Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD55 → Phasebound
By kepsert
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 13 | 4.31 | 93 | |
| Fun | 17 | 4.23 | 93 | |
| Innovation | 21 | 4.17 | 93 | |
| Theme | 192 | 3.51 | 93 | |
| Graphics | 18 | 4.36 | 93 | |
| Audio | 14 | 4.22 | 93 | |
| Humor | 37 | 3.89 | 85 | |
| Mood | 39 | 3.99 | 89 |
I really enjoyed your art style and that floating mechanic (not sure what to call it) was really fun to play with. I wish there was more explanation on the 'special blocker' blocks as I got a bit stuck at that part but none the less this was fun to play that had a refreshing mechanic that I'd love to play with more. Cheers!
Wow! This game was really fun and polished. I also found it quite funny, I love snarky narrators. If you do choose to keep working on the game I would make the tunnel spawn a little bit higher, their were a few time where i felt I was fighting with it, but still super cool!
wOW what a great game! Great idea and phrase lines are awesome! Pretty well tought and fun to play!
As always such a great entry. Blow away the core mechanic. Easy, thanks for stopping by and sharing. Congrats!
- Nice Game Mechanics - Intelligent programming - Nice Art - Nice Sounds & incredible music - Very good UX/UI design - My mind is blown - Great work - wtf lol
I loved the sound effects and the artwork in this one! I also really liked the time warping context. I felt the second level was really difficult though and didn’t know how to progress.
@nickcherns Thank you! I'm a sucker for trying to go without tutorials, hoping people will figure it out by level design- but it was somewhat hard on this one with a mechanic that basically gives the player mostly unlimited freedom haha. I'll definitely look for means to improve the introduction, however!
@pilottk Thanks for playing! I wish I could've continued the story some more (I have ideas!) but I had to let go due to time constraints / "scope creep". The idea of spawning a tunnel slightly higher is smart! Maybe the bottom line just below the player's feet?
@joua @aarimous @cibums Thank you for playing, and I appreciate the kind words!
@mrventures Thank you for trying the game! In level 2, once you pick up the orb, the little clock will light up and you can now press shift or c (or west button / trigger buttons on controller) to summon (or destroy) a time/space tunnel. Once you've got that going, feel free to see what it allows you to do :D
This game was so cool. The mechanic is super neat and it's explored wonderfully. Appreciated the coyote time and other platforming niceties. Loved the music, too! Very good stuff, especially for a compo.
"Harder than anticipated" say whaaat? Because this looks stunning, can't imagine what it'd look like if you felt you had an easy time :D
It's not obvious you can make the stream vertical, got stuck on level 2 (or is it 3?) for a while before figuring it out. A less dedicated (or more harried) player might have given up
@decadedecaf Thank you for playing! These comments make my sleep deprivation feel worth it!
@myse I guess the harder than anticipated in this case would mostly relate to art haha. It took up a lot of my time (to make it look somewhat good!) which I would've otherwise loved to have spend on narrative / my other gimmick ideas :id:
@cheesepencil Thanks for playing! Do you have any feedback on what I could've done differently to make it more obvious?
I could not figure out how to get past the second level. My portal was always horizontal and I guess I needed a vertical one. Maybe that can be tutorialized!
Excellent job! Nice art style and a very clever mechanic. The controls were a bit hard for me, but I'm bad at video games so that's probably my fault....
@mrventures I think you might mean level 3?
Level 2: Level2.gif
Level 3: Level3.gif
If you hold either up or down when pressing tunnel, it'll place a vertical tunnel :) I'll look into finding a better way to showcase this for post-jam as I've heard more feedback on this. I was hoping the gap in the ceiling would be enough to trigger dormant gamer instincts haha
@breakfastgun Thank you for playing! Don't underestimate yourself, it's a rather unique (or uncommon at least?) mechanic, so it'll always be a bit harder to get used to! I did try to set up the game so that there's no (or not many at least) input sequences and most of the level design will give you some time to set yourself up, otherwise if a level deems to rough but you'd still like to see what next, you could press F4 to continue :D
@kepsert ah ok. I saw the camera shift up but I thought it was just for looking like how Hotline Miami does.
