Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD48 → Aleph Qoph / Duat
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 929 | 3.50 | 42 | |
| Fun | 1515 | 2.91 | 42 | |
| Innovation | 337 | 3.75 | 42 | |
| Theme | 494 | 3.94 | 41 | |
| Graphics | 892 | 3.70 | 42 | |
| Audio | 640 | 3.51 | 38 | |
| Humor | 1287 | 2.18 | 32 | |
| Mood | 188 | 4.15 | 42 |
Very cool! 3D games in a jam are always kind of impressive to me, especially for a one man job. Atmosphere and music are great, graphics are honestly cute. Camera FOV is too short and the camera speed too quick, so I got nauseated rather fast.
Love the style! I had a lot of fun roaming around in the desert.
I loved the graphics but the gameplay left something to be desired. I was really hoping to find something interesting in the desert, but it was only more sand.
I played it around 15 Minutes and didnt feel like the story is realy going to keep going anymore. The camera near clipping plane is a little too far away so i sometimes see though the floor. Graphics and mood was realy nice. I could also imagine some kind of slenderman gameplay with it
Great visuals, really liked the warping and texturing in general. I placed the things and it guided my soul for today, namaste!
I were lost in the desert. :-) Is there some pointer to the oasis? Walking in the desert is the good idea for the game. There were something strange with ground surface under character. This is look like the deformation. Was it by design?
Wow I had so much patience with this game because I wanted to see the ending. It was an interesting story but the game didn't have any gameplay. At the end it says "Feel free to search for other players" so the game is multiplayer ? And those black shadows were other players? Wow this was a really weird game. Good job! Capture.PNG
I was first a little confused about the game, since I didn't read the description but after I did, I understood that the goal was to make the oasis bigger. The problem is, that I didn't quite understand how. I planted the word in the oasis and nothing happened :( On my first play ( before I read the description) I wandered off in the desert and focused on the story, which was really well written. I didn't finish reading it though, since it was really really long and I didn't have much to do. I am really impressed by the technical aspect of the game, since the world is infinetly big, 3d and also multiplayer. The mood was pretty good because the music, graphics and story matched really well and I felt kinda trapped in a surreal world. Good Job :)
ooh wow so I walked for what felt like 20 minutes and am not sure at all whether the oasis is real (I believe it is). The graphics were very much my aesthetic, I just love meshes with gritty pixel art. Also it ran really smooth on my potato computer. The 'mutliplayer' gave me some Journey vibes, could imagine the tech in combination with some proximity-based conference tech (like Workadventure) to work for virtual meetups even.
None of my seeds sprouted, I guess I should have persevered and continued further. As much as I like the meditative aspect of that, I think for a jam game you should take into account the mind-space of the players which is 'I want to play and rate many games' and reduce the experience to be digestible in 10-15 minutes. You might be underestimating the (sadly short) attention span of the average player.
Anyway it's beautiful, even if I didn't get to see the flowers!
@judah-doupe Yep, I wanted to do more, but afterall, a jam has to end^^
@viktor-dedek Thanks for helping the oasis to grow :)
@yuri-yakovlev Thank you for playing! You can only find back to the oasis, if you mark the way with "putting words" into the sand. If you pick up a symbol, you can use it anywhere to leave a marking stone. The stange warping is from the skewed sprites as this is not a true 3d game and engine :)
@tudypie Yeah, thank you! This game is multiplayer and the other shadows are other players. Unfortunately i didnt have enough time to implement a true ending or purpose^^
@drskort Thank you very much!
@minotalen Thank youo for the kind words! I would have like a proximity based system to hug and exchange words - maybe sometimes Ill work on it some more :)
I feel like words could be 'synthesized' when mingling with other players perhaps, that might be cool!
Thanks for the game! The multiplayer aspect of it was cool. I played for 10 minutes and as others have said have found it rather empty, while inspiring. Amazing atmosphere and good job on the 3D engine, even if it's wonky it's still a lot of work I'm sure.
@thevinter thank you for playing! Yes it was, and Ive learnt a lot :smiley:
What a delicates, it was a privilege to walk around in this sandy engine.
