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Aftermath
Aftermath
By peace-of-cake-games
View on ldjam.com
| Category | Rank | Score | Count |
|
|---|
| Overall | 826 | 2.77 | 74 | |
| Fun | 861 | 2.33 | 75 | |
| Innovation | 790 | 2.54 | 75 | |
| Theme | 814 | 2.74 | 73 | |
| Graphics | 791 | 2.65 | 75 | |
| Audio | 507 | 3.02 | 75 | |
| Mood | 245 | 3.61 | 75 | |
Comments
Hey gamers! I would like to notify everyone that the HTML5 version might be running a bit slow, especially during the initial loading stage and transition effects. If you have low speeds I have exports for Windows, MacOS, and Linux.
I would really appreciate it if you can let me know about any issues with the MacOS and Linux versions! I am unable to test them, so I'll need some players to help me out. This is my first time making MacOS and Linux export options so I'm sure there'll be issues. ๐
If anyone is interested in drawing some fanart, you can check out the source code or I can send you an image file of whatever asset you want! This game is fully open source so go ahead and poke around in the file, it's yours now.
Really awesome game! I like the atmospheric music a lot! It's good to see that you could finish this game in time. :D Mind sharing a version of your art and music apps?
metadept
2021-04-26 04:41
I like the creativity of the starting 'cut scene' visuals and leaving a blood trail as you walk was a nice touch. Good job!
@mrchickenboy I'm glad you like the music! I'm really going for a moody game and one of the things I gave top priority was the soundtrack. I feel like the game wouldn't really have the right mood if it didn't have a good soundtrack to accompany the game.
Right now the art and music apps are entirely keyboard shortcut operated and not very user-friendly since I made them for personal use, but now that my 48 hours of stress and success are over I'm probably going to work on making them be for a full release as an official software. I'll let you know as soon as I've got a good beta test ready, because I'm sure you'll like the music app (it's made for NES-style chiptune music development).
@metadept thank you! I was excited to be able to implement the little trail of blood, because the ground of the world is made of 3D objects and it's a relatively new feature in Construct 3. I saw that there was a "change image of 3D object side" action and I knew I would make a trail of blood wherever the player walks (or something similar).
valid
2021-04-26 06:02
haha i love that splashscreen and that flicker effect is sick. Great atmosphere. One problem i had was the text felt very close together and a little hard to read, other than that it was great.
I like the music, and the graphics-ification of what is essentially a text-based interactive fiction game. There's not a lot of depth or interactivity to the story, though, unless I'm missing an obvious story branch somewhere. Presumably more was planned but you ran out of time?
@valid I'm glad you like the flicker effect! I spent an embarrassingly large amount of time making it not too intense but also intense enough....
The text is a bit too close together, eh? Thanks for the tip, if I make a post-jam version (not much of a game length upgrade but rather quality of life improvements) I'll edit the font some. I used a SpriteFont to make my own font from scratch (a Ludum Dare tradition) so the hard-to-read text is my bad. ๐ฌ
@3lstmsinatrenchcoat thanks for playing! You are right, I did plan a little bit more but ran low on time. I did plan on making the discovery of flashback objects have a little image for flashback visualization, but I realized that the way I planned on implementing it it wasn't practical and it was too time-consuming. I was also thinking about a little cutscene for each ending but seeing as I spent hours and hours on the opening cutscene, adding more cutscenes was an idea that got trashed pretty quickly.
Oh darn it, I realized I forgot to add the note about there being three (technically four) endings to the story on the game's page! I'm interested to know how many you found, since I forgot to make a note about it. Also, how do you think the story could be expanded more and given more depth? I'm really open to feedback about that since despite being a writer somewhat, this is my first narrative-based game.
I got all 3 endings, but by "not much depth/interactivity" I basically just mean that there aren't really many choices for the player to make, and 2 of the three story routes are almost the same except for the end text. It's really more of a vignette than a story.
If you want to emphasize the moral difference between endings 2 and 3, it would be a good idea to actually ask the player to make a moral decision at some point in the narrative, instead of basing the character's final moral decision on whether they interacted with a particular item previously.
@3lstmsinatrenchcoat got it, thanks. I was planning on elaborating more on the end like what you said, but 48 hours is tough and I overscoped a bit. If I do make a post-jam version (questionable since I'm already working on a post-jam version of last LD's game) I'll make sure to remember your advice!
martynas
2021-04-26 08:13
Very creepy!
