Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD59 → The Beckoning
By rionisse, ferot, Steff, LerkaDverka, Graf, TowerCrane, insomniapill and
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 559 | 3.38 | 20 | |
| Fun | 728 | 2.80 | 20 | |
| Innovation | 736 | 2.75 | 20 | |
| Theme | 518 | 3.55 | 20 | |
| Graphics | 108 | 4.39 | 21 | |
| Audio | 91 | 4.08 | 20 | |
| Humor | 606 | 2.17 | 19 | |
| Mood | 76 | 4.25 | 20 |
I'm absolutely floored that you guys were able to produce this in 3 days. Hats off to you all! Super impressed with the visuals, environments and cutscenes look fantastic. Lack of camera movement feels weirdly limiting but it's neat.
I'm also amazed by how gorgeous this game looks! Can't believe you achieved this level of visual polish in 3 days. You even had an intro movie sequence, and the music and ambience was great. Sound effects were well done too. But unfortunately, this game is lacking in game design and level design despite looking so good.
I found the physics of the jumping to be too floaty, and also it's a very unforgiving game. I couldn't get past the beginning area. I went to the left and used the lamp post to get to the top and cross the wooden bridge with falling platforms, but the jump is too painful to do over and over and you have to restart from the bottom and wait for the signal to arrive again and get back up. I think it's too unforgiving. And also I went to the area on the right to the other lamp post, I jumped through the arch but died on the other side.
I think the level design is a bit confusing too. I think the lamp post lifting you up physics is a bit weird. You have to wobble at just the right spot to be able to air dash correctly. Hopefully you can iron out these issues, I'd love to beat this game.
@jag hey! Thanks for the detailed feedback! Yeah, I agree, the jumping mechanic just doesn't feel good. We spent the whole first day trying to customize the default Unreal controller to fit a 3D platformer (there were quite a few parameters missing, like separate jump and fall speeds, tighter air control, and so on), but sadly it was taking too much time for too little improvement, so at some point I had to call it "It Just Works" and move on. That problem also meant I only really started designing the level on the last day, because the character movement kept changing constantly.
Anyway, there's another ending in the game that is easier to achieve (it's a shorter route and there's no jumping), but it's trickier to find. I’ll give a small hint: at some point, you need to run in the opposite direction of the lighthouse.
Introduction is awesome and the game also looks very nice, goof job :-)
It is jawdropping. Great amount of work with this 3d environment. Great lighting. Great sound. Superb! Controls are wacky for me. Jumping is questionable. Sometimes it is hard to control character mid-air. Platforming is also strange for me. Mostly cause of camera. Because it is 3d you cant really see where the platform ends with this camera angle and it is VERY easy to miss it.
But overall, game is very cool and viby. I like it a lot.
I liked the overall vibe of the game. The theme of the mysterious lighthouse is quite captivating. The controls took some getting used to; I tried interacting with objects with E a couple of times and had to start over :D Navigation isn't as convenient due to the very low camera position, especially during the platforming sections. Good luck!
Incredible game! The ending even made me laugh despite the generally serious tone. I found a route that didn't require using E at all, all I did was moving and jumping and I felt like I broke the level design haha, but I still made it and it's all that matters. Very well done!
Interesting! Thanks for sharing!
Hi ! Would like to try this but am on linux sadly, do you plan to maybe release something for it ?
The idea is awesome, the design is atmospheric and minimalist. I love the style, really (and lighthouses too :D) But the fixed camera angle and the controls are too much for 72h to make properly. It feels unpolished and unnatural (which is obvious for a JAM game), but good platforming design is demanding and requires a lot of testing. Here you don't really understand whether this path is a necessary one, or you just entered some area where you are not supposed to be. Also the jumping is floaty and you don't see where to land. Falling platforms after the bridge are really rough, like dark-souls level hard.
It's definitely a neat concept that can be made into a good standalone game. Good luck!
You really played to your teams strengths, but for me the platforming was a little hard.
This game is beautiful, but the jumping and inability to really see where you're going really hurt it especially together it makes it incredibly difficult to know you're trying to go the right way; specifically the section with the two falling platforms and lamppost between them. Other then that beautiful game. :D
The visuals are super attractive, and I’m really impressed that you were able to reach this level of game art in just three days! However, the character controls and the lighting interactions could use a bit more polish. Overall, great job!
