Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD49 → Contrary
By ValiantSugar, nekopi, gamebucha, Ve_ret, Fazyes and Ekaterina Skripka
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 1064 | 3.28 | 52 | |
| Fun | 1299 | 2.85 | 52 | |
| Innovation | 1313 | 2.70 | 51 | |
| Theme | 982 | 3.28 | 52 | |
| Graphics | 291 | 4.13 | 52 | |
| Mood | 443 | 3.68 | 51 |
The graphics in this game are absolutely gorgeous. I wasn't able to attack any of the monsters, though, or at least there was no indication that they were being attacked. My health also stayed the same near them, so I think they can't attack either. As a result, it doesn't feel like there's a lot of "game" here, sadly. Hopefully, it's just a weird bug or glitch on my end.
I somehow find the main character to be cute. That's just me tho.
Graphics are really good, but I have a few problems with the gameplay : The walls are kinda sticky and tends to get your character stuck, and the alternating stats are a good idea on paper, but having them all turn on and off at once is a bit frustrating. I think a good idea would be not to turn them all at once, but to alternate (ie, disable attack, enable block or jumping), that way block would also have a use when attack is disabled.
Otherwise, it's a fun game and I reached Loneliness, but got stuck to a part where everything was dark. I don't know if that was intended or not.
Congratulations on making it to the LD49 ! :)
Overall I really enjoyed the game, I did get stuck trying to jump over the first large tree stump - but that was just me being bad. Once I got to the loneliness part I fell into a hole and never respawned though :cry:
I finish him :-) The atmosphere is very nice ! It just lacks a little sound. GG for this game ! =D
So to start with, the graphics of this game are simply incredible. I love the simplicity of them, yet they really stand out. The music too works pretty well. The environments are very moody, I love it.
My main point of critique has to do with the gameplay. It doesn't feel very responsive to me, for a variety of reasons. The movement feels very slow and floaty, which could work, but the animations are a tiny bit faster than what the movement suggests, which creates a disconnect between what I perceive on screen, and what I'm doing with my controls. As someone else pointed out, the character tends to get stuck to the walls. This is an issue that tends to happen when using Unity's physics system for character movement, which I know because I've made a few platformers using it. It works well enough for some kinds of movement, but for platforming it tends to create a lot of issues. If you do want to stick to using physics for the player, I would recommend removing friction with walls, probably by using a slippery material and assigning it to all wall objects. Lastly, there's no feedback for when the player hits enemies. This combined with the desync between controls and animations means it's hard for me to tell if any of my attacks land on an enemy, or if an enemy has hit me. Simple things like changing the sprite colour, adding particles, sound effects, maybe even knockback, all go really well to create that kind of feedback that informs the player of these kinds of actions.
Good job on finishing the jam, and with more polish this could be a really great game!
Like others have said the graphics are fantastic, and I think you did a great job with the mechanics matching the theme! I did get stuck on some of the jumping sections due to the sticking to the walls but overall great job congrats!
The paralax start menu was a very nice touch right at the start. aweseome character design. I bet it would have looked amazing if it had more detailed animations. Some feedback for getting hit by enemies would have been nice. Sometimes I didn't even realize that I was taking damage. Mostly because my eyes were fixated on the UI elements in the left corner. Over all great game, nice mood and a lot of nice details (like those following eyes) and a cool take on the theme.
A very interesting game. The graphics are lovely. Very good visual universe that you created.
I liked the look of the characters and the enemies. The setting is very well done too. Visually it is one of the most beautiful and creative games in this gamejam.
The sound is pretty nice too.
Gameplay is ok. It's interesting the combat mechanics, involving the block. A point that I found subtle but very interesting is that the boss' HP decreases while you defeat enemies. This makes the player pay special attention to enemies, otherwise he would simply ignore them. In other words, you are rewarded for defeating enemies in a very creative way.
However I believe I have had my experience affected by bugs, especially collision bugs. As I said earlier it is possible to completely ignore enemies, and although I don't know to what extent this was intentional. But I think you could put some limitation when the player tries to get "inside enemies". Another bug I had problems with was the jump, sometimes the jump didn't work as expected, making me have to jump several times to pass a simple piece of platform. Finally I witnessed a bug when I fell into a hole "on the second level", since when I died, the game screen went black and I couldn't do anything. This happened every time I tried, and unfortunately I wasn't able to make it to the end of the game.
But I fully understand that in a gamejam bugs are normal. These points I raised are only intended to help you in some way.
Speaking a little more, I couldn't stop talking about the interpretation you had on the topic. It was a very creative interpretation and it sends an interesting message. Associating instability with adverse psychological situations was a very well thought out point.
In general I liked your game! Congratulations to all of you!
