FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD54 → Down Below

Down Below

By draekdude

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall10392.9334
Fun10562.6434
Innovation10512.5632
Theme9892.9333
Audio5203.2334
Humor5822.8532
Mood7853.2534

Comments

draekdude 2023-10-02 12:44

Screenshot 2023-10-02 at 7.41.53 AM.png

draekdude 2023-10-02 12:44

Why didn't it grab my title page?

arthursenpai 2023-10-04 11:09

your game doesn't really start, tried 2 times and it blocks,if I click I am asked if I want to close it

draekdude 2023-10-04 11:37

Sorry! I had a friend experience that. It ran fine on both my Lenovo and Mac mini.

inumenor 2023-10-04 12:21

Sorry Bro, I try playing your game but interaction doesn't work

oddballdave 2023-10-04 12:32

Interesting game. I do love these old style dungeon crawlers. I clicked some statues, opened a few doors, and fell down a few traps, but alas I never found my way out of the dungeon. The dungeon changed slightly on different runs. Not sure if it was intentional, but thought I'd mention it. Good stuff. :8ball:

kr4sh3 2023-10-04 12:43

I cant seem to interact with anything?

draekdude 2023-10-05 00:39

Anything you can interact with is highlighted by a yellowish shader. You can use the mouse to hover over something and then click the left mouse button.

*spoiler* start with a statue.

draekdude 2023-10-05 01:40

Thanks for playing @oddballDave! most walls/ceiling/floors each had a list of assets they would randomly grab when building the level. The map was always identical, but it at least made the look different each time, thanks for noticing and playing! I wonder if the time was too short? I finished on hard with 3 seconds to spare right before I uploaded it. But then afterwards couldn't beat that.

tobius 2023-10-05 02:35

I was unable to click on anything, but it was kind of neat walking around! Spooky!

daniel-grinshpon 2023-10-06 03:27

Didn't really work at first, tried restarting, then I could play it. Pretty neat concept

lastuck 2023-10-06 10:52

The game seemed interesting but there seems to be a problem with the interact button, I could only open one door and the rest didn't do anything. But if you ever fix it I'd be glad to retry!

draekdude 2023-10-06 11:41

Be sure to click on the statues. One status unlocks one door. So there are maybe 4-5 statues.

6len 2023-10-06 12:56

The game is really interesting, it took me a while before I decided to try jumping. In hindsight I see that it's in the description on the website but not in the game menu itself.

Some things I think you could add: 1. I think it would be nice if you added a message to the locked doors as before I read the comments I thought it wasn't working for me ! 2. A windowed mode ! I had to unplug my second monitor which is vertical as I couldn't move the full screen game over, this might just be my computer being a bit haywire...

I really like the sound effects :laughing:. I just about finished it in the time limit on medium difficulty. Overall I think the game was really fun, it took me a few tries to figure out the puzzle and I enjoyed it :smiley:

allie-vera 2023-10-06 17:56

There's nothing like a good ol' dungeon crawler, and you really nailed the atmosphere!

matt-walak 2023-10-06 21:32

I was not able to figure out that I could click on the statues without reading the comments, so I was initially confused why none of the doors were opening. It also took me a second to realize I was triggering traps when I stepped on certain tiles. There were a few times that an arrow hit me from behind and I wasn't really sure what happened.

I also found rotating left and right a bit confusing since the camera just jumped there. I know that might be a callback to some of the earlier games in this genre, but I personally would have liked a little camera rotation to give me some context of the 3D space.

I'm a fan of the sound effects haha. A little unusual, but a very fun way to generate original sounds quickly. Good use of the theme in regards to gameplay and graphics. Nothing says limited space like being trapped underground in a dungeon

draekdude 2023-10-08 13:51

Some great feedback! I thought it was just cut off and then redid the UI to be sure it was visible and re-released it, but just looked and forgot it entirely! Sorry about that! My friend also told me the arrow was "cheap" because you would die without knowing why and you could barely see it even if you were facing it. I wanted the camera to move a bit when you turned and moved, but ran out of time, but great suggestion!

jasonm 2023-10-10 03:22

Had issues with the interactions. Cool concept.

fisher2470 2023-10-11 20:46

Doesn't seem like the interactions are working correctly, but I really enjoyed the sound effects and the snappy movement.

draekdude 2023-10-12 10:10

Could you highlight the statues and click on them? That's how you open doors. I wanted it kind of something that was discovered, but also I didn't want to make people super frustrated. Does any one have advice on the statues? Should I have just make floor or wall panels that unlocked them? Thanks!

epb9000 2023-10-12 14:32

The ambient background fits very well and the sound effects are quite unique. I did make it to the end successfully without too much trouble.

@draekdude I think the issue people are having with interactions is there's insufficient feedback to the player. For example: Locked doors should play a sound and provide a visual cue - like a shaking doorknob animation or a flash of a lock icon.

Likewise, the state of the statue should also visually update so you can tell it's state has changed, and that change needs to be visible even when standing directly in front of it. The audio effect is too subtle and would be completely lost on a player with hearing impairments - or one playing without SFX on. Similarly, the arrows only playing a sound is an issue - there should be a visual cue that you just triggered _something_.

PS: The jump control is missing from the game pause interactions - I only found it on accident. I did end up clearing the game though.

igor-kingamer 2023-10-14 04:36

Nice! I liked the style. Keeping track of which direction I was facing was hard at first, but I got used to it after a while.

The main issues I had were already pointed out -- mostly about feedback. I thought statue feedback was buggy, but now I tried it again and realized that's because the sound comes late, half a second after clicking -- more than enough to cause confusion since the player has to discover what's happening. (Edit: Moving stops the sound, which worsens the issue.)

A few points about interaction: When you click on a door to close it, then click again before it's closed, it stops in the wrong position. Also, I was able to interact from any distance. Clicking on a statue right after interacting with a door makes it stop halfway, but that feels about right.

Played it until I made it to the end. It took me some time because I mistook two statues near each other to be the same one, but I think that was my fault haha. Great job!

bentglasstube 2023-10-16 05:12

Got stuck on the section after the trap door. I couldn't seem to unlock the door no matter what I did. As others have said, some better feedback about the door/statue status would be helpful. I really enjoyed the retro crawler vibe and the atmosphere you created. Nice work.

dan-str 2023-10-17 19:53

the game is very interesting, I liked it, the idea is good, continue at the same pace and you will become more professional

saralizzieb 2023-10-18 02:04

Reminds me of flash games I used to play which is a big plus! Cool game especially considering you did it solo as well, despite the few issues I encountered.

cdunham 2023-10-18 23:16

Cool game, wish the puzzles were more fleshed out. Interacting with the statue works but you have to click it like 50 times to make sure.

draekdude 2023-10-19 00:05

I think I stupidly have it where the statue unlocks AND locks the door. I’ll have to double check.

epb9000 2023-10-19 15:13

@draekdude On my play through I did confirm that the statue DOES both lock and unlock the door. If I recall the sound effect was different - two click syllables for unlock, single for lock. This is how I confirmed a statue I came across was a new one.

draekdude 2023-10-20 01:52

Yeah. Sorry about that! Thanks for playing!