IMO, the game was at its best in the levels where the blocks appear or disappear depending on if they're in the tunnel. There are really some clever levels in the back half of the game - I think you could introduce those earlier.
Just a bit of feedback for the graphics - the transparent layers of the background + parallax really do the artwork a disservice. A solid background would be easier on the eyes and help with the signal-to-noise ratio. Maybe something to add in the Accessibility menu in the future.
I feel like someone was really wanting the "Tunnels" theme to win :)
nice game and level design. took some time to catch the vertical tunnel. Keep it up. Can be a great game if continued !
@andrewkennedy These levels were also the most fun to design, I'm glad you liked them! Now I'm sad the other 2 gimmicks I had at the ready weren't working properly, I think you would've enjoyed them hehe.
Regarding the background, thanks for the input! Art is definitely my weakest side here (takes me a long time to get something looking decent), and I wanted to get some parallax going, but I couldn't make it look right at all and at the point I gave up I had already spent too much time on background art to justify making yet another background :( Post-jam, perhaps?
Funny how you mention the theme btw, I actually downvoted tunnels as I despised it- didn't even think about the irony here until you mentioned it xD
Wow this is one amazing submission! Everything is incredibly well polished that its hard to pick one game aspect that's my favorite.
The art style is very well thought out. The music is charming. Loved the tunneling mechanic and the controls felt responsive.
Definitely one of the top games I've played so far, and I've been playing through submissions for hours! o_O
Awesome game, really enjoyed playing it:)
Amazing submission, art goes a long way and the mechanics are intuitive
Great puzzle platformer, great level design, very good !
I love it! This kind of mechanic (freezing time and move trough objects) is new for me, and i already love it
What a cutie! Nice art and core mechanic is awesome!
Had one crash, but hopefully the fact that our current level is saved... saved the day =D
Very nice game, impressive compo (especially loved the music!)
Didn't try the speedrunning mode, but I really really understand how fun it should be to try and find efficient routes through those levels. I kinda already abused it in my scenario play, quickly alternating tunnels directions and making dangerous falls around spikes, thinking it was the strangely-hard designed path, only to find out later that I skipped half the map.
Very enjoyable, loved it!!
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Great level design, art, mechanic, and giraffes!
Love it! That's creative way to implement the idea + I feel like it's a strong puzzle mechanic. Graphics were really good too! Was a joy to play the game
Thank you for coming onstream and sharing this with me! It was amazing. Definitely keep working on this <3
Fun game! I really like the humor touch with the narrator, well done!
Love the writing, the art was incredible, and the design was quite unique and innovative! I had a great time playing. It really makes you think outside the box!
Audio and visuals are fantastic! Gameplay is challenging enough to be fun and keep you wanting to push through each hurdle. Great stuff
Wonderfully fun game with banging tunes!!! the perfect amount of frustrating
Awesome entry! Super fun our whole team had a ton of fun learning all the tech and racing against eachother. Very well polished game jam entry!
This is so good, I spent an embarrasing amount of time only for THE GAME TO FREEZEEE and i lost all my progress. I had just gotten to the battery platform concept. But anyways, yeah this is a really great game for a jam game. really creative use of the time tunnel idea, and incorporating it throughout in interesting ways. I do think was kinda frustrating at times, such as trying to line up the correct jump when you exit the tunnel. I think with some more lenient spacing, this could be a really great puzzle platformer if you wanted to go further with it!
@zee-yuen hi! Thanks for playing! Am at work on phone rn so hard time typing but the game does have autosave if you want to try more! ♡
Since you saw me play you have some idea - all around banger entry. I liked the jokes, liked the puzzles (although a bit light maybe) and the platforming also has value to it. Good work!
Really cute game with an interesting mechanic! I especially liked the blocks that switch on/off when they are in the portal area - they led to some cool platforming puzzles.
great game, you can be the second celeste,Love this game controler feeling so well ,hope for more abiliy of this horse,not just summon the teleport tunnels , 5 stars
First of all - the visual aesthetics of the game are magnificent! You were inspired by Celeste's visual representation, weren't you?
*(btw, an article on this topic that helped me in my game: https://aran.ink/posts/celeste-tilesets)*
Secondly, the puzzle aspect of the game works really well. A little mind-blowing sometimes, but not too much.
