FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD41 → Feed Me

Feed Me

By pyrodaes and dodoita

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall2203.8228
Fun5373.3428
Innovation6263.3028
Theme6583.5027
Graphics1004.3529
Audio1383.8228
Humor6992.6827
Mood414.2328

Comments

n8m8 2018-04-25 22:21

Great job on your first LD! The little pet was absolutely creepy! I got the... bad ending... I think...

pyrodaes 2018-04-25 22:25

Haha thank you very much!! Glad you enjoyed it!

themonsterfromthedeep 2018-04-25 22:30

First, when I started the game, the window was glued to one half of the screen and so I missed all the buttons on the left, and I had to put my computer in Tablet Mode to force the game into fullscreen. (I'm on Windows 10).

And then I think I must have encountered a bug, because Tim came over and then the screen went dark and credits played, and then I switched windows but I heard music so I switched back and the game was still going and I had gained $50.

---

In any case, from what I can tell of the gameplay, I think this is kinda neat. There certainly seems to be something of a story. I'm not entirely sure what, exactly, the player can do to influence the story -- I imagine that the primary strategy is to buy a tiny bit of food every day (but, I couldn't, because I spent all my money right at the beginning).

I think the hand-drawn graphics are interesting, especially because you don't seem them much in games or in Ludum Dare.

I should say I was properly apprehensive of the creature -- I really didn't know what was going to happen, so I think this game really sold the creepy well.

pyrodaes 2018-04-25 22:38

@themonsterfromthedeep thank you very much for your feedback! If you're interested we are right now uploading a new version of the game where we fixed that very bug! It should be done in a few minutes :)

sndr 2018-04-25 23:00

Whoa, that was really cool! Perfect blend of pet simulator and mystery/horror genres :) Really like the take on the theme. I think I got the bad ending too... :)

abhimonk 2018-04-25 23:40

Fantastic Job! I think the mood was absolutely perfectly done.

-- Spoilers for those who haven't played yet --

I really only have a couple things that I felt could be improved: The game's title/title art seemed to broadcast the fact that it was eventually going to get creepy. It might have been more impactful if I went into the game with the expectation of just taking care of a pet. Instead, I found myself asking "When is this thing going to kill everyone?" as soon as I started the game up.

That said, I have a lot of positive things to say: The audio was really well done. I really love how big of an impact cutting the music made on the mood of the game. At first, you're used to hearing relatively simple, upbeat music. As soon as I got home on day 6(?) and heard the music stop, I immediately felt a chill run down my body. The sound of the pet eating Tim was incredible. The low buzz of the light bulb flickering over the pet's head after it grew (and the absence of the music during those sections) made the game all the more creepy.

I spent all my money on food the first day by accident. I loved the dread that I felt every time I visited the pet, and saw his hunger meter rise.

I think I also experienced the bug that @TheMonsterFromTheDeep experienced. Once the pet ate Tim, the credits were shown, and then I was allowed to continue playing (and I think I got another ending. The one where the pet's door gets broken down at the end). Regardless of whether this was planned or not, I still loved how eerie it felt after that. I knew something had happened to Tim, but now I feared for myself, so I kept feeding the pet in hopes that it wouldn't eat someone else.

One last small improvement that would go a long way would be to add tool tips to the UI for the pet. I didn't know what each icon did at first (on the left side), and also didn't know that I could only perform 3 left-side actions per day.

Overall, great job! Loved the mood and story.

ben-pearson 2018-04-26 00:24

The graphics were great, and the moving to the garage got a bit tedious. I guess it's part of the game, but... It does seem like it expects to be done. See me play at https://youtu.be/U15_YlyCNqY?t=52m43s

pyrodaes 2018-04-26 00:26

@abhimonk thank you very much for your detailed feedback! I think all the critics are spot-on, next time we'll improve and deliver a better game!!💪 Meanwhile we're very happy you enjoyed playing Feed Me. The credits bug should be fixed now, I made a mistake reuploding the files..😅

pyrodaes 2018-04-26 11:31

@ben-pearson thank you very much for playing our game! Unfortunately here it was night when you streamed it and we couldn't watch it live. But we really appreciated you playing it until the end! :D

darby-costello 2018-04-26 11:48

Really great mashup of these two genres. The graphics are absolutely on point and the whole thing has a very spooky tone. Well done.

dodoita 2018-04-26 12:09

@darby-costello Thank you very much!

leorototo 2018-04-26 14:06

Awesome! i must confest, i was prepared for this twist :D But good art, excellent music !

groggi 2018-04-27 20:26

Really great! I enjoyed to play- although I feel like I killed my parents somehow? :P

dodoita 2018-04-28 10:08

@LeoRototo @Groggi Thank you for the kind words!

maijauleberg 2018-04-28 13:07

I really liked the art style and the weird sounds the creature made. But, why was there a door i could not enter?

saiodin 2018-04-28 13:14

Wow. This was pretty creepy. The creature voice was a bit odd and it made me laugh for a moment, taking away from the atmosphere. Very nice drawings and style which fit perfectly to this, leaving a lot to imagination too. The game has resource management with money and buyables, but there is nothing to compromise. You can pretty much always get all the bars to the max, I'm assuming there isn't a good and bad ending or something like that? I don't think I would count this as two incompatible genres tho, mystery is just the dark atmosphere and there have been other games to combine that (recently on Steam, can look for the name if you're interested). But all in all I think this is a great entry!

pyrodaes 2018-04-28 13:19

@maijauleberg lol while working on the art assets I switched off the game design perspective... I realized too late that putting a door there wasn't simply a decoration xD No time to playtest during the jam! sigh

dodoita 2018-04-28 13:20

@saiodin fun while sound designing! yes, it needed a bit more polish, the gameplay as well. We thought about the game as a pet simulator x horror, which we felt were quite incompatible

saiodin 2018-04-28 14:03

@DodoIta Here just the link of what game I was thinking about: https://store.steampowered.com/app/580170/My_Lovely_Daughter/

beebo-studios 2018-04-28 15:04

A great game with a great sinister mood! Art and audio design are totally lovely!

