tomas88a 2025-04-08 18:52
the graphic is simple but gameplay is really fun, like the vibe, good job!
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD57 → Maps of The Darkness
By wolfier
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 663 | 3.21 | 48 | |
| Fun | 638 | 3.07 | 49 | |
| Innovation | 458 | 3.21 | 49 | |
| Theme | 533 | 3.50 | 49 | |
| Graphics | 690 | 3.00 | 50 | |
| Mood | 720 | 3.03 | 49 |
the graphic is simple but gameplay is really fun, like the vibe, good job!
Great concept for a rogue-lite. Like the drawing your own map gist. With more mobs and player attacks/pick ups this would be great
Brings me back to the Atari and NES!
@gifarre I definitely wanted to, i was considering adding a dude who fired arrows at you but I didn't get the time.
Cool idea with drawing your own map. Overall retro vibes are also strong. It was a bit irritating how enemies push you on attack - often out of the room, messing with the camera. Also I wish there is no timer. I haven't even fully explore the first floor when it almost run out. So, the message I'm getting from the timer is - don't waste your time exploring and drawing the map - better rush and find the exit fast. Anyway, I had fun :D Great job creating the game!
@kamuniaft I was worried it wasn't clear that the timer doesn't end the game. I didn't get time to set up anything to tell you to keep playing after the time runs out other then the fact that you have gold you didn't get to use yet.
You benefit A LOT from mapping though because its not erased when you head back in. So it helps you clear early levels quckly
the graphics are amazing! the gameplay is also good
@wolfier oh, good to know :D I kinda assumed I'll lose when the time will run out and just hitted Esc 5 secs before in advance. Wasn't very open-minded of me xD
Very cool idea! Never seen a game where you get to edit the map on a separate screen! In practice, it felt a bit confusing for me and I often just used the built in passageways; overall, though, very cool!
More enemy types and attacks would be cool, in general de idea of doing the map, or at least having the tool is enjoyable, but maybe it can become boring or not used without a reason. (You could add a reason to remember how to go back fast, like needing to go back to camp to refuel) Could not go back to base, finished the first floor and wanted to go buy, but was not able to go back. Maybe "setting camp" where you could upgrade at the first room on each floor could help.
Also if you press "enter" game does not pause and you can see the whole floor :laughing:.
Overall I like the idea, could be further refined with time :smile:.
I really liked the heavy knock-back directional combat, even if it might be a bit janky, it was really fun to learn and you could probably get very far without getting hit with a bit of practice.
The map mechanic was also surprisingly cool, but I wonder if how much of a difference the personal drawing makes with floors like this. An auto-updating map would probably feel very similar, besides having to click less often.
@darklumo as I said above its main purpose right now is to speed up subsequent runs. On the extreme end it lets you take a 5 minute exploration and reduce it to 10 seconds.
I did consider letting you end a run "early", but I didn't get the time to add it.
and ya that "enter" key is one of my debug buttons. I left those in just in case. You can also hit tab to jump to the next floor, which helps with a rare bug where the starting room doesn't have any paths.
Nice work! I enjoy dungeon crawls. Liked the foundation you're working on here.
@DrSmey I think the difference between auto-mapping and what I've done is pretty big. If I choose auto-mapping you'd largely ignore them map until it became useful. Here the quality of your map is largely up to your own diligence and it gives you something to do in between rooms.
You don't really need an accurate map to do anything here. It just has to be good enough for your interests.
The game is in ps 1 style, very cool
It's a good game, but the point is particularly clear
It's a bit hard to come across a place where you can use the money you've collected to upgrade your gear. Fartheset I've traveled was to floor 5, so it could be that I didn't survive long enough to reach that place yet. It's a big map, so traveling through different rooms and hallways felt a bit long. Maybe the rooms could be smaller?
Though I really enjoyed the part where you can create your own map! It becomes a bit clunky when it's small on screen. Because I would misclick to the adjacent box instead. If it was perhaps bigger, or the hitboxes were a bit bigger, it would be more easier to draw the map more quickly and efficently while you explore the dungeon.
Nevertheless, this is great work for just being one person!
I like the map concept a lot but the rooms seem kind of empty. Good game nonetheless.
There is definitely something there, the push back from damage could use some tweaking, some more enemy variety, and probably some more stuff in the rooms, but having said that what is there is already quite fun!
I had a lot of fun with this, I was surprised at how good the combat felt for how "simple" it is - I really enjoyed it though and love me a good dungeon crawler.
@5huno-3 You won't come across a shop in the dungeon itself. The game brings you back the shop at the beginning of the game so you can spend the money there. Also, i did notice the map was a bit clunky when i was testing it, i could of definitely made it bigger
@VladImperator @botch-frivarg This game is built partially on the bones of a bigger game idea. Largely scrapping ideas i knew would be too expansive for a ludum dare period. The gold is a simplification of having you record POIs (as i couldn't add POIs in the game) and the combat a quick and dirty replacement for more RPG flavoring if i was doing something bigger.
