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| Timestamp | Since previous | Game | pkenney's comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apr 10 02:00:48 | Depths shooter | ♥ 5 | I won!! Congratulations on your first LD entry! It's a complete little package with multiple weapons, pickups, terrain interactions, enemies with sensible behaviors, and even a climactic boss fight. Great work. I played just the right number of times - boss kicked my tail just enough that I was eager to retry but the game did not overstay its welcome. The checkpoints were absolutely VITAL to support this feeling. It would be so easy to make that classic LD beginner mistake of not having checkpoints and sending the player all the way back to the start, but you were smart designers and avoided that. There were definitely a bunch of minor splinters, which is totally to be expected the first few games. I'll give you some notes on them, but I hope this feels constructive, believe me I don't leave detailed notes unless I see potential. That said, if you don't want critique, please just skip this!! ### Colliders Colliders have a HUGE impact on the feel of any game like this. I can feel that something is off with yours. This should not be a collision, but it is: Collision.png This janky over-collision really dominated the boss fight, unfortunately. I learned my way around it, but it was a splinter. We could talk for hours about colliders, but I'll just say this: simple colliders will get the basic job done, but if you want to shoot for a smooth pleasant game feel you need to be super-critical of them. For example, typically there would be multiple different colliders: colliders for interacting with the pickups, colliders for interacting with the terrain, colliders for physically interacting with the enemy, colliders for getting shot. And so on. But a good starting point is this: rectangles have sharp corners, and the corner-to-corner is where it feels bad. Especially on the top of the character, getting their jump stuffed because they clipped the corner of their hair. Experiment a rectangle at the feet with a circle at the head. The key to colliders is to be as generous to the player as possible in every regard. Make the colliders downright unfair in their favor, and then tune the game difficulty around that generosity so that it's the GAME challenging the player, and not the controls/collisions. ### Juice Obviously there's a scope limitation in a jam. But check this great video out, which starts with a really really simple shooter and then just adds more and more of the right kinds of juice to it. You can just steal as many of these ideas as possible next time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJdEqssNZ-U The main piece of juice I missed from your game was some indication that I took a hit. And that's it! I think you made a nice entry here and I played it all the way through to the end. And if you improved it a bit in those two areas I think it really could go up to even another level. Look forward to seeing what you do next. | |
| Apr 10 02:28:49 | 28m 01s | Depth Delver | ♥ 1 | Very nice entry! Really nailed the all-around package. The graphics, sound, music, and the overall gameplay really created a nice retro vibe. But the character controls were well done and fair, and I felt like my failures were my own fault, which was pretty important in a game like this. I'll admit I did do a lot failing! That repetition (darn room with moving blocks and the arrow at the bottom!!) was key to nailing the retro feel, but the checkpoints were totally reasonable and kept me from feeling totally wrecked by fails. Great job! |
| Apr 10 02:37:21 | 8m 32s | Hoard | ♥ 1 | Nice!! I hit a hundred before my hand muscles told me to stop. You're missing some basics like sound, but it kind of doesn't matter. Or maybe it does and the game would have been just that much more intense. But I loved the initial confusion, the OHHHH I SEE, and then the frantic ferrying, and of course best of all the GADDAMIT why did I do that to myself??! Small scope that hits hard - that's the way to jam. Nicely done. |
| Apr 10 03:21:32 | 44m 11s | Nickel | ♥ 0 | Me in the first minute: "Why do I need this elevator when I can just drag and drop the guys around wherever I want?" Me five minutes later: "Oh I see why this elevator is useful now!" Me five minutes later: "Darn my elevator, why is its capacity so small??" Good job creating a system the drew me in. Scope was a bit basic and below that critical mass that made this REALLY addicting, but it was definitely heading in that direction. Nice entry! |
| Apr 15 01:57:11 | 118h 35m | Delver Delve | ♥ 0 | Oh wow, that audio is simply amazing. It does so much to set the mood. I think the jump sound is even someone saying "up!" but it also totally works just as a sound, which is just an example of the vibe in the details here. I felt like I wanted a tiny pitter-patter of the feet since I was enjoying the movement animation, but maybe I'm wrong and that wouldn't be tastefully minimalist like the rest of everything here. That moody vibe from the graphics and audio coming together was really nice. The gameplay was also simple but man that feeling when you fall down one level too many, and the R button just mocks you. Loved to hate it, and laugh at myself. What a nice little package here, rich with pleasing details. Well done! |
| Apr 15 02:07:07 | 9m 56s | Treasure Down Under | ♥ 1 | I collected all the rings! Not every game ends up as epic as it is in our heads, but in this one I could really FEEL what it wanted to be, even though I only saw the tip of the iceberg. The rope-swing was very cool. Loved when you had us chain the double. And nice work making that last screen really hard, but doable. I had to retry just the right amount of time. Obviously some scope issues there but I think you handled it well. Glad you left the ring-count at five. |
| Apr 15 02:27:17 | 20m 10s | The Trench | ♥ 1 | I enjoyed this! I appreciate the jam entries that are doing something a bit different, like this one. It was a great vibe. I guess two small things that jarred me out of the experience: 1, the sonar effect is very nice overall but the sound is a bit harsh for one that's repeated so often, and if it were more mellow I think the vibe would be more chill; 2, it's probably just me, but a handful of times I let go of the mouse click to stop and look around at the fish, but the camera had this disorienting recentering effect that ... I can't explain why but it felt like a punishment, so I didn't want to stop very much. But overall the game drew me in and kept me in this sort of semi-hypnotic state in a very nice way. The ocean gets dark quick! And is very deep. Well done! |
