FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD48 → Obelisk

Obelisk

By caeonosphere

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall1063.9537
Fun2333.6837
Innovation2413.6037
Theme2993.8137
Graphics2433.7737
Audio1873.6336
Mood2403.6235

Comments

caue-henrique 2021-04-26 18:57

Great game! Really fits the theme and it's really engaging. Love the art style and music. Would be pretty nice if I could use the skills using the keyboard, other than that, really good game! 8/10

vladislav-lesen 2021-04-27 06:59

Когда видишь игры с русский названием, написанным латиницей, ждёшь большого подвоха. Но здесь всё весьма круто и интересно. Новая механика затянула, имеется даже прокачка персонажа в лице фишки для настолки. Уровни сделаны очень стильно, лишь противники выбиваются из колеи, круто было бы и врагов нарисовать в таком же минималистичном стиле. В целом шик, блеск, роскошь) Десять настольных игр из десяти!

caeonosphere 2021-04-27 11:37

@caue-henrique Thanks for the suggestion! I just uploaded a bugfix build with skill hotkeys, among other things.

@vladislav-lesen Я могу только надеяться, что Google правильно перевел ваш комментарий. Спасибо, что играете в ОБЕЛИСК.

gimmers 2021-04-27 11:58

This was a really cool idea and interesting take on the theme. I couldn't figure out a good strategy, so my playthroughs normally meant I would get hit on most levels and eventually get overwhelmed and die. However, the overall experience was very satisfying, with clean gameplay mechanics and aesthetically pleasing visuals and sounds. Great work!

thegamerasd 2021-04-27 17:19

Good job! The mechanics were simple but fun and the music was nice.

ccglp 2021-04-28 11:40

Fits very well the theme and has a nice aesthetic and a clever magic system. Very good entry. The difficulty ramps up very nice also :)

hidjy 2021-04-28 11:53

One of the best I played so far! The mini tutorial level is a great touch :)

I would be curious to see what would be a slightly more puzzly (and less rpg-like) version, with instant kill, more predictable/manipulable enemy pattern and maybe inter-level interaction.

milan8890 2021-04-28 12:54

Probably the best i played so far! Love it!

caeonosphere 2021-04-28 23:17

@ccglp I'm glad you found the difficulty okay, turns out it's pretty hard to get right!

@hidjy Agreed about leaning into the puzzle aspect, that'd be a good direction to take it. I was initially planning on using the two levels a little more, but I ran out of time! A version with more content would definitely have that: dropping things to the floor below, enemies teleporting up to come after you, that kind of thing.

dom-de-re 2021-04-29 09:29

Fantastic game, crisp graphics and the depth of gameplay is pretty deep for a 48 hr effort

bassguitarbill 2021-04-29 09:29

image_2021-04-29_052945.png :(

caeonosphere 2021-04-29 09:31

@bassguitarbill ...

:(

slowfrog-again 2021-04-29 09:46

It took me more time than I want to admit to understand that I was supposed to jump into that hole in the first pre-level :grimacing:

Very nice experience after that, discovering the mechanics and powers of enemies and upgrades. Reminded me a bit of DROD, when you need to *dance* with enemies at a distance to get to a favorable position.

udo 2021-04-29 09:54

I had problems running the macOS version, but running "chmod -R 755 ObeliskOSX0.2.app" on it fixed it.

I loved the clarity and simplicity of this design, VERY well done! I also love the fact that you made a procedural roguelike for the Compo, that's really outstanding. I think I played about 5 runs, but the problem for me was always running out of HP. I couldn't really use the active abilities to great either, although I didn't see the one that does more damage until it was too late :laughing:

Obelisk is a game I'll definitely revisit after rating is done, just to see how far I can get!

caeonosphere 2021-04-29 10:04

@slowfrog-again Ah jeez, glad you made it! I may add a couple lines of in-game tutorial text if other folks have the same problem.

@udo Thanks for the heads up, I've actually run into that before and totally forgot. I've replaced the .zip with a .tar: for some reason that's fixed it in the past. Thanks for playing, and let me know if you get a high score! (My best is around 18 or so.) I hope you'll forgive any balance issues — it gets pretty rough pretty quick, but I feel like a full rebalance would be skirting LD rules a little too much.

thomas-bringer 2021-04-29 10:09

Amazing game! Gameplay is very strategic & interesting. Loved the different enemies. Really unique mix of puzzle and roguelike. And with great visuals & audio. I'm impressed, congrats! :D

madhumster 2021-04-29 13:29

Very interesting gameplay. I like the art style and overall mood of the game. I was a bit confused at first but figured out all mechanics on second run. Great job!

fabighindaru 2021-04-29 14:38

The music was great, the concept was great, the graphics were great. In case you haven't realized it by now the game was great!