@martynas Thank you for playing!
I'm glad you too perceived it as "creepy" because one of the three music's names is "Creepy Synth Pad".
falke
2021-04-26 08:23
It's a really cool game!
oadt
2021-04-26 08:36
Nice entry! The ending text went through a bit fast at the end
Thanks for playing Aftermath, @falke and @oadt !
@oadt Thanks for the feedback about that, if I do a quality-of-life improvement update I'll change that.
cagibi
2021-04-26 10:07
As others said, it's a bit hard to read the text, but the mood is well done. There's potential for a bigger game with more choices and a deeper (heh) story.
Nice game! Surprised how quickly the very first choice led me to an ending. The tagline really isn't a lie is it.
@cagibi lol, a "deeper" story? ๐ But yeah, I might make a small post-jam update to deepen the story and fix the text (really should have made that better initially). Probably won't make an expanded version like what I'm doing with my so-so LD47 game, it'll just be a little fix.
(At least this Ludum Dare I didn't make a gamebreaking bug like last time.... ๐ฃ)
Thank you, @toasteater ! And I suppose it isn't.
Looking back at my dialogue choices I think it was a good idea to make the first choice of the game be "investigate" vs "rest since you're tired and injured" instead of "investigate" vs "well I'll go die now". Makes it easier for people to find Ending 1 on their first try. ๐ป
played!
Thank you for playing, @chesschaser ! Any strong points in the game or things that should be improved?
@peace-of-cake-games not really! It was just great!
Really atmospheric game. Music and art are great.
Thank you, @bubakgames ! I'm glad you like the music and art, after how much I failed in those two categories last Ludum Dare I made sure to prioritize art and good music.
I tried your game.
I only found two endings, death and revenge I guess. I didnโt find the sadnessโฆ I feel sad for that ๐ข
Also I felt that the revenge ending is a bit too sluggish, like Iโm still confused because I found it four times and have no idea about not triggering it. Also I felt under the ground by walking left instead of right.
@crazyrems I guess having a bug that let's you fall through the ground by walking left is going to become a tradition for me.... ๐ Somehow every Ludum Dare there's been a bug like that.
I've updated the game page to say how to unlock all of the endings, I hope that helps.
Thanks for playing! Getting feedback on Aftermath is really helpful to me, since this game had a lot of firsts. First narrative-based game, first use of 3D graphics outside of a small demo I made, etc.
I got ending 2! The music has a creepy vibe to it (in a good way) and the writing is nice, which adds to a nice atmosphere.
Thanks so much for playing @emily-pitcher ! Creepy is the exact goal I was going for in the music, it turns out synth pads work pretty well.
###### (To be honest, since all of my previous games I've made were nice and pleasant, even a game called Massacre Dungeon for the most part, I kind of creeped myself out with how dark this is. I've never made something so dark....)
Good job! Liked the creepy mood. As others have commented the text is a bit hard to read but i really liked the handdrawn font.
Thanks for playing @generalsturgeon ! I'll have to fix the text at some point.
I'm glad you like the handdrawn font, I spent an embarrassingly long amount of time making it. ๐
gilborn
2021-04-27 19:31
Very dark atmosphere, music and graphics did their job to create a perfect mood. Some more Gameplay would have been great, but ok, the focus was clearly on storytelling. Nicely done.
conduit
2021-04-27 19:47
VENGANCE WITHOUT MURDER. Loved my first playthrough, had no idea the choices I made would've led to that outcome. Which was a very welcome surprise. Great entry homie!
godsboss
2021-04-27 19:53
Didn't read the description and also fell out of the world when I walked left too far. I guess that matches the theme?
solweak
2021-04-27 19:54
Good work on the atmosphere of your game, it's a little bit painful to read all the text with red color and this fonts, it's a pity because the writing is interesting.
Thanks for playing, everyone!
@gilborn yeah, I was intending to have some more gameplay, but due to the fact I intentionally overscoped just because I have wanted to tell this story for a while, I didn't manage to implement more gameplay.
