FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD45 → Eventualities

Eventualities

By human-writes-code

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall5053.5036
Fun6103.1935
Innovation554.1034
Theme2063.8134
Graphics9312.7435
Audio5392.9833
Humor7502.2929
Mood2753.7235

Comments

apace 2019-10-07 11:13

What a nice concept! I really like the idea of a kind of "detective" game, where you actually play a role in what you are "being detective about" (difficult to say what I mean!). I also enjoyed the calm background music and the sounds of typing and the messenger. What I didn't like as much was how many times I got back to the first sentence, but that's just the nature of the game I suppose, I can't expect you to write millions of lines of dialogue in a weekend.

Also, I managed to only get 4/6 right, and I'm not sure if I just clicked the wrong button, but it was kinda sad that I had to start from the beginning again with zero solution items, therefore I didn't feel like trying again even though I really wanted to know what happened.

human-writes-code 2019-10-07 11:40

@apace Yeah. I underestimated the scale of the dialogue needed - hence the looping nature of the game dialogue tree. I would have implemented a save mechanic for the solution had I realised the need for it early on... but sadly I didn't. Thanks for playing!

laegoose 2019-10-07 11:44

It took me a long time to notice how is this connected to the theme... beautiful!

The genre is innovative.

After playing for a while I wish the game would play faster when I visit the branches I been before.

Background music is very well done, creates the atmosphere. Well done!

rolly 2019-10-07 11:46

That's such a great concept! The story was quite interresting, and you can definitly feel the "passive aggressive"ness.

Visuals and sounds are simple but very well done! Music could have been a little louder.

The problem with that kind of game is that it needs a lot of content to make it feel like we are never repeating ourselves. Getting back to the "so... nothing?" seemed sometimes out of topic. Do you plan on adding more content after the jam?

At first, the delay between answers helps the mood, but when we want to get through the tree again to explore another part, it takes too much time... Maybe it should get faster after a while. I gave up with a 4/6 solution, but I had a good experience!

Nice entry!

human-writes-code 2019-10-07 12:20

@rolly Those are all great suggestions. I probably won't add more content to *this* particular game (seriously, you do NOT want to see the code base) but it certainly stimulated some ideas for building something very similar but more substantial and... well, better coded. :laughing:

human-writes-code 2019-10-07 12:22

@laegoose Thank you! I can totally see how ramping up the speed would be of great value! Cheers for playing!

rolly 2019-10-07 12:26

@human-writes-code Haha, I feel you! Let's just be glad that there is no "Code quality" rating category! x)

james-beninger 2019-10-07 22:38

I'll echo the comments of the other folk here. The delays and constant restarting do well to set the mood, but become frustrating after a while, particularly in a jam situation where we're - let's be honest - trying to review as many games as possible.

Criticism out of the way, the UI and sounds both achieve minimalism without feeling "cheap". The concept is good and is just missing a few quality-of-life features that would really make it shine. Options that are persistent between games would help, and maybe something like a journal where you could see how each option was unlocked.

I really appreciated the tiny "click" of recognition in my head when I realized the two options were literally "passive" and "aggressive".

baktillus 2019-10-08 07:19

Gonna repeat some of the praise: The visuals and audio are simple without being bad. It all fits together and matches the game's mood very well. I didn't have any issues with the delays, they gave me time to flick through the responses again. Plus they made it feel pretty organic. For the looparound maybe there would have been a better sentence but I honestly don't have a good idea either.

human-writes-code 2019-10-08 07:48

@baktillus Thanks for playing. Yeah, I kind of knew that the loop around of the dialogue would be a bit of a pain. It was a stop fix measure that I used because I was running out of time to implement the dialogue tree. Using a binary response approach means that you end up with 2 to the power of however many levels of dialogue. As I came to realise - that's a lot of dialogue to write :laughing:

khorm 2019-10-08 07:49

Cool idea and you really feel the passive aggressive radiating from the messages. This game score really high on innovation and mood for me and even though it might not be the typical game I normally like it was a cool experience!

Some negatives was the I found it a bit repetitive after a while, and there's maybe a bit lacking on the visuals even though the simplicity really do work.

But overall a nice submission!

givit-game-studios 2019-10-08 08:14

This is a good game. I really like it when developers starts inovating more. I just couldn't get the right combenation.

kirke 2019-10-08 08:18

Wow, I have never before meet with game in this type, but this one is great. I love you idea to use phone as a media. It feels so satisfying to hear this sound for new possible solution item! You add great, calm but mysterious music, and even when dialogues sometimes to often back to the beginning, still it was a lot of content and I really enjoy this game. I'm impressed you manage to do this in game jam! :D

human-writes-code 2019-10-08 08:20

@kirke Thank you!

human-writes-code 2019-10-08 08:22

@givit-game-studios Thanks! Finding the full solution is hard and you have to play though a lot of dialogue branches (one of the things I would change if I was to redo the game). A lot of the solution items are kind of half right, which makes it pretty tricky. Thanks for playing!

jake-white 2019-10-08 08:23

Nice theme interpretation. The conversation looping is really smart, although I'm not good enough to figure out more than like 2/6

human-writes-code 2019-10-08 08:24

@khorm Thanks for the feedback. I agree wholeheartedly with the negatives you pointed out. Glad you liked the experience (also, it's not the kind of game I would usually play, either).

graphicedit 2019-10-08 09:59

ok

shunt 2019-10-08 10:31

Really nice theme interpretation and a clever idea and execution, obviously you need to consider the amount of dialouge option but given the time constraints still really impressive.

justcamh 2019-10-08 10:55

This was really impressive, and for quite a while, you had me fooled. I didn't even realise things were looping, and the 'typical' response was a really smart transition. Although I eventually managed to divorce my wife multiple times which clued me in. Neat how the story opened up, if only the illusion held up a little longer. I still really enjoyed it! :heart:

pio 2019-10-08 11:57

Very interesting idea and a cool story. It's hard to make a game where you literally start with nothing, but it really was the case here. Player starts with no information. Music fits very well too. I wish there was less repetition, but still a great game.

swanijam 2019-10-09 03:50

This is so extremely interesting and heavy. Took a long time to figure out, and each time i learned something new i was floored. and sad. This reminds me a lot of https://tak.itch.io/agppbp this game - in the way that it simulates text anxiety, and the awful feeling of receiving a negative or stressful text. Thanks!

human-writes-code 2019-10-09 04:09

@swanijam I wasn't familiar with the AGP game so I went and had a look - very interesting! A lot better looking than my game obviously but I can clearly see the similarities. Thanks for playing!

radgegames 2019-10-10 05:11

This is actually a great and innovative entry

scott-steffes 2019-10-11 00:22

Very intriguing and thought-provoking concept. I got some strange lag in the HTML web version but maybe it was my PC's problem. Loved experimenting with this.

kleinzach 2019-10-11 00:26

Really cool idea. It basically simulates a mystery game through lack of information, and the mechanic of learning more about a situation and gathering more parts to come to a conclusion is great. The only things that I didn't like were how slow messages came through and that you couldn't see your history, but otherwise this was great!

human-writes-code 2019-10-11 06:06

@kleinzach Thanks for playing! A message history was on the feature list but I never got around to implementing it. Definitely would have been good to include.

enzo-b 2019-10-11 17:16

really nice idea love it