Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → Canyon
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | Cm | Co | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | 31 | Entire Game on One Screen | Terra | jam | 787 | 2.86 | 2.51 | 2.89 | 3.50 | 3.42 | 2.91 | 1.91 | 2.62 | 62 | |||
| 2014 | 30 | Connected Worlds | Precipice | compo | 897 | 2.85 | 2.66 | 3.02 | 2.16 | 3.17 | 1.84 | 2.23 | 2.76 | 72 | |||
| 2014 | 29 | Beneath the Surface | Off the Hook! | compo | |||||||||||||
| 2013 | 28 | You Only Get One | Space to Proceed | compo | 603 | 2.88 | 2.83 | 3.42 | 3.25 | 2.25 | 2.05 | 2.83 | 45 | ||||
| 2013 | 27 | 10 Seconds | Provider | compo | 271 | 3.37 | 2.77 | 3.57 | 3.17 | 3.40 | 2.93 | 2.06 | 3.24 | 52 | |||
| 2013 | 26 | Minimalism | InVS | compo | 1085 | 2.64 | 2.20 | 3.03 | 3.31 | 2.21 | 2.04 | 1.41 | 2.11 | 64 | |||
| 2012 | 25 | You are the Villain | Captain Iago | compo | |||||||||||||
| 2012 | 24 | Evolution | Tree | compo | 650 | 2.38 | 1.92 | 2.77 | 2.31 | 2.85 | 24 | ||||||
| 2011 | 22 | Alone | First Cell | compo | 395 | 2.59 | 2.19 | 3.18 | 2.44 | 2.82 | 2.90 | 1.33 | 2.93 | 3.11 | 85 |
Canyon leaves an average of 15.8 feedback comments each event.
Amazing idea, I love it.
The only frustrating thing is how long the load times are after dying, not sure if there is a way around that. But this is great!
I was _this_ close to closing your game because I thought it was just a static picture, after about a 30 seconds I noticed the red square on the left was a loading bar.
But seriously, _this_ close.
This has such promise! I love your creativity, please finish this at some point!
I liked it.
The page seems to be down for me. I'll download the source and try that.
Yeah checkpoints...
I love that you run out of arrows. And if this had multiplayer I would be so happy.
Bugs out on level 3 for me. But I think the game is great!
5 Stars for everything but humor. One day I will make a game this good. :)
Too good
This games great, I got stuck after a few minutes in. But this is so good!
I loved this! What a great interpretation of the theme!
I love the graphics and the editor. I actually guessed the controls for rotating and flipping pieces, and when I was right it made me really appreciate your choices.
I never came across any other ships. I wish I could, so I could trade. I'd be really interested to hear about any future updates to this. Heck, I'd love to help in any way if I can. :)
Made me laugh, managed to win a round. Cool idea, I liked the music!
I couldn't finish level 3 but I thought this was great. I would stay and play this all night if I wasn't on a rating mission.
I loved the music too.
5 Stars for everything except audio and humor. So cool!
I like the game. I think this level is a bit mechanic dense, which makes it frustrating. You have the dangerous boxes, the dimension switching the fact that the dangerous boxes aren't static (I think they should have been), it is all introduced into this crystal of a level.
If the mechanics were introduced one by one, and this was the last level in the game, I think it would be stronger.
But this level really is a gem.
When I start the game I just get a black screen every time :( (Web)
I really liked this. I don't mind that it is completely up to luck. Wouldn't exploring space realistically be like that? It is nice to have your own experience even if your choices weren't informed.
Seems interesting but I found the panning speed frustrating so I lost patience.
Cool idea
It's great, one request. Auto fire.
I love the idea of moving the worlds with your projectiles.
I kept dying but I like the idea and the graphics. Some better checkpoints would probably have stopped me from rage quitting.
I couldn't figure it out, but looks nice!
This is the best interpretation of the theme I have come across yet.
I couldn't move any boxes into storage, they just got stuck at the exit. But graphics 5 stars!