Nice job, @conduit ! ๐ VENGEANCE WITHOUT MURDER is the closest you can get to a good ending. Technically there is no happy ending, I felt like an ending that made everything be okay might not go well with the dark and depressing atmosphere I made. An ending where the murderer is dealt with in a sensible way before the player dies is the closest I was willing to go to a good ending.
@godsboss oh, that's a good point, it does match the theme! Not only did I essentially make a Minus World, I also unintentionally followed the theme....
Yeah, sorry about the bad choice of font and font color @solweak ! ๐โโ๏ธ I'll probably make a post-Compo version in one or two days to adjust that for anyone who wants an enhanced-quality experience.
this was pretty cool! nice job
Thank you, @monkeybit29 !
crowvax
2021-04-28 07:26
You did a fantastic job on this. I really like your take on a more narrative story-driven game. Although, I'm not really following the idea that this kind of art style would be particularly appealing for a more immersive story, even if that was on purpose. However, I did enjoyed the story's tone and aesthetic. You did excellent work.
Very creative take on the theme! Finding all of the endings was fun - I got the bad ending first, immediatly followed by the good ending, so that was a bit of whiplash lol. I like the frantic look for the font as well, I think it adds to the feeling of vengeance. My only main suggestion would be to maybe add an input to advance text instead of having to wait, since you watch the opening scene multiple times when ending-hunting. Nice work!
I liked the audio-visual effects. It created a good mood!
Thanks for playing, everyone! This Ludum Dare was all about expanding my horizons: first Compo attempt, first attempt at 3D objects in a Ludum Dare game, first time ever doing a narrative-based game despite being a bit of a writer, first time using my own art and music apps for some of the assets, etc. All of your compliments and criticism really help me know the strengths and weaknesses of my first ever Compo game.
@crowvax I'm glad you enjoyed Aftermath! This area of game development is new to me (despite being a fairly experienced developer), so I'm glad you liked the feel of it.
@brainloaf-studio That's a good idea, adding a text advancing button! (Or maybe I'll just make a button to skip the opening cutscene entirely) Thanks for the recommendation, I'll put that in the small update I'm working on.
Thank you, @linus-lindberg ! Mood is basically *the* category I feel good about. ๐ค
I liked the mood and setting. The text was sometimes a bit hard to read.
Good game
Thank you for playing, @thijs-tak ! I agree that the text is rather hard to read at times, that's something I plan to fix.
I'm not sure if this was a bug or not, but I only visually saw the knife on the ground, I couldn't see everything else, I kept getting dialogue for like the journal, necklace, kitten, even the person who I killed for revenge. I just kept getting more dialogue as I walked forward.
I like the narrative based game, the text was a bit hard to read, but I get that it's going with the dark vibes. What made it more difficult though was how far away it was from me as the player, and the fact that I could just keep walking, and might not even notice the text. I think if this is a narrative based game, you should make the text more prominent, and not so easy to just ignore and keep walking, like maybe pause the game and have the player advance through the dialogue with button presses, and have the dialogue appear word by word or letter by letter to make it feel more engaging.
@sakura-magika Yeah, sorry about that, it's not a bug! I kind of sapped up all of my time working on the opening cutscene and redrawing the player (I'm terrible at drawing people quickly) so I didn't get to make actual objects. ๐ The original plan was to gather all of the flashback objects and an object that allows you to get the end (rope/wood or knife), and then walking into range of the ending would trigger the appearance of the criminal.
Funny thing is, all of the things you think should be improved upon were things that I had planned to implement but ran out of time to do! Proof of your story- and game-making mastery. This technically is a post-jam sketch of what I pictured in my head during development, not an actual pre-development concept art, but here:
MyDrawing (11).png
I technically could have done a "click or press a button to advance text" mechanic with basically no effort at all, but I made the dialogue system when I was tired (and therefore dumb and not thinking about easy solutions clearly). Maybe next Compo I'll wake up early instead of staying up late.... ๐
๐ด
I had also planned on making different backgrounds for the different endings (i.e. blood splatter background for Ending 2, player's body for Ending 1). In the end I didn't implement as much as I wanted to, but this was my first time doing the Compo and my first time seeing how long a narrative-based game with some animation would take, so at least I made something! I intentionally overscoped since this is a game idea I've had for a while, so I basically intentionally doomed myself.... switching to the Jam might have given me more time but I didn't want to try the Jam when it's the 48th 48-hour event. ๐
Thanks for all of the feedback!
