Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD38 → PiP: A multi-layered puzzle game
By clickmation
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 340 | 3.44 | 36 | |
| Fun | 255 | 3.40 | 37 | |
| Innovation | 24 | 4.14 | 36 | |
| Theme | 266 | 3.65 | 37 | |
| Graphics | 405 | 3.45 | 37 | |
| Audio | 304 | 3.14 | 37 | |
| Humor | 508 | 2.25 | 29 | |
| Mood | 466 | 3.06 | 32 |
Top notch idea you've got here :smile:
Wished there were more levels, but as a showcase of idea this is cool too.
There's one more bug - when I've entered a laser tile the on switch wasn't glowing. And I've moved block away, then moved it back and moved it away once again and switch stopped turning off. Hope you've understand me.
Your game got great potential!
@alex-lutay Thanks for playing our game! We are planning on fixing that bug in the future update!
Very cool idea, and fits the theme well. Enjoyed the music, but got stuck on the level with the laser; pushing the block away from the switch didn't seem to do anything. Anyway, great job!
This game has a ton of technical problems, movement is almost annoyingly slow, and the transitions are frustratingly long. That being said, the further I got into this game the more cool little mechanics revealed themselves, and the more I liked it. Like others, I got stuck at the laser bug, but I'm definitely going to come back to this and finish playing once that's fixed! Great job!
Cool idea! I also got stuck on the laser level :x I couldn't seem to turn the portal back on.
Also, I noticed if die, retry, and then try to move before the camera zooms out, it'll still try to follow the character :p
Great game! Unfortunately, I also couldn't complete the level with the laser (let me know if you get it fixed). I would agree that the movement is a little sluggish, which I think stems from it taking a bit too long for the character to start a move. Other than that, I thought the idea was really clever, and the presentation was well done. I would love to see some harder levels!
Edit: I now see that the description directly mentions that the laser level doesn't work yet.
Got stuck at one point where the game hung at a teal screen. It was one or two puzzles after the first laser puzzle. I have no idea what happened. Very interesting idea. Smooth out the transitions and keep building the game and you've got something I'd probably buy.
This game has so much potential, I want to see more! I hope the full game is in the works because I want to see what kinds of new puzzles a game like this could have!
Comment 1/
Several cool ideas here! Some things I particularly liked:
- The sprite artwork is cute - Your main game logo and title screen are also cute, and fit the rest of the aesthetic well. - Confirmation on the restart screen. Conventionally this kind of screen is bound to the Escape key, but it’s nice to have extra confirmation around dangerous actions like this
I think it's slightly unfortunate you didn't get a chance to spend more time on level design, because even with the small number of distinct puzzle mechanics here it ought to be possible to develop a rather rich set of puzzles. That is to say, if you were to spend more time developing this game, the best place to focus would not be on additional mechanics (like rotating blocks or monsters), but rather a deeper exploration of mechanics that already exist. Some ideas that spring to mind that weren't already explored in your four levels:
- More complex puzzles involving basic block moving. You already have solid blocks, 4-way movable blocks and 2-way movable blocks in both orientations — that's more than enough for some pretty hard sokoban puzzles. - More puzzles involving blocks and switches that control lasers, even without inception-style subpuzzles: - Puzzles requiring you to shuffle blocks back and forth between various areas of the level - Lasers that gate significant areas of the level - Complex gating with lasers that cross each other, or pass through multiple rooms - Lasers with movable sources - And then, of course, exploration of the "block entering" subpuzzle mechanic: - Puzzles that require you to re-enter a block multiple times to change some internal state - Puzzles with more than one subpuzzle block - Puzzles with deeply nested subpuzzles, two or more layers thick - Subpuzzles, that when solved, change the directions in which the outer block can be moved, or change the direction a laser is fired
Comment 2/
Of course, any level slightly larger than what you have already would be a pain to complete, due to one singular problem more serious with any other: the input controls feel sluggish as hell. Playing the game feels like wading through molasses. Here’s why:
- In order to move in any direction, it’s not sufficient to press the key — you must press and hold for a significant fraction of a second. Tapping the key makes you look in a direction, but not necessarily move in that direction. I see no reason why this should be. - When you do start moving, your character’s movement speed is extremely slow — it takes a long time to reach the next grid square.