I am now afraid of wizards... (or cultists?)

michaelyount 2021-04-30 11:57

Keep them away! Those little enemies are relentless. Really fun game Thanks.

maaxoom 2021-04-30 13:21

Cool rougelike! I think the mouse hover didn't worked or am I missing something?

metadept 2021-04-30 16:06

There's a ton to appreciate here. It feels very well polished and has mechanical depth, I love the little indicators for enemy health and abilities, and everything plays very smoothly. My one big criticism is that it feels like there's a lot of unavoidable damage (because of enemies with larger HP pools, or obstacles generated in the only path to the exit) and no way to heal, so I felt like my tactical decisions weren't the deciding factor in my success or failure. Great job overall, though!

domin77 2021-04-30 16:20

Amazing game. I really like the gameplay and music. Sometimes it was pretty hard to avoid some enemies but I still enjoyed the game. Good job :)

caeonosphere 2021-04-30 22:24

@maaxoom That could be — you actually have to hover over the tile the enemy is standing on, rather than the enemy, so it can be kind of confusing. If you happen to try that and it still doesn't work, let me know.

@metadept Yeah, there's definitely some unavoidable damage. You do actually heal in between floors, and there are a couple abilities that give you ways to heal, but I would have liked something a little more consistent, some assurance that levels were "solvable" or at least guaranteed healing. Wasn't in the cards for 48 hours...

blinry 2021-05-01 22:10

Fantastic compo submission! We played it in a group of three, and it kept us engaged every step of the way – we loved how the mechanics were introduced one by one; how often you can make decisions that feel meaningful; how well all rules weave into one another (like the mechanic about lingering); we liked the minimalist, clean presentation!

After playing it, we immediately all wanted to do a second round, and made it to level 20, I think! :)

Maybe that's the only criticism I can think of: it seemed like all the new and exciting things were introduced in the first 2/3 of playing, while the last 1/3 didn't feel as fresh anymore. Oh yeah, and we were also a bit stumped by the title screen! :D

Thanks so much for making this! (I also enjoyed looking at the time lapse you recorded!)

caeonosphere 2021-05-02 04:37

@blinry Aww! Thanks for playing, y'all. Yeah, there isn't a ton of content; I had plenty of unimplemented ideas that would have spiced up the later floors, but it didn't quite happen. Lots of time I wish I could have gotten back, as the time lapse shows: 30 minutes making that dang brick texture, making all those symbols that didn't even make it into the game... many time-management lessons learned this time around.

sheepolution 2021-05-02 09:52

Nice game. I think it could be a bit more balanced, e.g. getting more health back when you drop a floor. Every time I die I feel like I couldn't really do much about it. It's cool that you have these abilities and that you have a max of four, allowing you to make the choice which you want to keep or not. The music is nice. Good job!

tengusheath 2021-05-03 05:07

Really nice atmospheric music

loveapplegames 2021-05-06 20:45

Great game! Addictive and polished. Sometimes it seemed impossible to not get killed. But I did progress a little more every time. Nice to discover the different spells and how to use them.

chillen 2021-05-06 20:55

Very cool! Looks and sounds excellent, the mechanics are quite fun, and the opponents have some cool mechanics behind them. Could really make for a good mobile puzzler if it emphasized the puzzle elements more. I think two ways to lean into it would be to make the opponent's next move more obvious to give the player more readily available info (are they going to punch me? for how much damage? Maybe they'll cast a spell? Slay-the-Spire/Into the Breach style forecasting), and then really focusing on orthogonal unit differentiation (each unit has a specific script to defeat them, and interesting choices are spawned when opposing units are mixed together).

VERY good stuff! Really liked the vibe, nailed the theme in an interesting way, and just fun gameplay.

caeonosphere 2021-05-06 22:36

@chillen Thanks! Yeah, displaying "intents" would be a good way of making the game more predictable as a puzzler. You also mention unit differentiation; this would put the game more in line with the games that inspired it, like *868-HACK*.

mrtroy 2021-05-08 05:00

I absolutely can NOT get pass level 14. That is always where I die every single time :(

This game is a lot of fun. Is it winnable or endless?

caeonosphere 2021-05-08 06:18

@mrtroy It is sadly not winnable, just gets harder and harder until you die, like some kind of interactive parable about mortality. Level 20 seems to be the hard limit, as far as I've seen. Wish I had had more time to work on the difficulty curve...