lunch 2024-10-08 11:14
A very cool game with art and ideas that are truly inspiring.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD56 → Shrine
By blacksheepza
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 3.50 | 13 | ||
| Fun | 2.95 | 13 | ||
| Innovation | 2.81 | 13 | ||
| Theme | 3.77 | 13 | ||
| Graphics | 4.68 | 13 | ||
| Mood | 4.54 | 13 |
A very cool game with art and ideas that are truly inspiring.
Unfortunately the fixed zip file also seems to be corrupt for me.
I managed to finish the game. :)
At first, I was a bit bored as there was not much things to do in the game. I could only click for a bit, build a new candle, click some more. It was not until the ~10th candle when I realized that I can send the followers to find some extra essence. I can't say that the game became much more exciting at that point, but at least I had something more meaningful to do.
The visuals are probably the strongest part of the game.
I'm not an expert on clickers, so I couldn't really suggest anything. This game looked good, it just lacked some extra mechanics to be more interesting. The game as it is right now can win itself at the moment I build a couple of candles and go AFK (it'll just take a lot of time).
But anyway, congrats on finishing the game for the jam.
Screenshot_2024-10-09_02-36-44.png
Wait a minute. A see a "bowl" building on the screenshot, but it wasn't available for me, ever. Also, I don't remember that piece of dialogue. Is it a final build of a game or there is more of a content I missed?
As mentioned above, the fixed zip also gave me an error during the extraction, but the game launched anyway.
I really love this artstyle, it's so atmospheric, very concise and very inspiring, good job, icredible
I really liked the mood and simplicity of the visuals! Gameplay is very simple yet relaxing. Thank you!
Oh what a gorgeous game!! the graphics were so put together and soothing
@milkwine Sorry about that. I've never had this kind of issue before. I've tried both Win11's default zipping tool and 7zip so I'm starting to think Win11 might be the issue :/
@quasilyte Thanks for playing! You're totally right, there isn't much to do at the moment and I hope to add the planned depth and some more interesting decisions sometime after the ratings. Time just got the better of me :) As for the bowl, that is cut content unfortunately. I will remove the screenshot to avoid further confusion.
@khton, @uniowl and @briibot thanks so much for playing and the kind words about the art! I'm really pleased with how the vibe of the game came together.
@blacksheepza could you at least describe the magnificent bowl and that extra dialogue here? I'm intrigued. xD
@quasilyte haha sure! The image was from an initial mock up but I wanted the druid to have more to say about what you're doing and as you grow in power instead of just the minor part in the intro / ending.
As for the magnificent bowl, I wanted to have the tiny creatures bring you offerings instead of just a chunk of essence. They would bring you things like pebbles, leaves and water which would all be secondary resources which unlocked other types of upgrades. There was a whole plan I promise xD
@blacksheepza gotcha, thank you for sharing. I love these little game jam "making of" stories. :D
The presentation is *top notch*, the colour palette, movement of the blobs, all the bits of art, are *really great* in the minimalism. However... - Was there any choices to be made? I get that it's a clicker, but I feel like even clickers need some kind of choices to be engaging. The game basically became whack-a-mole with clicking followers, not much more than that, unless I missed something? - A click on a follower correctly triggered should have a clearer feedback to confirm that you hit it. And/or they should have bigger hitboxes. - It was also not clear that they were meant to be clicked on - that is, once you clicked on them, they didn't react seemingly as if you were meant to. For a while I thought I chased them away and that was a bad thing. But I guess ultimately it was all non-destructive. Would have been good to feel like clicking on them was a good thing more immediately. - There weren't much in the sense of development and scope, which I feel was what you were going for. The land didn't expand, the culture didn't grow, whether explicit or implicit. I think that would have been something that gave the no-choice progression some feeling of impetus and outcome. - The mood is GREAT. Music + art worked well together. The low boops, weren't sure if they were followers' footsteps or something else. Proabably needed to be a little less bassy and distorted.
Aesthetically, this game is stunning. You've created an incredible atmosphere and mood, and the soundscape definitely gave me a sense of gravity and looming power.
As a caveat, I'm not really a big fan of idle / clicker games, so that'll colour my opinions. The gameplay wasn't very *fun*, per se. The mood really helped to make it feel worth it, but I ultimately just built a bunch of candles (so many, in fact, that I got an index out of range error) and then clicked a million times. I didn't even realise that the followers going out to go get extra essence was my doing, until I read it in the comments here. I.e. perhaps that would have helped a bit to make it seem more interactive.
I agree with tuism above that I would have liked to have seen an expansion of the map or some greater visual change for each level of the shrine (beyond just the shrine sprite) to build up this sense of expectation. And other than that, more things to do would have been nice.
Incredible mood and art, for sure, which does a lot to make up for the issues I had with the gameplay. It was an overall very positive experience!
The atmosphere and aesthetic of the game is so good! The game itself gets boring pretty fast thought, would have been nice to have more options to choose from, also would've been cool to have the program running in the background collecting essence.
This was super well done! My whole playthrough with more thoughts is attached here :)
https://youtu.be/xNU5lQ7O9T4
@tuism, @jaco-van-hemert, @kawales thanks for playing and the feedback. I'm glad the mood and atmosphere worked. That was definitely my main focus for the jam :) As you all say there is definitely not enough to do, the feedback could be better and overall the progression is too simple. I hope to add the progression system I had in mind once the jam is done.
@kawales sorry about it not having run in background enabled. That was definitely a big oversight!
@mathstr0fficial thanks for playing and recording your gameplay. It was super fun to see! Once again highlighting the lack of feedback but your followers would go and collect the essence if you clicked on them. It would have sped things up a little bit. But yeah, it wasn't clear at all.
I really enjoyed playing this! I wanted more ways to get more essence or to my followers "produce/collect" more essence. The whole vibe of the game is so good! I really like the music, the art and colors. I got an Argument out of range exception when I tried to buy candles at a certain point. I hadn't upgraded my shrine and was just trying to get as many candles. Super cool jam!!!!