cookie 2017-04-24 02:31
I love this. Sad ending (i think). :(
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD38 → World on the Tip of a Ballpoint Pen
By hacksawunit
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 171 | 3.56 | 25 | |
| Fun | 258 | 3.18 | 24 | |
| Innovation | 220 | 3.26 | 25 | |
| Theme | 43 | 4.13 | 25 | |
| Graphics | 43 | 4.22 | 24 | |
| Audio | 57 | 3.76 | 23 | |
| Humor | 177 | 2.94 | 20 | |
| Mood | 11 | 4.22 | 24 |
I love this. Sad ending (i think). :(
Really lovely world! I included it in my Ludum Dare 38 compilation [video series](https://youtu.be/tHgMVMVGPRc), if you’d like to take a look :)
That was cute
It's an interesting concept. "End" - does that mean I lose? Win? Just a general "this is the end of the game" with no good or bad attached?
Very nice mood for the game, though the silence lasts a long time after picking up the plot device. Overall, I like what's there, but the lack of length and things to do leave something to be desired. (it's LD though, so yeah)
Side note: I couldn't read any of the dialogue. I take it that illegibility was intentional?
I'm very impressed, your design is really special. I came across your game during the Compo when you posted a picture of the map and since then I wanted to play the game, because I found the world really appealing just from the title and that single picture. When the game was finished I looked at a screenshot and was taken aback, because everything looked like a pixelated mess. Only when I actually played the game, was the initial interest renewed, as the world oozes charm and atmosphere, especially for such a low-res title. The mystery in not knowing what the game and world is all about, the choice of undecipherable gibberish added to that effect.
My only real complaint would be that it's so short, which is a damn shame because the map foreshadows more to see and to reveal. That and maybe some more music would have been nice. The ending fits a game with this unusual presentation very well.
I can only assume that the length of the game was due to a lack of time, since I didn't see too much of the ballpoint pen concept realized in the game itself, or maybe I'm just too dense to see the metaphore here. Is the black cloud following us the ink? Do we have to resucitate a failing pen? Is the character's death somewhat symbolic for the short-livedness of utensils like that? I don't know, but I would have loved to see this expanded.
All in all I think the idea and the art design would make it a perfect fit for a game offered on itch.io, possibly even a paid title. Just expand on the concept (if you do, drop me a line, I would play it). A problem with this concrete example of a game is that it's hard to present in a still image, since as I said, it looks like a mess unless you actually dive into the world. So if you should decide to expand and publish, it might be a good idea to present it in animated form.
Great job overall!
Nice mood, i'm not sure but is the end i'm sacrifice my life to become the ink of pen? Eventually i still cant make sense of the game, btw,i love the interaction feedback from every single object in the game, even the symbol like texts also make me feel i'm interacting with a unique special world, u've pay alot of work for shaping this small world aren't u?
Anyway, welldone!
Definitely potential here. Feel it was too short, didn't get the map part feel you maybe spent too much time on that instead of introducing variety using existing mechanics. Good effort!
The atmosphere is great, also the gameplay.
The weird language the characters speak, the contrasting colors, the strange flora, the complicated map, the misterious flame, the almighty eye...
I know it's short and it didn't come like you wanted it to, but it totally captured me.
Please tell me you're planning to have a good story and a 2-hours gameplay adventure in this world, because now I need it!
Followed you on Twitter just in case you'll actually do it ;)
Thats a really interesting little world. You've created a lot of mystery around the characters and the environment and it really draws you in. I love the wacky colourful graphics and all the little sound effects when you bump into trees or step on plants. It all adds so much to the atmosphere. I wish the camera wouldn't lag so far behind the character though :).
It was pretty short and I got confused at the end, I reached the top of the tower and there didn't seem like anything left to do but I wasn't sure. Also took me awhile to realise you can climb up the rope, I was just clicking on it originally.
Pretty great and interesting art (awesome colors). The sounds were pretty nice and I liked where the game was going but it was unfortunately cut super short... I hope it's addressed in a post mortem. Great concept and idea, lots of potential!
It's fairly obvious this one is unfinished. I love the art style, but there's no gameplay to speak of. This seems like a classic example of spending too much time on the little details and not having enough time left to pull everything together into a working game. However, there are also some details that needed more attention, such as making it visually apparent what objects and UI elements are interactive. And I do wish the camera wouldn't trail so far behind.
Love the aesthetic with all my heart, very well executed. The proximity effects with the little blackholes, the fuzziness of the ambience - wonderful. The wordless nature of the game is very reminiscent of Hyper Light Drifter.
But yeah, not much gameplay and that's ok. Just come back to it and finish it soon, yeah?
Somehow you managed to inject emotion into a pen-click. Even with the lower level of gameplay, what's there is really good.
I do agree with @stuntdude that the camera needs to track a bit closer to the moving player thing.
this was really cool! the world felt really great, i loved that you detailed out the interactions with all of the plants and people around. i wasnt exactly sure what i was doing but somehow managed to make my way to the end, which did feel a little sad but still very satisfying. i think this could work really well expanded into a bigger game. good job! in the future itd help to set a cover photo for the game on this site too, though. its really visually appealing so its a shame it looks so default in the game listings.
The art style is very reminiscent from FEZ, with these trees evoking the same kind of floaty outworldish-yet-familiar feel. As mentioned before, the pallete also strongly evokes HLD. Amazing how you managed to fit so much depth into little over 30 seconds of game.
I liked the alien writing. If you had more time, you should definitely use the pixel-alignment concept to design a font that requires the user to mask part of the text characters to transform them into something readable. That would be genius.
looks and sounds great
very pretty
:pen_ballpoint:
congrats on the compo!
I don't understand. I like that game. Thank :)
I really like the style. There's a lot of pixel art games these days but this one really manages to still have its own unique visual feel to it. In the beginning, I was definitely clicking on just about everything. There's nothing inherently wrong with that approach to learning gameplay, but it's something to keep in mind if you wanted to make it a little more approachable. Good work!
Okay, finally got the time to rate this, and i must say first, it looks beautiful. the graphics are aesthetically pleasant, and the sounds helps creating the atmospheric world. Though, i must say, getting the... black flame thing is quite hard, especially since the world's comparatively so big, but the game screen is so small. Maybe put a little signposting to where it is?
Also, i know it's because of the time constraint, but the map is a little bit underutilized. Maybe for the post-jam? :3
All in all, quite an entry! as i said, i would love this to be continued upon