Sadly, on my first run, where I spent most of the time (until end of story), I did not had any player encounter, nor did I ran into water surface again to try planting seeds there. Might be just due to me moving mostly in one direction. Impressive work either way.
Planted 2 trees but then got lost x) (shouldnt have walked too far off my markers haha. Was really surprised by the multiplayer! One person guided me around for a while which felt really awesome! Great Job on this Game, seriously impressed :O
@junamai well, guessing your posting time, it was me :smile:
ohmygoodness how did you make this for a JAM! you are truly magical
@wizard-sino Thank you :smiley:
It felt pretty weird and confusing, but after some time, I found the first matching letter and everything became clear…
Using stones as marker is actually clever, I didn’t thought of that :open_mouth:
Also I thought you have implemented affine transformations for the textures, but you made that engine/3D all by yourself? Impressive…
So, I had a number of problems with input, that made it a bit unplayable for me unfortunately :( Mouse look was moving waay too fast, even when I turned down my mouse dpi so it moves stupidly slowly, didn't seem to effect the game. Also, when I had the game in not-fullscreen, it keeps pulling the view down. The super fast movement in fullscreen kinda gave me motion sickness so I couldn't really continue.
It looks really cool though. The PS1 style warpy textures are very nice :D
@wheybags thanks for playing, sorry to hear about your issues. Do you use any special monitor setup? 4k/double/triple monitors?
4k double monitors, yep
EDIT: also, on firefox on windows 10
@wheybags thx for the info, maybe I can patch something in :smile: 4k is certainly the issue - as for pulling the view down, it could be a gamepad issue (if one is plugged in) or something else browser related. I only tested quickly in firefox and opera but developed with chrome.
Really loved the graphics style. The first time I just walked around reading the story. Would love to have seen other players, but I guess nobody was around. Really cool and very unique game! By the way, tried using an XBox one controller but the left mapping for the right stick wasn't working, instead the left trigger was controlling left/right which was sort of unusable
Great idea on the theme, and the graphics are so nostalgic, it gave a big throw back to old 3D games like Banjo and PS1 Crash Team Racing! I would suggest having a lower sensitivity as it was a little difficult to get used to, but once I got used to it the game play was fine. Great narrative though!
@vknauss Oh no, which browser and pad do you use, if I may ask? If anything fails, yoou can use the arrow keys to look around^^
@humphreysmedia Thank you, yes, I got used to it too and had "developer blindness" - now I am working on a quick fix (especially bc its worse on 4k displays :grimacing: )
I dont have other monitors to test with, but I believe I found a solution for the mouse sensitivity in 4k or different monitor setups @wheybags if you are able too test it, I would be very grateful :)
Also I labeled the menu buttons to be less confusing and am monitoring a problem, where a tree seed planted in the grass wouldnt spawn a tree sometimes. Which must be related to synching issues between players... i dont fully know yet
I uploaded our gameplay of your game on youtube, you can find it here: https://www.youtube.be/watch?v=KLwrzc7DkDo&t=10065s
Thanks for being part of the stream, yesterday was amazing! :smile:
It's a gamble to use a radically different graphical style and I applaud you for it. Unfortunately, it really hurt my eyes and I couldn't play super long. I tried on a smaller screen too and the issue was the same.
Too bad because I found the premise interesting and would have love to start planting breadcrumbs-tree around to go deeper and deeper until I find the perfect seed. (at least that's what I understood from the game)
I feel like your name @ancient-pixel is on point for this game!
@togis Thank you for playing it, once again I am sorry that you couldnt enjoy the graphics - the name is the game :grimacing: Next time should at least double the resolution :sweat_smile: btw the text in the tree was some usual javascript shenanigans bc alpha = 0 apparently isnt always 0^^
As everyone else has said the mouse sensitivity precludes my spending too much time exploring the world. Clearly you are working on fixing the issue. I've got to say the atmosphere is genius, even if there was no definite goal or purpose I really enjoyed wandering around and learning about the world. I do hope you continue to work on it, or a similar project. Very cool!
