tomi-vahamaki 2024-04-15 15:31
A lovely game with nice atmosphere. I wasn't sure what kind of game I was getting into and I think in this case it just made the experience better. It was challenging in a good way and just the right length.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD55 → daydream
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 159 | 3.55 | 22 | |
| Fun | 163 | 3.45 | 22 | |
| Innovation | 324 | 2.60 | 22 | |
| Theme | 330 | 2.52 | 22 | |
| Graphics | 146 | 3.60 | 22 | |
| Audio | 171 | 3.20 | 22 | |
| Mood | 53 | 3.90 | 22 |
A lovely game with nice atmosphere. I wasn't sure what kind of game I was getting into and I think in this case it just made the experience better. It was challenging in a good way and just the right length.
I love the cinematics, the atmosphere almost had me daydreaming myself (in a good way).
I really like the first boss. In the end, the zelda part wasn't keeping my interest enough to keep going for another level, even though I want to know what the memories are about.
Everything feels good, it just got repetitive, and I ended up backtracking most of level 1, because I was missing a key. I really liked that the keys were showing me where to go, to find the locks, though.
Everything looks great, and the sound is great. Very cool entry
Lovely! I wasn't expecting this when I started, but I like it! Sadly I couldn't get to the end, because I kept dying on the second memory, but I liked this interpretation of the theme. Plus the graphics and audio really set the mood. Nicely done!
Great work with the story writing. Very emotional, and meaningful. I know last Ludum Dare you were asking for as much feedback as possible, and I'll happily provide that again.
Let's begin with the critical feedback.
- The enemies that can turn invisible act as invisible walls, which was more confusing than anything, leading me to assume there was jank wall collision. - The spinning eyeball laser felt "cheap". It didn't defeat me, but it brought me down from full health to half a heart, which was... stressful to say the least. I don't believe there was any way to dodge that? There could definitely be some better indication of what's going on there. - The second boss had a very large hitbox, which makes sense as it has a large sprite, but In top down games like this, I usually make the hitbox only extend to where the shadow is. Being hurt by the tall graphics when I assumed the game had some depth, allowing me to run around or behind it... that caught me by surprise. - The sword arc is a bit interesting. Perhaps making it swap from your left to your right with each swing could help? I found myself needing to rotate the character to hit guys on my right, while I could hit guys on my left while looking directly forwards. It's easy to follow how the sword arc works, but it's weirdly lopsided by only hitting things on your left/ahead of you. Either that, or what NES Zelda does where the sword is only directly ahead of you.
Now for the good stuff.
- The mood. Ohhh wow the feels. You said in the discord that this game was very personal, and it shows. I'm glad you were able to make this story. - The art outside the dungeon is very cute and relaxing. - The art inside the dungeon is very readable. (though I did mistake the walls for a carpet in one of the first rooms. It doesn't help that the ghosts can go through them) - I don't know if it was intentional, but hitting a jar twice before it despawns can yield an extra heart, which was very helpful at times. - The bosses were unique and made the end of the dungeons very interesting.
All around, great work! Here's my recorded gameplay for further feedback. Cheers!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4WxvOHmemY
Hi,
An interesting idea and quite a well fleshed out experience for a game jam game - nice work! I had a few bits of feedback:
- I'm a relatively fast reader generally find it uncomfortable reading dialogue that progressively "types in". Most games let you hit the "skip" button (c here?) once to skip the typing in and just show the text, then again to progress. I think this is better UX than just skipping the entire section of dialogue - Some enemies seemed to hit and damage me after they had despawned. I think this happened with both the initial "tadpoles" and the invisible black cat enemies. - Often the black cat enemies would disappear for (what seemed like) 5 or 6 seconds. As I could generally only hit one at a time this meant some rooms took 30 seconds to clear where for the majority of the time I was just sitting there waiting for the enemies to respawn. - I got stuck underneath one of the eyeball bosses, (it looked like I could get through between it and the wall while was avoiding the beam, but couldn't). I took 6 sudden hits of damage and was booted back to the start. I think I would have preferred to be respawned outside the boss room rather than having to walk through the entire level again so I gave up at this point.
