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F.R.E.D
F.R.E.D
By mr-field and juicybrucey
View on ldjam.com
| Category | Rank | Score | Count |
|
|---|
| Overall | 289 | 3.84 | 25 | |
| Fun | 477 | 3.54 | 25 | |
| Innovation | 189 | 3.86 | 24 | |
| Theme | 594 | 3.60 | 25 | |
| Graphics | 240 | 4.14 | 26 | |
| Audio | 171 | 3.85 | 26 | |
| Humor | 355 | 3.32 | 25 | |
| Mood | 64 | 4.21 | 25 | |
Comments
I loved the artwork on this one. Such a really cool concept! The sound design for this was also really entertaining. I loved how the scream actually feels like "AHHH I GOTTA GET AWAY FROM THIS GOO!!" which is great and really builds on the urgency to run from the goo and figure out how to defeat it. I think in game control instructions would be helpful. maybe a little arrow to pop up above the first door you open to leave your room would be helpful too! Took a moment for me to realize the button on the ground releases me. Other than that, I would love to have this game worked on and released on Steam! I'd see it being a really fun game with more levels and music design.
Incredible work in the amount of time you both had.
Nice game! It's has much more depth than I thought. The map is very well designed with plenty of path, remind me of The Escapist. Keep up the good work.
Suggestion: Control feel a bit clunky, maybe if you add custom key binding. Also has a tutorial or something for a slower start.
roitchie
2023-10-06 16:54
A very interesting entry. The art style and gameplay is quite different than the games i've played till now. The sound effects of the goo are especially good at setting up the mood of them being dangerous and something alien. I loved the death sound effect, maybe I'm a bit sadistic haha.
I would echo what the person above said. Some more instructions would've been really helpful. It took me a while to figure out what I needed to do. The Keyboard controls as well are not very intuitive. But you do recommend a controller and I will say it feels a lot better with them.
For 3 days this is really impressive. With some small quality of life improvements there's a really great game here.
dodoita
2023-10-06 17:23
Love the artwork and sound design, the keybindings feel a bit weird, but maybe it's just me. The game looks really polished, nice work!
I LOVE the way the ooze moves. Reminds me strongly of The Ooze on sega genesis, I wonder if you took inspiration from that.
Giving me a gun but no energy was a nice touch. I have a very clear goal of getting energy for it and felt pretty weak without energy, forcing me to get creative and merc that one ooze by sending them out the airlock. Then, when I did get energy, bam bam bam and another ooze was dead!
One some more frustrating sides, while I am fully in favor of high pitched retro sounds, some sounds, especially the man crying out in pain, were maybe too much louder than the baseline and pretty piercing for that reason. It also sucked that I had to scroll over to a keycard in my inventory and select it before I could open something with it. Being able to open things just by having it would have been nice, with maybe the inventory being 1 space smaller to compensate for that fact?
Loved the graphics and solid gameplay. Well done!
interesting game idea
Interesting game. The art style and audio are very good, but controls quite inconvenient. Also, some kind of tutorial would be good. Overall, nice little game that could use some QoL features.
robbobin
2023-10-06 17:31
Really impressive stuff! Feels really deep and expansive compared to any of the entries I've seen so far. I definitely struggled a lot against the keyboard controls, although I do recognise you recommended using gamepad.
martta
2023-10-06 19:28
Fun game! I think some sort of tutorial would be essential for this game. The controls were not documented inside tha game, and it was difficult to remember what was the difference betwee x and c buttons and ended up dropping the items accidentally all the time. Also some kind of desciption of the goals would have been nice. But really compled and interesting game!
Great, I really liked it!
At first, I didn't know what to do – my monitor is in portrait, so the game window was too and I didn't even see the line about destroying the ooze. I'd suggest highlighting it so even in these conditions one couldn't miss it.
That said, it was overall a great experience, I "feared" the ooze the first times it got close, and having different ways to destroy it was creative. Good job!
I love this game! The graphics are top notch. This is exactly how I want to do a game. This is very polished and enjoyable. Good job! =D
mr-field
2023-10-08 03:22
@jahwffrey thanks very much! i actually studied the way the ooze moves very closely to try to figure out how to do it, it was by far the hardest part of making the game.
i'm so happy you managed to shoot some goop out the airlock, i wasn't expecting anyone to pull it off! - Sorry for what we did to your ears though
I'm really impressed. I actually played for a long time, even after dying I continued, due to the brilliant fact that each hour starts in a different place. The look was what motivated me to test it and it's great that you created this clean chart with a perspective style. The sound of this game deserves top marks, the character's scream is truly terrifying, you can really feel the severity of the damage. I opened a wrong door and the vacuum of space burst me, it was tense. I found some keys, but not all. Even though I know I could have found it, the green goo is there to get in my way. The thing about seeing the map on the computer terminal is so brilliant. I would be playing this game for much longer if I didn't have to test others. It deserves to be expanded or finished. Even though it already seems complete. But I think there is more information missing than what to actually do, I read on the page that there is how to assemble items, charge batteries etc, I would love to have done that but I don't know how, I would have to do a lot of research... but it's brilliant.