@peace-of-cake-games running out of time / energy is a huge challenge, especially if you're doing compo! Having to do the writing, art, and music yourself in addition to the programming in just 48 hours is a huge challenge. That's cool that you already had all these things planned, maybe you can make a post jam version!
@sakura-magika I'm honestly not sure if I'll do a post-jam version beyond fixing the text, adding objects, polishing the graphics, etc. quite yet. Maybe if Aftermath does good in the rankings I'll make a post-jam version! (But then again I'm not really someone who considers the rankings when making post-jam versions, seeing as last Ludum Dare's game did terribly because my time management skills were terrible. I'm making a complete remake of it despite it completely flunking every category)
Good luck in the rankings! I expect your game will probably place pretty high in a lot of the categories.
I've seen some other submissions that had similar aesthetic choices to this, but yours pulls off the creepiness the best. Well done!
Thank you so much, @pierce-brooks !
kwaku
2021-04-29 07:13
I like the creepy graphics and color scheme. Somehow it reminds me vibes of Another World so that is a great plus :) however its hard to figure out the controls, like when to press, (maybe different colors?) and readability of text could be better. Also seems like A button does not work.
Thanks for the input, @kwaku ! Readability of the text is one of the first things I'm going to fix in the post-Compo version coming in the next few days, seems like most everyone agrees I made the font too hard to read.
Wait, the A button doesn't work? Thanks for letting me know, I'll look into it.
I liked the intro cutscene! it was simple enough but enjoyable! the art was also along the lings of simple but nice!
Thank you for playing, @arthur-mairs ! Nice and simple was my goal for the graphics, I decided some simple handdrawn-looking graphics would be nice for my first narrative-based game. (And also the time limits of the Compo....)
miej
2021-04-29 07:42
I am totally going to use the line "I hear chaos and destruction nearby" at the next available opportunity in a work meeting :D
xiyou
2021-04-29 07:58
I like the atmosphere of this game, very interesting
neshtyak
2021-04-29 15:14
Wow it's a bit creepy. Honestly I'm not native speaker of english and it was sometimes hard to read text because of it's speed. But anyway I've enjoyed it!
@miej ๐คฃ I'm interested to know how that'll turn out.
Thank you, @xiyou ! I was interested in making an atmospheric game since generally the games I make are just slightly bland action games, I'm glad I didn't completely fail. ๐
I'm glad you find it to be creepy, @neshtyak , because that's the exact mood I was going for! I've never made a narrative-based game, tried to have a very strong atmosphere and mood in the game, or made anything so dark, so honestly I creeped myself out a little when I did the final result of my 48 hours of work.
Sorry about the text being fast and difficult to read, I really blundered there and fixing the text will be the first thing I work on in the small post-Compo update.
Really well done on setting the mood!
Thank you, @atinybean !
I couldn't help but laugh when I got ending 1 in a matter of seconds. Not because of the writing or mood, but because I barely got to see the game yet :laughing:
I was interested to see where the writing was going to go. Because you woke up in such a confused and sudden state, I thought the player was going to be the murderer all along but couldn't see people in the correct reality. I think it's because the setup and pacing was similar to the Tales of the Black Freighter sequence in the Watchmen Director's Cut.
I looked into it too much. In some ways, the way you ended the story was more of a twist than that since it wasn't what I was expecting. Nice work exploring new kinds of games and genres, I like to do the same myself. That's what LD is really all about imo.
@peachtreeoath Ha ha, I did put Ending 1 in there rather early!
Hm, that's interesting you thought that maybe the player would be the villain. It is true that they were the murderer all along in a sense, seeing as the murderer got murdered.
I agree that Ludum Dare is all about trying something new! It's thanks to Ludum Dare that I actually have the courage to try making games for commercial release, and without Ludum Dare I would never have been introduced to the emotional power of narrative games and visual novels.
kiptok
2021-05-01 19:03
pretty atmospheric game. short but felt creepy and cool
Great work with this interesting take on the theme. I particularly liked your static fade-ins and quirky font/control instructions.
felo07
2021-05-01 19:29
hey, first impression of the game, I died waiting the game starts. I didnt feel that it was intuitive. Playing again I understood that I needed to read and press a letter for something happens. I took a knife and I dont even used for nothing, I think is missing more content.
