givit-game-studios 2026-10-19 13:46 ♥ 1
Good entry, just may make the railway changer buttons a bit bigger or more readable. It took me some time to figure out what I needed to do. I loved the art and the music.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD60 → Rail Switcher
| Percentile | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | LD60 | Ever | |
| Overall | 27 | |||||
| Fun | 27 | |||||
| Innovation | 27 | |||||
| Theme | 27 | |||||
| Graphics | 27 | |||||
| Audio | 1 | |||||
| Humor | 25 | |||||
| Mood | 26 | |||||
Good entry, just may make the railway changer buttons a bit bigger or more readable. It took me some time to figure out what I needed to do. I loved the art and the music.
Really cool entry! I played through it and had a great time. Here is a quick breakdown of my thoughts: โข Gameplay & Design: The core mechanics feel solid and intuitive right from the start. The gameplay loop is engaging, and the controls feel responsive and fair. โข Visuals & Art Style: The visual direction fits the overall mood really well. Everything looks cohesive, and the presentation makes it very clean to follow what's happening on screen. โข Audio: The sound effects and audio design add a lot of punch to the experience and help build the atmosphere. โข Theme Interpretation: You did a fantastic job incorporating the jam's theme into the core loop in a creative and clever way! Constructive Polish Idea: If you decide to update or expand this after the jam, adding a few extra feedback cues (like juice/particles or subtle screen shake) or expanding on a few mechanics could make it feel even more polished! Overall, awesome job for a jam project! Left you a high score/rating. Keep up the great work! ๐
Thanks for playing!
@givit-game-studios : the junctions went through several iterations, and I'm still not completely happy with them. Some of that's down to the limitations of working in a 16x16 grid, but I've got some more ideas about how to make them more visible.
@anastasia-pitomets : thank you so much for playing and for the detailed breakdown! Iโm really glad you enjoyed the gameplay, visuals, and audio. Your feedback is much appreciated, and Iโll definitely keep your polish suggestions in mind for any future updates. Thanks again for the high rating and the kind words! ๐ฎโจ
Fun game! The lane-switching points seem a little clustered on the left side of the screen, so maybe they could be spread out more evenly? Overall, itโs a nice little game. Amazing work! Take care and get some rest!
Neat! the idea worked well, it was painful when I missed one watching the choo-choo of shame to the wrong station XD Nice entry!
Nice work! Really fun core loop and a great take on the theme. Had a good time playing it! Left full ratings. Cheers from the Meow Bomb team, feel free to drop by our page if you're looking for more games to rate!
Fun game!
Congrats! Clear tracks, puffing steam engines, simple rules. The top counters are flag icons, so I couldn't tell correct from wrong; labels would help. Well done, congrats again!
Thanks for playing!
@jooooooise : yes, I pretty much set up a test network with the idea I'd come back to it later, but never did so the left-side of the map has more options for routing.
@no-grapes-games : the teleporting bug I mentioned in the description doesn't help when a train jumps on the junction before you can change it ๐
@nursultan : always try to play and rate the games of people who leave me comments!
@wolforce : thanks!
@milq: originally, the signals at the top did have labels, but I was having font rendering issues. I eventually sorted those out, but never but the labels back ๐ข
Solid jam experience! Simple, intuitive, and very well executed. Left full ratings! Weโd really appreciate it if you could test out Meow Bomb! too. For an updated experience with a working PC and fixes, check out the alternative build here: https://naiper.itch.io/meow-bomb-by-naiper
Have fun playing!
Fun game! As always :-) First I found it a bit too slow, but later I was thankful as each train entering the screen sent me into a small panic trying to get all the switches to the right positions. I think, however, that a hardmode would have been cool where there are 4 or 5 trains on the screen at the same time, just for people who want to torture themselves ๐
Some trains seemed to skip / speed up at random points, that threw me off guard to be honest. Also, I didn't know what the icons on the top of the screen meant until way later. I think it's clever design, but users like me aren't always that clever to understand ๐
I had fun playing yours
Edit: I like your "features cut for time" section here on the LD page, some of those features sound fun! Maybe there is room for a post-LD version later on?
That was fun! Simple and straight forward, with potential to be brutally hard if you wanted to make the before mentioned "hardmode" *wink-wink* I wouldn't be able to play hardmode, but I would appreciate the fact that it was there :D
Nice work! Really fun core loop and a great take on the theme. Had a good time playing it! Left full ratings.
The logic puzzle of routing those old-tech steam engines was really engaging. There's a satisfying feeling to successfully navigating the junctions and getting every train to its right colored station. Awesome effort, especially considering the jam constraints!
Thanks for playing!
@nursultan : loved the new version!
@wouter52 : I've spent quite a while trying to fix that skipping bug! It's defying all logic and reason! As for the icons at the top, they originally had labels but I had issues getting the font to render properly; I fixed that problem, but forgot to put the labels back. ๐ Glad you enjoyed it, and I'd like to do a post-jam version (with the bug fixed, the labels restored, and maybe a hardcore mode too).
@mrs-wheelsx : Two votes for hardcore mode. Guess this means I'm doing a post-jam version. ๐
@ao-85 : Glad you enjoyed it!
