bereg 2025-10-05 22:45
A nice, relaxing game! The controls felt a bit clunky at first, but once I got the hang of them, I had a lovely couple of minutes soaring around the area. And the music is fantastic!
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD58 → Acorny Business
By theoratkin
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 290 | 3.63 | 28 | |
| Fun | 486 | 3.21 | 28 | |
| Innovation | 623 | 2.80 | 28 | |
| Theme | 222 | 3.94 | 28 | |
| Graphics | 445 | 3.53 | 28 | |
| Audio | 133 | 3.83 | 20 | |
| Humor | 622 | 2.29 | 17 | |
| Mood | 130 | 4.00 | 28 |
A nice, relaxing game! The controls felt a bit clunky at first, but once I got the hang of them, I had a lovely couple of minutes soaring around the area. And the music is fantastic!
Thanks for such kind words @bereg! Agree with you that the controls could definitely be smoother, especially considering the required precision to land on the branches. There's also an issue with mouse capture on the web build which I'm still solving. But I'm glad that you enjoyed the game anyway!
Very pretty! I'm impressed by how well a job this game does at making you feel in nature, good terrain design and art. Surprisingly bug-free geometry too for how complex it is - only got stuck in a tree once (even then, managed to wedge myself out after struggling for ~20 seconds).
The flying itself was nice too, I didn't find it hard to get used to or be precise. I did have some trouble clicking on the nuts after landing but maybe that's the mouse capture issue you mentioned above. Great work overall, this was nice.
Thanks @bad-fetus! I wanted actually to add an unstuck button haha, glad that you managed to get out.
I released an update yesterday shortly after (since the jam didn't end yet), fixing the mouse capture issue, adding crosshair, and slowing down the player even more when holding Shift, so that might explain why you had better time with flying. I think I know what you mean by clicking on acorns, they don't get highlighted sometimes even when looking. I'll keep an eye for that!
Visual is magnificent! gj every one
Thanks @ulziton :-)
very cute game, i like how you realised a theme, good sound, all in cutish
Thank you @teroflups!
surprisingly relaxing game, despite the fact that at first it was difficult to understand where to find the nuts and how to take them, I continued to look for them with pleasure, where they could be. I really liked the landscape) I collected 12 nuts
Pretty relaxing with calm music. Also a surprisingly large world.
Thanks @mrv! I placed the oak trees a bit sparingly to encourage exploration, glad that you were able to find them!
Thank you @pschichtel, it's the biggest game world I made so far :-)
I was only able to collect 20 acorns, my woodpecker family will surely starve this winter :'(
Really enjoyed the game, the music and background audio is very relaxing and I love the theme. Acorn woodpeckers are awesome! Great work!
@matthew-rose happy to find another acorn woodpecker enjoyer haha! And 20 acorns isn't too shabby! Since other family members collect acorns as well, there should be plenty for everybody. ;-)
Flitting through the forest and listening to the ambience was lovely. I got 14 acorns!
I did find the controls a little tricky. Maybe it'd be helpful to slow down a little automatically near trees? I like the variation in trees over the landscape.
Glad that you liked the ambience @johnstarich! I actually had an idea to slow down automatically near trees, but then I thought it'd take longer to takeoff. So I just settled on manual slowdown with Shift. But I should probably revisit the idea!
Okay I'm torn on whether or not I think being able to hold space to gradually fly up would be an improvement. I think your current controls work better here in the scope of a tiny little experience here for the jam than would otherwise. That sounds negative, but I don't know how to write it better, this is a great project. I like the audio-visual work you've done here, and honestly I'd like to explore more as this bird, maybe after the winter is over. Very impressive job overall!
Totally understandable @threeli! Holding space is actually what I wanted to do initially, but I really enjoyed the flappy-bird like controls during testing, so I kept it. But it probably turned out to be not the best decision due to the required precision to collect acorns.
I guess what I was trying to say, if you were going to turn it into a longer experience I wouldn't want to have to mash space like that, but for this scope of an experience I ended up liking that element of the control more than I thought I would!
It's a cool game, engaging, and at the same time, it offers the potential for developing skills in flight.