I love the mechanic of variable jumps/ attacks/ blocks on twofold levels so much! The monster/ stage design too is simply mindblowing <3
Jumping a bit difficult, but all other sides a brilliant!
That is reminiscent of some weird demon dance, the animations almost fit the music! A paranoid ballet. It's charming, actually, thanks for the entry.
Art style is amazing, same goes for music. The block and attack mechanics are fine too. And added story behind a game is also nice. But the jumping is quite glitchy. I got stuck multiple times because of it. Nevertheless, great job with the game!
P.S. I like the graphic with controls. Really nice.
This is an absolutely beautiful game which you should keep making. 1) The graphics have a lot of seams or glitches around the edges (eg. top of the player character) that could be fixed 2) The block mechanic isn't very clear, mainly because of its animation. It's slow and makes me want to think there's a windup but I'm not sure when it captures the Block value. Overall it seems better just to flit around and spam attack when the bar is high as the enemy attacks aren't very threatening. 3) The sort of sine wave RNG doesn't fit well with the jumps and moving platforms since you can't control either except stand around and wait.
The jumps were hard to get at the beginning, their reaction to input are quite weird sometimes. Anyway, the art style was really awesome and the music worked very well for the overall atmosphere. The unstable mechanic for attacking and blocking was a nice touch and a great way to put the theme. Gg and thanks for this game.
Very nice mood and graphic :)
Good looking game that needs a bit of work on the platforming.
The art style and overall mood is very good. I liked how the unstability was transcribed in the game mechanics throughout a reduced window of time to block/attack/jump as well as the narrative.
As for the main downsides of the game : - I felt like there was a lack of feedback at times, as I was sometimes unsure whether I would hit enemies or not of if they were hitting me except by looking at the health bars - At times my focus was more on the bottom left corner and the UI to get the timings right rather than the game itself, and it's not easy to focus on both at the same time. - Having both attack & block share the same time window to use make it so you have to either choose one of them, which ended up always being attack in my case (as it works best). Would have felt better to have them available at different times to encourage using both. - Difficulty curve was a bit off, with the first boss being rather hard as you are still learning the game while having to get the right timing for attacking. And the following ones being a lot more easier as you would be able to attack freely.
Loved the art style and the music. I think not being able to freely jump is probably one of the most frustrating game mechanics haha. I do appreciate that the level seemed to be timed to allow you to jump when it was important to catch a platform. More checkpoints at the second level would be appreciated. Overall, was a really enjoyable experience!
Nice work. Great mood and graphic. Maybe moving the bars to the center bottom of the screen will be better?
wow, these graphics are something else, seriously well done cus they are so pretty! The mechanics felt a little 'floaty' at times and the combat felt a bit weightless, but the atmosphere was just amazing, beautiful game :)
Great mood created by the graphics and the music! I felt "In-the-game", really good.
For me the controls felt "squishy", it felt as if something was softening/ dampering my actions. In addition, I was not sure if I was hitting the monsters or just hitting the air. [EDIT] Now I understand: the bottom left bars tell me how much jump/ attack/ block I have and it changes continuously. For the whole first level this was not clear to me: I perceived it as a regeneration/ cooldown. Maybe if the bars or some other indicators would be at/ close to the character it would help, as my eyes are on the character in front of it and not at the left corner. I like the concept/ idea, ... probably if balancing/ adapting a bit it is more intuitive? And adding some clear feedback (visual/ sound) when jumping when attacking and hitting.
Little bug (?) in third level (city): first previous music was playing and when I died, the actual music started.
I always prefer controller instead of keyboard/ mouse. So I had a hard time just due to this.
Overall, very impressive for a game jam!
Really cool graphics with dark, consistent visual style. Well done! I only noticed some artifacts (tiny black lines, like from improper sprite sheet slicing) above the head of our main character and the enemies. The walking animation could use some work - it is kinda jerky, and it doesn't fell like it's purposeful. The moody music fits the visual style like a glove. Very cool.
The gameplay itself could use a few improvements. Some visual and/or audio feedback of dealing and taking damage would be great. Even simple flashing, modulation on the sprites would already add a lot to the player feedback and make the world feel more visceral and interactive. Some more player feedback in general would be great.
It is also very easy to "stick" to the walls and edges of the environment. And the enemies themselves are not very threatening - the first big boss dies from something like two well-aimed strikes - it felt kinda anticlimactic :laughing:, the cool battle music didn't even manage to get going.
I really like the slow, meditative, sad atmosphere you created in this game.
Cool work! I like the art style. I had a problem with jumpings. It was hard cause I just stucking with platforms((
Screenshot 2021-10-21 124533.png
Thanks for the experience!
Well implemented. I'd love more of this.
the game is good but the player sometimes get stuck to walls and he looks jittery while standing still just small bugs needs fixing but it's a good game after all