I tried to read the controls screen but I could only see the bottom quarter of it. Is it possible to scale it based on window size? I'll come back later to rerate.
I tried to run it but it stayed minimized and in Task Manager said "Not Responding".
Is it possible to make a web build?
The intro was great! The concept was great! The mechanic idea was great but once you realise that nothing happens and you have experienced all that it is going to offer, there is no incentive to keep playing.
I am not saying that is a bad thing though. I am glad I played.
I think the mechanic could be expanded upon to make some kind of VVVVVV style thing. And if you could represent the bounds of gravity with sound and visuals it would be really interesting what kind of puzzles you could design around that.
I now see your comment "play until you reach some sense of closure" as a commentary on conflict.
This made me feel sad for the world we live in, which suprised me. Great work.
Loved it. I had troubled with the control scheme as I only had a touch pad thought.
I love the theme idea and the pixel art. But I couldn't get past the first room. I just walked off screen and then nothing happened.
Bu
I didn't have a mouse plugged in (just touchpad) so it was kind of frustrating. But I can tell it would be pretty fun with a mouse. Maybe consider adding keyboard only controls as an option? ARROWS to aim and WASD to shoot, or constantly fire and you fire the direction you walk? I don't know. In any case, great work!
Yes, it is a lot like Galcon. But I prefer the twist of not being able to manufacture units straight away, that there is a no mans land that last longer, where as in Galcon ownership changes the moment you have wiped the enemy and have one unit.
It changes the strategy, where attacking one world is strategically more sound than do a massive sprawl attack.
If this was expanded on, I would buy it for iPad. I love the visual design too. When I was using the, it was quite frustrating - but at some point I started touching the screen and it made the game flow so much more.
I don't mind that it is Galcon's mechanic, because if that stopped us making games we'd only have Wolfenstein and Jumpman to play.
The delivery makes it worth while.
I love this game. I love how it feels.
I liked the art style and how the time was represented. The pixel perfect jumping was a little frustrating.
I like your art.
The game does not need much more tweaking, you have really nailed the mechanic. When I die, I feel it is my own fault not the games, which is important, considering it is a physics game. This makes me want to play again and master my skills.
Unfortunately I could not get the sound to work but I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt. Cool game.
I loved this game 5 stars for everything but audio, humor and mood.
Beautiful game. Like @FiveThumbsDown I found it confusing that there were handles visible that I couldn't move. I am amazed that this is your first entry, it is super polished well done.
I think if there was no limit of shots I would have been more absorbed in the game.
The game is beautiful!
Is there any penalty to driving at the slowest speed, or is there any advantage to driving as fast as possible. It'd be great if you measured the time taken to reach a distance. Then there seems to be an incentive to not just dial back the speed.
This was awesome. The music and sound made it for me. It is a beautiful game, but the fact that left and right had a different beautiful sound made me really enjoy just the act of turning. And seeing as you turn a lot in the game that was important.
The Visual design is beautiful, it meets the theme.
I wish the game left you a little bit longer in a haze of colourful nothingness before the game restarts.
I like the presentation a lot. The tiny window is cool.
It'd be great if you could skip the text animation by tapping any key. It'd be cool to have a two player option too.
Beautiful music. The only part I did not like was waiting for the text (even sped up) to continue on to the next move.
It is a good way to do combat in an RPG and could definitely be used in a larger scale RPG.
Well done.
I liked the art style. I'm suprised you used lwjgl for this sort of game, it seems like overkill. Performance on my lapptop was very slow.
I really enjoyed this :)
I liked the game a lot. I like the music and the visual style. I liked the mechanic and to a degree the level design. But some later levels seemed frustrated me.
I really liked this game. Ignore those who say it isn't a game. This is definitely a game. It just lays bare how little importance the player has in an RPG, in the end you are in a designed system and no matter how complex the system seems - you are just clicking buttons to continue a system that has been laid out for you neatly to experience.
Other Judgers, before you proclaim 'this is not a game', you should have written down exactly what your definition of a game is. And then think of all the games you play and see if they meet your definition.