As well some more minor reasons, like:
- When you hit R to restart, the game replays the zoom animation from the end of the previous level, which takes several seconds to complete.
This alone (making the controls feel quick and responsive) would already make the game vastly more fun to play.
There were a few game-breaking bugs I encountered as well:
- The switch in the inner block in the fourth level was very buggy. Moving the block off the square in front of the switch then stepping away was not enough to release the switch. But stepping in front of the switch and moving away again did release it. - I got killed by the laser once when I was inside the inner block on the fourth level, which clearly should not have happened - Indicator lights and lighting on the level end square did not always correspond to the state of the switch controlling them — they sometimes drift out of sync with the switch that toggles them. I think I hit this in level 1. - After completing level 4, I got dropped into a blue screen, at which point the game froze. Restarting the game showed your splash, but then went straight back to the blue screen again. Nothing I tried allowed me to replay the game 😞
Comment 3/3
I hope this is helpful. The game has promise and there’s a lot of low-hanging fruit for easy improvements and bug-fixes. Besides that, you have a solid foundation (your art is good), your puzzle mechanics are neat and there’s potential for a lot of richness with more levels using the existing features. Cheers
@lennart-jansson Thanks for playing and writing this long helpful feedback. The sluggish button input derives from the need to NOT push a block while just facing it so that you could enter the block without actually moving anything around. However, I too think maybe such a sluggish input should only be true when pushing a block. We will take every inch of your feedback into consideration and try to make our game better. Thank you once again.
The game showcases very few levels but the mechanics you've got going laid down a base for promising expansions.
ps. It seems the second build is missing the music.
What a super cool premise. I'd love to see where you can take this. I would say that the character movement speed could be faster and the game seems to hang a bit when switching scenes but it looks like you've already addressed both of these!
This is a really neat mechanic so it's a shame the game's so short. The game has a ton of potential and I really hope it gets extended. Imagine levels where you have to go down 2 or more layers to progress!
As for the game right now, it's pretty cool but can be a bit sluggish. You move fairly slow and transitions between layers could be smoother. The laser block also seems pretty glitchy - it took me numerous tries and retries to get it to turn on/off correctly. The graphics are very nice and the music is good too, but some more sound effects would we welcome.
I was surprised how good this ended up being. I loved the idea of zooming into blocks like they are their own little world that needs to be solved and then zoomed out of. Brilliant. The laser stage is buggy though like you said, and there seemed to be some graphical flickering on the first stage too. Overall though, great entry!
Yes!!! I really like this entry, the concept is simple but yet very rewarding and fun. The movement is maybe too slow. The tutorial progression is perfect and smooth. Transitions seem kinda broken (you can move the camera and it might be a little slow). Loved the music and the art. I only wish it had more levels. Great job!!!
Graphics are really cute and the music is quite original, i like it a lot. Some sound effects would have been nice. The zooming between levels is a really nice touch. A hint that i need to press 'c' at some point would have been good - if i hadn't gone back and read your description, i would have been stuck.
From the design perspective, my first though (obviously) is sokoban. Then i saw that you added a little twist with the limitations of the blocks. I do wonder if this will actually make the game better (in the subsequent more complex levels), because the puzzles that you can make get very restricted too i imagine.
Overall, a very good LD entry, good job!
Like others said, the idea of this game is really good. Is the blue screen the ending or was this a bug? With more levels and a bit polish on the puzzles, this could become a really good puzzle game. Good job!
I really liked the mechanic of the game, I think it's original and full of potential, I encourage you to keep working on it beacause I can imagine a big variety of levels. The art is good and the music, even if it's simple, it sticks in your head. Don`t mind the bugs, keep working, after all the idea is key for a game (at least for me!).
Once I got the inception-style concept, I thought it was really cool! It does feel a little raw at the moment, with awkward controls and rough transitions, but as far as mechanics go, I think you've done a great job! I ran into some issues with the level design, but those have already been mentioned. I hope you're continuing to explore this concept, even if you might have to rewrite everything from scratch.
By the way: Thank you for reporting my broken game link. I've uploaded it to a different host now, and it might be more stable: [**Entry page**](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/dr-plumb)
Very polished game and nice progressive difficulty level. It's really cool the way you create a kind of mini world inside the other.
