Keep It Alive by danman9914 2020-04-22T19:31:31Z
I'm not 100% sure why but this kindy reminds me of the old Game & Watch games. Like a modern Game & Watch game. With retro looks, but not that retro. :sweat_smile:
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → CharlieGray
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Mo | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 48 | Deeper and deeper | ScanR | compo | 30 | 4.17 | 4.00 | 4.13 | 4.21 | 3.87 | 4.00 | 4.44 | |
| 2020 | 46 | Keep it alive | Social Life | compo | 254 | 3.72 | 3.45 | 3.64 | 3.79 | 3.40 | 3.73 |
I'm not 100% sure why but this kindy reminds me of the old Game & Watch games. Like a modern Game & Watch game. With retro looks, but not that retro. :sweat_smile:
Very cool puzzle game. I'm a sucker for setting things up and watching them unfold, so this is right up my ally. The graphics look very cool as well. The only downside for me are the controls. They work decent enough but i had to wrangle with them a bit. :laughing:
Very nice atmosphere. To be honest though at some point i just left the sheep behind and explored the map. :sweat_smile:
Very nice idea. It's trying to satisfy as many people at the same time as possible.
I really like TD games and this is a fun little TD game. Different designs for the towers would have been nice, but it is functional as it is.
Very funny. Had me surprised and laughing at several search queries. And the name of the search engine alone is great!
Okay, great game! The Art is amazing, the gameplay is creative and fits the theme and there is good music! I like that medi kits also double as a slow down for Rémi. Thumbs up from a Unicorn :wink:
What a cool mechanic! And wrapped in a so good package overall. Amazing.
Oh wow, this is polished. I mean, what's there that's not to love? A fun game, fantastic graphics, good sound. I guess if i must find something negative it would be that some deaths felt unfair due to gaps between platforms. But with short levels there is no real time loss and no frustration. Great game!
Nice twist on a tried and tested game mechanic.
Oh no! I ded! Cute game. I'm surprised that you were able to make the blobs that cute with such simple graphics. The way they cry for help when they are lying on their back...
Simple but nice concept. Very fitting for the theme. And the sound effects set the mood nicely.
Jo, this is lit... Sorry. But really, I greatly enjoyed this game. I feel like this theme birthed a lot of hectic games where you nee to work against the clock or something similar so a nice relaxing game like this one ís very welcome. And it has such a neat mechanic where my developer mind can't stop thinking about how to recreate it. :smile: So, great job in pretty much all regards.
Definitely good music. And a nice idea. A faster player character qould have been nice, though.
Very cool idea and also very well executed. Also nice graphics and sound design. I would really love to see a longer game with more puzzles that expands on this idea. The only critique i have is that the theme is not that incorporated in this game. But still, all in all a very cool idea.
itch.io says "The developer has not uploaded a game yet..."
Wow, just wow! I can't even put into words how cool this is. Okay, simple things first: I like the graphics. Especially the background images are beautiful. Then the sounds set the modd very well and when the music came on, it really had an impact. The way to combine gameplay and story (with the revealing background as well) is a really cool idea. The way the story wraps in of itself and still makes sense. And the ending is very neat as well. All around for me one of the best games of this jam.
Oh jeez, this is franctic. A lot of fun though. I really like the art style and the idea for the theme is also pretty cool. I do think its a bit hard, though. I never made it once even on the easiest difficulty.
Nice graphics and sound. I like that the logs are your weapons and source for the fire. But after some time the fire burned down pretty quick and it felt like it did nothing to feed it more wood.
Good game. Simple to understand, fun to play. Great graphics as well.
Now this is a novel idea for this theme. I really like this game mechanic. Had great fun playing your game.
I really like the artstyle of your game. And i like the idea of having enemies that attack you and enemies that attack the flower you need to protect.
Reminds me about "Storm the House". Nice game concept and very topical. :smile:
Very cool idea. And also very well executed. I like the gameplay, pixel art and the sound effects. And the fact that the enemies can shoot each other gives it a nice tactical side. Well done!
Nice game. The controls are a bit too quick for my liking but i did get used to them. And I like to have levels to explore. Even though they are simplistic they each had their own identity.
Very cool game! Graphics and sounds are great. And i just love the game mechanic. It's kinda hectic and relaxing at the same time. Good job!