@ancient-pixel I was using a Xbox one controller on firefox esr. I played through no problem with the mouse though :)
@vknauss thx for the info :)
@threeli Thank you very much :)
Wow! I loved your game! My favorite part: you showed me that you can do a 3D game in Phaser, which I didn't know before playing your game. It was obvious that you didn't use Unity (like the majority of people in this jam) which always makes me get interested to see what engine was used. So I was surprised to see Phaser, so I had to go through your source code to figure out how you did it. I love puzzles like that! My only feedback maybe a way to find your way back to the oasis? I felt very lost, but maybe that's the point! Nice game!
@caramelcode Thank you and thx for the effort going thorugh my uncommented code XD yep, getting lost is what you can do but actually I should have done more, than just give the players waystones to place - like autoorientating them to face to the oasis, or let the sand show the direction with its lines - smth like that :smiley:
I think this has a lot of potential if you keep working on the concept. I liked going off after the shadow to find the words, but when I was trying to activate them in the water I just got an error noise.
Has a very esoteric feel. It's fun, but more than being fun it's...cathartic, maybe? I dunno, there's something meditative in just wandering the desert looking for words with the music on low.
@arguablyarugula Thank you for the kind words :smiley: You have to bring the correct word to the oasis (the one that is floating in the air over the water), to gain a seed - but I am glad you found your way of playing it and stayed a while, much appreciated :)
@ancient-pixel Ohhh, that actually makes so much more sense. I'll need to revisit it later, as I was a bit bummed out not to be able to plant any trees.
I love game-experiences and this was a great experience! I adored walking around the desert and figuring out how to plant trees. Amazing concept! Then I checked the comments and holy crap - it is also mutiplayer?! Super cool. I didn't find any players but I appreciate this feature very much. Great job! (especially that it was all done by one person)
@dane-tesla Thank you for your contribution to the oasis, good to hear you could enjoy it even without any other players :)
Very cryptic and interesting mood! I think that it could be more clear what placing the symbols down does, and perhaps some more visual variation or something along that vein to keep driving the player forward in the direction you want them to be going (it doesn’t have to be super over the top, just a little more guidance so players don’t feel like they’re stuck in a loop forever). Also I like the direction the sound is going– to me it sounds like the footsteps are an instrument as well, and I wonder if there are ways that you could emphasize it, perhaps by making it more rhythmic. Good work!
I don't know if mouse acc is on, or if performance was bad, but that combined with the visuals made me really motion sick. it's too bad since the game look interesting but I just can't do it.
now, since I can really play the game, I'm not gonna rate it (good or bad) since that feels unfair to me. just thought I'd let you know that this might be an issue for some people.
Really unusual game-- enjoyed the look and overall vibe, and the storytelling was interesting. Cool music too. That said, yeah, ultra-sensitive mouse input made it difficult to move around. :/
@simex thank you for commenting, what is your display(s) setup and resolution if I may ask?
@otresnjak thx :) I am working on the mouse issue, could you please tell me what your desplay setup and resolution is?
If all breaks you can look around with the arrow keys :grimacing:
@wintergatn :sweat_smile: the footsteps are an instrument. You are right and I am thinking about updating the game with some more items to find and varied terrain generations the further out you go. Thanks for playing and your feedback :)
@ancient-pixel one monitor at 4K. :)
@otresnjak well, I see a pattern here^^ thx, Ill see how I can solve this - i thought Ive implemented smth that can work with any resoultion, but the problem must be buried somewhere there
Interesting! I really enjoyed the vibe of the game - the graphical style and haunting music really made it unique.
First attempt I just wandered into the desert and got lost, and the second attempt I started to plant trees but nothing seemed to happen. I think a bit more signposting / forcing the player to learn the rules would certainly help at the start, as figuring them out is quite hard!
But I really like the style, and would love to play more like it :)
[duplicate comment]
@leekanarchism Thank you very much :) the idea was, that if more players are online, they can learn from each other, but I am working on an update, with a little more things to incentivise (and give the player feedback) what there is to do and with some more interesting stuff to find and flesh out the story.
Also waited for the horror pic to pop up XD. The idea of planting words is nice, but I couldn't play it.
Wow! Cool concept
It's easy to get lost in the desert. Placing stone piles is nice mechanic to prevent that.
@juan-matias @kostya @vodzik thank you for playing :D