| Apr 15 03:04:46 | 37m 29s | blablabla deep finite ocean II | ♥ 1 | NO NO NO STAY BACK NOT THE CRABOhhhnoo. He got me again. I stink at Shmups. Once in childhood I was at The Mall, and I saw a sign that said "Video Game Tournament Today! At The Mall!" so of course I signed right up, because I loved Zelda and Metroid. I didn't know how they were going to determine the winner, but I had gotten the raft with just the wooden sword, so I knew I was going to do well. But the game was a Shmup. The winner would be decided by who could get the most points in five minutes. I was the only player who ran out of lives before the time was up. I'm not sure any other player even died once. But anyway - I had fun with this one! Jamming tunes kept me in there, and I spent a bunch of time replaying, and pushing further despite my stinkitude. The crab got me, but I learned to get him first. Eventually I was there with multiple toothbrush fish, and we cleared the zone together! I was doing pretty well in the next zone, too, but then I died and lost my toothbrush fishes, and it got a little tougher as the waves of enemies no longer insta-melted. But I kept trying. What eventually got me was something about this screen. I kept coming in here with one or two hearts left, and something I didn't realize was a hazard kept killing me. I was just moving through empty space and it would be like, GAME OVER. What happened?? invisi-death.png I still don't know wh.. wait a second... is that a tiny black poison spike on the ceiling?? spike.png Gotta be it. Anyway, thanks, because I enjoyed this one. It actually kinda made me want to experiment with this genre and try a few things... Nice entry! Solid graphics with lots of fun effects, and a really jamming sound track. |
| Apr 15 03:44:57 | 40m 11s | Nightmare Descent | ♥ 2 | Nice - first run was spent figuring out the system. Second run I finished off the boss and myself in the same move with Scream of Terror. I think I was awarded the victory -- the screen went dim and I thought I'd lost, but then it dealt me like ten Hopes and I saw the credits. Game has a nice brutal resource limitation. It's pretty limiting when you are stuck in a battle with nothing but Remembrance, so I felt clever figuring out that a few turns down the road I would be able to maybe-win by venting all my cards and getting the Scream that can deal 2. I think you got some extra mileage out of the air of mystery while I explored the systems, which is always nice in these small-scope jam games. I appreciated the lack of tutorial. Nice work! I enjoyed this entry. |
| Apr 16 01:25:43 | 21h 40m | Into The Deep | ♥ 1 | Nice job on a solo jam! The optional guitar soundtrack was a very nice touch, and overall the audio set the vibe really well. Graphics really worked well, too. The pleasant vibe with just a touch of danger combined with the one-more-run mechanics to create a nice game loop. Well done! |
| Apr 16 01:39:22 | 13m 39s | Faith-e-vator | ♥ 1 | Nice tense action game with good chunk game feel! Found myself clenching my fingers on the keyboard. |
| Apr 16 02:02:50 | 23m 28s | Focus! | ♥ 1 | Very cool - maybe every person will have their own experience with this aspect, but for me the time spent puzzling out the next step was just right, same for the overall mission length. I won't give spoilers but the first important step took me a bit because I thought I had done it without a reaction, but fortunately the game hinted strongly enough that I returned to the idea and progressed. Game was charming and didn't overstay its welcome. Nice well-rounded entry delivering across all the categories. ... The no-hand-use, quite a constraint, very cool that you've set up tools to make it work. I've tinkered with Cursor a bit lately. It's a mixed bag but it does translate natural language into code changes in a reasonable way. I see people claim they set up voice software and just talk at it, I'm curious what that experience would be like. |
| Apr 16 02:31:37 | 28m 47s | Oakhaven | ♥ 1 | Intriguing idea to have the puzzle in the board and then in the rooms. I had fun experimenting a bit, then read the rules, then experimented again with the details of how it the tile icons play out in real life. After that time getting my understanding, I started to think I wouldn't finish, because of the walking speed, I could feel myself starting to get that feeling of wanting to just speed through a game. But the cool ambient music kept the mood right and I stayed engaged with the game on its own terms for a lot longer than I initially expected I would. Go mood! I found the light and got all the way to the codex, but then I decided that I would skip the return trip. Overall very nice entry! Cool system, nice line-of-sight darkness, solid graphics, and a great ambient background, and coming together into a complete-feeling experience. ps thanks for posting that note about the edge detection, it helped to know that. |
| Apr 25 04:11:26 | 217h 39m | Big Boom Bob | ♥ 0 | Very cool! Lots of nice features here, bomb-toss, destructible terrain, grapple, tricky enemy combat, and the whole upgrades-and-timer game loop. Art and sound really brought it all together, too. I was not able to read most of the text because I happened to be playing on a television across the room, so it was hard to engage with the tech tree. But I could kind of guess what stuff probably meant. And other than that, I saw some text go by to kind of tutorialize me, but the game was very self-discoverable without needing to read it. Actually after I lost, I went back for another round and played even longer all over again. Nice addictive quality! It's very interesting how much more powerful you are when you are on the rope vs off of it. But you want to get off to grab things. This dynamic creates a cool risk/reward tradeoff. Nicely done! |
| Apr 25 04:22:07 | 10m 41s | Repossessed | ♥ 1 | Nice art and audio, the overall vibe really came together! If I could tweak one thing it would be to make the character a little more nimble, especially the turning speed (to snap off shots). But the character as-is certainly created some nice arcade-style challenges. Nice work! |
| Apr 25 04:34:24 | 12m 17s | 2.5 Depth | ♥ 1 | Ha!! Loved the flip-world style a lot. The challenge on the platforming was quite a finger-dance to get through, but it stayed just the right side of sane. Failed a bunch, had some frustration, but then overcame. I did get stuck on the second door. I didn't understand... I thought I had flipped a switch on the thing on the left in polish-world, but I guess not because the door did not open. Cool concept, well executed. Congrats! |