Cool Puzzle game. The artstyle is really cool. And you have quite a few levels for a jam game. I did encouter one or two bugs but still this game is impressive.
@wilson-taylor Might be fixed now. I'm not sure since I didn't have that error on both of my machines. But I had a Windows Defender Problem on my Laptop and that's now fixed so maybe your error is also gone.
@sheetcode I tried, but I couldn't get the shader to work. The whole screen was just pink.
The controls are a bit hard to get used to and sometimes food goes into the cage without registering (i gues it needs to touch the dog?). But a nice idea and i don't know if it's intentional but the fact that you can go to the next level even if you didn't actually win the current level is pretty handy for a jam game.
Fun and intuitive gameplay. And the graphics are simplistic but also looking good. A bit more enemy variety would go a long way, i think.
Oooh, it's this game! I saw yur posts and wanted to try your game out. With the theme I also thought about keeping music alive but I didn't know how to execute that idea. Well, this is one way. I like the visuals and i like the music. I also really like that the song reacts to your actions and evolves over time. The trippy effect looks cool but slows down the game quite a bit. Coincedentally this slow down cancels out the increased difficulty induced by the effect. So maybe that was intentional?
Very cool. Very nice graphics, expecially the horse. He looks so cute! A bit jittery in places, where the collision is a bit to precise. but overall a very fun game.
Cute idea and cute graphics. Interesting that you control Darryl while also kinda passively protecting him.
Nice little game, the mood is on point! A little fiddly with the camera, though. I accidentally shot the girl a few times.
Very simple concept, fun execution.
Web Version worked for me. And i love the freakish character design.
Okay, first: The Sprites look really good. And i like the idea of the game, I find it pretty challenging, though. Trying to stop all the enemies on time while avoiding to get hit yourself and replenishing your mana... Still, cool little game.
I would love to try your game but the link leads to a 404 page and I also couldn't find it on your itch.io page.
Very nice idea, to protect two sides of a battle from each other. Great fun. I think using the mouse for control would make for a greate game feel overall, though.
@polypickle Don't feel to bad about it. It's fun as it is. :smile:
Simple idea well executed. Fits the theme well, is a bit quite, though.
I always enjoy these kind of little "coding" games. And this is no different. With a bit more polish and more levels there could be quite a bit of fun hidden in here.
Took me a bit to figure out what I should be doing to not die over and over again. But once I figured that out the game was quite fun.
Cool art and music as well. And I like the idea of a looping level to try and beat your previous time.
Wish the level was a bit longer but you wrote that you had time issues, so I understand. All in all a fun game.
Very nice art and an intriguing story. Short, obviously, but interesting.
This is a fun game!
I didn't look down before I hit start so I didn't notice the hole in the ground. I assumed the game would load to the level and start from there. But the message "Look Down" followed by me starting falling after I looked down was a really cool way to start the game.
The gameplay itself is simple, but great fun and instantly understandable. The obstacles (and openings in them) are easily discernable and with increasing difficulty it gives a noticable rush when squeezing through a tight hole or just managing to dodge one.
I like the controllerless design. Not that using a controller would have been a problem, but theres no need for a controller in the game itself, why require one for the menu? Good thinking.
The graphics are, again, simple but effective. They look good but don't distract from the game which is the best for a game like this, I feel.
Over to sound: The music is nice, it makes sure the game isn't to quiet and sounds good. While the accompanying sounds really sell the rush of falling past obstacles.
I am relatively prone to motion sickness in VR and had my worries, that this game might be bad in that regard, but I had no issues whatsoever. Most likely because I actually moved myself.
Comfort wise it wasn't a problem constantly looking down. The Oculus Quest sit comfortably the whole game and I naturally started to len forward a bit to spare my neck a bit. It might get uncomfortable after longer sessions but this game is not the kind you pump hours into in one session.
The highest score I managed in my first few rounds was 323. And I will keep the game saved on my PC and most likely will play it again every now and then for a few rounds. It's simple, good, polished fund that really benefits from being a VR game.
Great job guys!
Ah I've played the "Wikipedia Game", as it is so creatively named in my circles, before. But not this comfortable and automated as this. Had a lot of fun with it and will come back to play it again for sure!
