FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD57 → Where it Ends

Where it Ends

By cherrybcake

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall3263.6946
Fun2133.7146
Innovation5013.1445
Theme1864.0846
Graphics3563.8445
Audio2383.6545
Mood3583.6946

Comments

immortalfox 2025-04-07 13:32

Very interesting game, but a bit disbalanced. Like for example, no matter the speed, you will lose equal amount of health. Anyway, good entry! Thanks for a game like that

UPD: Very, VERY good entry, for a first game :)

cherrybcake 2025-04-07 13:38

@immortalfox thank you! And that's a pretty good idea for the health mechanics, i wish i had thought of it XD

immortalfox 2025-04-07 13:46

@cherrybcake you are more than welcome!

paulhocker 2025-04-07 13:57

Very nice simple game. Perfect for the LDJAM.

cherrybcake 2025-04-07 13:58

@paulhocker thank you so much!

iluvatar 2025-04-07 14:08

This is way more fun that it has right to be! It's basically an endless "tower jump" but backwards haha. And honestly I think this one is better and more challenging. Such a simple concept yet so much fun. Well done, this is a textbook Ludum Dare game :)

PS: I really enjoyed the little "thoughts" of text on the way down, it gave it such a cool charm and gave the character life :)

ssiannas 2025-04-07 14:11

Very fun game! Amazing first time submission :D.

I found it a bit hard to control the character after a long fall since you couldn't see what was coming at you but I loved the sound and graphics.

cherrybcake 2025-04-07 14:11

@iluvatar you made my day! XD thank you!

cherrybcake 2025-04-07 14:12

@ssiannas thank you!! I can't wait for the next one XD

yanzhi 2025-04-07 17:49

love the lil jump animation for the main character! pretty similar game mechanics to the game that my team and i made too and i think your game is fun to play!! would totally play this on my phone to kill time

cherrybcake 2025-04-07 18:11

@yanzhi thank you! Your game is very fun too!

onngd 2025-04-07 20:16

interesting idea. would like to spend the coins somewhere, but overall good work

cherrybcake 2025-04-07 21:45

@onngd thank you! Neat idea XD

ji-li 2025-04-07 22:00

I love it! Not good at it and I kept dying, but it's amusing and I like the dialogue as you keep playing XD

cherrybcake 2025-04-07 22:04

@ji-li thank you! XD yeah it ended up being a bit hard to play

unidaystudio 2025-04-07 23:44

Hey bro, I'm happy to see you here at Ludum Dare, participating on this competition. Of course we hang out together during the development so I know every detail of this game but I still got excited when you finished it and wanted to play it so bad. :smile:

Overall, I like the mechanics, the art style and the sound of the game. The fact that you made it all using PICO-8 makes everything even more impressive, so congratulations for that. One thing that I would like to emphasize is that last minute story line you said that you added to the game. I really felt very motivated to keep playing because of the phrases that was appearing as I progressed. I wanted to read them all to understand how deep they are. So in the end, you made the theme of this jam approaching them in two distinct ways: the depth of the hole and also the deepness of the story.

Well done!

dywanix 2025-04-08 10:41

Really nice ieda!

cherrybcake 2025-04-08 11:34

@unidaystudio thank you! I'm really glad you liked it, and I wouldn't have made it without your support, so I really appreciate it :)

@dywanix thanks!! XD

izzqz 2025-04-08 12:10

PICO-8!!! MAD RESPECT!

cherrybcake 2025-04-08 13:39

@izzqz haha thank you! PICO-8 rocks!

thatfirey 2025-04-08 16:51

Ooooooh haven't seen a PICO-8 game on LD in a while, really cool game, although feels a bit unfair with how fast you fall, you have no idea what's ahead, but other than that, it's fun ^^

cherrybcake 2025-04-08 17:12

@thatfirey thank you! And yeah I guess I made it way too hard XD

piero-pbes-studio 2025-04-08 21:34

Hi pico lover ! I really like the finish of your game, the little phrases, the UI (the gauges are very beautiful), the graphics, the shading, the impacts etc... it's a shame that we can't have more control over the character or that it's a bit more progressive...buuuut hey it's fun... in any case I like your style and I'm going to follow your work with interest !

cherrybcake 2025-04-08 22:33

@piero-pbes-studio Hii thank you so much! It was my first PICO-8 game and it was super fun to make it, but I kinda took too long with everything so I couldn't add more mechanics in time :( I appreciate your comment though XD

ghettobastler 2025-04-09 09:55

Great game: a simple concept with a lot of polish. I like the double interpretation of the theme! My only suggestion would be to cap the falling speed, but apart from that it is a very good entry, and very impressive for a first game !

cherrybcake 2025-04-09 11:21

@ghettobastler thank you!! And yeah I actually forgot to limit the speed XD

pusheeneiro 2025-04-09 12:50

Very joyful concept and good execution

0x-void-x0 2025-04-09 13:13

Congrats on your first jam game! I hope you had fun making it. I think the graphics and sound design is really cute and fits the style, the gameplay is simple and fun.

