzles to be a fair bit harder, but this is mostly a story game anyway. Great art-style, not one you see often in games -- a bit like a children's book. The most interesting part was the mirror puzzle. That has some potential, maybe if there where mirrors that flipped upside down, or rotated. |
| May 10 17:58:45 | 52h 57m | Bundle Dumper: Florida Edition | ♥ 2 | I persevered until level 5 (or the one where you have to do 5 deliveries at least, you had to stay between two rows of drones) -- I took one look at the start and said 'nope'! Though this is actually praise, since I have a relatively low tolerance for frustration games; so this means that the difficulty curve is probably just about right. (Though maybe for a jam you should be erring on the side of easy.) Since I took a decent number of deaths (I think I saw the retry screen at least once in level 2 and then about twice in levels 3 and 4 each), it did frustrate me a bit that it took a long time to respawn. Though that's probably to give a ejected baby a chance to just barely make it while the stork expires? (Though maybe there could've been a button.) So _maybe_ not really 'for me', but otherwise this is exemplary of PICO-8: Small, retro, juicy and joyful in its own strange experimental way. |
| May 13 10:24:06 | 64h 25m | Careless Couriers | ♥ 2 | (Sorry for the ramble here. I'm not really up for editing this down to a more manageable chunk of text right now.) When I first started up the game (on Linux) I thought the controls where broken for me, so I also tried to start the windows version via proton, and even fetched my actual Windows lappy to try it out. -- I don't think it got much better, but I did eventually learn to not crash long enough to get out of the street and even turn multiple corners without crashing into anything*. I still can't make it out of the loading area _with_ packages and _then_ roam around though 😅 Still, it's an interesting idea, and if the rest of the game where a lot more forgiving (like nothing really kills you, but only slows you down) it might've worked. For example, it doesn't really respond when you get dizzy, and it leaves you right in front of the wall you crashed into, so you just have to intuit when you get control back or you crash into the wall all over again. And then when you steer too fast you get dizzy as well. I could mention all the other things, but it feels like everything is out there to punish you. -- I'd say pick either one or the other; really tricky movement that does have some joy to it when you finally get the hang of it*, _or_ the old-school 'three bumps and you're done for' game design, but not both. *) The very brief moments when I _did_ sort of feel in control felt good-ish and a little unique, so I can see where you where going with this, which makes it extra awkward to have to tell you the rest. (Also, are you sure it's equally hard on all systems? Maybe part of the problem is that it runs differently on each PC. It might just be me, but the Windows version felt _slightly_ better to control.) Anyway, I think the music, especially the in-game loop is really well done. I like the funkiness of it, and it fits the city-scene well. The graphics are decent as well, though they could use a little more character. Its a nice touch that you can see people through the buildings. |
| May 13 10:42:11 | 18m 05s | GoBat | ♥ 0 | I liked the fast-paced nature and the chosen music. I don't think I got a successful package delivery --I got the right color, and I tried every position around and on top of them, but it reacts just the same as dropping it on the ground and I get no points from the delivery-- but I could just pretend that I did, and the game worked just as well. Perhaps it would be a good idea to reverse the shooting direction, since you can only shoot in the direction you fly in, but because you are delivering packages, you're inclined to move away from the bugs, so you have to do this awkward fly-to-fly away movement to actually shoot them 😅 |