It's great that you handled so much work solo. Awesome!
Really impressive work! The later levels got a bit too challenging for me but I really enjoyed what I played. Awesome visuals, sounds, and level design.
This is a good one
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Music is ***sick***. Really like it. Core mechanic is simple, but opens quite a wide field for a lot of experiments and art is just chef's kisses. :relieved: Great job on the game!
This was a mind bender to play on stream! Sorry I broke the game a few times :)
Cool game, I liked it!
Loved the mechanic. Art and music were spot on. Great job!
Every side is great, and each mechanic is explored by ourselves and easy to understand, and they fit with the level well. But I have to say when level gets bigger I just find a close orb and get, and find a platform with a barrier and set a tunnel, which might be less strategic. Anyway, I like it!
Really cool concept! I beat the game on stream, and had a lot of fun! I liked a lot more the levels with interesting puzzling than hard platforming. I felt the harder platforming around the phasing felt a bit weird, I had to time jumps in relation to my un-phasing, and time phasing with relation to jumps, and it was all a bit stressful. People who are better at platformers probably loved that! Just kinda a me thing. Overall great job!
Really fun to play platformer. I had a lot of fun when using tunnels and exploring what they can do!
@nardandas thank you for playing! First of all I'd like to let you know you were quite a lot quicker at figuring out the levels than most people, the execution was a bit harsher but that's mostly a design thing from my end that needs improvement haha. Limited time gives limited time for playtesting (if any at all).
There are some things I'll be looking to implement after rating period including but not limited to a killbox buffer after removing tunnel. Sorry for the stressful moments, I'll make sure to use it as feedback in the postjam / future jams, however! :D
This game is actually really amazing. The game plays so good, music and visuals are amazing, I literally can't see anything bad about this game. I would say a top 10 game definitely in this jam. Very nicely done!
Thanks for joining the stream and giving us a glimpse of your game!
Walls and ceilings are no problem for this shapeshifter giraffe, but watch out those levels can be harder than you think!
Awesome summoning mechanic, I really enjoyed the game. Great job!
Just wow! I have nothing to add to that! Well maybe expcet... I want more levels! It was pure pleasure to play. I would not be surprised, if this game would ended up on a LD podium! Amazing job :)
Kepsert the constantly-delivering mad-lad. Fuck yes.
https://youtu.be/NfH6ykcaC_I
Humour is on point, giraffe is adorbs and such a great interesting mechanic.
excellent work! love this mechanic, love me a good platformer. the song is rad, the sfx are on point, feels very arcady and classic.
A super fun puzzle game that turned into a platformer halfway through because I'm more patient with finding and executing cheese and finding and executing actual solutions. Was fun to break with some timing and resource shenanigans! Highly recommend to anyone and everyone, thanks so much for making. Such a cool concept.
Eye-catching game mechanics. Well done!
This one is a bit overdue buuuut I really liked your game! Once again it is Giraffe O'clock and with a really polished version. One thing I missed were some collectables, that would've been a really nice addition with this mechanic as it could add some extra difficulty getting them and looking for them. Either way looking forward to the post jam version (if there is one like the text hints at), well done kep!
Great art and mechanics
The type of game I like. Simple and challenging platform. I liked the simple pixel art and I loved the music. What program was used to make this tone? Congratulations!
@euler-moises Hey! Thanks for playing! All sounds and audio are made in Famitracker, my favourite of the trackers out there :D. But there are other trackers you might like better. For Famitracker, if you're looking to try it, I recommend googling the v5 beta (not on the actual famitracker site)
I didn’t expect I’d have the skills to make some of these tricky jumps, but was surprisingly do able! Such a slick mechanic, I was constantly expecting secrets as it feels like the sort of game that could easily be hiding things around every corner :heart:
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2123757357
@justcamh Thank you for playing! Trust me, I did have secrets in mind but time constraints haha, couldn't even finish the narrative :(
what a cool concept! personally, I found the timing to be a bit tight towards the edges of screens and terrain, but it's such a well-polished take on platforming!! also the dialogue was really cute.
Such a great entry. I love the art style and it's nice to see another spin on the summoning + platforming spin as well. The overall mood was really good an all things combined it made a really solid and complete entry!