Wow, the cute bunny sure can dig fast.
A simple game sure, but it works well and looks nice. At first it seemed kinda wonky, since it seemed like I often "got stuck" on the tunnel I was digging, but the game felt a lot smoother, after I figured two things out: 1. It's better to just press the buttons rather than holding them down. 2. The rabbit and carrots/onions are aligned in lines and with one press you change one line.
With that in mind the game was a whole lot more fun. And I could appreciate the art and cute sound effects (apart from the vomiting at the end, maybe :smile:) even more.
This is the end score of my first playthrough: Bunny.png
Oh, another Wikipedia game, cool. :smiley: I like the "Wikipedia Game" and I love that there are actual games now, that monitor your prgress, really cool.
This is a really fun and unique little puzzle game. Works really well and I didn't encounter any bugs.
The only thing was sometimes I got a starting hand that immediately was impossible to place down without loosing (like one right and two lefts).
Apart from that the only things I could criticise are things that are not there, like sound but that's not really necessary for this kind of game and is understandable to have left out for a jam game. Also, since you opted out of the Audio category, no bad rating because of that as well.
Oh, and a restart button (I didn't found one at least), so I had to reload the page for every restart.
This is the highest score I could manage in my tries so far:
Score.PNG
What a cool game, and a neat idea as well. It feels really stressful to try and finish as many tasks in three minutes as possible. :sweat_smile:
I also really enyoed the artstyle and sound effects as well.
I've always had trouble with autostereogram images and it's even harder when it's moving so I only got to 320 meters. But I just love the idea, this is the creative kind of stuff I like to see from gamejams. Also nice work with the audio-illusion.
Cool little dungeon crawler. It's satisfying to really clean out a level and get all the gold possible. After the first level I almost never had enough to buy something, though.
I'm not sure why, but I really like the zoom-in on death. Seems like a neat little flourish.
Managed to get stuck on the first part of the tutorial... twice... in a way that I had to restart the game to complete the tutorial. :laughing: Had not very hopes for me after that.
But on my second go I managed to complete the tutorial, understand the mechanics and properly play the game. I like the puzzle mechanic, you really need to think before you start digging. Also nice pixel art, I like it!
Wow, 3D graphics on PICO 8? I have never seen that before. Looks great and plays well.
A nice little maze solving game.
This is a really cool mechanic. A little bit of a learning curve but I got the hang of it fast enough.
I also really dig the aesthetic of your game. Really reminds me of some older lower budget PC games. Great job on this!
Gool game, works well with a PS4 Controller. :thumbsup:
A really cool concept to go deeper into some paths and then get out again to be able to go further in the "parent" level.
Wow, can't believe this game is in the Compo. I love the visuals. The sprites and effects look really awesome. The gameplay, while realtively linear, is fun and I think there is an optimal strategy in here, to complete the game as fast as possible. On the other hand you could take your time and build a huge civilization.
Small critique points are: I could not figure out where to put mines until the very end. I don't know what affects the ritual speed and sometimes they get completed very slowly. The ending is a bit underwhelming.
Still, I love this game, good job!
Neat little idea. And I like the graphics. The game runs well, but it's really hard to keep the boxes alive if you still have more than one. It get's way easier with the last box.
Had fun playing.
Cool idea to have two programs running and have to debug the game. A fun puzzle game.
Wow, this is a tough game. My best score was around 850m. I love how the cat falls and rolls around. I pretty much immediately dubbed it "Tumblecat". :smiley:
All in all a fun game, sometimes you get rock combinations that feel impossible to clear, though.
This is really good! I love the visual design and I love the gameplay even more! The small levels, predictable enemies, lots of different powerups.
There's one thing I would change though and that is the automatic time progression. I often had the situation that I would have liked to really analyse a level, the enemies and my options to try and find an optimal strategy. With the automatic time progression I couldn't always do that and sometimes had to drop a level, just to save myself.
If that would be changed this game would go from really very good to simply great. (Oh, and maybe the things that you wrote you didn't have time for, like menus etc. but such things missing doesn't bother me too much in a jam game.) Let me know if you plan to make a postjam version (maybe with an option to turn off the automatic time progression? :smirk:). I would love to play that.
