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Firebounded
Firebounded
By tucan and RSR Studios
View on ldjam.com
| Category | Rank | Score | Count |
|
|---|
| Overall | 846 | 3.24 | 31 | |
| Fun | 974 | 2.85 | 30 | |
| Innovation | 152 | 3.94 | 30 | |
| Theme | 139 | 4.28 | 30 | |
| Graphics | 595 | 3.58 | 31 | |
| Mood | 467 | 3.64 | 30 | |
Comments
2023-10-02 07:03
The gameplay loop is really good, The way there is a normal path set out, but you are able to skip and shortcut through by understanding the main mechanic is a really tight gamedesign. Having enemies which follow a set pattern also feeds well into this games "stop, scout and go" style, but also having enemies which only move once you have started to progress to force a quick reaction keeps the game from feeling completely in your control.
I also really like the art, reminds me of old RPG Maker games, the level with a bunch of assets in the background really reminds me of the toybox room in IB.
The music has a cool vibe, but did get a bit grating maybe grabing another of a similar vibe and using it to break up the music could've given some rest for the ears.
Only real criticisms I have is a lack of feedback in things like SFX, and while the main mechanic working the way it does is import to the gameplay, it did feel a bit janky at times. Maybe some acceleration and decceleation could make it feel slightly less janky.
I really enjoyed this game, Great job!
The art is amazing!
The idea is very unique, but it feels like I need to stop playing every few seconds. It felt a bit frustrating.
This is a very cool premise and nicely executed as well. The idea is neat - I've never really seen a game work in that exact way, and it definitely fits the theme for this LD. Even after only playing it for a few minutes, I am still mentally "feeling" the rhythm/timing of the fire circle, which is a little surprising to be honest. The song and graphics fit the mood well, and it really conveyed a specific sense of place/feeling/identity of space. Nice work!
Great, unique take on theme with good visual design. Had a really hard time telling when the fire ring was gonna kill you. Not sure if it is the collision not being properly synced with the visuals, or something else. Makes it kinda frustrating to play.
I liked the idea of the story alot, a paper character surrounded by it's weakness, really cool. I think everyone has really said everything else, unique idea but controls and waiting can be a pain. But, I beat it and level 3 is my favorite, was fun when the flow of the game was working.
xry
2023-10-04 07:02
I want to be really honest, limiting the movement space of the platforming character in order to match the theme, it was a bit unique but felt strictly less fun to play because of the ring of fire around the character, the changing size is a nice touch though. I think finding a way to balance this a little better (what if the player maybe had brief moments to break free of the fire?) might make the game loop more exciting! That being said, the art of the game is wonderful, and the music is a great fit for the vibe! I love the story and want to learn more about the world, the concept of a paper princess trapped by fire is so cool! Overall good job!
owca
2023-10-04 16:13
Really uniqe game. You picked the music perfectly and it creates nice mood.
igor-fam
2023-10-04 20:17
I didn't really understand how the fire ring moved, it sometimes followed me, but sometimes it just didn't and I died. I think this mechanic should have been made clearer, but great idea and nice game overall!
tucan
2023-10-05 04:38
Hi everyone! I really appreciate all the feedback and the cool messages. With all these encouraging messages we are getting very motivated on developing the game further taking into account all the great feedback you are giving us!
@cooldry77 I'm glad you like the little detail of being able to shortcut the levels once you got used to the mechanic! Also, you are totally right that we need to add SFX and more music.
@diego-teran I'm also named Diego! Several people have mentioned what you are saying about having to stop and we think it is due to the Princess being too fast. We are going to tweak the player move speed on a next version and we hope that will make it better.
@pete-valeo thanks for the message! I am glad you enjoyed the rhythm and timing mechanic!
@snesgaard We have heard similar comments, we believe it might be that the Princess in the version we submitted for the jam is moving too fast which makes it hard for some players to keep the game pace, we are going to tweak the character speed and smooth the ring's movement.
@beeb-gamecodecompany Thanks for the message! Tweaking the character speed will probably help avoiding stopping as much and help the game feel smoother. We are planning to add more levels like level 3.
@xry We really appreciate your honest feedback and to be honest we really like your suggestions of trying to add more dynamism to the game loop by briefly removing fire ring, we are discussing on different ways to introduce this mechanic that also would make sense with the game story.