Either your definition will be vague and encompassing or specific and wrong.
Yeah a win condition would make all the difference. What is the significance of the different balls having different colours? I like your colour scheme.
I had a lot of fun with this. Right up until I rage quitted. The art is beautiful. My game plays on black and white too.
Your level design is interesting. My mind got some exercise in that inter dimensional jump puzzles.
I digged the mood. It made me feel super anxious. It is great for a game to make me feel complex emotions and for that to be intentional. I like the brevity to. Gets the message across quite quickly. High points for mood and audio.
I like the graphics and the sound.
This game is reliant on action mechanics when it is really a puzzle game. So even after you know how to solve a level, you have to have quick reflexes to actually beat it.
I think it would be stronger if it focused on one or the other.
I love the spawning sound.
Fantastic entry. Very charming. The art melds well with the mechanic and it all seems very peaceful.
If the resolution was a little smaller you could keep this open on the desktop is a little toy. Very well done. Looking forward to seeing your work in the future.
I did not appreciate needing to install the game using a setup. Just an executable would be more convenient.
But otherwise, all good!
Cheers Canyon
Interesting idea. The vague objectives were frustrating. The control scheme was confusing. But the concept is solid.
Were the controls more intuitive and the objective more clearly attainable this could become an interesting game.
Well done. Problems I see in this entry are very similar to problems with my own. Hope to see your entry next time!
Cheers Canyon
This is very well presented, it's challenging, the music is great. I like the concept. Well done.
I really like the parallax effect of the nebula interspersed with colour.
I like the view of Mars through the window.
Give me some of those sweet sweet windows binaries.
I found the game really easy, and quit at about 86. I just circled them and shot. The back story was a nice touch and the music was pretty good.
The 'Web' link leads to the timelapse on youtube for me. And the Windows download link leads to a dropbox 404. I'll try again later.
This game is innovative, I don't see how it fits the theme. I think this concept could work but it needs to be faster. It is very fiddly directing the balls movement.
I don't understand why the control system changes between levels. As is right now the game isn't very fun but I really like the visual style.
There was no sound when I played, I think some music would help in terms of mood and engagement. And sounds to reflect what you are doing are great for feedback(jumping, collecting gems etc).
I found this game extremely hard and the difficulty felt unfair due to large hitboxes mostly. Sometimes it was impossible to do a section because a platform was too thin followed by an obstacle immediately in front of your only landing position.
I think you need to tweak your procedural generation code to not just be purely random. Test your game more and add conditions to make it playable.
With free running games it is important to have some sort of learning curve.
Yeah I'm in the same boat as jfroco, I can't download the files, it just times out. I'll keep trying though.
I opened up the archive and tried to recompile manually but it just wouldn't work. I like the title screen, hopefully you fix the bug and we can all give it a try before judging ends.
I like how fast paced this is. I think it'd be great if the levels were procedurally generated as you explore. Because I was skirting the edges and working my way in, but if the world was infinite then I couldn't skirt the edges and I'd be forced to play the game less cautiously.
I found that overtime the game slowed down, so I think the projectiles aren't being removed from memory, it gradually slowed to a crawl for me.
The walking sound was annoying. But the other sounds were ok. I think this game is great and I think if the levels were procedural and there were more weapons or some kind of progression then this game would have more replayability.
Great game. Great name.
This is cool, what was the ending going to be? Just getting on the boat and leaving?
This is great.
I read your read me and was suprised how self deprecating you are. The pixel perfect jumping is fine, as Caranha said, the levels are so short that dieing isn't frustrating at all. I like the name and I like the character animation, the music is fantastic.
I agree with Hempuli, the later levels do tend to trick the player which is great. Not knowing which critters to trust and their indifference to you works well with the theme. Overall I think this game feels complete.
That said, the level design could be refined to explore the concept more concretely so that each level is some new manifestation of that mechanics possibilities.
Well done.
Really great work, I admire your skills.