Great entry!
Pretty enjoyable <3 Too bad the laser stage couldn't be finished. I liked the graphics & music a lot, it really fits the gameplay. I hope you plan to keep developing this one! (I can even see a boss to be beaten by entering his body and entering again his inner parts xD)
Really solid entry. Idea isn't maybe really unique but level design, nice-but-a-bit-silly-looking graphics (xD) and clever blocks managing made it so much more enjoyable. I would speed up a player a bit but otherwise good job! :)
This is a really cool revision of classic titles like sokoban.
I love the potential of this project and It's a pity you didn't have the chance to iterate over it's core idea. It would be really cool to have some more rooms to explore the main mechanics of the game. It feels rushed and, unfortunately, it seems that you ran out of time before you even could get into the juicy part of any game like this: level design.
However, It would be really cool if you take this idea and polish it to make it shine as it deserves.
Great job!
Fun game, a bit buggy tho
Cool game with a nice concept. I enjoyed the cute graphics and the puzzle mechanics were interesting. The transitions into/out of blocks are a bit jarring but the idea is communicated well enough. It could be a great starting point for a great puzzle game!
Now one of my favorite LD puzzle games because I really like the multi-level mechanic. As others have said it would have greatly benefited from some more levels and faster movement, but well done!
hey @clickmation you went to our game page and asked for a tutorial to be posted here, so here it is
Ascension is kinda confusing at first, even for the creators The game is turn based. You get mana every turn, and when your mana ends you should skip a turn because there's not much to be done, since all of the actions use mana
At the left side of the screen you get action buttons. Click on them to change what clicking will do. The little bag is for collecting resources (it takes mana to do that). The other five icons at the top part are for imbuing (adding a kind of resource to the selected terrain). You should try them to find out what they do ;)
(continues. . .)
When you try to act on the map, a tooltip pops up. At the bottom part of the tooltip it shows how much of each resource you'll get (if you're collecting), or how many you'll have to use to imbue (or build) on that terrain.
There's also temples and villages. Temples protect villages and forest from harm. Villages increase your mana gain when skipping turn (when they are touching a temple), and also increase your VALUE gain when skipping turn (when they are touching a god statue). You'll only get the recipes for the statues after a few turns.
Eventually a mountain turns into a volcado. You must quickly deactivate it AND find a way to block the lava from expanding over your map (it expands each turn, even if the volcanoes are dead).
I think that's it. Tell us of your progress if you play it again!
@macro Thanks for playing the game. We will keep working on it. By the way, did you make a game this dare?? I try to play all the games of the ones who commented, but I just couldn't get your page loaded completely.
wow! i love this game! really nice job. i loved the player animation. i dont know how you made so few pixels look like they were a blob plopping along. the sideways movement was particularly nice with the head bob. i loved that you could go into blocks and manipulate them to affect the 'outer world.' the transition animation going into blocks and going to the next level was super cool. the recursiveness (if thats the right word) is interesting and makes you think about how scale can be infinite and how perspective is so relative.
while i loved that you could go into blocks, i think that there needs to be a bit more indication of which blocks you can go into. i had no problem finding them, but im just thinking of the player population as a whole. honestly, i enjoy when a game doesnt hold your hand and you have to explore and figure things out on your own, so idk maybe you dont need to make it more obvious after all, but its something to think about. i also would have loved more levels and more complex puzzles. obviously i understand the limitations of a game jam. i think you should continue working on this though, it has huge potential for expansion. you should make an itch.io page so that i can follow you and if you continue this game, ill be able to easily find it. if you host other works of yours there too, then i could find that as well. oh really nice job with the music too! it fit the whole mood and your art style well. great entry! i really liked this one. bravo.
@xxdoombox Ah, the afterbirth guy! I still remember it due to it's funny concept and cute art. Thanks for playing the game. We'll leave a comment on your page after we refine the code and upload it on itch.io. It pleasing to see support on the graphics and the music as well. It was actually our first time making music by ourselves and we really liked what we ended up with. Thanks and bravo to you too!!
Hi,
I liked the game, but as other have said it had some problems with the keyboard input and the laser level. Other than that i thought it was fun and I enjoyed the music loop. It's a shame the game only has 4 levels, I wanted to see how the mechanics evolved.
Good job guys!