Pest Control

kroltan 2024-04-16 00:48

I like the colour palette and its consistency. Good job on the level design principles application too, showing the enemies before the real deal. It is a very short game, but presents its mechanic well, and what more can you ask of a jam entry!

I'm conflicted on the "shooting" mechanic. I like it in principle, but because it basically means you get very long range attacks, and the only way to nerf the player is to make them not able to see the enemies. Which in turn means the player is incentivised to shoot off-screen then move in, which I'm not sure is what you intended, and also means the player doesn't get to see what they are dealing with.

Maybe requiring line-of-sight to the cast point or something similar could nerf it a bit, but communicating that to the player would be annoying.

jnur 2024-04-16 08:18

@kroltan Thanks for the feedback!

Totally agree with you, the end result ended up being pretty much a basic side scrolling shooter, you just get to decide where you shoot from basically. It's not super apparent, but the summons actually disappear after a while, both to make long range spamming less viable and to make it a bit harder to accidentally kill yourself with rats running around.

I did consider requiring line of sight, perhaps combined with a max distance, but decided against it. Exactly for the reason you mentioned, couldn't think of ways to efficiently and understandably communicate it to the player so I decided to leave it. My "vision" of a more complete version would definitely have that, as not having it would pre-empt a lot of threats and make cheesing encounters even easier. And there's some puzzle potential in limiting summons a tad.

gamesplusjames 2024-04-16 12:09

This is a fun idea! Great job :)

ziggy 2024-04-16 12:20

Nice work, i liked the art style of the game. Gameplay is a bit bare bones but enjoyable for what it is. Also, the camera speed was a bit too slow for my liking and sometimes did not keep up with the player character.

quadape 2024-04-16 13:07

Cool little game! I liked the way you aim your spawns, it's a bit unusual but satisfying. The thing I found weird is that sometimes same enemies require 1 and sometimes they require 2 hits to be destroyed which throws you off sometimes. But the game was enjoyable regardless, and I also liked the UI animations you added

jnur 2024-04-16 13:26

@gamesplusjames @ziggy Thanks!

@quadape Oh right, the flying ones always need one hit and the horned enemies need two. Except in the boss fight, there they also need only one - I thought that the fight would be way too chaotic and hard if you had to hit them twice there as well. Felt really intuitive to me, didn't realize it might be confusing - but I guess that's just me being blind to my own ideas :sweat_smile: Thanks for the feedback!

calvin 2024-04-16 15:33

Simple but charming! Great work

bitlytic 2024-04-16 15:55

Took a second to figure out why I was dying, at first the bat summon can be hard to spot, but I ended up running through the game 3 or 4 times. The movement feels good and it makes me wish there was a speedrun timer. The only tweak I would make to the main character controller is maybe smooth/slow the camera a bit, it was a bit too sensitive to your movements for my liking but other than that it feels satisfying.

congeesetador 2024-04-16 15:56

As other people said before the game is very simple but very fun at the same time, simple graphics can go a long way with a lot of games including this one! I like the mechanic for summoning the creatures to kill the enemies, the only thing I'd suggest would be making the camera a little bigger because it was sometimes hard to see the enemies that were below me to be able to summon the creatures to kill them, some background music would also fit the game really well but overall I enjoyed playing this!

heretic 2024-04-16 15:57

I really like the visual style and concept, there is some problem with getting stuck in the ceiling, the game could use some rocking music and more brutal SFX

this one goes pretty well with the BGM

https://youtu.be/ckCrkuh9_GQ?t=3283

tayteus 2024-04-16 16:00

It's not my kind of game, I'm really bad at it! But the idea is good and the whole thing works well. I tried several games, which is rare when I play jam games. So congratulations, you got me! Well done !

mibi88 2024-04-16 16:01

A great game but way too hard unless you glitch into the walls (it was really easy!), then I could win easily. More levels would really improve it!

Capture d’écran du 2024-04-16 18-00-12.png

oni 2024-04-16 16:05

Great idea, loved the art style! I found the aiming a bit difficult and I didn't realized that I could die from my projectiles at first, but once it clicked I had fun! The shooting mechanic could be better explored by having some environmental puzzles that takes advantage of your aiming position though.

Nice job!

the4thcircle 2024-04-16 16:20

I had real trouble with the control scheme, possibly because I was playing on a laptop. Couldn't get very far at all. Probably a skill issue.

storeyware 2024-04-16 16:33

Screenshot 2024-04-16 123108.png

Heya! I immediately shot myself before leaving the first platform. xD Nice game. I killed the boss by just.. not dropping in the pit. not sure if that was intended or not.

joeshanahan 2024-04-16 17:01

Really love the art style on this one, the sprite work has a lot of personality. I too cheesed the boss by standing on the ledge and summoning birds, but what's the point of being a summoner if you have to stand close to those attacking you? :joy:

I didn't really see the point in using anything except the bird, the rats just seemed like less good birds. Also the camera (using cinemachine?) felt a bit off to me, maybe the lookahead a bit too aggressive? But then when I actually wanted lookahead (when falling downwards) I didn't have it. That's my only real gripe, otherwise - great job! :tada:

breaddysticks 2024-04-16 17:45

I liked the option of choosing what you summon as it provoked two different playstyles. I was missing a bit of the music as it made the game feel a bit empty and the camera felt a bit off, I never knew if it was safe to fall down or if I would collide with an enemy and have to restart. I like the art style and the enemies have pretty cool designs.

wouterk12 2024-04-16 18:25

Fun little game! I see that I experienced the same ending as some others here, not having to stand in the pit with the end boss. But that's okay, the art style is really cool, I like the animations a lot :D Well done!

joeshanahan 2024-04-16 20:47

I made a video compilation and this game is part of it! Hope it's useful for you! https://youtu.be/NJKVSQgn7-E?si=pIClVOYC3hTwkT0Y

kirass 2024-04-16 22:57

I like this game! You guys are great!

thatsommes 2024-04-18 13:58

Very hard to get used to the summoning part, I had a lot of fun commiting suicide XD Love the idea, love the sounds, It's a bit annoying to so often jump/fall into the unknown.

dreamscale 2024-04-20 16:20

I'm not quite sure what it is, but something about the summoning just _feels_ cool - I had a lot of fun just jumping around and slinging stuff. I'd love to see more levels!

andruid 2024-04-21 19:16

Hi! Visiting you back! I like your game and I think that maybe you should embrace the wall collision glitch into a more controllable mechanic if you make sure the player knows what to do. The game is hard without it but it also can add to the fun. A solid entry doing it alone!

corbak 2024-05-04 10:58

Hello! I'm surprised by the well crafted game you have here. I love the little details you put into it, such as the animations, the game over screen, the fact that you can aim yourself and do an autokill. It's really fun! I don't know if someone said that already but if you click and release the attack button without moving the mouse, there are no shots, it just doesn't work, you have to move your mouse in order to release the host, was confusing at first but afterwards. You can have a decent action game with the controls and with the mouse combined, its a lot of fun to spam shot :D Well done on your entry !