Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD56 → The Swarm
By neoleg
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 999 | 2.91 | 25 | |
| Fun | 1023 | 2.56 | 25 | |
| Innovation | 982 | 2.58 | 25 | |
| Theme | 769 | 3.37 | 25 | |
| Graphics | 873 | 2.97 | 25 | |
| Audio | 419 | 3.36 | 24 | |
| Humor | 908 | 2.12 | 22 | |
| Mood | 377 | 3.71 | 25 |
Game is atmospheric, and the graphics looks okay. I found it a bit hard to understand what I needed to do, and found myself aimlessly wandering around, looking for levers that I couldn't see what they do. But it is a good entry regardless.
Look nice, I like it, good job ❤️
Got to the finish. Atmoshpere is nice and i like hearing the enemies coming. Quite punishing enemies and since the was no feedback when i took dmg the death often suprise. After some tries the layot of the map was familiar and i understood what to do. I though the hp pickups where somekind of altar switch where the body should placed xD. I didnt get what were you suposed to do with the bodies, distract enemies? Oh right, now that i read your info i was right :D
The mood is alright, but overall game design leaves you IN THE DARK! (ba-dum-tss) Like, I'm not sure where I'm even going, or what to do with the bodies, or why the creepy insects don't disperse from the light. Good job on the atmospheric music!
Good game, with a good mood apply to it. There just not has much indications to let you know what you have to do, or what you're doing in the game. The position of levers/batteries feels a little random, and kinda strange that you can't pickup the corpse that you just throw. But overall, the exploration mechanism with the swarm that can pursue you is really cool.
Good atmosphere, I like the dynamic of the flashlight keeping the insects away, which would often have me walking backwards to keep them at bay, at the cost of not seeing where I was heading. Balancing those two aspects - seeing my surroundings, and keeping the insects away - was interesting. The sound design is nice too, hearing the insects approach. The level design is a bit obtuse, having no clue where to go after pulling a lever, but I suppose that raises the tension.
The game is pretty punishing in regards to damage, you take it very quickly and without feedback, so you can go from full health to dead in a second.
Also, here's a heads-up: the embedded doesn't work on this site, you can check the Ludum Dare resources page to see a fix for that. And I would suggest crediting your sources for any assets you used, since you mentioned that the SFX are not original.
I like the concept of this game, but its really hard to tell whats going on at any point in time. Maybe a map that you progressively fill in would help! Also the swarm is kinda hard to see even when they're illuminated by the flashlight, some accessibility options would be nice!
I like the flashlight mechanic and it is very SPOOKY. I think that it would be nice to have more health though
I like the concept itself, but it's Hotline Miami level difficulty. Overall impression is positive, I like what you wanted to say with this game and spiders really make me nervous (they ate a whole corpse, geez!)
Yeah the embed on ld cuts off the intro text but its still parsable. Stumbling around in the dark while scribbling a rough layout into your mind feels like old school horror types so I personally didn't mind it but I think a hurt sound for the player helps when you're repelling one swarm of bugs and another swarm creeps up from behind because they use the same insect noises. It's rougher when the creeping swarm is the tinier type too.
Nice match with theme, like the concept keep going!
Menu graphics are offset unless I zoom in to 80%. Some typos. I didn't experiment with the dead bodies at all since it felt hard to experiment or plan with those. Maybe if there were safe rooms or some of the bugs had glow in the dark eyes or something. Flashlight can see through walls if you're right next to them, which is confusing. I like the sounds and was able to get through eventually, though.
The atmosphere is spooky and the flashlight mechanic adds great tension. The sound design was spot on, but I often had no idea why I died, there wasn’t clear feedback when taking damage. The concept is great, just needs more clarity in what’s happening during gameplay. Gj!