The game has really beautiful graphics. But still, there are some issues.
At the beginning, the text changes too quickly. It would be good to add a button so the next line appears only after pressing it. I don’t know English well, so I didn’t have enough time to translate or understand it.
I ran into the thorns right at the start :) Maybe they should have red spikes as a danger sign.
The camera perspective is very uncomfortable. It immediately shows where the goal is, which is good, but it also makes some segments harder to complete, which is bad. The game has really beautiful graphics. But still, there are some issues.
At the beginning, the text changes too quickly. It would be good to add a button so the next line appears only after pressing it. I don’t know English well, so I didn’t have enough time to translate or understand it.
I ran into the thorns right at the start :) Maybe they should have red spikes as a danger sign.
The camera perspective is very uncomfortable. It immediately shows where the goal is, which is good, but it also makes some segments harder to complete, which is bad. Sometimes the camera is too close, and sometimes it is just… still too close.
I split my other comments into 3 parts:
Big thorns They should probably be made absurdly large, so the player is not tempted to try jumping over them. Also, the hole near the lantern should be placed lower.
Platforms near the wall The camera is too close in this section, and because you can’t rotate it, jumping is very uncomfortable. Also, when I finally managed to do it, the lantern just pulled me off the last platform, lol. That felt unpleasant. If someone hadn’t recommended the game to me, I would have simply dropped it. I fell about 20 times, and then the game just threw me back down once I finally made it.
Platforms above the thorns Here, it is simply hard to stand in line with the platforms because of the camera. The spawn also places the player a bit awkwardly, so you have to align yourself again. Also, most likely the trigger is not based on touch, but on a zone above the platform. Because of this, the first platform may fall faster than you can jump off it.
The sheer scale of the visuals is mind-blowing, though there are some clunky bits in the 'game feel.' Regardless, reaching this level of polish in a 3-day jam is seriously impressive.
Absolutely killed it with the mood, amazing work on the cutscenes! As said by many before, while I get this is for lore reasons, the camera was a bit of a struggle for platforming, I imagine locking the camera up-axis for certain sections could smooth the platforming experience out a bit.
I'll have to be honest that I felt a bit disappointed with how there's a mood disconnect between the intro and the game itself (gloomy intro vs brightly-lit game) but its crazy that this was achieved in 3 days at all so good job, I enjoyed it either way!
Oh, i like the cthulhu vibe and overall style and mood. You did a lot of work for 3 days. Great job!
Great atmosphere and remarkable sound design -- a deep, smooth feeling to it, scratches the right itch, really
Neat looking game!
The cutscenes were wonderfully done. The gameplay parts were gorgeous too.
It was a bit difficult to know where to go and I'm not sure if I did the jumps correctly at the first lantern, but I jumped straight over the thorns and then up from there. The next jump puzzle was also pretty unclear and I ended up finally jumpin from one roof to another instead of the steps you put in there.
The falling platforms were bugged, at least the first one, and it would fall all the time and not let me jump off it when it was falling. I had to dash to the next one. That seemed to work correctly as did the third one.
Despite the level design and bug, the movement felt good. Camera angle was little difficult, but it was still okay.
Music and soundscape were great and fit the atmosphere perfectly. The mood was the strongest point of the game and carried me to the end even if the platforming caused a little frustration.
Good job!
Moody game, nicely done! The fact that you couldn't change the camera angle made it pretty difficult, but I still enjoyed it because of the cool atmosphere :D
The graphics and mood are incredible with an interesting story to go with it. I like how there are different ways to achieve the ending and it was fun exploring to find all of them. For me the biggest pain point was the platforming, especially with the lights. Getting sucked into the lights is a neat idea but I often found it was just too hard to control and would often end up flying in the wrong direction or getting flung backward into the light before falling back to the ground. The jumping is also very difficult mostly due to the camera angle since I couldn't tell where my character was going to land. A minor note, I did manage to get out of the map boundary several times. Overall I had a good time and got both endings.