FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD50 → Life - Delaying Death

Life - Delaying Death

By itzemii

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall11153.1648
Fun10842.9849
Innovation12752.5549
Theme8583.5249
Graphics6463.6949
Audio3473.6849
Humor9082.5846
Mood8123.3848

Comments

silkmeloni 2022-04-05 09:02

What a rich and varied world,Good job!

itzemii 2022-04-05 11:37

@silkmeloni Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

jamsgams 2022-04-05 12:24

I liked this a lot! The gameplay was really simple, but the art made up for it. The sound design was great at first, but it did get a little hectic when picking up a lot at once. I also couldn't figure out why Puzzle pieces were bad, but that's ok. Fun time :)

lucy-lu 2022-04-05 13:04

I liked this cute lil game. But why are pzzles bad? I love to puzzle :dizzy_face:

heho 2022-04-05 13:09

beautiful art and sound one can really see that you focused on that :thumbsup:

nicmagnier 2022-04-05 13:28

As usual you do very zen-like games :) At the beginning I thought the balancing was a bit too much on the easy side but I was clearly wrong and the end is kind of depressing (no more joy for you!) got some vibes from the game Passage :)

itzemii 2022-04-05 15:08

@jamsgams Thank you for playing and for the nice and constructive feedback! Yes, the sound effects when picking up get too much. In the beginning when there are more good things that is too hectic, while I think towards the end when there is mostly only bad stuff it creates a hectic and a feel, that I did not intend, but occurred. I still don't know how to balance a pure BGM or having SFX on top, to fit - as the SFX are "random" when something happens it is difficult. Oh, puzzles, I thought of it as a symbol of worrying/ thinking to much about something/ being overloaded with lives "puzzles", ... but I see that a good puzzle is a good thing.

itzemii 2022-04-05 15:09

@lucy-lu Thank you for playing and happy you liked it! Oh, yes. Nice puzzles are good and relaxing. When creating it I was thinking of it as a symbol of worrying/ thinking to much about something/ being overburdened with lives “puzzles”.

itzemii 2022-04-05 15:09

@heho Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

itzemii 2022-04-05 15:13

@nicmagnier Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback! The games vibe and zen style just happened, I did not notice while developing, but just today when (really) playing (not testing) it myself. I did not have much time for finding the right speed/ ratio of good:bad but twisted the parameters until something acceptable was there. Funny detail: the game behaves very differently in the Unity editor and in the executables (frequency, speed) - I did not encounter this before. I think for a more serious game I have to include my own "random functions" or a clean "seed" thing.

deylinia 2022-04-05 15:45

This was a surreal experience! The theme, mechanics and music all tie together wonderfully to depict life in a charming way.

I like this a lot, and I had fun playing it. My high score was 1332

itzemii 2022-04-05 16:54

@deylinia Thank you for playing and for your nice words! Happy you liked it.

dan-smith 2022-04-05 20:16

This is really well presented - music and visuals work great together :)

pev 2022-04-05 21:24

At some point, good objects completely stopped spawning. It seems not very fair. Speed gives enough challenge to the game. The music creates a philosophical mood...

revetoon 2022-04-06 11:03

Cool graphisms with a simple yet functional gameplay mechanism. The music / sounds was a plus !

benjamin 2022-04-06 12:33

Best score 3122. I died from alcoholism but I got a lot of love in my life so I guess I'm cool with it.

pierre-baudoin 2022-04-06 12:46

A bit easy, but the AD works quite well. No bug detected. Well done !

itzemii 2022-04-06 13:46

@dan-smith Thank you for playing and for the nice feetback!

itzemii 2022-04-06 14:02

@Pev Thank you for playing and for the nice/ constructive feedback! Yes, I am neither happy with the randomization, I thought I had it working, probably broke it just before publishing close to the deadline. I wanted to have less good things towards the end, but still some good things.

itzemii 2022-04-06 14:08

@revetoon Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

itzemii 2022-04-06 14:12

@benjamin Thank you for playing! And for the cool summary of your life in the game! I really liked that, your philosophical interpretation. Thx.

itzemii 2022-04-06 14:15

@pierre-baudoin Thank you for playing and for the feedback!

zackavelli 2022-04-06 15:37

Art and music are fantastic. Very good vibe to the whole game. As for the game design, It might have been a good idea to cap the overall count down to like 1000 or something. I was able to get my counter up in to the 5000's or so and from that point it didn't really matter what I did. I could just run back and fourth and get everything. A cap I believe would force the player to consistently make good choices. Still with that I had a good time and enjoyed the experience. Impressed you were able to pull all the code and everything together in one day. Nice Work!

itzemii 2022-04-06 15:41

@zackavelli Thank you for playing and for the nice and constructive feedback! I really appreciate it! Yes, there should be a cap. And in addition I have balance better the speed, good:bad ratio change over-time.

shabo 2022-04-06 20:10

I do like drinking though, too bad it gives minus.. Thanks for the game, it was nice!

sakura-magika 2022-04-06 20:23

it's an interesting game for sure, i really liked the gameplay mirroring the experience of life throwing all kinds of things at you, and you can try to go towards the good and avoid the bad, but eventually hit the bad.

i like the art and animation, so good job focusing on that. the sound effects were fittingly surreal.