@eugenik : Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!
So... I like the concept, the bugs in question you have already mentioned. What I struggled with is the bright green background... And figuring out if a train is red or pink. For me they somehow seemed veryyy the same and as far as I know I am not colorblind. I really liked the music, and the old way of switching the tracks. While the speeding up is a bug it did make it more challenging in a way as I had to jump quicker into action in mostly those bits. I would be curious to different levels. Very nice you had a form of tutorial in it!
Cool game! I wouldโve loved an endless run mode, though. It seemed easy at first, and it was, until things started speeding up and I got two wrong. Aside from the known bugs, this game is dope for the time we had. Great job!
Thanks for playing!
@lizz : I should've added a list of "things I want to change", and using colours to indicate which train had to go to which station would've been top of that list. I've very deliberately limited myself to a fixed palette (the [CGA palette](https://lospec.com/palette-list/color-graphics-adapter) ), but then this became an issue in trying to differentiate between the four colours (especially in the confined 16x16 sprite size of the trains). Others (including wouter52) have suggested a post-jam version, so this'll be one of the things I'll look to fix. (And yes, I often found it hard to distinguish between red and pink, so it's not just you.)
@richard8 : thanks -- others have convinced me to put in a hardcore mode, so an endless run mode sounds like another one for the list!
Fun game. However, I think there's a bug where the trains jump forward a bit at the start. It's usually fine unless it's on the bottom track and jumps right to the junction.
nice work brother
Thanks for playing!
@oller125 : yep, that's a known bug (see the description at the top of the page) -- still trying to figure out what's going on, it's defying all logic :-(
@adrian8 : thanks!
20/20, success! Also, you're at 20 ratings, woot! ;) Almost missed a sneaky train at the bottom, that lower junction could be a problem. Agree with others the red/pink were a bit too close in color, always was second guessing myself. You could maybe have the trains be patterned with stripes too to make them more color-blind friendly too.
Main thing I was just missing was a button I could hold to speed time up, or maybe if I clicked a train it could speed up. I found myself just waiting for trains a lot of the time. I had a lot of fun though, it was a great idea for the theme, and just enough puzzle. I could see it speeding up a bit and going through a few different levels if you do more post-jam.
Thanks for playing @mikeware . I really do have to fix that bug. Got a long weekend this week, so I'll have a crack at it then.
I knew even when I originally came up with the idea of using colours to indicate which train went where would be a problem, especially for people with some form of colour-blindness. (My university UI/UX professor would be very disappointed in me!) It became a problem for future-me... who now has to deal with it ๐
I think you're the first to suggest a speed-up button. I think I know a way to implement it, and it might make things really interesting when I implement train collisions ๐
I agree on with others with having a hardcore as option it felt pretty simple expecially with this layout, the optimal starts seems to be just use 3 junctions leaving the rest of the map unused (though it takes some time to realize it) and with the quit slow spawn easily manageable. I lost my 3 trains due to, first a train spawend at bottom track which meant it almsot instantly went to yellow => i never left that stragith after that. Second one i miss identified the train color (hard color distinction could be a feature also but i dont think it fits here). Final one i missed due to being bored since i found the "optimal strat" did not pay attention.
Despite critique this is pretty good jam game and nice idea, its just quite slow and nothing to do while you wait for the trains to pass by. You could also signal the win condition in game, I was half quiting before i checked your description and decided to go for the win.
Thanks for playing @prunus-padis ! You've made all good points, which I'm hoping to address in a post-jam version.
Pretty unusual idea and I like it, but it's a bit hard to catch control fast, so start of the game is stressful (but it's not bad :D) It might be a good idea to show current train paths, at least on the start, so it would feels like railway operator :) Also, entry has a great potential to have various level design and interesting difficulty curve. Now it's a good one, but with stress control in early game I think it would be even better overall And music is so chill :D
A very solid and fun simple game. It's surprisingly fun to click those switches, though I wish the difficulty would ramp up faster. Very green, good job!
Nice arcade game, the 20 train goal is a good breakpoint. Reminds me a little of an easier Root Beer Tapper in charm.
Minor bug, the audio adds a second stack of background music when continuing after winning. Also, the pink and red trains were hard to tell apart for me.
Lastly, the cheerful music was fun to listen to.
Thanks for playing!
@fortythird : yes, the sudden jump the train makes when it first enters the map is a bug which I finally managed to track down yesterday, and fix for the post-jam version. I like the idea of showing the train paths, maybe while the player is holding down a key. I did intend to have more levels, but just ran out of time.
@reaktori: thanks -- there wasn't much time left for balancing at the end of the ham, but the post-jam version will (hopefully) have better balance.
@nbumgardner : always nice to be compared favorably to a classic! Thanks for the bug report -- I'll get that fixed for post-jam. The music I found on jamendo.com (link at the top of this page).
Cool game! As another commenter mentioned, red vs. pink can be hard to tell apart, and I think it might be helpful to have a little bit of advance notice of which train is about to go where (similar to how you can see upcoming blocks in Tetris), since some of the switches are very close to the spawn point. But great concept overall and very good use of the theme!
