Dreamer's Depths

mduo13 2021-04-26 02:29

I cleared it! I like the concept of boosting into ledges to jump so much I kind of wish the game didn't have a traditional jump button. The atmosphere of the background images and color palettes works well, and I really like the "portal to the next level" effect.

The placement of the hearts is on-point. I was just barely at low health when I got to them several times. Props for that.

It's kind of tricky how going over even a really small hump can cause you to become airborne. There's one spot in the second level (where you double back to going left) that's especially difficult to navigate because of that.

kraemahz 2021-04-26 03:47

Thanks for playing! I'm glad you enjoyed it. I tried to fix most of the issues in playtesting but it was sometimes a struggle to get areas exactly how they needed to be. I'll try to fix it in a patch later.

jibberwocky 2021-04-26 05:21

The noise of the crows and snakes was quite jarring (might have been better if they were slightly quieter) which is a shame because the sound for the dash jump was really satisfying. The dash jump mechanic just felt really good in general (art+sound+momentum). I like how the first level had plenty of opportunities to do it by accident before being formally taught about it.

goodman233 2021-04-26 05:33

I really like the feeling of the dash-jump and the atmosphere of the graphics,nice game.

kraemahz 2021-04-26 21:24

@jibberwocky Yeah sorry about that. I knew the sounds were out of balance but I was right up against the deadline and all the energy went out of me as soon as I finished.

minibobbo 2021-04-27 04:01

Like others have mentioned, the dash jump is super fun. I discovered it by accident in the first level and sued it to skip large sections and thought it was an unexpected interaction of the abilities, but then I was pleasantly surprised to see it becomes a major movement mechanic.

Music was fine, graphics work well. I think you need the other half of the walk cycle because when only one leg ends up in front it looks like the character is limping along. The character looks and animates nicely though, in spite of that, so nice job! :smile:

I also would have liked to see some checkpoints or something in the game so a game over didn't take me all the way back to the beginning of the game. I actually got stuck at the beginning of the third level where I baaaaarely made the large jump and landed right on the corner. I then slid off the back and lost a heart. I respawned back onto the same place and immediately slid off again. Repeat 3 times and game over.

I think you can speed up the crows also. They mostly just require waiting around for them to pass harmlessly over your head.

I really liked the movement in this game. I'd be interested to play it if you get a chance to polish it up a little. I get the overall impression that you were about 85 - 90% of the way there and ran out of time.

kraemahz 2021-04-27 18:11

@minibobbo Thanks for playing and the detailed feedback! You are absolutely correct about the time crunch, I finished the boss in the last hour before the compo ended and that day was something like 16 hours of straight work.

I appreciate the tool I was using to make the ramps since it made the game possible (https://github.com/SirRamEsq/SmartShape2D) but it had some really sharp edges around quick content creation that made me cut a bunch of level content due to some of the automation breaking pretty consistently.

My animations definitely need work, this was the first time I ever did pixel animation :laughing:. And sorry you had to do it all over again, I didn't have time for polishing but I figured it was such a short game resetting wouldn't take that much time since you had already seen most of the obstacles.

alina-baybulatova 2021-04-28 17:20

Interesting idea and good atmosphere) I really have fun to play this game! Thank you) And so cool graphic and sounds) Great job!

zondarg 2021-04-28 18:27

Cool, some sounds were a bit loud (got really spooked by the crows in level 2) and you can do enormous dash-skips. But otherwise, runs fine. I like the visuals of the dream portals a lot, that looks very cool. Nice story too. And.. Godot! :v: Good work! :thumbsup:

wheffle 2021-04-29 00:35

I liked the premise and the dash-jumps were super fun. Sometimes while you were walking normally you kinda left the ground on slopes, which caused me to miss a few jumps. Some of the sound effects made me poop my pants, I think just toning the volume down on them would have fixed that. I appreciate the dialogue and story, that effort brought a lot to the game. Also the portals into the next world looked super dope. The boss fight was simple but pretty satisfying as well. I enjoyed it quite a bit, nice work.

Also, good to see another Godot user. :fist:

sonicpixelation 2021-04-29 03:46

Nice job with the game. the slope dash is a cool mechanic idea. I can imagine a full game coming from that.

jitspoe 2021-04-29 08:10

I liked the momentum-based aspect of using the dashes into a slope to launch yourself! As mentioned before, sometimes it would lift you in the air walking on slopes and cause you to fail to jump.

noobdude 2021-05-01 12:01

cute little game, i didnt manage to finish it but i did reach something that seemed like a boss fight, im impressed by the fact that you had time to make a boss fight at all, good job.

tengusheath 2021-05-03 05:21

I like the art style

shumarie 2021-05-05 00:34

I like dash jump and its interaction with the level geometry. The music is also very good and adds to the atmosphere.

As for the technical details: sometimes touching nearby enemies does not count, and the game does not take a life for it.

From the point of view of writing the script, it is not very good that the character at the beginning breaks through the fourth wall when he names the keyboard buttons. This destroys the viewer's belief that the world on the screen is real, and prevents immersion in the story. It is better to separate the hints for the player from the direct speech of the character. Unless, of course, the break through the fourth wall is used to deliberately create an effect. Like, for example, in «Deadpool» or «Fight Club».

The easiest way to make the text visually different for telling the story and explaining the controls is to use different colors and / or fonts for different types of information. You can also select a different location for the hint, such as the center of the screen. You can do it differently: provide an explanation of the controls on a separate slide, where there will be no replicas of the character.

The graphics is generally good. Some objects can be more precisely adjusted to each other, because they are not made in exactly the same style. For example, the menu is very different from the images inside the game. The face is drawn quite realistic, and the character in the game and the landscape are more stylized and more cartoon-like. The background on the level is not perfect for the game objects and the ground, because it is more detailed and similar to the photo.

I think it would be great to additionally add a parallax effect to the background by breaking the background into layers. This will add depth to the environment.

In general, the game turned out to be interesting. I liked the connection with Greek mythology and the gods responsible for dreams.

notexplosive 2021-05-05 02:09

Some cool ideas but the jumping felt really inconsistent because half the time I was technically "in the air" and therefore couldn't jump and would hit obstacles. I think instead of a health system I would have rather died in one hit and just had more forgiving checkpoints throughout the level.

It felt good to dash up a shallow slope, especially when it wasn't the clear intended way to get through the level!

cakts 2021-05-05 03:06

Awesome platformer mechanics, only issue I really had was the audio mixing being a bit loud in some places, but that was easily ignored, enjoyable game overall :D