Oh wow. I mean at this point a great jam game is to be expected of you lot, but this one exceeds even my high expectations. I don't really have anything in terms of criticism. The game is gorgeous, the soundscape is great, voice acting and writing is pretty good. The game controls well, is fun, creative and I never felt lost as what to do.
Just high marks all around!
A fun puzzle concept, I'm not sure I understood it completely, though. As I ran into situations that seemed unsolvable pretty quickly every round. Still fun to collect the fossils and buy upgrades.
The Art and Sound are great as well.
Cool game! The art and music is really good and the controls feel great. The first few levels were maybe a bit boring but better that way around than be overwhelming with the controls. This way it was nice and easy to learn the mechanics.
Great job overall.
Okay, the game is pretty short, but I think that was not the focus here.
The art and sound however is simply great! And what little game there is, is pretty good as well. The "Bruh" sound effect on death is also really funny.
Nice twist on the theme. And I like the one button control, makes it easy to pick up the game and play.
This is a really cool game. The controls felt a bit too complicated on keyboard and mouse but with a controller this game plays wonderfully.
I love the aesthetic of this game, the colors, simple shapes and visual effects are gorgeous.
Audio is also top notch. The music is great but not too distracting and really fits the aesthetic. The Sound effects are also really good and the voice acting is top notch (if maybe a tiny bit too loud).
The tutorial teaches the controls nicely, although I almost dashed through the looking up/down part and I think it might be possible to overlook the hint mechanic. I don't know if it was actually taught in the tutorial I only noticed the text for it during the actual level.
Two small nitpicks: The jump didn't feel perfect when dealing with edges, but it worked well enough that it didn't really bother me. And the move speed is a bit slow when delivering the packages i. e. walking thorugh mostly empty areas. Some sort of sprint mechanic would be nice. But the level is small enough that it really isn't much of an issue.
One bigger issue I had was with the weapon, it took me a while to figure out how it worked. It seemed to me like the "weapon" you activate when the yellow bar is full is some kind of bomb and I couldn't figure out when I can shoot and when I can't. So I activated the "bomb" and nothing happened. I then shot the enemies, but later couldn't shoot anymore. I eventually figured out that the weapon is no bomb but is the shooting and you activate it for a limited time (I thought the timer that pops up over the character is an additional cooldown for the bomb at fist). This all is also not a huge problem, but I think a different kind of sound effect when activating the weapon as well as having the particles travel towards the player and not in an explosion outward could easily fix this potential confusion.
Apart from that I really enjoyed my time with this game and wished there were more levels. Great job!
Thanks for the kind words, @gonutz
@kro Good Idea, have to keep that in mind should I make a post jam version. Thanks for playing.
Thanks, @liammasters I'm glad you like at least some of the sound effects. It was a first for me to make all effects from scratch and not go the chiptune route with Bfxr. And apart from the boulders I'm happy with the results. :smile:
Thanks for playing @laurenloco and @zevsehg, I'm glad you enjoyed it.
Thank you @crazyrems. I'm glad I could do Scanner Sombre justice, for a jam game at least. :smile:
Thank you for playing @cavedens, I'm happy to hear that my sound effects have the desired impact. :smile:
Thanks for playing and the feedback @rhoff95, I thought about some kind of limitation or reward for less usage as well. But for a jam game I decided to err on the side of the game being too easy, rather than being frustrating.
But that's definitively something to think about for a potential postjam version. Thanks again.
Thanks @hungryroy, nice to hear, that I managed to create an at least somewhat scary experience.
Thank you @azakharov.
Thanks @acdia. I'm glad I could meet your expectations :smiley: The movement mechanic has not too much effort put into it but it at least has coyote time so there's that. It's good to hear that the movement feels good.
Thank you for playing.
Thank you for playing and commentig @nazorus Good to hear the enemy sounds are effective. And it's also nice that somebody got to benefit from the plethora of control options. :smile:
Thank you @adamsmccall, I'm glad to hear that I managed to set the mood right.
Wow, thank you for the nice words and detailed feedback @cammin. I'm always happy to see that people enjoy my game. :smile:
Thanks for playing and for the feedback, @wetburritosupreme.
I understand completely, @mockthebear, I'm a wuss when it comes to creepy games as well (apart from those that I made myself :smile:). Thank you for giving it a shot, though. And I hope you had fun up to that point.