Before I go into my main problem with this game, I want to say how brilliantly the mood and feel is conveyed through art, sound, and theme.
The sound design and the character design matches the world, he is born of that world, like dead twigs. A world with life sucked out of it, a world without colour.
The sound is abstract but
I think this game would be more interesting if the mechanics
were in harmony with the concept.
The mechanic - you walk in a direction until the game ends.
The game mechanics fall flat for me. This isn't really a game.
I saw screen shots of this and was really looking forward to 'playing' this game.
I think you can create a game with this kind of high concept, brilliant art and sound design, but also compelling gameplay.
I really enjoyed this, and I think it might seem arbitrary to pick on this otherwise brilliant entry because of its lack of gameplay. Because in the end why does it matter? It is what it is.
But, I could have put a paper weight on the right arrow and 'watched' the game as a short film, and it would have been more enjoyable
(Actually this is easy to achieve, just hit the right arrow and then click on another window and the character will keep walking).
As soon as you have the ability to control the character and then do nothing with it, that is a waste of the mediums strengths.
I gave you a good score for innovation, simply because the goal wasn't to kill the aliens. But everything else could have been more interesting. For a first entry though this is a great effort, I had trouble with your link as well.
Brilliant game, I would pay for a full version. Pre rendering 3d graphics was an amazing choice, because in point and click you don't often expect that it is 3d. And I didn't realise until later that it was pre-rendered. The ending seems more like a cliff hanger, and I hope it is resolved in a later version.
The game itself is impressive, but what is more exciting is the possibility of making this a full game.
As a full game it was great,
as a teaser for a full game it blew me away.
Well done!
This is a tough game to review or even rate. I'm not sure if it qualifies as a game. But I know it has worth. To say what you should improve really depends on what you were aiming for. You said you were aiming for the emotion in this one.
I think you conveyed emotion, possibly of being alone. The emotion I picked up from this was teenage depression, self pity.
I think the art style in the room works really well. Outside of the room it felt less consistent. The buildings seemed rushed, along with the clouds.
As for the poem itself. This isn't a poetry jam so I won't rate it based on the poem. But this game was essentially a poem. It wasn't my taste in poetry. It was predictable and metaphors were scant.
I think this is good though, I am glad I played/watched it. And I'm interested to read your post mortem and see what you were going for when you made it.
Nice work, and keep it up,
Canyon
Excellent
I got used to the collision, I think it's fine. All I would really add is for the species to have behaviour. And for there to be some kind of logic behind why certain colours create certain species.
I really like the aesthetic, the music and the visuals really work well together. And explaining the controls, the game name and the creator in the background is genius. It also created a sense of depth in the water.
After playing for a while, I kind of wanted some form of closure, some kind of end. But maybe that is a result of conditioning from years of playing more conventional games.
I really enjoyed it. And I think you should be commended for how complete the game feels.
Next time I will keep in mind this game as an example of design clarity.
Well done.
Hey Bad Sector,
I agree with mcc with regard to the right mouse button being jump. I didn't realise you could jump until the 3rd level. You don't need to use more popular controls necessarily. Your level design showed me that there must be a jump button, and then I quickly found it. Possibly have a jump puzzle earlier on if you want to stick with the right mouse button.
In principle I like the game mechanic that you need to stay around her, but also not annoy her. But it isn't communicated visually. If this game was a statement on miscommunication in relationships then that would be fine, and it works in that sense. But I don't think that is what you were going for...maybe I'm wrong?
The game was confusing, and I don't think it portrayed the theme of alone all that well. At the same time something about this game sticks with me, maybe its just how abstract it is, I'm hurting her with these eyes, then she gives me a heart.
If the LudumDare theme was tension I'd give it a 5/5
This game is interesting to me, I feel it stands out from the crowd in the sense that most games in ld48 are going to be 2d, but game design wise it needs work.
Hi PapyGaragos!
First of all congratulations on your first LD48 attempt. It was my first attempt as well. I wrote down some first impressions as I played your game and I'm just going to give them verbatim.