@owca Thanks for the message! We are glad you like our game!
@igor-fam We have been seeing people mentioning this, we think adjusting the player speed and making the ring movement smoother will help with this case.
We will be trying to play all your games during the week!
I like the idea, but the execution is a little lacking. I think having the ring moving constantly as a slower speed (such as `lerp`ing to the player position every frame) instead of moving every few frames, would be a better and fairer approach. Also, the collision against the fire hardly felt consistent, there were a few times where I was like "Oh, I definitely should have died there," but worse than that, at times the opposite was true.
For a game like this, you really should have a snappy death animation and a quick reset, especially when I'm expected to start all over again, with no checkpoints and relatively long levels. At times I had to wait nearly a minute until I felt confident enough to clear a gap where an enemy was roaming. The game could definitely use more speed across the board. I was not able to clear the second level, it was much longer than I anticipated, despite being able to sort-of-reliably reproduce a skip.
The art and music are nice, and I like the story and use of the theme.
tucan
2023-10-06 02:37
@catusfelony thanks for the great feedback! It is always cool to find people willing to share technical knowledge! We are currently thinking on ways to make the game feel smoother. Adding checkpoints was something we were thinking to add but with the tight timeline it was one of the things that we had to leave without implementing, that is why we want to improve it.
Whoa I really liked this interpretation of the theme, and it STRESSED me out ha! really nice work
tucan
2023-10-06 18:05
@dan-burns I'm glad you liked our game! Haha also I hope it was the good kind of stress! :smile:
dhargan
2023-10-08 20:30
why I can't vote for audio? I want to headbutt to that 5 star for audio! really nice track!
I died so many times. Very clever take on the theme. I would just say that it starts out quite difficult and takes a good number of deaths to get used to. I also felt I really had to mash the space bar to jump, the response was delayed, but that could be my keyboard.
tucan
2023-10-11 04:46
@dhargan I agree with you, it is an awesome soundtrack! Our team didn't compose the music track, it is CC0 licensed from opengameart and the author goes by the name HorrorPen. We didn't feel it was fair to get ratings on something we didn't compose. We created all the visual art, story and game mechanics. And that soundtrack we felt like it fit perfectly the game. Thanks for the comment!
tucan
2023-10-11 04:55
@johnsensei thanks for the comment! We thought about starting out more simple and ramping up the difficulty as you progressed through the game but the timeline was brutal and we only got time to include the harder mechanic. If you are interested we have been working post-jam taking into account the feedback we have received and also we have fixed some bugs we found on the version we submitted. We want to keep developing the game further.
knexator
2023-10-12 15:30
The optimal way is the most boring way to play (move slowly and only when the circle is big); music and art are very nice.
Good take on the theme, like especially the dying animations, pretty creative. Art is a bit of a mish mash with the flags and backgrounds dont match together. Gameplay is innovative, great take on the theme, definitely frustrating as others have said. Good job.
natano
2023-10-13 23:32
Difficult game, and surprisingly that's not a bad thing. I love challenging games and this is one, the mechanic of not catching fire while you have to worry about enemies and the level is challenging and very innovative. I remembered the graphics and gameplay style of Castlevania, and I wondered what magic you did to produce a game with functional mechanics, surprising art, an unprecedented interpretation, a great soundtrack and a bit of nostalgia. As for improving, there were a few times when my character didn't jump properly, I didn't understand why. But that doesn't have much of an impact, the game is incredible!!
papaver
2023-10-13 23:37
Wow, really cool game, with very creative mechanics and original take on the theme!
I really like the player animations, especially when jumping or burning.
But wow, I am very happy that I am not a paper princess caught in a ring of fire! I am too impatient, and it gave me a lot of stress, having to be so careful. It was quite frustrating sometimes, because it was not enough just to be careful! Sometimes there were unpredictable situations: a deeper fall or an unpredictable enemy. In those cases it felt often unfair that I had to start all over again. Some checkpoints would have been nice, since the levels are quite long for such a unforgiving game.
I generally don't like jumping with space, and would have like to use the up arrow for this. Also, sometimes on the edges of a platform jumping didn't seem to work, while it looks like the player character is still somewhat on the platform.