My feedback would be that there isn't really a sense of progress here, maybe if we had some collectables that restore your health or slow down the fall etc it would make for a more variation. The second thing is that whenever I die it feels like it was the game's fault (the camera to be exact) rather than my fault which can cause frustration, ideally you want players to feel like they lost because they made mistakes rather than because the game design prevented them.

That's just my 2 bits, I think the game is fun nonetheless and for your first game you should be proud!

cherrybcake 2025-04-09 13:28

@pusheeneiro thank youu I appreciate it! :)

@0x-void-x0 hii thank you for the feedback! Those are some valid points, the game ended up being a bit too repetitive and hard to play, I'll keep it in mind for the next :)

leorean 2025-04-09 20:07

What a nice pico-8 game! I really love the style - the game is very smooth and has nice controls & physics!

ryrumeli 2025-04-10 00:51

Ah Pico-8, you elusive marvelous pseudo-console. I love every time I find a Pico-8 entry.

And honestly, the game is great. The movements are snappy and precise, it is fun, engaging, just the right level of challenge here. The mechanics are interesting, and the messages are appreciated. I am sure there is someone that is going to play this game that needed to hear just those words, and you will help them more than you may think. Games are about expression and it is clear just how much of yourself you poured over this one. Really dig it!

cherrybcake 2025-04-10 10:56

@leorean yayy you played my game XD thank you!!

@ryrumeli thank you so much! I'm really glad you enjoyed the messages, I was afraid I had made them too deep haha, but it was a last time addition, and I kinda needed to vent XD so I really appreciate your comment :)

scoobysnacks 2025-04-10 21:30

I love pico games! The gameplay feels like being trapped in cursed cycle of constant death and rebirth.

koolruz 2025-04-11 22:20

Oh man, this was not at all what I expected, and I really liked it :) The mechanics felt really nice, and like someone said above, I'm sure the message is going to hit home with someone who needed to hear it. Great job all around!

cherrybcake 2025-04-11 22:41

@scoobysnacks thank you XD that was the idea hehe

@koolruz I'm really glad you liked it :) thanks!

jtap 2025-04-12 02:03

Fun, cute, but difficult for me, thank you

glurgludor 2025-04-12 10:55

Really fun game, gamefeel on point!

cherrybcake 2025-04-12 11:26

@jtap thank you! It's a bit difficult for me too XD

@glurgludor thanks! I appreciate it :)

glurgludor 2025-04-12 11:55

Your welcome :)

aurel300 2025-04-12 13:40

trans vibes :purple_heart:

Very tight arcade gameplay loop, though I guess by design you can't quite reach an equilibrium state where you can keep going indefinitely(?). When the text started appearing after a bit of playing, I was surprised, but it worked :) Still I found the contrast between the text and the ridiculousness of a girl bouncing around cave walls with magic hover abilities funny.

The smooth-scrolling cave, the coins, and the pickup effects were all very pretty; the sound effects were fine, maybe the music could have been a bit more interesting!

cherrybcake 2025-04-12 17:53

@aurel300 thank you so much!! And yeah I should've made an actual background song but I'm awful at it XD also your website is amazing!! :purple_heart:

ryusui 2025-04-13 21:47

Believe it or not, this is the *second* game I've played this Ludum Dare with the premise of "girl falls down deep pit, collecting coins along the way" XD

That one was a time-based score attack, though, so the two games are quite a bit different in approach and gameplay!