Thanks for playing, @kiptok @tigermouse @felo07 !
@felo07 Yeah, some of the game interactions are a little uncomplete due to the low amount of time for the Compo, I had planned to have a post-Compo fix for them up and running yesterday but I haven't finished it yet.
I appreciate the multiple endings and the way they are laid out despite there being some moral judgements made on the player based on their actions. The music adds a bit to the mood as well as the details in the graphics (the blood trail for example.
One thing that was confusing was finding the memorabilia was surprising since there was no graphical representation of the photo/journal/etc as you walked by so I wasn't sure if I was missing something. Other than that I'd say taking some more time to practice your drawing skills would help to make the narrative game more immersive.
oddarock
2021-05-03 20:23
I liked the creepy tone, maybe more interactivity could have helped. Even though the texts ware hard to read but they fit well the mood. I had to read the spoilers to find the third ending.
Thank you for playing, @bentglasstube and @oddarock ! I agree that there are some important things that could be changed, I had intentionally overscoped despite this being my first Compo entry. Hopefully I will have the minor post-Compo update complete soon, I had planned on making the post-Compo update to address some of the important issues but I was unable to work on it when I had planned to.
rawbits
2021-05-04 01:01
Couldn't read the text well, it would probably be better to advance it on a trigger. I have tried 'A' but it didn't worked. Then I saw that written in blue on blue (that is bad) with acircle. So assume it's a controller button thing. Music was very annoying, it hurt. Sorry! About the theme. I haven't found any progression. So there is nothing deeper in it.
@rawbits Oops, I guess I didn't specifically write "A *button*". Sorry about the confusion! Pressing A does indeed only work on an Xbox 360/One/Series X|S controller, the keyboard interaction controls are exclusively Z and X instead of A and B. (Apparently some of the ABXY buttons on my Nintendo Switch Pro Controller work too, not sure which button is which in relation to an Xbox controller) Probably should have made it change the text depending on whether or not a controller is connected.
As for the use of the theme, when I upvoted "Deeper and deeper" I knew that almost everyone would go with the obvious digging or diving game. The way the theme was implemented in Aftermath is sinking deeper and deeper into feelings of vengeance (or in the case of Ending 1, pain that ends in death). I've never really been someone to take a theme or idea literally when the easiest idea is obvious to everyone.... honestly I'm not incredibly impressed with this Ludum Dare's theme.
Impressive attempt at a narrative game in the very tight time constraints of the compo. GG well done
Thank you, @cheesepencil ! 48 hours is certainly harder than I thought, now I see why it's best to focus on the story rather than "proper" gameplay.
kr4ft3r
2021-05-05 22:19
Hey, congrats on finishing a Compo game in time. There is a start and the end (at least 3 endings that I found), so you actually finished it rather than getting sidetrack by countless other things.
Blood trail while walking is a nice touch. Graphic may be simple but it feels fitting.
In case you want to know how it went for me, first I got the worst ending as I was too busy thinking about what choice to go for after reading the text and didn't make any selection in time. On second attempt I went all the way left past the pole and outside of screen edge, which made the character invisible even when I returned back to the scene (I'm good at finding the worst possible thing to do in games), so that called for a restart. After a restart I went again towards the pole and used it, which gave me that rope ending. Figuring out what the deal will be, I replayed again just to read what happens with the knife option.
Story had a good induction, made me angry&sad and all, perhaps the weakest part was towards the end where people/person who did this are/is described as "a criminal" without any other explanation. Yet this may also be a more honest approach.. when faced with horrible stories our brains are made to look for someone to blame and to get a full explanation of what happened, which can sometimes be used against us and we end up being fed an explanation given by media, while the reality can be more complex or not even what the story told us at all. Again, congrats on finishing a Compo entry, it was an interesting experience and I hope you keep creating.
@kr4ft3r Thanks for playing, and the extensive feedback! Regarding going too far to the left and disappearing: yeeeaaaaaah, that's a bug. I forgot to make it so the player can't walk off the edge of the world! ๐ The game is still beatable though, the player will just be falling Alice-style (without the pixel art butt) underneath the ground of the world and you can make them move right and left still. I have some more details about it up in the **Known Issues** section of the game page. The weird thing is, I had an almost identical bug last Ludum Dare....
