lemare 2022-10-03 20:33
Very fun game. One tip: always take the fan when available. The knockback is super OP lol
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD51 → Phemie's Fable
By isabelle-szeto, austin-law, Joshua Denk, rachjn, Aaron Lee, jomnaq and darth.liam
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 270 | 3.82 | 25 | |
| Fun | 397 | 3.58 | 25 | |
| Innovation | 852 | 3.00 | 25 | |
| Theme | 271 | 3.97 | 25 | |
| Graphics | 251 | 4.10 | 26 | |
| Audio | 135 | 3.93 | 25 |
Very fun game. One tip: always take the fan when available. The knockback is super OP lol
Wow! Amazing work everyone!
Really nice! The art and music were excellent, there was a good variety of different weapons to try. Not sure if I'm just bad at choosing stats, but it feels like the enemies' stats scale faster than your own?
The art is cute and the music is nice. Gameplay was reasonably fun, although it was a bit difficult to pay attention to the options and the ongoing movement/fighting at the same time. The weapon variety was good. Solid overall.
The game was fun and the art and music fit so well! I liked that there were different weapons, but I feel like I felt most satisfied with the sword so I kept choosing it because I liked how it felt and disregarded what stat was associated with it.
@lemare @raddishradish I'm happy to see different people enjoying different playstyles!
@lancival Yep, they scale slower than you early and faster than you late. That's intentional to make sure the game ends. Prepare stat-wise early on, then get as many kills as possible in the late game before you get swarmed!
Very nice graphics - reminds me of Japanese water-color style, appealing and cute :smile: Color design is exquisite. Music is great as well and compliments with the art well. And Phemie just rocks (of course he's a dragon, just look at his cute dragon face).
The gameplay is solid, although the fast pace leaves little time to really look at the various weapon upgrades you get. So I just ended up choosing semi-randomly and smashing away :grin: I noticed a potential bug - a few times I had quite a lag when changing weapons. A weapon changed in the UI (checkmark moved) but Phemie didn't change the weapon he was holding for quite a time.
I would suggest adding some delicate animation to the player when he takes damage - it would improve feedback. My one wondering is - how did Phemie end up on this fighting forest arena, and who lock him there with the lasers :wink:?
@fabula-rasa Absolutely, our art team really knocked it out of the park.
As for weapon swapping, Q and E simply surround one of the weapon/stat boosts with the green selection border, but do not instantly give grant you what’s in the box. Instead, every 10 seconds you receive what’s in the selected box, hence the timer above the two options. I’ll add a note to make that more clear in-game in the future!
I agree with your take-damage animation suggestion, and have added that to the list right next to red damage animation on enemies when they take a critical hit.
Thanks for playing and for such comprehensive feedback! I really appreciate it :)
Graphics are ADORABLE!!! Seriously, I am a sucker for cute little dragons, this one reminds me of a plushie I had as a kid so I'm sold.
Music is lovely and well made!
I loved the weapons, the sword was super satisfying because it kinda felt like I was sweeping the spirits like dustbunnies, Phemie's tidying up!
I loved the mechanic overall, It reminded me of a fast-paced version of the mechanic in roguelites like Slay the Spire or Hades, where you have only a few choices between each level of what new tools to add to your repertoire. (I'm sure there's a better comparison out there, but my point is, I am a fan!)
The only critique I have has already been mentioned. I agree that some sort of take-damage animation would help, perhaps also have the health bar blink when hit. There were some moments when I couldn't tell what enemy's hitbox damaged me, it was a bit harder to learn and react in that case. But certainly not the end of the world! As for the confusion another commenter mentioned about the weapon/stat swap—I was able to figure out that the weapons changed when the timer turned over and that the green box indicated which was chosen, but as I played, I think the pace was quick enough that it took a bit too long to glance away and check where the green outline was. Perhaps if the line was thicker, or it gave off some other visual cue (like pulsating), it would be easier to spot and refer to throughout play. But again, a pretty small detail!
Overall, EXCELLENT! I love it, you all should be proud!
that fish is a d o r a b l e
very nice polish! game was fun and concept was pretty cool too. audio could use a little work but... 72 hours lol.
loved it!
Cool game that keeps you interested a good while. I really liked the atmosphere, artwork and the music. I think it fits pretty well to the theme also. Great job!
@gardenovena Thanks for the feedback, I’ve noted it down. Thicker lines like you mentioned and a background color switch on the selected box might do the trick, and pulsating would only help I think :)
Also, as a PSA for everyone: enemies have longer range than you think. That’s something a few people have mentioned, and something I’ve marked to adjust/signal in the future, but for now, now you know
Nicely made! I agree with @Lemare the fan is certainly quite OP
Very cute! I didn't get the "select your weapon/upgrades" mechanic when I played but that was only my own fault for not rereading the manual first. All the weapons were fun to use!
Love the overall aesthetic and the take on the 10-second theme!! I like the mechanics, the character is so lovable, and specifically I really like the volume slider's design O.O (how did you guys do that teach me your ways). Very nicely packaged game!
@fawntune The slider was one of the trickier parts to code! Izzy gave me an image for the background of each bar and an image with the fill-in part of each bar. Each bar and fill image are UI images independent of any slider, and I placed an invisible slider (all colors set to zero opacity) on top of each bar. When you click or drag you are sliding the invisible slider, and a script updates the slider's left-to-right fill value!
@johnnydz0707 @lemare Fun fact: right before release I upped the fan's attack speed and reduced its damage in order to grant its attacks the continuity we associate with wind, but in my haste I neglected to reduce the knockback. I've since fixed that in a non-uploaded version, but it blows a lot harder in the LD51 version than intended as a result!
Overall, it's such a cute and addicting game. I love the fact that your weapon comes with the stat changes so you have to constantly make split second decisions. All the weapons are fun to use, and the art is gorgeous! <3
Very cool game! I love the koi sprite and the various weapons are very interesting in their functionality. The fan as others have said is insanely busted but I still loved it haha.
The animation for the sword really caught my eye and looked almost like the swish of a fish's tail which I thoroughly appreciated although I'm not sure it was intentional lol.
I love this genre of games and have enjoyed seeing the various takes on it in recent times. This one is up there as one of the better ones!
Great job friends :)
Super rad idea! Good job guys!! I was super sad when I died lol