I'll admit I found myself spending a bit more time with this one just to try and read the story snippets that display as you go down. (I wanted to include something similar in my own game, but I didn't have enough time to!)

cherrybcake 2025-04-13 21:49

@ryusui hehe thank you! And yes I've seen other games like this too XD I'm glad you enjoyed it :)

circleoflife 2025-04-14 14:26

I was very attracted by the graphics, reminding me of ROTMG. But I don't understand how I should fall further than 30 meters? I checked all the control buttons and in the HTML5 version only the arrow controls work. The other buttons indicated in the tooltip did not give any effect for me when pressed... As I understand it, they were supposed to slow down the fall? My character was flying so fast that I had to memorize the cave by heart to fly the record 38 meters xD It was still funny.

cherrybcake 2025-04-14 15:03

@circleoflife hii, thank you for playing! You only need the arrow keys to play, to slow down the fall press UP :)

hinamarina 2025-04-14 21:12

suuuuuuper juicy gameplay. I really liked it a lot! The sound effects are awesome, and the overall vibe is super nice. The art is super nice, i really liked how well saturated the colors are, make the contrast between light and dark be really strong and it contributes to the overall sense of being lost.

The text slowly passing in the screen as you fall made the experience so atmospheric! I really loved this touch.

The game is super hard, but is so pleasing to try it again that I kept playing over and over and over! :) A super nice entry, very polished, really good for a 1st entry! :) Keep up the good work!

cherrybcake 2025-04-14 21:21

@hinamarina what a wonderful comment! Thank you so much! I'm glad you liked it :)

cdupe 2025-04-15 05:20

Super interesting game, the balancing of fuel/health recharge rates in particular feels really tight and well-done! The fact that there are multiple "coin get" sound effects is also aesthetically pleasing and breaks up what would otherwise be monotonous. The written messages on the screen also help do that in a different sense, and they definitely help develop the game's atmosphere a lot (I think this is the game I've rated highest for "mood" in the entire jam).

cherrybcake 2025-04-15 11:59

@cdupe haha thank you!! I appreciate it a lot :)

sztobar 2025-04-15 19:40

I have special place in my heart for pico-8 entries even though that's not my engine of choice. Your game is simple and fun. The text appearing on the screen was an interesting addition although I must confess I haven't reached the end of the Monologue. It took me time to figure out you can hold "up" to control the fall velocity, for couples of my initial runs I just fell without it :laughing: Screenshot 2025-04-15 213911.png

cherrybcake 2025-04-15 19:57

@sztobar whoa that's a nice high score! Thank you for playing :) Sorry I didn't make it more obvious that you can fly XD

sztobar 2025-04-15 20:16

@cherrybcake That's ok, no worries. Sometimes I like to start playing LudumDare entries without reading the manual and try to figure out controls on my own :grin:

tolja 2025-04-20 06:00

I too took my time to figure out the flying part :D Nice and challenging game once you get the hang of it.

Managed to collect 141 coins!

kaba 2025-04-20 07:49

The storyline is a nice touch and I love how it ties all of the attempts together. I also spent a good while just crashing against the walls to test out the collision detection. A fun game overall!

cherrybcake 2025-04-20 09:13

@tolja whoa that's a pretty good highscore :0 thank you for playing!

@kaba haha the collision was kind of tricky for me, but I managed to make it just good enough. I'm glad you enjoyed the little story I put into it :)

chuckeles 2025-04-20 20:35

Cool game! I think I need to look into that Pico-8 for the next jam... :thinking:

bloodbane 2025-04-21 08:01

Nice endless diver game! I tried to get all coins but ended up hitting walls oftenly. So I decided to fall nicely while avoiding wall and gained 145 score.

cherrybcake 2025-04-21 13:13

@chuckeles thank you! It was my first game with PICO-8 :) You should try it!

@bloodbane hey nice strategy! I definitely didn't think of that XD thank you for playing!

thesmellofoxygen 2025-04-25 13:07

Pleasant despite the crushing difficulty. My highscore was 41 coins. Paltry! But the sounds, the fast pace, nice bright visuals and little text made me keep going back. At first I didn't see that I could fly and was kinda mad, but that opened things up. I wish you bounced off the walls just a little less so I wouldn't ricochet between them and nearly instantly die occasionally.

cherrybcake 2025-04-25 14:50

@thesmellofoxygen thank you for playing! Yeah I kinda messed up the collision system and should've made it more clear that you can fly XD

online-play 2025-04-25 19:58

Really difficult one I am bad at it but it's also fun and addictive

cherrybcake 2025-04-25 20:44

@online-play thank you for playing! :)

stending 2025-04-25 20:49

I agree with others, it's amazing to see Pico8, especially for a FIRST Jam?? It's a perfectly polished game, I don't see anything I would change! Loved everything, great difficulty curve, I don't find it unfair at all! And I loved the little story bits too!

PERFECT Entry, can't wait to see your next entry! :smile:

cherrybcake 2025-04-25 21:11

@stending omg thank you so much! I can't wait for the next jam :)