Nice job getting every ending! There are three different endings, and if you find the criminal with or without the knife (but still without the rope) there are actually two variations. (Further described in the **How to unlock all of the endings** part of the game page. It requires you to click it to view it)
Wow, some real philosophical thought about how one-dimensional and plain the antagonist is.... a lot of this game is up to the player to interpret, but the general bit of info is that person you end up either killing or apprehending is in fact villainous. They burned down a town of innocent people....
I may have managed to make a Compo game with actual endings, but I read your Fall Of Alice devlog, and I'm impressed! You and your partner made a pretty solid game in much less time than me. (I worked myself to death, just gamedev and sleeping took up about 36 hours, and it was a busy weekend for me too so I have no idea how I managed to get ~20 hours of gamedev.) I hope to see more of your fun creations in future Ludum Dares!
My friend, congratulations on your game, I liked to see you staring at the make up, you played a psychological game, it was really daring and still with different endings, congratulations, keep evading and soon you will reap good fruits of your work, a unique suggestion to leave the texts a little further down, it is good to meet you again, a big hug.
Thank you so much for the feedback and encouragement, @etrealjunior ! I can't wait to see what you make next Ludum Dare, a big hug to you too!
Got all 3 endings, amazed at what you achieved in 48 hrs. Hand-drawn style is unique, but text was harder to read and there were times dialogue continued before I finished reading. Well you already know that, so last ending that kinda didn't make sense, everyone is gone and just you and them are left so by tying them up either you are burning them alive, or starving them to death. That is downright more evil than just killing xD. Also super amazed that you made a software for art and music yourself. Good game!
Thanks for playing, @ansh-mishra ! Definitely made a mistake deciding not to scrap that font.... whenever I get around to making a post-Compo version the text is the first thing getting fixed. ๐
haiyoooo
2021-05-07 06:47
Muauahuahua vengence! Muauahauuhaaaa! I loved the mood of this game! Very good choice of color palette and music
Thank you, @haiyoooo ! Mwahahahahahh vengeance indeed!! ๐ป
zimny11
2021-05-09 00:12
Interesting approach to the theme. I managed to get 3 endings (I missed "extra" one). My only complaint would be the screen transition. I think I understand what effect you were aiming for with this transition screen, but the many bright colored pixels changing rapidly was a bit much for my eyes.
@zimny11 Thanks, noted that I'll have to tweak the transition. It's a simple noise effect that I used as a faster way to make a transition, I'll be sure to do a better transition effect.
kooky
2021-05-09 14:46
Oooh, a Construct 3 game. I'm very much a fan of Construct! It's also really cool to hear that you used your own programs to make the art and music!
Nice presentation, I love how you presented the intro cutscene and transition! I also love multiple endings. Good work on writing the narrative.
Additionally, I like the trailing blood, and the eerie audio and atmosphere. Audio definitely adds a lot to the mood.
Well done!
Thanks, @kooky ! Always happy to see a fellow Construct fan.
Looks like your C2 game is lacking some ratings.... time for me to do some gaming! ๐ฎ
A very grim story. I was reading about the cremation fires in India around the time I played this, it really set me on edge. But I like the fact that you have multiple endings. The positive ending โ not being "consumed by the darkness of hate" โ is reassuring. I guess it's just me, I always like stories with positive endings (or relatively positive, as in this case). The graphics, music, and game-play all fit together very well.
I would say more but I am way behind on play and rate โ our server was offline for a while and I was busy with some other things at the same time. Now I need to scramble to catch up with LD. Anyway, congratulations โ this is a very impressive entry for the Compo.
Thanks so much for playing, @gamebuilder ! I'm glad you liked it, I honestly had no idea if I would finish since this was an overscoped concept I had been wanting to make a game of for a while. It's not quite as polished as your entry, but at least I made something playable, especially when I was using untested features and apps....
Neat little game! Much darker than the usual fare here, for sure. Pretty impressive you were able to cobble together 4 different endings in a single weekend!