The walking through the hall part was a bit repetitive, though I understand it was needed to set the mood. Maybe some random dialogues would help, like a selection between "have a nice day", "don't stay up too long", "we're visiting your aunt later" or something. Also, I didn't feel like my choices made any difference in the end. I think I kept Ludy well fed and also got him stenchless every day throughout the game, but in the end he still got more and more out of hand.

All in all a great and creepy game though, great work! Have a fish <3 🐟

dodoita 2018-04-28 18:25

@beebo-studios Thank you for the fish! I totally agree with what you say, but we rushed so much we didn't have time to write new dialogues for the hall. Same thing for the choices, we ended up at 3:30 AM uploading a build we never tested :sweat_smile:

surue 2018-04-28 20:40

Loved this game and the art, specialy the girl! Quite funny to play and easy to understand! Is there a good end? ^^

pyrodaes 2018-04-28 21:38

We must reveal it now: there is no happy ending! We are guilty of betraying our players' hope!

legavroche 2018-04-29 00:55

Loved the artwork, the theme and concept. Personally, I watched the trailer and I it spoiled a little too much. Could have benefited from a little bit more foreshadowing/dialog/exposition. Overall, I can see myself paying money for a more fully fleshed out game and narrative (like a dark-tamagotchi-like game).

rebecca-kremer 2018-05-01 05:11

Wow! Fantastic entry! I agree with the others that a little less foreshadowing would have gone a long way. Perhaps if the pet had started out cute and gotten more and more dangerous, much like what happens when people take real wild animals as pets? Overall very well executed, especially with the voice overs and SFX! Can't wait to see your future work!

angela-he 2018-05-01 19:06

I really loves this. Amazing concept. It's the first time I've felt so spooped from an LD game.

Fantastic polish - it has an app icon, lots of smooth small animations (the little hair bounces when the kid walks! the breathing of the weird.. monster..creature thing!)

I tried to never feed it but I feel like that didn't make a difference; the thing didn't die off :(

Audio: When it got silent and made the "FEED ME" sounds, that was so creepy, great job. Amazing sound effects and music as the game progressed - the lights flickering, the ambient noises; those were really scary.

Oh god.. still shook. It's hilarious in a very sad kind of way - you kinda know this kid's future ain't bright; he gon get eaten.

ribout-horace 2018-05-01 20:34

It was really well done ! The graphism and the little movement feel pretty weird (in a good way) and all this put in a special mood of horror , and , in a pure game design point of view, it work really well : as a player, we keep doing it, beside knowing what will probably happen, and we almost have that evil voice asking to see what can happen of more terrible when we come further in the game ! And the "false end" only push more this feeling ! Really, a great game and a horrific experience !

pyrodaes 2018-05-01 20:50

@angela-he I'm glad you enjoyed our game!! I played yours and it's incredible what you managed to do in so little time! Unfortunately we were too inexperienced and we didn't make it in time to add a proper game over or different endings. According to the original plan the creature should have evolved according to how you took care of it (we never considered happy endings though :P). Next time we'll do better! ;)

puppetmaster 2018-05-01 21:48

Great job!! Great atmosphere. The only thing that bothered me was the short display time of the text. A really great game.

Please vote back if you have the time https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/astropover

rodrigo-denubila 2018-05-01 22:02

Really great. The art style is amazing! It was a pretty take on the theme. Good job on your first LD.

Take a look at my game too: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/confessional

lautregars 2018-05-01 22:35

what.PNG

WHAT ?!

AFTER ALL I DONE FOR IT, THAT'S HOW IT THANKS ME !

Hoping to see a New Game++ in which I have awhip to teach it the good manners.

jokes aside, well i'm gonna make it short by just saying : Awesome.

I love virtual pets, so it's not difficult to get me hooked up : I tried to play my best to keep a small amount of money to feed it, while keeping cuddling it every day so it's mood would never go down. The scenario was previsible, but therefore satisfying : As soon s it began to grow up, I knew exactly where it was going, and was okay with it. I'm not gonna spoil, but that one friend of mine was very useful, as I ran out of money on this day.

But really, it's a game with digital-painting art, and that's rare. So it's really the cherry on the top of the cake. The Sound Design was very good too, ffs, those baby voice-lines have really surprised me when I heard em first.

The mood is on point too - Creepy, efficient, good parallel between the hosue music and the basement music-

Not much to say : You guys got yourselves no less-than-4 grades there, and even a bunch of 5. Super gg. And the fact that this is a first LD makes that even more amazing. Great polish, great take on the theme, great time management with this result in 72 hours : Great Entry.

pyrodaes 2018-05-01 22:46

@lautregars :hearts: Thank you so much, we're happy you liked it!!

bunnybreaker 2018-05-03 13:47

This is so cool and creepy. Love how the music is so happy sounding even though you know everyone is going to die. Love the graphics too :smile:

fashionbatman 2018-05-03 17:30

Amazing entry for your first LD! The game is really well polished all around. Creepy and funny at the same time. Great Job!