Very nice game. Interesting mechanics, though I ended up inside a wall waaaaaay too often :rofl: Love the limited-palette graphics. Excellent work!
@digital-bacon Thank for you playing!
Ending up inside a wall was a common thing haha- should've thought about the design a bit more, there! The post-jam fix has the horizontal tunnel spawn a bit higher, and there's a buffer on the kill-call when inside ground (so you have some time to jump out of a tunnel while in ground)- hopefully that solves the issue for future players! :D
love your games kep ^^ 5/5
ya we both know its great lmao the puzzles are done well and the progression feels natural the music, sounds, art, and gameplay all come together very cohesively for a really awesome game ^_^
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Oh! It's you, the giraffe guy! I really enjoyed your last giraffe-entry, giraffe o'clock! This was really nice as well, a bit hard at times though due to not understanding the mechanics fully yet and a bit confusing level designs at times. I would recommend building up the mechanics and level ideas gradually in a full release if you intend to continue working on it (which I think you do, as per your blog post with a 2025 tba date?)
That would give the player a way to familiarise themselves with what they're given and can do, kind of like how mario games introduce concepts in a gradually harder way or how celeste teaches you in increments how to play in the level design itself.
I really enjoyed this game though apart from some frustrations, the mechanic is really nice and could feel really good with some tweaks, and the music is really nice and on point.
Great work!
Design of James/Lisa/Burt/Custom the Giraffe is adorable. Humor is great, puzzles are enjoyable. Themusic and effects fit the lighthearted mood. One of the most polished games I've played in LD55. Excellent job!
Really liked the mechanic and the puzzles, it got particularly tricky once the blocking areas and spikes were introduced. If you continued with this beyond the compo, it'd be cool to see some modifiers to the main effect, maybe one-directional movement, speed changes etc. Great job!
Love how you explored the mechanic to almost its limits with elevators, unpassable obstacles, spikes and having to open portals mid-air. I was very confused where to go on the second level, maybe there could be a minimap or a way to zoom out / move the camera freely? It was also unclear that you could open vertical portals, but I figured it out eventually :) And yes! Why do you slide off the unpassable platforms?! That was very frustrating, to be honest!
Overall, it's a very solid entry, would be interesting to see what other puzzles can be built on top of the mechanic.
Beat the game... no monarchy's were harmed. Overall good game, though controls were a tiny bit slippery at points. Also some of the puzzles required kinda annoying timing. And once or twice I did from a screen wrap that shouldn't have killed me. But overall pretty solid and polished. You did about all you could with this premise. Good job!
I don't often rate compo games since I usually join the jam, and doing all that work, including audio, by yourself in two days sounds absolutely impossible to me :laughing: Anyway, this is an impressive entry, especially considering the number of levels. You added an apology for not finishing but this is already a _lot_ of content! You did what I probably should do, which is come up with a simple mechanic early in the process and then make levels to showcase it; and honestly there's a lot of effort in the level design here. Comparisons to Portal are a bit stale but I could sense the same progression from obvious to more arcane or roundabout uses of the mechanic. The presentation (visuals and audio) are simple but effective.
To list some of my gripes... I didn't think it made total sense that horizontal tunnels let you move at your leisure while vertical tunnels are a free fall. Though I realize that you can jump in the horizontal mode, so tunnels don't remove gravity. Eventually you just accept the mechanic as it is, but it does mean you have to press a combination of buttons (namely up + shift) very fast before you end up in the wrong place (or die), which is not my forte. Also on the logic side, I initially thought it was a bug that you can just look up or down to make spikes go off screen and thus avoid running into them when you summon a tunnel, but later puzzles obviously make use of that. Still, I sometimes got killed off screen, perhaps by a spike that wasn't completely out of sight.
I had to skip two levels, including the one in the image below, because I couldn't find the solution and it could get a little frustrating to me due to the things I mentioned above. The cheat code is appreciated!
hardlevel.png
Finally, I think you can jump higher than usual when you're in a vertical tunnel; that didn't feel intentional but maybe it is! I liked the cheeky answer when you pick a "custom" name :wink:
Congrats on finishing :smiley:
Nice platformer, good idea for the mechanic. Liked the music and I think it's the first game I've played where you're a giraffe :)
Congrats!
Congrats! :)