Level 2 took me very long. At some point I was quite frustrated, but later I started to like the mechanics more again, developing some speedrun tactics for certain parts. Eventually I found a way to skip the first bit of level 2 by going to the right immediately at the start at the right timing of the growing of the ring of fire. :smile:
But... I did it!
LD_FireBounded.PNG
Overall, very well done!
Hey! Beautiful concept and art I thought, and even though you didn't make it yourselves, I thought the audio choice was smart in tying the mood of the whole thing together. Your world is definitely coming together beautifully here, and it feels like it could be a wonderfully emotional journey.
That said, I feel like at the moment, the fire ring itself is a little too hard to work around to be a 'fun' challenge for the player at the moment - my play experience was pretty frustrating unfortunately. From what I could tell, the ring didn't harm enemies - that might be a nice way to offset the limitations it imposes? Even just giving the player some 'health' (3 chances or something) might make it a little easier going to start with.
All in all, this was a really brave and innovative entry - I hope you keep going with it.
It's too difficult at the beginning, as soon as it starts I'm surrounded and I burn to death in the flame. The flame around me also burns me. Very difficult so it kills the fun
tucan
2023-10-14 15:27
@knexator yes, a bit of people have told us the same. We are working with the player movement parameters so that the game feels fluid, our development version now feels a lot better! Thanks for the feedback!
tucan
2023-10-14 15:37
@digitaldude555 Thanks for the comment! We are working on more animations and graphics to improve the mood of the game.
tucan
2023-10-14 16:29
Thanks for the very encouraging comments! After reading these comments our team is very motivated to keep working on this project! We had so many ideas while brainstorming to create this game but due to the very short timeline we had to boil it down to the very core. Getting great feedback so quickly is amazing!
@natano Thanks for the great comment! We are really happy the game resonated with you and even brought some nostalgia! That is amazing! Working on this game jam was a lot of fun and quite a bit of work, especially with the timeline we had to make some tough calls on what we needed to leave out and what rough edges to leave there. Regarding the improvement you mentioned, we found some bugs on the version we submitted for the Jam which may be causing that problem. On our current development version the game-play feels a lot smoother!
@papaver We are glad you liked our game and thanks for leaving a great comment! We are really happy you liked our game, we can see you are really persistent! We are taking feedback into account, because we want the game to feel challenging (and we know it is never fun when a game feels unfair) so on our development version we tweaked the player's and ring's movement, we tweaked the jumping code on the edges of the platforms, and finally we also added checkpoints!
@lachlan-james Thanks for the great feedback! We want to keep extending the game world, story and characters! The feedback we have been getting is awesome, we know the version we submitted for the Jam had rough edges and a big one was starting off with a very high difficulty level, on next versions we are going to make it progressive so that the game feels better. Our development version now have checkpoints, which makes the experience feel a lot better.
The game concept is really cool, it is my first time seeing such Interesting rules. The game fits with the theme so much, I wish I could have a few more lives, the game punishment seemed too much, the first few times I tried to explore backward but quickly died and went back to the beginning. It's a little hard for me to pass, or maybe you can add some weapons for the main character. https://ldj.am/$374960! Try this if you like puzzle gameđź’—:)
Hey, really nice game! Love the theming of the paper princess surrounded by fire - it's very simple and fun, reminds me of the old Fireboy and Watergirl games. And your use of the theme is great, definitely some of the best out of the games I've played so far. A lot of my other thoughts have already been noted by others, but I'll say anyway: having to move with the ring of fire makes the platforming pretty slow, so it's pretty frustrating to die. You'll probably want checkpoints or major character/hitbox tweaks, but you already know that. Really nice game overall though!
tucan
2023-10-19 03:42
Thanks for the awesome comments and feedback!
@tao-yuanyue I am glad you liked the game and the game mechanics, we are working on an improved version where we added checkpoints and it feels less punishing. I love puzzle games and will definitively give yours a try!
@lemontyseven I'm happy to hear you enjoyed our game and even reminded you of another game you liked! We are going to keep working on this game and we hope to have an improved version soon!
I like the concept and art quite a bit! I agree with the earlier comments about slowing down the princess would make the game easier, such as replacing running with slow walking. It becomes quite tense further into a level where one false move sends you back to the last door. The idle and jumping animations are excellent, I can almost imagine the rustling of paper and various deaths in my head.