Very addictive and relaxing — nice game!Снимок78.PNG
Great game, I enjoyed it a lot! I think the acorns could be spread out a bit more, as I needed some time to find some and then it seems a lot of them were around the same trees. Maybe there could be one or two acorns right at the start area to ease the player in. I am also not sure if I really understood how slowing down with shift worked, as it seemed not to work sometimes. But again, this is a great game!
Thanks @skeler, I'm happy that you found the game engaging :-)
Thanks for sharing the screenshot @8212games! Congrats on 13 acorns!
Thanks for the feedback @le-don! This is something I thought about as well. The current acorn placement encourages traveling back and forth to the same tree, which is not ideal for a game (even though that's what woodpeckers do in real life). Maybe I should allow collecting multiple acorns at once, or spawn only 1-3 acorns per tree. I'll try it out after the jam!
Very cute game and atmosphere, loved flying and the mood was great :)
Thank you @pimeko <3
Screenshot 2025-10-07 160012.jpg
Chill and nice game, only manage to get 9 because I wonder off a bit :laughing: Should've choose the trees nearby. I think the speed is just a little fast for landing on the branches, and it'll be difficult to get one mid air, especially in third person.
i like the graphics alot. i also like birds alot. this game is cool. i just think its too hard to figure out where the acorns are. honestly just being a bird and flying around in nature is enough for me to enjoy playing this though
I'm so happy you both enjoyed getting lost in the game world @accardo @web-gnar! That's honestly the entire point of the game. I just added the timer for the sake of having some sort of tangible goal haha.
The theme is wonderful and I really enjoy this game!
Thanks @yichen :-)
It's a cozy game with nice sound effects like the wind passing through the leaves and birds chirping. I ran into performance issues and I must say that the controls are imprecise. Other than that, good job! ;)
Screenshot_20251008_212229.png
Thanks @andriybyelikov! The game definitely isn't as optimized as it could be, and the controls could be more precise. But I glad that you enjoyed it anyway!
Honestly, I was a little confused at first, but then I loved it!
Thank you @gonulgaye!
A lovely little game! I only regret we cannot gather multiple acorn at the time otherwise it was a really relaxing entry! Congrats!
Littl' bird is freeeee! Freeee.png
@vhalenn AHAHAH I was wondering whether someone will actually try going out of bounds. :laughing:
I will experiment with gathering multiple acorns! Maybe it will be an unlockable ability. Thanks for playing and having fun in my game!
Nice graphics and overall mood. I felt the controls were a bit clunky. I do not know if you did that on purpose to make things harder or if the controls could really get some more love. Nice entry! :smile:
Thanks @tanis, the controls definitely need some love haha!
cute game with a cozy atmosphere :) I felt like the controls were a tiny bit awkward and I usually needed multiple tries to click on an acorn, but that could just be a skill issue on my side lol
Thanks @larazofia! Not a skill issue. Controls is the biggest complaint this game receives. Even though I got pretty used to them as the developer. :smile:
It was nice playing this annoying-and-drunk-woodpecker simulator. I felt each of those acorny honks pass through my very soul.
In all seriousness, I probably had more fun with this game than I should have, fighting the *Flappy Bird* controls. I think most commenters have already addressed the difficulties with controls, so I'll try to summarize: I personally found it highly sensitive, and would have liked it if the woodpecker stayed level (rather than fall,) and a different set of controls allow one to change elevation.
Though, I think a huge part of the reason why I felt like I was fighting the controls had to do with the fact that each acorns are really small, as are the tree branches to land on. Since it was really hard to land onto a tree branch, it was hard to collect acorns; and since the branches would get in the way when rotating the camera to collect acorns, it further worsens the collecting experience. An alternative way of improving the game could be to make the acorns a **LOT** larger, and simply allowing the woodpecker to collect them by colliding into them. This would streamline the collection-process, and solve both the controls and, to a lesser extent, the camera issue.
The game was basic and simple, but in a way, that added to the charm of the game. I just liked how minimal the game was, as it really helped the chill mood it evoked. Nice job.
@omiya-games thanks for such a candid and detailed feedback, with practical suggestions on improving the controls! Collection by collision is a particularly great idea!