joel-davis 2023-01-09 04:11
Interesting. Very poetic, and cool to see a narrative game. I liked the illustrations and the character of the cat.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD52 → Grandma's Garden of Crystals
By xlores-liang
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 237 | 3.23 | 41 | |
| Fun | 311 | 2.64 | 40 | |
| Innovation | 288 | 2.78 | 41 | |
| Theme | 278 | 3.03 | 40 | |
| Graphics | 79 | 4.00 | 40 | |
| Audio | 96 | 3.52 | 40 | |
| Humor | 154 | 2.78 | 39 | |
| Mood | 25 | 4.07 | 41 |
Interesting. Very poetic, and cool to see a narrative game. I liked the illustrations and the character of the cat.
@joel-davis Thank you for loving my cat!
Obviously a narrative game is one of the worst choice in a crowd-voting jam, since everyone is too busy to get started with it (which is much slower than other game types). Maybe it's just dumb enough to make it somehow cool XD
OMG! just found the sound doesn't work properly in the web version! I don't know if it's against the rules to update...š¤¢ I'll add a downloadable version on the itch.io page
didn't expect such a emotional game from the jam. š„² actually i think making games that offer strong mood is a clever strategy.
This was a very emotional and well-written story, accompanied by fitting music and breathtaking visuals. I hope you're doing well <3
Great writings! The mood overall is very emotional. For me the story naturally blends in strong feeling of sorrow, reflecting upon similar experiences. It is quite successful in mood in my opinion. The A/B side narration is interesting too, and I think you may add more perspective information for each sides.
@xlores-liang
wrt fixing bugs: you can fix the audio and its not too late! you are allowed to fix things like this, you just have to call out what you did on your submission page [^1].
```"Certain Bug Fixes are allowed. You canāt add new features, but if something broke or didnāt work correctly as you were finishing up, you can fix this after the deadline. You are asked to highlight the changes you make in your submission (a short change log). You probably wont get a 2nd chance with some players, but at least it wont be a problem for future players."```
[^1]: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/rules see 'bug fixes' near the bottom
@xlores-liang I'm 60s in and already love the sense of humor. its adorable how motivated granny is to get back to work like "hi kids! oh you have diseases? thats nice. gotta run! mmmbyeee" lol
and now awwww... what a great game and story!
P.S. I see in the subtitle what just happened a few days ago and I'm sorry for your loss. *hugs*
Sorry for your loss, this is a great tribute for your grandma. Great visuals and calming music, it fits the theme pretty well.
I didn't go to the end as narrative games are not my cup of tea. I had some issues with some characters though :
issue.png
Overall a nice submission !
Your grandma must have been a great person. Don't want to (over-)analyze any of the details for this game, just saying: it got me thinking.
Nice theory that misfortunes come because people believe in them. Not bad story, but it didn't feel like a game. Music and art are awesome!
Nice graphics and mood! There're some ā”ā”ā”ā” issues that affect the narrating a bit. Thought it's a game about grandma managing a garden at first, but I really enjoyed the interactive novel, love the game!
I don't think the rectangle characters are broken. That is words the grandma didn't understand. You can see what the kids said when you are on side B.
To me that was actually the best thing about the game. Got me thinking how life gets hard for some people when they get old, and how hard they try to get around it, maybe even hide it, and how to us we might get annoyed or frustrated with them.. totally personal interpretation now..
Thank you for sharing this beautiful story, itās very emotional and relatable. I like how you used the [] characters to convey hearing problems and then showed the other side of the call. I think itās very cool for you to have chosen this type of game, and itās a vibrant hommage to a loved one.
This particular game/writing style is not my thing, but I decided to click through anyway. I like the multiple perspective narrative idea and the experience/emotion you're trying to convey to the audience. IMO, video games as an art form needs more of this. Good submission!
Without reading your submission, it took me a while to understand where you were coming from. Once I did, it completely changed how I was relating to the story. It would have been nice to somehow glean that from the game itself.
I think you're right that it's slow/long for a game jam entry. Maybe having more choices and having those choices impact the game in a more gratifying way (other than repeating back in B/C sides) could have made the pacing more palatable.
At first I thought the same, that there is something with the characters. But now I understand! Thank you for the experience and for this cute story!
You did a long story for a game jam, wow. Impressive. I understand that you did it to honour your grandmother. That is a very nice thing! These kind of games are not my type. But I loved the graphics, the mood and the sound scape.
Sorry for your loss and may you remember all the good times. This is a great tribute and I know your grandmother would be proud. Keep on making games!
I loved the music and sound and the art style, very dreamlike and warm. I loved the characters of the cats especially. This is such a sweet game and I enjoyed playing :)
@forgin-bits I'm sorry for causing your confusion. Those å£s were meant to show that grandma is half-deaf and cannot hear clearly. And the same dialog will repeat in Side B, in which characters go normal at the grandson's view.
At first I wanted to make a "deaf grandma simulator" in which the grandma can only guess the dialogs and make choices. But I found it off the theme so I changed the gameplay. Thus, these å£s can be confusing since they are no more the main gameplay and lack of explanation.
I should figure a better presentation for it. Thank you though for pointing out the problem!
@jellzilla Thank you very much for the comments!
My first thought was to let the grandma guess EVERY sentence in dialogs and choose a response. Then I found this gameplay cannot work well with my thoughts of "harvesting karma at the end of life".
And the second thought was super-hero grandma saving the world. It can be an action game (which my last paid job was making) or a vampire-survivors-ish game. Then I found again it is not very good with "harvesting karma" unless I can make art designs like *Persona*, presenting "karma" as something fightable. I have no experience of painting.
And then, I found 12 hours has passed. Looking at my empty design doc where everything was strikethroughed, I gave up and made the LAZY choice: just finish the story, make it simple, or my poor coding cannot make it before the due.
@math-daemon Thank you for your empathyļ¼ Those irrelevant talkings do happen a lot in my video calls. My grandma cannot hear clearly for her illness. My grandpa was strong like a bull but almost deaf for deacades. My father has a bad habit of sitting at the balcony where the wifi connection is really bad. And my mother loves the kitchen where the wifi is also bad...
I'd suggest you to add some screenshots or GIFs from the game to the description page (as you did on the Itch) since now it's very hard to understand what this game is about.
I think it was intended to be there, but something with the text went wrong: 7V6WSOUm8qCpYTC.png
Thanks for sharing with this submission! Unique entry and engaging storytelling. Love how we got to see both sides of the phonecalls and the feeling of getting older. Classic holding the phone way too close grandma! <3
I didn't feel like the monster gameplay was necessary though! I feel like I wanted more feedback from my fight choices. But more of a nitpick, not the focus of your game.
Thanks again, take care :)
I really liked the different perspectives on the same conversation. Lot of emotion in this game. Sorry for your loss. This is a very neat way to memorialize her.
very unique and intriguing story. I like the switch of perspective for the same situations. gets even more deep and meaningful with your personal back story. really a project from heart :)