Wow, this is really impressive. It took me a second to understand the gist, but once it clicked it was a lot of fun. Having to draw your own map of the floors adds a lot; I really like that it makes you stop and think while exploring, which is the opposite of what I normally do in roguelike games like this (which is just explore blindly and rely on an auto-map of some kind to save my progress :p)
Combat is also fun despite being a bit janky. The only issues I had were when enemies would insta-knock me back into previous rooms, but this didn't detract from it too much. Really fun game!
Ok this is so cool, music is cool, level design is cool and game design is amazing, i love writing my own map to get quicker on the next run ! Thanks !
cool idea about the map!
Love the lighting effects. Super zippy and a great time.
Nice graphics
It is an excellent game, plays very well and escape gets you out right away.
A small suggestion. From one room to the next you didn't use scrolling it was just a room transition. I would try to add smooth scrolling like Stardew Valley
What did you use to program this in?
Thanks for the play
The map idea is really cool, but to be frank it doesn't have much to do with the theme. The gameplay is fun, but it gets a bit repetitive due to the lack of enemy variety. The enemies are also pretty fast, its hard to see them coming sometimes.
@beebster-games Gamemaker and and i agree about room transition. I had a thought about adding one and then got distracted by other tasks.
@locke8 Well TBF I didn't really aim for the theme, the fact that it ended aligning with it at all was pure coincidence. As far as the enemies being too fast I'm assuming you're referencing how they can hit you the moment you enter a room? Ya i should of added a short delay before they can act so you don't get ganked before you can see them.
The textures are a bit of a bummer, maybe the floor should be less contrasting. But overall it's a pretty good game! Good luck with the voting!
The map mechanic is really cool, I quite like that the enemies kind of catch you off guard if you get a bit too absorbed in marking out where you are on the map.
Heh, farthest I explored was floor 6, that was when the green guys ganged up on me and put an end to my adventuring. I love the way you actually have to map out the paths yourself, I thought that was fun and also kept you on your toes to do this and pay attention to where you are going while traversing the dungeon. I also liked the different playstyles that were possible in this game. The combat upgrades for when you want to play more aggressively, slaying all the enemies, the armor when you want to play more defensively and the light, which is extremely useful when you try to avoid combat altogether. The sneaking approach was actually the one I got the furthest with, seeing a good chunk of the room and thus the exits/connecting floors is an incredible advantage.
Music and art fit very well too, I think it really immerses you while you are getting around exploring the dungeon. You did very well designing this game, it's super fun!
Loving the old school vibe you have going for you
I can see the idea with create your own map however I could travel in the dungeon even if I don't modify the map at all. When I did modify the map, I couldn't see any impact on the dungeon. I might need to try this game again to see if I could do something different.
@bloodbane The point of the map isn't to stop you from reaching the exit if you don't use it, its to speed up subsequent runs after the timer runs out. You get more xp from discovering new floors then you do traversing old ones.
The mapping mechanic was good, though a bit small. You attack when clicking up/down marker buttons. All my initial runs ended by dying so I wondered what the point of mapping was. Seems I have trouble with the combat. I did wait out the timer once to see what happened so it makes more sense now, though my run still ended there as no healing. A way to go back up would have been nice, or a warp back to the shop to avoid having to sit and wait for a few minutes.
Eventually got the hang of it - I found it hard to resist the urge to fully explore each level and acquire all the gold. I managed to get to floor 8 but couldn't get back there again as I died way too quickly even trying my best to avoid all the mobs. Buying anything other than potions doesn't seem worth it as there is no other way to heal. Enemies can still hit you during the transition between levels which is not ideal.
Also what is the difference in the deloused edition?
@someone realistically everything is useful in some way since buying the armor and weapons allows you to keep up with the difficulty curve as leveling won't do it alone.
The only problem I have with letting you warp back early is that it makes it so there very little threat of dying. As potions are designed to be your healing method. I do agree though that I need to find a solution to that as telling people to either push forward and risk a likely loss or sit and wait doesn't seem that good.
The major difference is that deloused fixed a bug with my darkness disappearing if you had the first upgrade of the lantern, any other level was fine. There were some other minor fixes as well I don't remember as well.
Fair point on the warp, though the enemies get stronger so there would be that downside for doing so. It wasn't that the other upgrades would be unhelpful, it was that I always needed healing and did not have enough gold to spare on the other upgrades. I guess I was losing more health in combat that was intended in the balancing. My runs always ended due to lack of health rather than running out of time.
@someone Well you can't lose to time.
You definitely want some level of armor as each level of armor negates one level of damage.
This was a fun fast-paced game! My only complaints are the wanting more enemies, the light box being visually square, and the occasional enemy spawning outside the map. Combat was felt intense and engaging, and I love the quick movement speed. Super fun. Good job!
Always fun to be able to do a little cartography. I would have leant further into that-more kinds of landmarks to take note of to make the dungeons feel a little more elaborate.