vladimir-ins 2025-04-08 08:31
Great job!
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD57 → Belials Bellybutton
By kujoen, KattaLord and Polite_Prinny
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 268 | 3.75 | 34 | |
| Fun | 303 | 3.57 | 34 | |
| Innovation | 339 | 3.40 | 34 | |
| Theme | 120 | 4.18 | 34 | |
| Graphics | 306 | 3.92 | 34 | |
| Audio | 112 | 3.95 | 33 | |
| Humor | 597 | 2.34 | 31 | |
| Mood | 139 | 4.04 | 34 |
Great job!
I do like the style, the ambient music, and the tutorial. However, I have some doubts about the goals. I expected the harpoon to hit the fish, but they didn’t take any damage or react at all.
@jackshadow There are multiple damage upgrades you can collect throughout the cave. The basic harpoon does not deal much and needs multiple hits to kill enemies
Really like this game! The atmosphere is perfect, and I really like the little graphical touches - things like the diver looking back and forth really add to the overall aesthetic. The only things I'd say is there could be some more feedback to the player that they are doing damage with the harpoon, it took me until the swordfish to realise that I could kill enemies.
Spectacular! Really like trying to dance around the sword fish in close quarters
Looks cool. The atmosphere is great. I guess there is no ending, you just swim around caves until the end of your life?
@chrisbeck :v: Thank you so much for playing and pointing that out, we forgot to attach the signals to trigger the flashing animation :cry: . Should be fixed now.
@kit-gorn You win if you collect all the upgrades. Sadly the boss did not make it into the game, so we altered the win condition :(
@kit-gorn @levi-kingma Thank you so much for playing !
I can't put it down anymore... this game is superb: excellent graphics and sound. Very good respect for the theme. It might need a little more challenge, but that won't stop me from diving back in.
The game really sets the mood. Alone in the depths, lost in the darkness. The upgrades are nice, for most of them you notice the difference it makes right away. some of them, like the movement upgrades werent really as noticable, but thats okay. I did get one shot by a jellyfish after picking up ~15 upgrades, not sure if thats intended. The getting lost part really sets the mood well, but in terms of gameplay, getting lost isnt really great. I had no idea where i am, where ive already been, which way to go to explore new areas. I think a decent way to solve that would be to allow the player to somehow leave a mark. Like leaving behind a very dim light, or just somehow marking things so you know youve already been there when you come back.
All in all, nice mood, decent gameplay, got lost in the darkness. Good job!
@pickydogfish That darn jellyfish, sometimes it seems the attack cooldown isn't applied correctly and well... Sorry for it ruining your run, but we are so glad you enjoyed and played our game :D
@bismark Thank you so much :D
The UI is simple, but effective. The controls felt good, the navigation worked fine. My only complaint here: I would have prefered, if you just used the mouse buttons instead of adding the space-button for the harpoon. It felt counterintuitive to me. The swimming on the other hand was good.
I also did not notice, that you could kill the fish. Blocking the path with jelly fish at the beginning (like you did at some point) would help to educate the player in a natural way. But I really appreciate that you put in a tutorial.
The atmosphere is very nice! The sound effects supported the uneasy feeling to be stuck in the depths of the ocean. As someone mentioned, I also like the small detail, that the swimmer looks around. The swordfish scared me. :D Good job!
You guys really cooked this time, I enjoyed this game a lot, the atmosphere is genuinely creepy and the controls feel challenging. Nice work with the creepy sounds and art, don't think I didn't notice the attention to details like the diver's head and the directional audio. Overall this was fun to play I couldn't manage to find all upgrades I'm sure it was only 1 or 2 left but I couldn't find them for the life of me, I wouldn't make a good cave diver lol.
@0x-void-x0 Thank you so much for playing, we are happy you enjoyed it :D I already checked out your game too, but I haven't posted yet, It's amazing though!
Solid work! You really managed to create some mood. The art is cohesive too. I wish there was another threat lurking down there. I think I died to a jellyfish (somehow killing me from full health?) close to the last chest I was missing.
@peringo Thanks for playing and sorry for the bug :(
Love the atmosphere! The treasure indicator and the light changes in different depth areas are very nice. It's always good when you have a tutorial that explains how to play playing. Amazing job!
I had to give it another shot for the new update. The game plays a lot better now with the restored [Redacted] especially that one big scary [Redacted] that made me gasp :smile:. I thought the chest direction UI would remove the exploration element out of the game but it actually makes it so much more fun by giving you a purpose while also not making the game easier since you still have to navigate around to reach it.
I managed to finish the game this time and had a smoother (and scarier) experience. I'm really proud of you guys for trying something different and moving out of your comfort zone with this game.
I did have a bug with the tutorial text at the beginning of the game, when it says "Hit spacebar while the mini-harpoon..." The mini-harpoon UI showed up and I instinctively thought I should try left clicking when the mini-harpoon was in the yellow zone, and the text box kind of freaked out. It displayed the next text prompt multiple times and played the typewrite effect backwards. Hopefully that's enough info that you could recreate it.
Everything else worked fine as far as I could tell, and I had a good time with this one, thanks for making it!
