FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD55 → Demanager

Demanager

By nomersol, satacat, kndratova, rekkorize and durkagames

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall3413.7878
Fun5213.5078
Innovation3243.6578
Theme944.3278
Graphics2464.1979
Audio864.0976
Humor1903.7675
Mood3013.8778

Comments

thatfirey 2024-04-16 14:40

The game could really use some tutorials, sounds and overall fixes, but it does look like an interesting concept

lllarso 2024-04-16 14:59

The strong point of this game for me is especially the audio. Really set a great mood with the casette-player. I also liked the music and the visuals.

jbartelsson 2024-04-16 15:41

The mood is amazing. I really like the graphic effects and the audio. I didnt completely understand what I had to do, but It was still fun.

p3ngui 2024-04-16 15:52

Amazing Idea, I loved the graphics, the retro look and I am a big fan of the Audio! The Intro was a bit much text for my taste, would have been cool to have it voice recorded since you already have some amazing Voice Acting? I also must admit that I didnt understand the exact system how to summon the right demons.

sariiger 2024-04-16 15:59

I love the art style and the audio! Also the idea is really neat, it was fun playing through it.

nicol3 2024-04-16 16:12

The audio and the graphics were amazing, the tape was a mechanic that i did not fully understand but it was still one of the best games i played so far

kaesterin 2024-04-16 18:30

One of the best games at this jam! Awesome art, atmospheric music, interesting mechanics and cool use of sound cues! Especially liked the attention to detail (and the end game picture, of course). 10/10

erlioniel 2024-04-16 20:17

The portrait on itch page expresses exactly my mood of employee of the month after the jam. Nice art and sound design - it's really pleasing. This watch is hilarious and I like it so much!

stanov 2024-04-16 21:15

Thank you for stopping by!

The graphics are nice, I wasn't quite sure how to play it. Maybe a tutorial after each round making the game more difficult over time?

usenrame 2024-04-17 05:10

5 stars, game is so great! found it on a twitch stream! your team is amazing!

rincs 2024-04-17 16:09

This is such a great entry! xD I love figuring out the different summons. Love the graphics and I'd totally play more if you added more to this. xD

patrick-pang 2024-04-17 16:24

I love your game so much that I even gave you a full 5/5 ratings in a very irrational and unfair manner! ! ! I've downloaded it and added it to my favorites! I have longed to perform such a ritual since I was a kid, just like in the cartoon Jackie Chan Adventures. Thank you for your game for making my dream come true. What a great team you guys are! BTW, I really love that alarm clock lol, it would be great if this whole set had models in real world. P.S. Go on vacation with Succubus is such an irresistible temptation hahahahaha.

james-greenleaf 2024-04-17 18:36

Great concept, aesthetic, and gameplay! I was a little confused since the voice on the tape didn't seem to match up very often.

nomersol 2024-04-17 21:20

@james-greenleaf thank you for your review, you are right sometimes orders have mistakes it is part of a puzzle

nomersol 2024-04-17 21:23

@patrick-pang from all our team big thanks for your words it is really meaningful for us and brightened our day, your comment really inspired us

matt-green 2024-04-18 02:43

There's a show called Ugly Americans about a guy who works at a public sector job integrating various demons and monsters into society. And there's one episode where a wizard melts when his job is rendered redundant. A giant floating head (ostensibly their boss) appears and shouts "MAINTENANCE! I SUMMON THEE"

For some reason this magical bureaucracy has always tickled me, so that the first thing I thought of when the theme was revealed.

I didn't end up doing it, but this is more or less what I had in mind, and I'm glad someone did it. :)

ausstein 2024-04-18 22:35

Thanks for dropping by my stream! <3

here is the vod if you want to rewatch

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2123241621?t=1h45m9s

zoranac 2024-04-19 01:38

Love the art style and the music! The audio cues are kinda loud and hard to listen to, but everything else is great!

naplz98 2024-04-19 03:04

image.png I am the employee of the day! The game is very good, in the end I don't know if I went on vacation with my succubus or not but I finished second and third in the other two days for not watching the tutorial video before playing! The game is very fun, the idea very original, very good job guys!

slickramen 2024-04-19 11:53

This game is super awesome! Congrats guys!

schwede 2024-04-19 20:05

Thanks for coming by and letting us experience your game during the stream yesterday!