Masterpiece!! One of the most interesting games I've found in this edition. I love how it throws you in there without holding your hand and expects you to figure out. UI and inventory control feels a bit hellish (I usually dropped the thing I wanted to use, which being the laser gun was not fun with the ooze in front of you) but one gets better. Still, incredible entry, very well done!
Awesome game! I love the respawn mechanic being the little vats of ooze. The game is fun and scary and it looks very polished for the time limit. Very atmospheric and the audio works really well. Great work!
thyoi
2023-10-14 06:54
Impressive pixel work making it one of the best examples of pixel game I've come across this ld. The sound effects are also great, and despite the lack of BGM, the atmosphere has been created excellently. nice job
fupi
2023-10-14 18:57
It's an impressive amount of content, with beautiful art and funny sound effects, although, even having read the notes in the game page I was still confused.
It's OK for a game to deliberately not hold the player's hand and expect them to figure out what to do, but I don't think clarity should be sacrificed for that effect. The game has a lot of different objects that can be interacted with, but it's never clear what items can be interacted with, picked up, shoved, and the items that highlight change depending on what you're holding. While you're running and looking around, there is no visual distinction between items you can use, and just decorations, nor do you have any idea of what they do. And even though the game page mentions a science lab with a combination station, and an armory with a charging port but I swear I could not find these anywhere.
I managed to figure out some game mechanics on my own, like how to kill some of the ooze by bringing it to a door to the outside and opening it, and how the little energy drinks on the floor are actually ammo for the laser gun, and that interacting with a wrench on a valve does, things, I could never understand how these mechanics connected together and how I could use them to progress, they felt like different mechanics in a sandbox playground. I'm a bit sad because this game looks REALLY clever, but I just really don't understand what I'm doing, doesn't feel fun to walk around for several minutes doing no progress just testing different things that do different kinds of nothing...
I'm not gonna rate this game on anything other than graphics, audio, humor and mood, because I don't think my frustration is entirely due to faults in the game, and rating based on that, I feel, would be a disservice to the enormous effort and clear attention to detail you guys put here. I'm sure this is just not the kind of game for me.
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3mpty
2023-10-14 22:47
You made a whole immersive sim in a weekend and that's absolutely incredible.
It's so cool how different features interact with one another, trying different ideas to beat the slime in different ways was loads of fun, sucking them out of airlocks, burning them with steam, but good old fashioned space lasers are clearly the way to go. The enemy design is amazing, a really really cool concept for an enemy in a tile based environment.
My only gripe is the control scheme on keyboard is absolutely horrible. I'll let it go because the game is great, but the amount of times I used or dropped an item at the wrong time because the keys are all grouped together was ridiculous. I definitely think tweaking the controls could make the game much more enjoyable.
Overall one of my favourite entries. Go rate some more games so people see yours on the games tab, it deserves to be seen!
Man, this game deserves more recognitions than it is now. The pixel graphics is gorgeous! I mean really, each object is very detailed and crispy, absolutely love that. The ooze is so well designed, I love how it moves and navigates through the map, it can even press on pressure plates to open doors to reach the player, and the sound it makes is nice too, very suitable for the "oozing" appearance it has. And the fact that there are lots of possibilities to try in this game, from different ways to take down the ooze, or just the ways that objects interact with each other, they are incredibly cool and well implemented!
The thing that bothered me the most was the controls were a little off, it took me a while to get used to and I still dropped or used an item unintentionally, maybe rebinding the keys to be more reasonable and convenient is the first thing to consider. And I noticed that you were not being able to pick up an item because the currently selected slot was "taken", even though there were plenty of empty slots left in the inventory, instead you had to switch to an empty slot before picking an item up. To me that was a bit tedious and irritating sometimes, especially when you were in a danger situation and needed to pick up something fast. I think it would make the experience more worthy and enjoyable if you were allowed to pick up any items as long as there were available slots in your inventory. And I believe some kind of instruction or tutorial at the beginning would be a really good idea for this game, it can guide future players through the core mechanics and tells them what they can do in the game, instead of letting them figure it all out themselves.
But other than that, this game is basically a prime example of hidden gems, definitely one of my favorites so far! What an amazing job and I'm really impressed by the effort you guys put into this entry! Consider rating more games out there and leaving feedbacks, so this precious gem can get a higher chance to be discovered by others!
mr-field
2023-10-18 23:01
@fupi i really appreciate your sentiments and extra appreciate your gorgeous little piece of art! big shame the game didn't do it for you - it's very kind of you to be generous with your rating despite your issues with the game and its clear flaws!