Thanks for playing @coleslaughter ! Not going to lie, I honestly have no idea how I managed to get 4 endings implemented in one weekend, I was working on it right up until the deadline and as is apparently tradition for me now, I eliminated critical bugs within the last few seconds. ๐ Honestly I'm proud of my dark little game having more than one ending despite not getting to do everything I wanted. (That's what I get for intentionally overscoping ๐
)
togis
2021-05-15 01:16
As promise, I finally had time to play your game on stream :) Here is a link to the correct place in the video: https://www.youtube.be/watch?v=Sx1MQ445u7k&t=4274s
What a nice well package litle narative game. I really enjoyed it.
The spacing between letters in the text made it super hard for me to read, maybe something related to dyslexia, but it could be fixed really easily.
Other than that, nice graphics, mostly in the waking up scene, and I enjoyed the way the story evolve naturally according to your actions instead of just dialog choices.
Congratulation! Very cool game
Thanks for playing my game on stream, @togis ! Sorry about the awkward word spacing, I think I rushed the font a bit much. ๐ Whenever I get around to making a post-jam game (I gave up on the idea of a post-jam update since there's too much to be improved) the font is right at the top of the to-do list.
I'm glad you liked the graphics of the little opening cutscene, I don't code cutscenes very often so that ended up sucking away 3 or 4 hours of time. ๐
Glad to know it didn't end up being a total waste.
All right, finished the playback of the stream, thanks for all of the great in-depth feedback! It's not often I get to see other people play my projects without me giving them hints; getting honest feedback and letting the player experience everything fully on their own really helps me figure out what could be better.
Sorry about the bad text, strong flashing, audio, and fast and unskippable dialog system, guess I really don't work well late at night. ๐โโ๏ธ๐
All of those were things I was implementing at 2 or 3 AM in the morning, now I know to get up early instead of going to sleep late. I really could have made a better dialog system if I hadn't ended up being pretty dumb when programming at 3 AM, I made a working dialog system in about 5 minutes earlier just to show myself that I could have done better. ๐ด I'll definitely be adjusting this into a polished post-jam game that basically fixes up everything that could be better or didn't make it due to the strict 48 hours.
laaph
2021-05-15 14:18
I love this! It's not the greatest game but I love this sort of homemade feel. I love the music, as others said, it's very well creepy. I am curious what program you used to make the font - font-makers unite! :fist_tone2:
@laaph Thanks for playing! *"It's not the greatest game but I love this sort of homemade feel"* is basically exactly what I aim for; I like making games with a strong feel of homemade-ness coming from them, sort of like a proof of my efforts. I won't ever be the best artist or sound developer out there, so why worry about that? I like to make games people can just enjoy playing.
I actually made the font with Construct 3's SpriteFont plugin, it allows you to make and edit fonts on the fly by pulling up font data from a Sprite-style image you draw right inside of Construct 3. It's pretty effective for making fast handdrawn or pixelated fonts and not having to spend time surfing the web for free fonts. Looks like I deleted my dev screensnip of me drawing the font since I didn't think I would need to keep them since I kept forgetting to take dev screensnips throughout the development. If you're interested in the font it's right here:
Aftermath Font.png
(It looks pretty bad in-game because I forgot to edit the character and word spacing....)
fupi
2021-05-18 17:56
Here's some notes I took while playing: - Cool moody graphics - I'd prefer if I could skip the dialogue - Music kinda hurts my ears - I walked all the way to the left expecting an ending and fell through the floor :d - Text is really small and the font is hard to read - Can I not get the knife on the floor? - Oh I think I understand, you can only reach the end with one item at a time. - Wish there was something more to do than just walking right and choosing an ending..
Ok I got all the endings. I can't really say it was a very engaging game but I think it does a nice job of setting a mood.
Thanks for playing @fupi ! I 100% agree that the text was poorly made and spaced and too small, I put myself in charge of the graphical and gameplay stuff like object interaction and text design at around 2 AM each night, so my game is pretty weak in those aspects. Trying to make the game have a little bit of gameplay was a bit of a blunder, I'm a total idiot when I do Ludum Dare programming too late at night. ๐ด
Sorry about walking off the edge of the world. ๐โโ๏ธ As I noted in the Known Issues it technically doesn't break the game, but it's still a pain. (I probably should have made a bug fix patch by now, but I'm waiting to do any post-Compo updates since there's too much that the Compo's small time limit scratched off of my to-make list.... I plan on making a post-Compo version with everything I could have made if I had 24 more hours.)
fupi
2021-05-18 18:34
What this game lacks in gameplay it totally makes up for in charm though, so don't worry too much!