The cassette recorder was simply very nostalgic! It definitely has style! Congratulations on your submission.

zen 2024-04-20 03:53

Great game! I played the updated WebGL version with the tutorial and it was a very polished experience. The art and animations were amazing and it fit the theme of summoning really well. Reminded me of those old Papa's flash games which I loved playing as a kid. Fantastic submission :heart:

cheesepencil 2024-04-20 04:16

I didn't really understand what was going on, mostly I just got summons by flipping page-by-page thru the book and hitting the bell after every page flip because the stuff on the table and the tapes didn't make much sense. Got second place with that strategy three days in a row before I gave up.

Looks great, sounds great, the animations and sprites are hilarious and terrifying, good job.

guitarbro 2024-04-20 04:23

Huh this is a pretty interesting take on demon summoning lol. Really like all the funny little details in the art, gives it a lot of personality. The inclusion of audio to help you figure out the correct demon was a cool idea, though in practice I felt like there were multiple times I had a perfect match with the audio and the items, but it was actually one that didn't match the description which was confusing. Not sure if that was a bug or intentional. That aside, the intro/outro movies and the demon summon animations were a nice bit of polish that were totally unnecessary but definitely puts this a step above the average submission quality. However, listening to the intro loop for the entire duration got a bit repetitive. :stuck_out_tongue: All things considered, I think this was a pretty short and straightforward, but very complete and polished experience. Well done.

(Oh and I did get #1 every day :wink:)

braktheman 2024-04-20 05:08

Good concept and pulled together well for a nice cohesive game experience. Really like the audio tapes and having to stick them in the player and manually click the play button. A small touch that worked for me!

Great job to all of the team!

gexo 2024-04-20 05:49

I really like the audio, and the idea behind it is not bad. I'm just missing a bit of progress, you could get one summon per day, for example :)

friskila 2024-04-20 06:36

Awesome summoning game! Incredible XD

verti 2024-04-20 06:45

Really cool concept. I saw it on stream and had no idea what was going on, but the tutorial made it pretty clear. Fun game!

konstantinreed 2024-04-20 07:02

Interesting concept, cute art, and pleasant sound design. I didn't watch the tutorial but managed to figure it out on my own. Great job, guys. I'd love to see more immersion in the world's atmosphere and mechanics related to summoning in the future. Thanks for the gaming pleasure!

zamizmi 2024-04-20 07:26

The elevator music during the tutorial is nice and the visuals are really cool. Enjoyed a lot the clocks eyes, and it reminded me from Cuphead!

Found the game logic to be very confusing from the second day forward; the tape casettes function stayed a mystery for me. if I understood correctly they represented voice mail from people needing demons and the ingredients were wrong sometimes.

I felt there was a bug in some point, see pic, since the expected answer was Void, but the goat was wrong.

Getting the answer wrong IMO could be made more interesting mechanics wise; instead of losing only 10 sec, and needing to brute force the correct one, you could make something else, eg skip to next one to make the game more interesting, and forcing the player to understand the feedback better.

feedback.png

overall really enjoyed the visuals, and the mood of the game

nomersol 2024-04-20 08:03

@guitarbro @zamizmi Thank you for your comments. Summoning orders sometimes consists mistakes this is done intentionally to increase the difficulty of the game, as you know, this humans can sometimes be very inattentive.

unrealkazu 2024-04-20 10:41

Nice concept, and I loved the art of the game. The attention to detail is good, and the UI being integrated into the game itself is a great touch, especially the clock with its eyes following you around :P

Like others have said I also had some false negatives where I had a full match on all ingredients (with no ingredients left as well), but it still didn't allow me to summon, and I had to select another recipe that only had 2 of the 3 ingredients. I don't think this is intended when talking about the 'intentional mistakes' right?

