Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD57 → Folder Depth
By zigtalk
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 780 | 2.93 | 25 | |
| Fun | 832 | 2.47 | 25 | |
| Innovation | 173 | 3.76 | 25 | |
| Theme | 206 | 4.04 | 25 | |
| Humor | 269 | 3.26 | 25 | |
| Mood | 840 | 2.52 | 25 |
Neat and novel game idea, though the wording of "Getting warmer..." made me think I was in the right folder the first couple times I tried it. For those reading this: the correct folder, when you click on it, will have no pop-up.
I wasn't a fan of having a time malus on getting the wrong folder, but it was fun once I got the ball rolling. Got to level 5. Great job!
The mechanics were hard for me to understand, and I don't think I figured out how to play. Interesting concept though.
Interesting and novel take on the theme. Would have been nice to have some music/sfx and a bit of time before the timer starts to see what you're actually supposed to be looking for.
Cool take on the team! I like the style, made it level three but I wasn't able to sense which folder was the scariest fast enough. I wish wrong folders didn't penalize, or didn't navigate in because I felt like guess and check was the only option. Perhaps there is a pattern I couldn't decipher.
I like the concept but I think it would be better if there were just a lot more folders and no real penalty for clicking the wrong folder/directory other than the actual time wasted by searching that folder. Would have loved to hear some music or sound for the game. Overall, it's gameplay that I definitely wasn't expecting and I enjoyed it. Well done.
It took me a few tries to realize that I needed to manually go back up after clicking on a wrong folder. After figuring that out, it was fun to play for a few minutes.
This is a hilarious concept! I absolutely love it! It was slightly confussing going in to it, and I think it could've benefitted from the first level just letting you get used to how to navigate the game, without a timer. I think this is a well done jam game!
Cool take on the theme! I was a bit confused by the “Getting warmer” message, but I eventually figured out that it’s just another penalty, and that the penalties grow with each mistake (up to -7). I don’t mind the penalties per se, but I think players in general would find it less punishing if they had lives that they lose when clicking on the wrong folder, instead of having the time reduced directly. I also noticed a small issue: it’s possible to select a file/directory through the error box, which felt a bit unfair.
I think the game is at a great spot to implement some puzzle mechanics (hidden files, shortcuts/symlinks for teleport style navigation, limited search tools). I think it would be interesting to piece together a paper trail of clues about how the file moved around, and use these different clues to figure out the true location of the important file. I love the idea that the file structure is so cursed that people using the machine would leave notes to each other about the whereabouts of important files.
Cool concept.
Mechanically I found it a bit hard to figure out what was the right direction from the popups, and sometimes I'd end up clicking on a file trying to dismiss the popup, further exacerbating the situation.
When clicking on a wrong folder, you're told it's wrong but it still enters, so you always have to click back. The context switch, mixed with the popup and time pressure, sometimes causes me to forget which folder I even clicked on since the names repeat a lot. Would probably make more sense to not traverse here.
I wish I had more time to read the flavor text, but all I do is skim it for the filename and ignore the rest.
Might have been cool to have a more gentle guidance than the popup and time loss. For example, some kind of gauge or indicator that doesn't make it immediately obvious what the right/wrong choices are.
It's crazy to see someone actually implemented my first idea! I was initially going for the same kind of timer-based folder search before pivoting to a puzzle game. :D
I changed my mind mostly because I had no idea how to generate random but coherent folders, which is kind of the issue here: we have no idea what each folder is going to contain, so the only way to play is to click randomly and hope for the best.
A way to guess (more or less) which folder might contain the file (for example, `Images/` will probably contain a `.jpg` if we're looking for a `.jpg`) would have made the game much more strategic. Just because the company server is a mess doesn't mean it should be completely random!
I agree with the comments above, we shouldn't be penalized for clicking on a wrong folder, but only when clicking on a wrong file. Wasting time searching an incorrect path is already enough wasted time by itself!
Pretty neat idea! I like your take on the theme! The aesthetic of a file manager is pretty well realized. Others have already mentioned most of the issues I had. One thing I'd add to their feedback is that the pop-up messages might be better if they were just click-anywhere to dismiss instead of having to press the tiny X button or wait. There's also a click-through issue on them - multiple times I clicked the message window and the game detected as me clicking on another file or folder and I think I got double penalized. So far I've managed to reach level 4, and while the moving folders at first didn't look like they were going to change things much, they do make it way more chaotic. But I guess it's a pretty good simulation of how you see things when you're trying to quickly find something when stressed. :D
The game’s thematic presentation is quite innovative，but the game might feel unclear about how to play at first.
Cool idea fitting perfectly the theme ! I'm not sure how to guess which folder to click, which is very punitive since each wrong folder makes you lose seconds. I managed to win 3 levels, the folders where starting to shake.
Love the idea! Thought of a lot of depth related stuff but never file depth, hits home in a different way! Figured out how to play pretty quickly, only thing that would make it better is some fast paced music.
Clever idea, I liked how when I started to lose my mind the folder started to shake. I had a few incidents where I would click on the wrong folder and then it would trigger again instead of closing the popup
Fun and clever concept, it's minimalist but works well, too close to reality. Good job !
This is such a unique take on the theme. The software engineer in me is tingling at exploring a file system. It's about as well organised as my own. I would've loved some music or something to make it more tense as the timer runs out but otherwise this was really fun and unique. Well done!