Thanks for the kind words, @fupi ! ๐
vphyre
2021-05-18 19:18
A very emotional and interesting game. I like the way you made the game. The graphics are simple but functional, as well as the sound. The text content is very interesting as well. In general for a game made in 48 hours by a single person, you can deliver a good game. Congratulations.
Obs: I really agree with what you commented on my game page. Our interpretations of the theme were similar hahaha. Just as you are following me here at ludum dare, I will be following you too. I wish you success!
moski
2021-05-18 19:54
I like these atmospheric experiences. Very daunting.
firefox_QxToDQIU1i.png
I'm glad I managed to get to this one on time just before the ratings end. It'll be my last game of the jam, and it's quite a fitting closure, I'd say. A character dying as the jam wraps up. We should all be poets :muscle:
Anyhow, you asked me for opinions on the sprites and visuals, so I'll focus on that. First of, mad respect to you and all participants of the compo who have to do all of the work on their own in so little time. If the sprites of ours are applauded, it's only because I'm a dedicated artist with a fantastic team that does the heavy lifting everywhere else. Any compo participant, regardless of skill level, impresses me more than what someone in my situation can do.
In your case, I'd say that your game does a fantastic job when it comes to use of practical effects. The intro in particular, with the stars, the TV static and the glows, it really sets up the first person atmosphere. Some of that is lost when the core of the game starts, but it still fits the atmosphere of the game.
Sure, I wouldn't call your sprites pretty or outstanding, but at the very least, they serve the purpose of representing what they're meant to do without looking clunky, intrusive or out of place. The main character sprite does look good, even if the animation loop is a bit iffy. I can attribute that to the protagonist shambling around in pain, but even then, the shuffling could have been a bit better.
Regardless of that, the only suggestion I'd give you would be to do a bit more "thought" practice. Not to make "better looking" sprites per se, but to try to get the mentality of how things could look before you sprite them. Let's say, for a Compo like this, your character sprite - with 3 frames - is sufficient and looks good. But 2 out of those 3 frames could look more varied to make the character feel like it's moving more. The houses maybe could have had some rectangles or squares around or random strokes to show that they're broken. Put a lot of white blots in the sky for stars. Small things that shouldn't take you much longer to implement, nor have to spend weeks of practice if this is not your expertise.
My point is, there are different areas to improve on. "More quality" is one thing, but I'd recommend you to do "more varied" instead. With that I mean that you don't nead to do "much better", but rather, more diverse. You can use the same style you've got, but with some smart tweaks, it could pop more.
Those are just my opinions on the matter. The core game works well, tells its neat story as it needs to, and is short but effective. A welcome addition to the Ludum Dare compo roster. Do keep up the good work! :thumbsup:
Thanks, @vphyre , I'm glad you enjoyed my game! (And yeah, our games are pretty similar but it's clear that your team is better at getting more polish in!)
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Wow, @moski , thank you for all of the feedback! I'm glad you liked the opening cutscene (I used up about a 5th of my development time on it ๐
), and I do agree that the player animations could use more frames, there could be some stars in the sky, etc. This was quite an ambitious project for me, since a majority of the tools and plugins I used were experimental and untested, plus this was my first time making a game in under 2 days. I intentionally overscoped.... ๐
I honestly don't remember if I added some little details to the wrecked houses, I haven't opened the project file in weeks except for when I retrieved that image of the protagonist.... ๐ค Generally I build games at a 480p resolution since that was the default window size of a project in Construct 2, the engine I first used for learning to program games. The advantage of it is I'm pretty good at eyeballing how big images need to be, but the downside is little details often get unseen when it upscales. Next Ludum Dare I'll be sure to try and put the resolution closer to 720p so little details don't get erased when the canvas upscales. (I'm betting that 720p won't have to be downscaled for anyone, even my relatively small screen size is around 720p resolution.)
> Iโm glad I managed to get to this one on time just before the ratings end. Itโll be my last game of the jam, and itโs quite a fitting closure, Iโd say. A character dying as the jam wraps up. We should all be poets
That is quite a fitting ending! It's quite a nice ending to LD48 for me, too, having the last reviewer be none other than a game artist I certainly look up to as a superior artist. ๐