I loved that you start with a visual novel type of thing ... just to surprise with a binding of isaac meets zelda meets swords of ditto experience.
I kinda felt an eerie vibe it being so silent, and I thought the main character has a lot of personality
Screenshot 2024-04-17 162659.png
really want to see more of her
the black cats are a bit annoying particularly because they offer no real risk and just make the pace slower
I like that the sword is long enough so that if you hit space real fast you kinda become invincible
This truly has been one of the most fun games I've played this Jam so far. Don't really know what else to say, the mood, audio, gameplay, and enemies were all so good. Great work!
I love the game a lot! i like art style of the game as much as audio and gameplay. It was funny to play that game, great job!
This had some deep feels, congrats on making a lovely personal game. I enjoyed the gameplay in the memories, and the mechanics and art was great. All round ,great work!
Definitely getting some LoZ/Binding of Isaac vibes here. Switching between cutscenes/gameplay was a nice touch and added a bit more substance to the game. The gameplay was simple but didn't overstay it's welcome and having two unique bosses was nice. That said, the sword swing was quite clunky since it had to actually rotate and make contact with the enemy to hit it. Additionally there were a number of times an enemy dealt damage to me after they were already dead which was a bit annoying with only 6 HP. Though the "rooms of respite" with the ponds felt very well paced and meant I never went too long with low HP. That said, even if the graphics were pretty basic, the vibe of the game with the atmospheric wind was pretty solid. Overall a nice little entry.
Nice and polished, good amount of content with bosses and cutscenes. There is a bit of gameplay jank like enemies being able to hit you a bit after they die but nothing too bad. I kinda wanted some knockback when hitting some enemies but that is a design choice really. Not sure I completely understood the story behind the items but the mood was quite relaxing.
damn i didn't suspect it to be THAT long, it's impressive and only adds more points to your compo work! i'm a little dummy when it comes to playing any fighting games but for me personally adding a such feature as hitting a jar twice so that you can get an extra heart was really helpful (hope it was made intentionally). the mood was really nice and the game itself has a welcoming atmosphere along with the story. nice entry!
Great mood, good outer story layer, and the Zelda part was well done. Movement was responsive and the balance against the enemies in terms of having to get in and swing felt fair while creating some tension. The art was strong, in particular the harmonious colors that fit the vibe really well.
I did stall out early in the second memory dungeon, because it was the same enemies as the first, and it's mandatory to track them down and slaughter them. The disappearing guy who makes you stop and wait for him is a bit grindy to exterminate, and while at first this part was great, it did overstay its welcome given that there was no skipping it.
It's a shame because I was curious to push further and learn how the story unfolded and what the next boss was going to be like!
This is a nice, well-rounded entry! Just a small smoothing of grind and I think I would have spent a lot more time with it.
A very solid entry! I love that zelda vibe and honestly i'm a big fan of top down - hwat can i say.
Here are some things you should consider, that I realized during playing:
- The attack cone for L/R needs to be balanced, it stops at a weird position and I would love to have both sides full covered with the cone - otherwise the intercardinal positioned enemies are hard to target
- The deactivation of colliders needs to be optimized a bit. U can still walk into enemies and get damaged even though they are dead. I would recommend upon killing the enemy - destroy it and instantiate a new gameobject for the cool particle filter effect :)
Thank you so much, I hope I could help with my feedback!
Liked the disappearing enemies that would move around - their collision box staying present while invisible made it a little easy to predict where they were going to be if you were chasing down the last one.
Sound was nice. Great effects and pleasant BG music.
Some confusing hit/damage boxes, but given the time constraints that's not surprising.
Fun little entry. Good job!
Super cool game! I love the zelda style of gameplay and love the main character's art. The cats were a little hard to deal with but otherwise super fun!
Nice atmosphere, you did a great job with the sound design. Love the enemy designs as well. Good job!
Very solid entry, specially given that it's a compo entry, good work :)