Hey @jafcraze, thanks for checking out my game and for the feedback. I see how the death pits could be confusing in that way, maybe it would have been better to not have that first drop in the game, as every drop afterwards is lethal... Don't know how I didn't see that fault in logic. :sweat_smile:
I'm glad my mechanic intruiged you enough to look at the source code. I hope you didn't have too much trouble finding your way around, for GameJam games I often forego the usage of folders for scenes and scripts. A bad habid I picked up from competing in Trijam, as you rarely have enough time there to think of a good folder structure. :smile:
Thank you @kevinworkman, for playing and the nice feedback. It's intentional, that the enemies are hard to spot and/or keep track of. In hindsight I'm not sure if that was the right choice.
But it sounds like you still had a good time, thankfully.
Thank you for playing @seebass22. I'm glad to hear from a Scanner Sombre fan, that I managed to do it justice. :smiley: I'm also happy, that the sound effects did their job. I hope you weren't too annoyed by the enemies, ultimately they were meant to be scary but not too challenging.
Thank you for the kind words.
Thanks for playing and for your comment, @eugenik.
I'm glad you had fun @brendev and that I managed to "tutorialize" the mechanics well enough. :smile: Thank you for playing my game and for your feedback.
Thanks for playing and the indepth feedback, @impbox. For the lever "puzzles" I agree, they aren't very interesting, but I feared more complex puzzles would be frustrating in the dark (notice how even the current, easy puzzles have lights) and since the main mechanic of the game was the darkness and the scanner I didn't want to have too much of the game take place in lit up areas. Maybe I was too careful with the difficulty here.
As for the enemies, the sole focus here was the sound of them. I agree an option for visual feedback would have been a good idea (and a released, non-jam game should have such a thing). I should at least have had a clear message, that sound is pretty much required. I will keep an eye on that in the future.
I hope you still had some fun, despite the frustrations.
Thanks for checking my game out as well @ianthebee. It was my first time making sound effects with only my voice, so I still have a lot to learn on that front. :sweat_smile:
Wow, just wow. Thank you so much @gonutz for the high praise. :blush:
I can't express how happy it makes me to hear that somebody enjoyed my game that much. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. :heart:
Thanks for playing and the feedback @duvey. That's a cool idea for a larger game. Maybe some metroidvania style of game focues on caving and finding lost people.
I'm glad you survived @re-lo :smile: Dead people don't vote on games :wink:
Thank you for playing.
Good on you to keep going, @karo I'm glad to hear I managed to create a spooky atmosphere.
Thanks @testudor Good to hear I could create somethin nice looking with just a few pixels :smiley:
Yeah! Another group of hikers saved @swen, good job!
Thank you for playing and the positive feedback. I'm so glad to hear I could make my weird mouth-noises sound scary. :smile:
Thank you @deepinthewoods, good to hear the checkpoints did their work.
Yeah, a bit more story would have been nice, but at the time I didn't manage to come up with anything that didn't seem like useless fluff and would actually enhance the game.
Thank you for your feedback.
Congratulations for finishing and rescuing those hikers, @bicheste.
Thanks for playing and commenting.
Thank you for the kind feedback @meritcoding. :smiley:
Thanks for playing @azagaya!
Thank you for playing and the nice comment, @felo07.
While the enemies do have a sprite it's very hard to see anything when you encounter them. It's intentional that the player's imagination comes up with the type of enemy they are encountering. So if you imagined dogs, then they are dogs in your playthrough. :slight_smile:
Hey @kroltan, thanks again for playing on stream yesterday. And for rating as well as the feedback.
In response to the polishing things: - The crates where just set dressing for the light. A better sprite would maybe help with the confusion. - Yeah, a toggle for the scanner seems like a good idea. - I actually have coyote time in there, but I agree that the jump sometimes feels sub-optimal. I think the problem is that I used a capsule for the collision shape of the player character. And the coyote time is the only thing why the jump feels decent.
Thanks @minibetrayal that's great to hear.
I was afraid the game was already too long, glad that's not the case. :smile:
Hi @togis, thanks again for playing and thank you for the link. It's always nice to watch people play your game.
I'm glad you enjoyed it.
Thanks for playing and the feedback @8bitcharlie. I really should look up how jump buffering works, I always forget to include that in my games...