It's good that enemies wall jump to show the player that they can do that as well. I think introducing this earlier, or forcing the player to do it in order to complete some obstacle could have worked even better. Teaching with gameplay is always better.
I like that when you die you still get to try the other levels. Especially for a competition like this where we want to see as much of your content but may not have time to play the entire game.
I think it could benefit from dynamic difficulty, if you are finding it very easy, increase their health,
their fire rate, their spawn time. And if its getting too hard modulate it a bit. If one enemy seems to always beat the player, control how often they spawn.
Also let the enemies spawn from less predictable positions.
I always knew where they were coming from so there was little strategy involved.
Oh and the little red things, I thought they were mines, I still dont know whether to shoot them or collect them.
All in all a fine job, especially for a first attempt, I played the entire game and I look forward to playing your future Ludum Dare entries. Possibly with sprites.
That said Alphaland is a pretty great game and it uses similar graphics.
Cheers mate
Canyon
Really great game, I got to 48 token. It'd be awesome if you use the Journal more next time. Great work
I eventually got pretty good at avoiding the ghosts. But is there an end to the game? I got to the bottom right corner and you could just leave the map. Pretty awesome lighting. Congrats
LD31 — Entire Game on One Screen (31)
Blackout by kaa 2014-12-28T08:43:00
Great score for mood
Snowball juggling Olympio by Benjamin 2014-12-28T08:21:00
Perfect entry, I can't believe the game design and the level of polish are superb. Well done!
Planetary Body Shooter by kavic 2014-12-28T07:55:00
Great graphics. Suprisingly difficult. I like that you could reverse. Could have done with less friction. A little frustrating that the music restarts whenever you die.
Great idea to have a shop and make conservation of ammo important. I got hit by spawning asteroids a few times and then I had to rage quit. But great work!
Space Dwarves by CMWeissMedia 2014-12-28T07:46:00
I really liked the art, sound and mood, and the sense of progression. I'll have to come back and play this a little more because I never managed to survive very long.
Harvestier by killthealias 2014-12-28T07:39:00
Beautiful graphics. The game design is a little shallow. It doesn't feel nice to have to turn around, and there is no danger of hitting the reds at all. There is also no real reason to collect these things other than score.
You could increase the danger by lowering your friction, or make the green and yellow affect play in some more complex way.
Abdominal Snowman by Dissiden7 2014-12-28T07:31:00
Clever mechanic. I think some polish on the UI would go a long way to make the game feel more complete. The stars, and the buttons didn't really match the snowman or the level art.
I liked when the levels required you to have shrunk in order to progress. Some more puzzle elements would be great.
Also, not sure if it is meant to be a pun, because the actual term is abominable snowman. Maybe I missed something.
0000 : Press Z by alvarop 2014-12-28T07:23:00
I love the art style
Narwhal with a Gun by LonelyTimeLord 2014-12-28T07:19:00
I think this game needed more peril.
Perhaps a mechanic that meant you lost if you missed more than N bad guys. A score on it's own is not motivational enough.
When time counts up, the game should be difficult to survive, but that isn't the case here. I feel like for this game, the timer should have counted down, and it was more of, how many can get, with in the time constraint.
Otherwise, you just play until you get tire of it.
It would have been great to change the level after a set time/goal was reached.
The controls also feel a bit airy. I like a lot of the little touches, like being invulnerable after spawning, and wall jumping, having a menu with instructions etc.
I think with a few tweaks the game would give one more reason to continue playing.
The Shift by SoulGame 2014-12-28T07:11:00
Great all round game. Something just doesn't feel right with the weight of the character, I am not sure what it is. But I love the game. It'd be cool to have a zen mode where it never ends.
Monster Buster by AsixJin 2014-12-28T07:06:00
When I try to run the web build game jolt gives an error saying "Failed to download data file"
Thief Before Dark by GSG 2014-12-28T07:04:00
Really good effort for your first Ludum Dare! The game could do with more feedback e.g. when do I know when I will be seen/hidden. A solid foundation!