(although i didn't understand why puzzle pieces were bad)

but as far as the game play, it felt much less like delay the inevitable, unless it's inevitably getting board by the game. i got to like 8000 and realized there was no difficulty curve, and no end condition other than deliberately going towards all the and things to kill yourself.

one way to fix it would be to make the base level decrease get exponentially faster, since no matter how many good things you try to go towards to prolong your life, death is inevitable for all of us. then it would feel like i'm actually playing against a challenge. i think it would metaphorically fit as well.

itzemii 2022-04-06 20:38

@shabo Thank you for playing and for the feedback! Drinking a bit and enjoying is good! The symbol is about abusive/ extreme drinking, which is not good for the liver and for social life.

itzemii 2022-04-06 20:58

@sakura-magika Thank you for playing and for the nice and constructive feedback! I really appreciate it! Let's start with the puzzles ... yes, a relaxed (jigsaw) puzzle is good and extends life, I think. I chose it as symbol for thinking to much/ turning around thoughts in the head, but not a good choice. In my update (1.1) I did change it to an anxiety symbol. Yes, balancing is not good in the jam version. I was happy just to have something, an hour to the deadline. (I was doing art/music and my jam partner should have done coding, but no code by Monday morning, so I decided to do a game with the art assets on Monday until Monday night). Version 1.1 has a (fuzzy) limit of 1100 (by increasing up to 500 with full value, then less up to 1100, i.e. if you have 1050 collecting a good thing just increases by e.g. 20, while if you have 700 it increases by 100). Yes, life without challenge would not be a good life. Thank you for your detailed, helpful feedback and the time you spent!

bucketh3ad 2022-04-07 03:58

Solid take on a classic format. I liked the graphical style, but I found the UI overlay with mixed good and bad icons on each side confusing. Perhaps group them together so the player can more easily see the associations. Gameplay ramped up to impossible by the end, and while a hard difficulty can be rewarding to skilled players, if it feels unfair that will keep players from coming back to reach that level of mastery. Given what you set out to accomplish, I think you should be proud of your success.

itzemii 2022-04-07 07:34

@bucketh3ad thank you for playing and for the nice and constructive feedback! Yes, the difficulty and balancing is not good. The deadline was close and I was happy to have it working and then changed one little parameter, which reduced good probability from 5% to 0% at the end … For the icons while doing them I noticed them not being clear and thought of adding a clear marker (underlay, color, animation) but then decided to leave it vague, as life is not so clear. And actually reshuffling the icons on the borders. Thank you for your time for the detailed comments!

substain 2022-04-07 08:54

the gameplay itself is pretty polished, and I also like the art and audio :)

itzemii 2022-04-07 16:04

@substain Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

dangerbleistift 2022-04-07 20:26

The sound design is really good! At some point i could not evade the bad stuff, no good stuff came along the way. Just like real life... It was a really nice journey to play this

itzemii 2022-04-07 21:17

@dangerbleistift Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

elvinn 2022-04-07 21:59

An interesting game. I liked the visual graphics. Good Job :)

tomatoomelet 2022-04-08 05:54

Really love your art style, and the music is also great!

itzemii 2022-04-08 07:55

@tomatoomelet Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

ds-nahogara 2022-04-08 18:55

This was a blast to play! In the end the experience gets chaotic as you get less and less goodies :tired_face: The art/sounds are amazing, and the gameplay is tight and very well done, fantastic game! :v:

itzemii 2022-04-08 20:30

@elvinn Thank you for playing and the nice feedback!

itzemii 2022-04-08 20:31

@ds-nahogara Thank you for playing and for the very very nice feedback!!!

mikropiru 2022-04-09 07:12

Nice and actually rather profound take on the theme. Also, the art is really pretty! I wasn't sure about some of the symbols at first but quickly learned them and they mostly made sense right away.

The idea is simple, of course, and to be honest I don't think it offers _that_ much replayability (for me). But I did enjoy the time I played it, and everything worked without glitches. :-)

itzemii 2022-04-09 18:30

@mikropiru Thank you for playing and for the nice and constructive feedback! I agree, the game is not replayable, it is more a one-time experience.

wouter52 2022-04-09 20:04

Fun game! I had to learn what was good and what was not. Appearantly the medical sign is good (I though it meant sickness at first) and the puzzle pieces mean 'bad'? I did not really understand that logic still.. Does that mean "searching for yourself" or something?