Good entry, and great job to the team! It's clear to see that it's a team effort, and it integrates flawlessly.

roroto-sic 2024-04-20 10:58

yeah Holiday for me ! Very Great visuals and audios ! Funny game! Congrats to all the team ! Capture d’écran 2024-04-20 125813.png

tetracold 2024-04-21 08:35

The art is good, I like the variety in designs and the whole idea of this being your job is pretty funny

The tutorial really helped to make erything easy to understand, you did well adding that

The game is really polished and well designed! I really enjoyed the core mechanic here, it never got too hard and I like how especially in the 3d day it encouraged me to take a closer look look at all the clues in order to identify the right demons, it kept the gameplay fresh and fun!

Really solid entry! good job!

toc 2024-04-21 10:34

I enjoyed figuring out the game without the tutorial. Really unique, fun gameplay. The art and sound is also amazing. Overal a great package! I do not agree with the other comment that thinks getting it wrong should have a harsher penalty. I think it felt fair to lose some time, but allows you to continue guessing. That helped me understand the game more.

ategon 2024-04-21 12:17

Thanks for submitting your game to the stream! If you wanted to watch it again in the future heres the vod of the stream (with a chapter for your game)

https://youtu.be/c9SO3tlrBa0

And I'm the host for the ludum dare score chasers tournament this Ludum Dare. Wanted to ask if youre fine if I put some gameplay of the game in an intermission video. Last year for reference:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TM_eIvjBmIQ

nomersol 2024-04-21 14:18

@ategon thank you for your comment, our team don’t mind if you add our game in your video. You are welcome.

tomatoomelet 2024-04-22 00:33

Great art style, didn't realize the instructions on the page can be unmatched with ingredients sometimes (I thought it's bug initially) until I watched the tutorial video. Now I understand what does "people can make mistakes as well" mean! Good job~

zerocomms 2024-04-22 03:51

Tried to just stick to the symbols, got pretty far.

pres2300 2024-04-22 12:31

Neat game! The audio and sound effects were pretty great. I loved the art style as well. Like others have mentioned, I didn't quite understand the audio tape nor how to play at first. It's an interesting mechanic but a bit hard to get a grasp of initially. Overall, great game!

kanity 2024-04-22 17:13

Played a bit, had a lot of fun! I like how it was not that easy as it appeared at first, but then in round three I felt like the voice and items don't match at all, got wrong option three times in a row and ragequit xD But I am not very good at recognizing and memorizing voices, and I feel like here you should rely mostly on the sound (at least that's what I attempted to do).

The graphics are fantastic, and I love how the eyes follow the mouse and the horns sparkle with colours. The creatures are all cool, and the sound is also really great ^^

employee.jpg

jhax 2024-04-22 21:08

Wow! Everything really comes together brilliantly on this great audio and visuals, an interesting twist on a kind of "gather these items to summon the thing" mechanic. And a bunch of neat touches like the tape player and the eyes following the cursor!

lindote 2024-04-23 06:45

Loved it. The art concept is great. The game play is fun and easy to understand. The Documentation could be a little bit better explaining what we're supposed to do... Like "Find into grimory the correspondent demon to summon, according to the ingredients..." or something like this... (for Dummies, like me.. hahaha). Congratulations, guys!

aviv-levy 2024-04-23 11:03

This is a very interesting concept! The art and music were great, though I did not like the constant ticking of the clock, it was distracting. I also accidentally pressed the bell a bunch of times as it was way too close to the book.

I wasn't 100% sure about the rules, I thought they were strict at first but realized at a later stage that "it doesn't matter if the symbol is wrong this time" etc. It was interesting, but I did not find it very challenging, and think the levels may have been a bit too long.