I really like the controls. controlling the character felt difficult but fair, and the harpoon felt really good. The audio was also really well done! I did find it really dark though, I got an upgrade for the diver light, but I couldn't see anything still.
Great work :clap:
The level design and attention to detail are absolutely top-notch — bravo! Exploring the branching paths of the cave was super engaging, and extra karma points for the little hints about where the treasure chests are hidden. The swordfish behavior was dangerous but still predictable — you could spot the glowing eyes and twitching before they attacked.
The visuals, music, and design worked together beautifully. At one point I realized I was genuinely spooked by the open space — and sure enough, within a minute, a giant fish showed up! I also really loved the sense of progression — and it’s a strong one! At some point, I caught myself thinking: this would make for an amazing roguelike.
The only thing that slightly soured the experience was a sudden death. I’m not quite sure how it worked — I had plenty of health left, and the swordfish weren’t doing much damage anymore, but then one dashed into me and wiped out my HP in an instant. Oof :с
Still, I think you’ve done an absolutely fantastic and meticulous job with the time you had. You created a mysterious, tense atmosphere, an interesting map, and solid challenges. Huge thanks for your work!
Please rate more games so your own gets bumped up in recommendations — your entry truly deserves to be played!
@missfire Thank you so much for your feedback :D We may have overdialed the BIG swordfish a little bit, though the idea was that he will kill you very quickly if you did not collect enough upgrades. But a oneshot should not be possible, so there seems to be some weird bug there D:. We are trying to get more people to play but I feel like it's harder somehow this jam :( Thanks again for playing and the feedback!
Very atmospheric! The diver animation and the harpoon mechanic are both very nicely polished. I wished the enemies were less static - and then I got swordfished, serves me right...
The skippable tutorial is a great touch too.
Superb presentation and mood - really loverd the head moving animation for the diver (remind me of doom), and the bubbles particles were amazing. The audio design is top notch too. I also appriacate the tutorial, the arrow pointing towards the treasure.
I didn't figure out how to fight the swordfish. The diver moved really slowly, and I wasn't sure if I hit it with the harpoon as it was very dark
Very cool game!
finished the game was a little repetetive in the end but still great. The mood was done very well with the music and the light making one feel a little anxious. Well done ^^
@atsh You can fight them but if you meet them too early on without upgrades it can get be difficult to hit them! Thanks so much for checking out our game, I just wish we could have built a sonar as cool as yours :D
@cgraen Thanks for finishing it, I had great fun making the audio and alot is inspired by my love for subnautica :) Unfortunately we just ran out of time for more varied enemies or a boss :(
Great game and it's quite long and complete! This one definitely captured my attention longer than most... and I was just about to give up, but something was telling me "just one more"... well about 4 more upgrades and I did find the "You Won" screen! I appreciate the navigation arrow assist to the next pickup. Some UI feedback about how many more upgrades there are to find would have been appreciated though. Very moody and those large speedy fish are terrifying! Great job!
@t-pirozzini Thanks for playing and glad you enjoyed it! We originally thought of having the count of an upgrade pop up once you collect the first one, and the game over screen displaying how much you missed, but we ran out of time D:
I'm a big fan of how the harpoon was implemented with the ability to quicken its reel; I got to say, that's pretty innovative. The sound design was also very immersive and haunting. Good job!
I won! This is really nice, i really appreciate the amount of work that went into this. The pixelart effects like shadows/etc is something i really look forward to finally do, as it does not look as plain as normal pixelart. Great entry. The only feedback I can give is that level is either too huge, too open, or there should probably be one more thing in the game to justify going so far. But its so atmospheric that you really want to get to the end.
@jonathan-vogt Thank you so much for playing, I tried my best with the audio and i'm stoked it achieved just as I intended for so many people :D Same goes for the harpoon system.
@hatmajaster Thanks for checking us out as well, we really wanted to add some more horrors down below but we just ran out of time :( Even the swordfish almost didn't make it into the game
This is the first game I rated 5 star for everything (except for humor). I usually give a few constructive advices on how to improve the game but this one I just couldn't think of any. If this game doesn't win the game jam I don't know what will. Congrats to you all, this is one of the best games I've ever played in LDJAM 57!
@joseph-tan Thank you, we are thrilled!!! Its an honor that you enjoyed do much and we are glad we could entertain you :)
Wow this game perfectly transports the moody and claustrophpic feeling. Even the slightly floaty controls match super well. Unfortunately I got one shot by the second narwhal from offscreen.
Really well done, had me exploring for a long time. Super atmospheric and creepy. The only thing I found was I didn't really need to do the fast reeling mechanic timing minigame very often, it seemed to be too fast anyway. Otherwise great job!
@sibi glad you enjoyed it :) We put that bad lad there to punish players that venture too deep to quickly... gather enough upgrades and you find him not to be tough at all :D
@ryano That is true, we were torn between how impactful we wanted to make the upgrades and decided they should be very noticeable, so collecting three reel upgrades does make it almost instant... but toning it down more definitely is worth a consideration
Thanks for playing!
Interesting game! Very cleverly combined with the theme
Great exploration game
@i-pots @itskdog Thanks for playing! Anything you would improve? :)
Very atmospheric with good use of light and vision, good job.