I like your game though, it s simple to learn bit hard to master! Which is nice, because it's 10PM here in the Netherlands right now, my head does not think clearly at this hour ^^"

The graphics and music are outstanding and have their own unique style I did not see in LD before. Great job!

praccen 2022-04-10 13:43

Nice idea and a nice message. A bit sad that the good things stop coming after a while. I don't really understand the total counter, as I was at like 6000 or something but my highest total says 2500. Other than that, a nice looking game, and the audio is nice. Well done!

itzemii 2022-04-10 15:07

@wouter52 Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback! Yes, "Puzzle" is confusing, I thought of "anxiety"/"too many thought"/ ... but misleading. Replaced it in the post game version.

wouter52 2022-04-10 15:15

@itzemii great! That graphic is much more clear! I just played it again (your post-jam version). Took a while before it came by (or I did not notice, it does not feel out-of-place)

itzemii 2022-04-10 18:20

@praccen Thank you for playing and for the nice and helpful comments! Yes, balancing in the game jam version is not good (a little last moment change of a parameter changed intended late-game probability for good things from 5% to 0%). I see, the counter is not clear, I have to make it clearer. The one below the player is the current "life-energy"/ "potential life", while the upper right counts the actual "lived". I.e. even if you had 6000, they were reduced by bad things, that does not count towards the total.

woahitsjeff 2022-04-11 02:40

The audio was so satisfying! The way it speeds up, felt very representative of life, how things go by so fast. Great experience, well done!

itzemii 2022-04-11 20:37

@woahitsjeff Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

don-fouts 2022-04-11 21:36

Nice game! It was wild how many objects were falling which made it almost like a living maze. The Sound was really nice, though it sounded really crazy when I plowed through everything across the screen. I think I hit some objects when I thought they were off the screen yet still partially there. Overall, great work and nice entry!

itzemii 2022-04-12 08:44

@don-fouts Thank you for playing for the nice feedback!

quentinverlhac 2022-04-13 22:31

Nice graphics and sounds! Well done!

4ahizon 2022-04-16 23:16

The 2d art is interesting. Soundtrack was soothing. Would like to have utilize the soundtrack changing based on what you choose to pick up. I assume you did this solo. Good job for doing it with limit time constraints.

itzemii 2022-04-17 15:49

@quentinverlhac Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback!

itzemii 2022-04-17 15:51

@4ahizon Thank you for playing and for the nice and constructive feedback! Yes, I was going for something like changing the music with the number of good/ bad things. Story is, I was doing this with somebody else, me the graphics and music and the other person coding. On Monday morning there was no code in sight, so I decided to do coding of a generic game mechanic quick on Monday so I had at least something.

aune 2022-04-18 07:27

The symbols speak for themselves (well I just got fooled by the puzzle too ^^) very nice. The idea is quite interesting I can see it being increased with "special event"s (wedding / divorce / win LD) that arrives one time only. I think I would have liked to have the head of the character in a corner that evolves as a feedback of the points you get back.

Nice entry

codeforjoycaro 2022-04-18 10:55

I like the way the game can open up discusions about life decisions and that you made an interesting concept out of a very basic game mechanic.

itzemii 2022-04-18 11:47

@aune Thank you for playing and for the nice feedback and the additional game ideas! I appreciate it.

itzemii 2022-04-18 11:47

@codeforjoycaro Thank you for playing and for the philosophical view on the game!

papaver 2022-04-20 23:03

Nice game! Pretty graphics. As a jigsaw enthusiast, I immediately went for the puzzle pieces, but apparently that was wrong, haha. I got my score quite high, and was just thinking "this is too easy", when I noticed that there weren't any positive things anymore... Best total after 1 round: 2878

jozgames 2022-04-20 23:07

Ideia bem interessante, só achei muito fácil 😐

itzemii 2022-04-21 12:07

@papaver Thank you for playing and for the feedback! Yes, a lot of people had the perception of puzzle pieces being good, and a nice puzzle is good. I thought of being puzzled/ too much in the head/ turning thoughts in circles. Changed it for the updated version 1.1.

itzemii 2022-04-21 12:11

@jozgames Thank you for playing and for feedback. Yes, balancing of difficulty/ length of game is not good, I was just happy to have something just before deadline, as I was supposed to only do graphics and ended up on Monday doing the whole game code as well.

alpharock6 2022-04-21 16:09

Very satisfying audio design/selection. Also props on the coding exercise for doing your own object pooling, etc :) Very calming to play, nice entry!

itzemii 2022-04-21 19:49

@alpharock6 Thank you for playing and for the very nice feedback!