Very nice game regardless!

digital-bacon 2024-04-23 11:06

Interesting concept. Like the use of audio, and little touches in the interface (like the tape deck, and the way the eyes on the clock look around). Love the art design. Great work!

krummsakura 2024-04-23 18:03

It’s a refreshing approach to identify the demons (which are really cute and well selected) based on the summoning materials. Obviously not a huge deal but it can be more punishing. By the way, my favorite demon was 999 among all, it was really funny :) Good job!

randomhuman 2024-04-23 18:04

Good game. I was nearly at the end before I realised that the summoning circle colour (and letters?) is also a clue, before that I had a few that seemed unfair because there was an exact match for the items that was wrong. I also didn't really get much out of the tapes - I guess each entity has a sound associated with them, but because I only listened to the tapes when I was stuck I didn't pick up the associations. My fault really, since the intro did tell me to listen to them!

maxthedoom 2024-04-24 09:01

I love the Papers Please take on the summoning theme! It was close, by I managed to get my vacation. It took me a bit to realize I'm looking for the most correct items, I've had a few cases where all items themselves were attributed to a summon, but I didn't think about the pentagram, and thought the chanting was a "mistake". Great game!

bananplyte 2024-04-26 09:52

Loved the audio effects being part of the demon information, finished the game!

Overall great! I do think maybe the game could be a little bit tighter if you would lower the "wrong information" and just lower the timer a lot so that you got rewarded more for memorizing the correct information - but that's just a minor thought, overall it was a great entry!

smidgens 2024-04-26 11:49

Gorgeous art and vibe. The audio tape (and the play/pause buttons) was a nice touch. Great entry!

gabrimer 2024-04-28 01:28

I really liked the overall idea of the game! The mechanics were slightly confusing at first, and I think it could have a bit more tweaking to it, to make the game play more understandable. Great art and audio, awesome stuff!

squeele 2024-04-28 07:25

I really had fun with the game!

The UI, graphics all have a great polish to them. The only complaint I have is that the tutorial is quite heavy at the beginning. It could have been great to show the different gameplay mechanics step by step. But for a jam entry, amazing work! Congrats!

katanajellyfish 2024-04-28 14:18

How could I have missed your game, and yet I've seen some of your posts. Damn it! I really enjoyed playing it, the design made me smile, and the game is simple and addictive. Thanks for the experience!

captandrey 2024-04-28 17:43

Great job on the fun characters and the cool window sketch on pause! The humor and mood are on point too. However, the long tutorial could be a bit of a drag. Overall, keep up the awesome work!

sweetwizzle 2024-04-30 18:37

There have been numerous "choose the right demon by using the right ingredients" games this jam, but this one stood out with its presentation. It was intuitive, but had enough brain-teasing to keep me engaged until the end. I got to go on a vacation with Succubus without issue, but I feel like there were a couple of lucky guesses in there, haha! I'm mostly glad it never got frustrating.

The theme was very present in both the mechanics and aesthetics. Bonus points for the clock's eyes following your cursor, that was fun. Really nice work!

2024-05-01 18:12

Okay, so, audio is solid, full marks there. But ultimately, I struggle to enjoy this game as much as other commenters do, because of the succubus. I hate the artwork; I know what a succubus is, but the artwork is uncomfortably reductive, especially compared to the art for the other summons (and I really like those). The fact that she is the reward for winning the game is... problematic.

I was really excited to play this game at first, I had heard good things about it, but in the end,I'm just left feeling disappointed.

gamebuilder 2024-05-03 00:38

Graphics are very impressive — 5/5. I especially like the color scheme and the creature drawings. The music is also very good. You seemed to have nailed the theme as well. A lot of imagination went into this game, I can see. One of the better games here. Nice work.

lachlan-james 2024-05-03 01:29

Hey, I really liked this!

I didn't initially think that the mechanics you'd set up would have had as much staying power as they did, but the variation kept it interesting and the actual gameplay loop was satisfying. Art style, music, sound, aesthetic, all awesome. Loved the clock-eyes - nice touch.

It's a minor gripe, but the scrolling text at the start was a *big* issue for me as a player - as someone who reads quickly *and* has pretty spicy ADHD, having a 'tap to finish sentence' button is VITAL. I didn't want to press the 'skip' button because I imagined it would skip to the next sentence - but I actually missed most of the tutorial because it was going too slow for me to read it... if that makes sense.

Hopefully this is useful feedback! Obviously not a big deal for a jam game, but for a retail release I'd have lost my mind.