Lombom by Kevin_twenty7 2014-12-28T06:56:00
Great mechanic, with some better audio and graphics this could be really interesting.
Fido, Fiona & Fidel by pjimmy 2014-12-26T06:51:00
I found this game very difficult. I admire the concept, but this design requires the player to place a lot of trust in the game, and when the game in question is made in 48 hours, well it is harder to justify that trust.
But, I think this would work well as a mini game inside a more conventional game, where trust has already been earned.
Silk by hoqjed 2014-12-19T23:38:00
I think a few puzzles in the middle could have been cut, as they were repeating the same notion. But going through the categories, I gave you 5 Stars all round.
Dancefloor by kebabskal 2014-12-19T23:11:00
This game is beautiful! I really loved the art style.
S by Lars Faust 2014-12-19T22:52:00
I enjoyed it, and I wish you had more time to add the finishing touches because it is a beautiful idea.
Is the hint bar at the bottom sequential or randomized? Is it showing only what tiles there are, not the order of the them.
Also, playing on a laptop with a terrible mouse pad, an alternative control scheme that didn't require dragging so much would have been great.
It took a while for me to associate the different elements with different colours, could that hint bar at the bottom, say the word themselves, or show icons?
This game has a beautiful core and if you expand on it I would definitely buy it.
Great work.
Rainbow Maze by FrozenCow 2014-12-19T05:08:00
Technically very impressive, and innovative. But, I had no reason to actually want to explore the maze. Seeing how complex it was only made it less interesting to explore. If this was an exploration/sandbox game, I think the mechanic would be more useful, but here, it just made me not want to play.
That sounds bad, but I actually rated you really highly (for everything except fun)
Sweep Stacks by excaliburjs 2014-12-19T04:45:00
I loved this!
Outpost: New World by BMacIntosh 2014-12-19T04:35:00
My favourite game so far. Excellent visual and game design.
Do Not Melt by Zarkith 2014-12-19T04:27:00
I would like to see where this goes if it were to be expanded. I loved the art style and the music. I like the game design on paper, but it would take a lot of work to get right. All in all, great work!
NO AMMO NO ARMOUR NO SIGNAL by Farfin 2014-12-18T04:51:00
Great art style, and phoning in for supplies was an interesting twist. Overall very polished too!
Blocked by Pinpickle 2014-12-18T04:39:00
I like the music!
Orion by feiss 2014-12-18T04:31:00
I can't even
Dino Dash: Rex's Run by Mechatodzilla 2014-12-17T00:03:00
I love this idea and the execution of it! It could do with a little more polish, but it really feels like it would have been a classic handheld game from the 80's. Great art style! And due to the genre, the simple bleeps and bloops make sense.
I also appreciate the simple control scheme and design, and the UI.
Don't Rain On My Parade by JasonG 2014-12-16T23:40:00
I like the graphics!
Age of Snowmen by SUNFURY 2014-12-16T23:38:00
I couldn't make sense of it at all, sorry. Great start though! Coding an RTS is no easy feat!
Hampered by garygreen 2014-12-16T23:35:00
I got 680. I liked the music.
The MANT Experiment by AlbertoSM 2014-12-16T23:26:00
I like the music and animation and the general style.
Zombie Maze Escape by Thepattybeast 2014-12-16T23:22:00
Well done on finishing and including an editor!
The game is pretty frustrating, but that could be resolved without too much work.
Alchemia by blzkz 2014-12-16T23:12:00
I like the mood of this game! I managed to craft some dust, but I couldn't drag the coal to the tray. Not sure what I was doing wrong. I tried a few times but to no avail.
Planet Defender by Clonestyle 2014-12-16T23:01:00
Interesting twist on Asteroids with potential. You are meant to defend the planet, but shooting asteroids that aren't on a collision course with your Planet still give you points.
Might be interesting if shooting those asteroids deducted your score.
Also, does the planet ever get destroyed?
I liked the art and the sounds. The controls are interesting too. Well done! And good luck for next time :)