zakchaos 2026-04-20 06:04
Id like to rate this game, however i cant get past the opening text, am I missing something?
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD59 → HeartW@rd
By ne-aquilon
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 160 | 3.39 | 31 | |
| Fun | 208 | 3.06 | 31 | |
| Innovation | 132 | 3.44 | 31 | |
| Theme | 261 | 2.66 | 32 | |
| Graphics | 66 | 3.88 | 32 | |
| Audio | 174 | 3.08 | 32 | |
| Humor | 182 | 2.11 | 24 | |
| Mood | 117 | 3.57 | 30 |
Id like to rate this game, however i cant get past the opening text, am I missing something?
@zakchaos you mean the section shown in the first screenshot? Just wait a little, the opening door gradually opens with each heartbeat. Or do you have a bug? Because I checked again both in itch and Unity Play and it works fine.
The visual design is really great. It adds a high intensity that you wouldn't normally expect from the "nethack" aesthetic. Some random notes:
- Needing to navigate all the way back from the start whenever I died wasn't very fun - The cursor doesn't move when the camera does, only when the mouse does, which looks a bit strange - It'd be nice to have a visual indication of what the "current cycle" is when in circle-cursor mode - The enemies would get caught on corners while pursuing me, making them nearly impossible to shoot. Walking around the corner to get a better angle frees them, killing me instantly.
@henk
Thanks for feedback. All mentioned issues are valid. I plan to make a full game out of this prototype and these things will be fixed.
About visuals, some time ago I came up with idea of 3D ASCII environment with "stacked" layers and utilized it for this Jam.
Visually it's probably the most interesting game I've played so far. The mechanics with storing a colour/state/beat is a bit hard to grasp. It's a very harsh punishment to go ALL the way back whenever you die, also it's very hard sometimes to avoid being touched.
The perspective is insane! I read your other comment on the stacked ASCII, fun idea and you pulled it off well here! When the enemies first started attacking it was surprising and fun. Some of the same comments as other players - mainly I got soft locked in the corridor with enemies at the exit. Congrats on your first LD (remember to like constructive comments its how the karma system works)
@nullval @ansible
Thanks for your support. I really happy people like these visuals, because it was the best I could pull off as a programmer with zero artistic skills.
And thanks for mentioning likes, I'm still figuring out how everything works.
I really like the artisitc direction (this sort of camera angle is really cool), and the sound of the heart. The mechanic is nice as well. It's a little bit hard to temporize when enemies of multiple colors are coming. Great job anyways !
微信图片_20260423011711_117_152.png "Noooo—when I died and went back to that room, I found it completely swarmed with enemies! I sadly had to stop playing there, even though I absolutely love the concepts and mechanics!
Also, your 3D/stereoscopic visual effects felt like magic to me. I really love the creativity behind this game. Thank you for creating it!"
I got a bit confused at the start, feels like the door should open faster maybe? Very interesting art style, can't say I've seen similar before.
Thanks for the playing.
@helagos
Initially it was standard top-down camera angle, but then I decided to tweak it. Happy to see it was a right decision.
@deng
I didn't have enough time to implement proper AI, so tried to find some balance. I put a limit 10 on each spawner, so if you can give it another chance to finish, I would really appreciate this.
But you and everyone else are completely right about how this is the weakest part of the game. I'll definitely focus first on enemy AI and proper balance.
@freamdev
It was intentional decision to let a player see, how heartbeat affects the world. My only regret I didn't add color to the door.
Nice game. I really liked the art. Simply but very effective and the first time something started to move I jumped a bit :laughing: The beat gives it really good mood as well. Well done!
This is a very cool and unique style, really nice jam game. I got to the end
I have always wanted to see a game that takes the roguelite ascii aesthetic into 3D. It looks so clean.
Beat the game, it got really I mean really cool visuals, but I still don't get color changing mechanic or it is just not quite interested to intrigue with, generally just wait for it to change is not that fun, lacks interactivity. Still quite impressive for your first entry, looks great(That is already something diffcult to achieve)!
comfortable viewpoint
@cogcomp @bonedaddy @tater-hater @shu-wen
Thanks for the playing!
@wo-ri-gou-le
Yeah, this is why I introduced things with shifted phase, which forces you to swap to second mode and save the color state. But you still can save one color and wait when target will switch to this color... So, yeah, this whole thing requires more tuning, also I want to add enemies which switch colors. Thanks for the feedback!
This game has a cool creepy atmosphere, the pov was really interesting with the graphics. I liked the gameplay, maybe better collision would help some smoothness. Fun and good length.
Good graphic design, original idea
Visually this is so cool! Ive nver seen anything like it! That plus the writing and sound design really took me somewhere, that was great fun. I unfortunately had the same problem as some others where I died and then an impenetrable wall of enemies stacked up. I spent another 5 lives trying to break thru but couldnt get any further. Super cool visuals, awesome work!
Conceptualization 10/10, if you know what I mean =) The art is also consistent and pretty unusual to my taste. Overall I really enjoyed what was going on. But the gameplay was a bit strange — I mean I never really figured out whether I actually understood how it works or not. I was just pressing different buttons and praying the right color would come up. Other than that, it turned out really unusual in a good way. Screenshot_18.png
I like the way it looks. It's missing a CRT shader, I think, but otherwise it's cool.
It's an interesting idea, and I was able to get through the maze. However, it seemed like the best strategy to handle the enemies was to try to get them stuck on something rather than engaging more directly. It was also unclear to me what the difference between the modes was, so I think a very gradual introduction of each mechanic would help explain the game (e.g. start with a stack of one obstacle of one color, add more in the stack, add more colors, etc.). However, it was interesting to play, and I haven't really seen these sorts of mechanics before. Nice work!
An interesting idea. You got some mileage there with quite simple mechanics, which is great! The simplistic aesthetics were a good fit with the overall mood. Great work especially for your first LD!
Really unusal aesthetic with a clever gameplay. Top ++
Fun, cryptic little game! Very interesting idea with the cycling colors, and then giving you some control over it. I had to cheese the enemies by letting them bunch up at the doors and then just permanently blasting in their direction... but that might just be a skill issue
I red? I blue? I yellow?
Reached the end! The visual style was kind of awesome. There were a lot of things that made the game pretty disorienting (in a cool way), between the slanted movement direction, the tall walls, and everything being displayed like a stack of pancakes.
heart.png