Gecko's Chronicles: The Miserable Men

derek-volker 2021-10-05 22:50

Sem título.png

Ok, my time was horrible, but i finished the game!

I never saw graphics like this, and it's really interesting that you took the theme not only for the scenario that keeps on getting more and more unstable, but as well for the stories of the misarable men.

I found the experience really different from all other games i tried in this jam, and i think that this is one of the most fun part of the event, the diversity of games that are produced and the oportunity to experience them all.

fear-games 2021-10-05 22:52

Interesting game, However far too much motion blur, Love the idea of 3d scanning everything into the game and the effect in the last level was cool

the-lame-brain 2021-10-05 23:16

I managed to finish at just over 5 minutes on my second play through, am I supposed to get a different screen?

Trippy game, it looks like you scanned your area in? Very clever, I would like to see more games like this!

Cheers! [-LB](https://ldjam.com/users/the-lame-brain/)

leorid 2021-10-06 01:21

Phoscanned and shaders, more an artwork than a game, which isn't a bad thing. Subtitles along the voicelines would have been nice, because gameplay distracts quite a bit from the stories and as non-native english speaker, I missed a few parts.

Definately something different than everything else and a brave entry. ^^

rufson 2021-10-06 02:16

It was an interesting narrative and I like to wander through 3D scans. I collected all cards :)

kwiper 2021-10-06 06:21

Definitely one of the most unique narrative experiences I've played, and photoscanning everything made the graphics very different. The shaders were a little bit overdone, in my opinion, a bit too much motion blur and bloom made the graphics a bit distracting from the gameplay and story. The platforming is mostly alright, but because of the unevenness of surfaces, sometimes that made me fall off the platforms when I thought I was able to jump. Maybe giving a little buffer after the player starts falling to let them jump would make it feel a lot more responsive (coyote jump, basically). I loved how the scenarios got more and more unhinged, this is a stand-out from the jam for me for sure!

margotlsdgt 2021-10-11 14:41

Really weird game, and hard ! ^^

zacharypinkham 2021-10-13 23:11

Wow, I wasn't sure what I was signing up for when I started the game and it's definitely not what I was expecting, it surprised me in all the best ways. Love the unique look, the interesting premise, and the sound work was really excellent as well. Honestly, nothing to criticize, you made something really original and wonderful. Great work!

geckoo1337 2021-10-17 20:46

Impressive game with a strange and clever aesthetic. It fits totally with the theme and in an unusual way. I love this technology which you used, but I want to know more now. I saw your game on Twitch (do you remember me?) and I had fun playing. Very innovative and addictive. It was a little bit confusing at first, but after a while I really liked to walk among your objects. However, there is a little (but annoying) latency between the key pressed and a jump. It was one of my favorite experiences for this 49th LudumDare session ++

PS: please can you share here a link about the technology which you used and application? Maybe you made a post-mortem with some explanation? Thank you.

justmars 2021-10-17 22:31

Thanks for playing our game @geckoo1337 ! The jumping is indeed quite finicky and would definitely be the next thing we fixed were we to update the game.

About the tech, we used an app called Polycam to capture the environments as 3D models. For a larger scan the depth data was quite rough tho. We (me & @raffe) started out with long capture sessions, like 20 minutes for a single room walking around and scanning every nook and cranny. But after scanning we realized that the app wasn't able handle that much data (the results were somehow worse than the minute or two long test scans we did at first) so we decided to keep the scans short (10 minutes or so) with more coordinated routes to avoid overlapping scanning as much as possible. After exporting the captures as .obj files our 3D model expert @jokku then tweaked the meshes a bit in Blender, but to make them actually look good would have taken way too much time so we left them in the kind of "unstable" state.

The consumer grade 3D scanning technology is evolving quickly, but right now it's still very much in its infancy. Even with a phone that has depth sensors (e.g. LiDAR on iPhone 12 Pro and forwards) the precision isn't too great so it's up to the software how presentable the output will be. There are probably more advanced apps than the one that we used (and we don't have much experience on the scanning itself so our results were definitely less than optimal), but to achieve a usable result for a commercial game would most likely require to stitch the textures and depth data manually & do edit in post. But overall, we are satisfied enough on how the models turned out. At least they fit the theme well xd.

geckoo1337 2021-10-18 09:35

Thank you for your large explanation. In fact, I like the main aesthetic because it is weird. I would like to test the technology which you explained above, but not with some hard devices or efficient way - I want to get these weird meshes. I will explore this tech. Thank you. I wish you the best ++

anchorlight 2021-10-18 23:29

The photoscanning technique was a really cool concept. As mentioned on a stream, I would definitely recommend adding a short delay to the time it takes from falling off something without jumping to no longer being allowed to jump; the main issue comes from hitting uneven geometry at a high velocity and having that force translate to upward momentum like a ramp. Otherwise, the presentation is charming and the environments are fun to explore; I especially appreciate the warped developer models complete with dramatic camera angles during cutscenes.

All in all, this was a fun out-there title. For better or worse the game appears to be entirely shaped by the environment photoscanning method your team employed, and despite some annoyances here and there the final game is something that easily stands out from the rest. Well done to your team.

adafheyesh 2021-10-19 01:10

Unique-looking game! Everyone else has already touched on the main issues I had (not being able to jump, and subtitles for the card voiceover). In the first level, the jumping issue was exacerbated by having to restart on the bed each time. I'm glad the card progress was saved, at least.

The music on the main menu feels a bit more upbeat than the mood set by the rest of the game.

Finally, I felt like the lines saying "oh look how *unstable* things are becoming!" were a bit on-the-nose, but that could just be personal preference for subtlety.

time.PNG

jk5000 2021-10-20 13:22

I liked the atmosphere and the music, but the jumping mechanic worked so badly for me, that gave up before hearing very much of the story.

gamebucha 2021-10-20 14:03

Excellent work by the artists.

mrbell270 2021-10-20 18:30

Amazing artwork and very fitting sound design!

Controls are little clumsy, especially for "speedrun"-oriented game.

Anyway, game is breath of freash air, I had a lot of fun

Good luck!

negator2vc 2021-10-20 19:13

Amazing art and excellent sound with VOICES!!!!! Good controls and gameplay but the game need CHECKPOINTS!! One wrong jump and back to the beginning is a big NO NO! Nice work!

erikengineengineer 2021-10-20 19:28

Nice artstyle but to clumsy controls for such an fps platformer. But nice usage of photoscans!

lychee 2021-10-20 19:43

Great visual/sound design, A cool take on a kind of walking simulator style game. The 3d scanned environments felt very dream-like and made for a cool atmosphere - the endless stairs in part 3 was cool. The little stories were neat but maybe felt a bit straightforward. Great job overall!

coderaurus 2021-10-21 17:57

This felt very unique. I liked the narrative, although I think you could've told us more of the story with each card. Props to graphics as well. Maybe there was a bit too much blur for my weak eyes. And the music - it fit the narrative. Great work overall!