FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD50 → Fountain of youth

Fountain of youth

By greenphox, Felikios and JustAGameDev

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall9363.3333
Fun9703.1233
Innovation8233.1733
Theme2724.0133
Graphics9943.2433
Audio6683.1930
Mood10873.0831

Comments

cobouti 2022-04-04 18:21

Can't jump high enought to go up a block, so I awalys get stuck in the same hole

greenphox 2022-04-04 18:47

@cobouti where are you playing?(windows, linux, browser...)? thank you for the feedback, I had some problems with the linux version...

larsdu 2022-04-04 18:52

I love the little pieces of artwork in the levels and the fact the character visibly ages as the game progreses.

kirill-islibaev 2022-04-05 14:02

I love age mechanics. But I would like to see some kind of goal. For example, a competition with yourself or other players

robert18 2022-04-05 20:58

I can't jump high enough as @cobouti said. I can only jump like half a block which looks like that shouldn't be the case. Both the web version (Chrome) and download (Windows) have the same issue.

underlig 2022-04-05 21:14

This was fun, great work on the puzzle labyrinth, also the replayability with uncovering the labyrinth and making better routes on the next playthrough. The aging is fun and disturbing, just imagining Robert being in that labyrinth for decades XD Could have some small tweaks to the jumping, great job =)

nardandas 2022-04-05 21:16

Really interesting take on the puzzle platformer concept! There was a goal Kirill! The fountain of youth! I though movement could start a bit faster. The age mechanic was kind of bad-feeling because of the giant movement speed penalty. As well I think the layrinth was a bit difficult to navigate, oweing to the same-ness of everywhere. The little posters were a lot of fun though!

theunusualart 2022-04-05 21:23

Really cool game concept, I like you get more time/get younger by collecting the youth water. Good mix between jump and run and puzzle game. On thing I might change is the color or sprite of the background stone, because those look really similar to the stone the character walks on. With a different texture/sprite, it would look less confusing I think. Great work with the game, keep it up!

ferociter 2022-04-05 21:26

I was very relieved when dying didn't completely reset the game. Overal pretty enjoyable! I'm willing to bet making all those little paintings was a lot of fun.

nakami 2022-04-05 21:35

Nice entry love the puzzle part, the platform part is a bit rough, talking about platform, I'not crazy age influence jump height right ?

Little bug some of "door" platform some times "block" the way but they are on the floor level so I had to jump over them.

felikios 2022-04-06 06:11

@nakami yes, you were right. Age affects jump height and also speed.

The other thing you mentioned were made intentionally.

Edit: I just understood what you meant, yeah it happens some times :))

confidant17 2022-04-06 17:38

this game is awesome. love how the player ages withtime and see that affect my speed and jump height. althou in a few rooms i got stuck due to age restrictions.and it turn into a waiting game to die. but other than that is AWESOME. very good job

indigowolf 2022-04-06 17:38

Very solid entry, really quite liked it although the one major critique I would have is that the very minor colour contrast between floors/walls and playable area was a huge issue. Not sure if it was a conscious decision but would definitely have tried to make things clearer.

wilko 2022-04-06 17:39

I would have liked a reset button so that when I get stuck I didn't just have to wait to get old and die.

kason-xiv 2022-04-06 17:40

Cool concept, and I really liked the character pixel art. I will say the controller layout was a bit odd, hitting Z comfortably while using WASD was pretty awkward, but I see now you can use arrow keys too :P

barce 2022-04-06 17:42

Nice game! I really liked the aging mechanic and the concept.

glimmer 2022-04-06 17:45

full gray hair with 50y. just crule.

fredrik-rosell 2022-04-06 17:47

The art was great, and the music was FANTASTIC! Using WASD + Z was maybe not an optimal combination for my fumble-fingers, but reading the comment above, I now realize that I could have used the arrow keys...Overall, a great game!

antti-haavikko 2022-04-06 18:30

Can't really say I loved it. Kinda soft lock the game. So many places you get stuck on and have no to proceed than just wait for death...

Screenshot 2022-04-06 at 20.44.21.png

Making the player just flat out wait is never a good design choice.

On my first time I even got completely soft locked as I somehow lost the key I got from the left side and ended up with just two keys and an empty map. The whole using keys to get more keys stuff was super confusing too. Making the three keys you need to pass to the end of the game be something completely else would have been so much better.

After restarting completely it was a breeze though and two manned it. Would have even had enough time to do it with Robert but I don't think there is a way back up to get to the right side double keys after opening that door without respawning. Or is there?

Screenshot 2022-04-06 at 21.08.16.png

It was really hard to look at. Not that the art work was bad but there wasn't enough contrast between the ground and the back wall. The character animation was a bit odd though. You just decided to do a mix between idle and walk and use the same for both? It also kinda looks like flossing. The paintings were awesome though, I think I recognised almost all of em.

The dungeon could also use more "landmarks" just like those paintings to help differentiate areas from others. Not everything looked very much the same and was super easy to get lost and because of that fall to the same soft lock traps again and again.

The walking speed was painfully slow even for the younger side of the character and obviously it got notoriously awful with elder folk as in addition even clearing single tile gaps became a pixel perfect jumps. And having long corridors with a dead end and a "prize" of a bit less time back than what you wasted exploring that nook doesn't feel very rewarding.

I guess you had some dedicated audio guy and the music pieces do sound nice. Not very fitting to the game overall theme and feel though. But where are all the sound effects? They add so much atmosphere and tactileness to games.

Anyways, it wasn't bad at all even if I'm just complaining about stuff. :sweat_smile: Just quite a few frustrating things that could have easily been avoided. Good job! :thumbsup:

svemir 2022-04-06 18:33

Cool concept and great music! I did find some of the jumps had to be a bit too precise as you got older and lost speed. Fun to explore around a bit, really loved the homages to famous paintings - it's a great touch.

greenphox 2022-04-06 19:00

@antti-haavikko thanks for the feedback, unfortunately we didn't have enough time for level design, more landmarks and sound effects. The animation of idle and the animation of walking are different, maybe there is a bug in the code that I missed. Thanks again for the feedback, appreciated!

bauke-regnerus 2022-04-07 14:34

Then aging mechanic is pretty cool, but I feel you can do more with it. The platforming was a bit clunky and slow, and I got stuck once. Overall not a bad game, but too much elements that just lack that last bit of polish and attention.

elysiagriffin 2022-04-09 11:33

Thanks for submitting your game for me to play on my stream!

If you’d like to rewatch the playthrough, you can find it here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1450143040?t=2h51m20s

Good luck on your ratings, see you next LD! :D

💜 Elysia Griffin AKA Button Feedback Lady

https://www.twitch.tv/elysiagriffin

specturnal 2022-04-11 00:02

I am glad that this game isn't punishing, and I can continue my progress bit by bit on every new life. The message is also very nice where the ending achieved is a matter of group effort. I like the dungeon layout and the platform mechanics, as well as the jump nerf as you get older. I think the tiles for the background walls could be better, because at first they look like solid walls. Overall this is a neat entry :thumbsup:

codexzier 2022-04-18 17:11

I am a fan of the pixelart graphics. The game reminds me well of classics. Good work :)

corrupt-spaghetti 2022-04-20 16:46

Really unique concept! The level design was especially good, having a nice balance between puzzles and exploration.