Thank you for playing my game and for the kind words, @ditam. It's nice to hear that the transparency for my inspiration was appreciated.
Thank you @chrissimas. I'm happy you liked the weird sounds I made.
Indeed it is, @tero-pulkkinen. I hope you found your way through the caves nonetheless.
Thanks for playing @kostya. I'm glad you enjoyed my game.
Thanks for the nice feedback, @vuvuzela80. It's good to hear that you had fun.
Thanks for playing on stream and sticking to it @der-finski. It's always nice to see that the scares in your game land :wink:
Thank you very much for playing and the kind feedback, @hypp!
Wow, love the sound and graphics. And the gameplay is really fun too. Good job!
Managed to escape my darkness, barely :sweat_smile:
Love the art and the sound effects, great atmosphere!
Cool game concept and even better graphics and atmosphere. A really interesting game, that I wanted to explore further as I was playing. I noticed a few graphics glitches but I'm not sure if they were maybe intentional :smile:.
I thought I got stuck on the second level, but then I found the door with the lights (I tried to do something with the red one for quite some time). And a cool idea for a "boss fight" as well.
One small complaint: I needed to input the codes for doors twice. Not sure if that is intentional but with the success feedback and the door remaining closed it seems like a bug to me.
Nice art, maybe a bit too zoomed in, though.
I find it really funny that the same guy (not sure if it's supposed to be the same guy but I decided that for me, he is) warns you to not go any deeper, while going ever deeper himself. Just the same guy running ahead of you again and again to urge you to please stop going deeper. :smile:
Fun little game, I always find recoil mechanics satisfying. Also a neat idea to have the game loop when you reach the end.
I have no idea how the game decides what is trash and what is deep. But I had a good laugh, when my first deep and successful poem was literally just "Huh?" :laughing:
That is a cool idea! I love that you can see what's happening in the small circuits. Pretty short but I liked every second of it.
Nice! Score.png
This game feels like a fewer dream, in a good way. I love it!
Really neat game mechanic, a bit hard to guess how far your pucks gonna go, but after a bit you get the hang of it.
Great looking game with great audio and really good controls. I also really like the idea and mechanic of holding onto walls to slide down slowly.
The game is a bit too hard/frustrating for me though. I did not manage to beat the first (and maybe last) longer level. A few checkpoints would have been nice.
It's a bit mean to have the player beat several hard jumps and then have them die on a jump where they need to learn something new (a jump that actually requires usage of coyote time to make it), send them back to the start to beat all the hard jumps again, beat this new kind of jump, beat several more hard jumps and then have them die again, because they need to learn yet something else (just drop to the next lower platform instad of jumping to it), send them back to the start and have them do all that (and maybe more) all over again.
Those teachings should either have a checkpoint or be taught in an earlier, shorter level.
Despite this criticism I really liked the game, though. Proof of how solid the machanics are.
Also a small tip: I noticed some lines appearing between tilemap cells on vertical movement, especially when falling. I found that can be fixed in Godot by going to the Project Settings -> General -> Rendering -> 2d -> Snapping -> and enabling "Use Gpu Pixel Snap". That fixed it for me at least.
TLDR: Great looking game with solid mechanics that's maybe a bit too frustrating.
It's always nice to be able to play a platformer with a controller. And you even integrated vibrations, cool stuff.
I also really like the graphics and music/sound.
A few of the jumps were a tad frustrating, but nothing unmanagable. I had fun playing your game. :thumbsup:
The slowdown is a cool mechanic and the combo is a great incentive to shoot fast but accurate. Visuals and sound are nice as well.
Only the spike blocks felt a bit frustrating. Maybe it would have been better to have more of those, but also apply the slow motion there.
All in all still a fun little game.
Wow, cool game. I love the concept, the gameplay, the puzzles, the graphics and the sound. I really don't have anything negative to say. Great job!
You should really try to make an export so other people can play your game. I got it running by opening the source project in Godot and starting it from there, but that's not something that should be expected from players.
As for the game itself: Movement felt good and the graphics look nice. I'm just missing the goal of the game.
Hehe, our games have a somewhat similar core mechanic. So naturally, I love it. And your game looks gorgeous as well. High marks all around. :thumbsup: