Downward Frog by jonbro 2021-04-29T05:58:20Z ♥ 1
Amazing job, love the shift in tone over the course of the game. One of the better looking games ive seen so far in this jam.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → FrankieSmileShow
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Overall | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥈 | 2012 | 23 | Tiny World | Going Rogue | jam | 4.27 |
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Category | Score | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥈 | 2021 | 48 | Deeper and deeper | Abyssal Lab | compo | Graphics | 4.74 | ||
| 👥 | 🥇 | 2019 | 44 | Your life is currency | SACRIFIGHTS | jam | Graphics | 4.90 | |
| 👥 | 🥉 | 2019 | 44 | Your life is currency | SACRIFIGHTS | jam | Audio | 4.55 |
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | Cm | Co | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 55 | Summoning | Heartless Forever | jam | 87 | 4.13 | 4.13 | 3.23 | 3.85 | 4.38 | 3.98 | 3.22 | 4.08 | ||||
| 2023 | 53 | Delivery | Fortune Footsteps | jam | 3.00 | 2.50 | 3.17 | 4.17 | 3.75 | 1.50 | 3.17 | ||||||
| 2021 | 49 | Unstable | BrawlQuest | jam | 2.67 | 2.83 | 2.83 | 2.33 | 3.17 | 3.83 | 3.00 | 2.67 | |||||
| 2021 | 48 | Deeper and deeper | Abyssal Lab | compo | 24 | 4.20 | 4.00 | 3.64 | 3.66 | 4.74 | 3.84 | 2.57 | 4.22 | ||||
| 2019 | 45 | Start with nothing | 👥 | TRIGGORE | jam | 19 | 4.30 | 4.20 | 3.81 | 3.22 | 4.41 | 4.22 | 3.10 | 4.35 | |||
| 2019 | 44 | Your life is currency | 👥 | SACRIFIGHTS | jam | 4 | 4.42 | 4.17 | 3.78 | 3.93 | 4.90 | 4.55 | 3.88 | 4.36 | |||
| 2018 | 43 | Sacrifices must be made | Devil Cult Party | jam | 141 | 3.91 | 3.69 | 3.33 | 3.41 | 4.23 | 3.86 | 3.45 | 3.81 | ||||
| 2018 | 42 | Running out of space | The Flesh Pit | compo | 44 | 3.98 | 3.89 | 3.83 | 4.14 | 4.00 | 3.56 | 3.46 | 3.78 | ||||
| 2018 | 41 | Combine 2 Incompatible Genres | Sword And Plow | jam | 6 | 4.40 | 4.35 | 4.25 | 4.22 | 4.40 | 4.33 | 3.67 | 4.06 | ||||
| 2017 | 40 | The more you have, the worse it is | 👥 | Bugburgh | jam | 174 | 3.85 | 3.37 | 3.35 | 3.25 | 4.41 | 4.20 | 3.15 | 4.00 | |||
| 2017 | 39 | Running out of Power | Salvage! | jam | 49 | 4.09 | 3.91 | 3.48 | 3.74 | 4.38 | 4.22 | 2.56 | 3.73 | ||||
| 2017 | 38 | A Small World | A Growing Adventure | compo | 15 | 4.19 | 4.05 | 4.12 | 4.00 | 4.45 | 2.71 | 2.53 | 3.67 | ||||
| 2016 | 35 | Shapeshift | Sluggy's Tiny Adventure | compo | 22 | 4.07 | 3.95 | 3.32 | 4.28 | 4.60 | 3.47 | 3.45 | 4.00 | 41 | |||
| 2014 | 31 | Entire Game on One Screen | Tiny Adventure | jam | 225 | 3.56 | 3.28 | 3.08 | 4.52 | 4.28 | 3.56 | 2.44 | 3.45 | 37 | |||
| 2014 | 30 | Connected Worlds | Honko's Worlds | jam | 121 | 3.65 | 3.55 | 2.34 | 2.21 | 4.19 | 3.84 | 2.47 | 3.48 | 49 | |||
| 2012 | 23 | Tiny World | Going Rogue | jam | 2 | 4.27 | 3.87 | 3.67 | 3.27 | 4.47 | 4.47 | 4.11 | 3.36 | ||||
| 2011 | 22 | Alone | ASSAULT THE DARK FORTRESS | compo | 38 | 3.61 | 3.53 | 2.55 | 2.81 | 3.58 | 2.39 | 2.20 | 2.93 | 3.47 | 74 |
FrankieSmileShow leaves an average of 16.5 feedback comments each event.
Amazing job, love the shift in tone over the course of the game. One of the better looking games ive seen so far in this jam.
Had a blast playing this on stream! Amazing work, really impressive.
OH YEAH
A really solid start, making a functional SRPG in a weekend is really something. Definitely a lot of potential in putting a SRPG into a roguelike structure.
Amazing work, loved playing this on stream. Shocking amount of polished content for a jam game, this could be plopped down on a marketplace for sale as-is. I'd be shocked if this didn't make it to top 5 Overall.
A lot of potential in this one, id love to see how you can expand this. Tho like I said on stream, this is def the kind of game that could explode in complexity really easily!
Loved this on the stream! I'd say main issue is that the controls are a bit overwhelming, lots of actions mapped to lots of buttons, especially if playing on keyboard. Idk how id fix it exactly, maybe moving some actions to be button combinations instead of single button triggers?
I also have that problem, it wont run, its looking for some DLLs. I am on windows. Please reply if you fix it so I get notified and can try it out! :)
That was fun! Could definitely use clearer instructions though! To anyone wondering how to play, you need to pick a set of notes for each instrument to play, and need to avoid any instrument's set of notes overlapping. Hit left and right to change instruments, and hit the space bar to cycle between different note sets.
I believed in Bigfoot, and Bigfoot believed in me.
Excellent game! Love the variety in all the pieces of equipment you can find! Really well put together. One issue is, that once you have some equipment set up, the game can essentially play itself. Maybe some mechanic forcing you to replace equipment after a while would help with this?
*Hook Noises* Very good.
One of the better games I played from this jam! Looks really nice, plays well, and the concept is pretty funny!
A lot of variety in this shooter, lots of different beasts and things! It was cool that you could break walls, too.
That was a good mix of game ideas! I got a score of 10750!
Best game I've played in the jam so far! Really solid, this is a winner. Could really use some kind of healing or checkpoint: although the game isnt too difficult, you are likely to get hurt a few times on the first few enemies before you get a hang of things, which then leaves you to play the rest of the game with reduced health. But yeah, the overall package is super solid, top marks on all points.
This is a really solid game. It takes a few tries to get all the mechanics in your head enough that you can play it effectively, but once you get there, its great. To anyone about to play this: Pause the game at the start! you can give characters tasks and take your time to read the descriptions while the game is paused. This will give you a chance to figure things out before all of your little homunculi starve to death!
It was pretty good, but damn my handddds The warning at the start was Too Real
That was solid! I died at the final level, moments after a bunny and bird catastrophe undid all of my hard work.
Hahaha this gets really hectic, eventually theres hundreds of em!
Very impressive to have made a game like this during a game jam! Lots of little level features, enemies, traps and items etc, very cool!
It didnt work for me, running it only gives me a black screen. Yet I see a bunch of comments here from people who could obviously play it! Any clue what could be wrong for me?
That was pretty cool! I would recommend simplifying the controls on using the shovel and throwing snowballs, it seems as though this control scheme was intended to have more weapons/tools to use, but that did not make it in in the end? Since it only ended up with either the shovel and snowballs, left click to throw snowballs and right click to shovel snow would have probably been best.
Very solid game, great work! Love those colors.
Could not play either, gave me the same error Local Minimum reported, sorry! Tried running it several times! (sometimes I get this error with jam games but it just works after a second try)
This is a really good start! I think there is a really good game in there, it just needs a few tweaks and adjustments. Here are a few suggestions:
-Starting fuel should be a little bit higher, and the first fuel upgrade should be a bit cheaper to get. When you first play the game, as you get used to moving around, that starting fuel is frustratingly low, even just to mine the nearest asteroids, and it takes many, many trips to accumulate enough to get the first upgrade. And its very easy to mine just one asteroid too many and run out of fuel on your way back, and then have to completely start over. That is enough frustration to make someone stop playing immediately!
-Reduced penalty for death. Your progress in the game feels very slow, so losing all cargo and credits on death is basically a reset. Maybe consider having some sort of storage bank you can automatically unload all of your cargo into when you are back to base, so you only lose the cargo that was in your ship upon death, but not what you stored? As for your money, maybe lose half of it instead of all of it. Consider that like, the price of buying a new ship or something! Another recommendation would be to give the player one free "death" at the start of the game, like they get towed, and the first towing is free. Maybe you can pay the towing company a fee after that to get the safety back (starting 1000 units or something, but it doubles every time you use it). Just an idea!
-A bit more play-feedback in general. For instance, an on-screen display of the ore you just collected, when you destroy a asteroid. Maybe small floating text popping up from the asteroid when it disappears, that says like "iron + 7". Also, player should flash and shake upon taking damage, and a warning that your fuel is running out would also be a good idea, making the meter flash etc. Im sure some of this you were already planning to do, its the kind of stuff people sometimes just skip in a game jam setting, but dont underestimate the importance of it, its the kind of stuff that makes the basic actions satisfying and keeps people playing in the short term, while your upgrade systems keep them playing in the long term! Also, sound effects in general would add a lot.
-A possible upgrade would be a minimap? Showing nearby asteroids and the direction of the home base from where you are right now, that would be very useful, but would take away one equipment slot, so people who can do without can have one extra upgrade in exchange.
That was just some suggestions! I'm sure some of this is stuff you already realized since the end of the jam though. Cheers!
This was fun, a good idea and well executed! After you understand how the obstacles and powerups work though, its no longer really difficult. Maybe the recharge tiles should give you less power each after a while?
This game was excellent! So much polish and content done over such a short time, really impressive! Love the cave story style visuals, very well done, with good tactile feedback on player actions. Amazing job all around!
This is fun and feels very polished, but seemed a bit simple! Most of the time I didn't really need to think about my actions to get to the end of a level, or even to get the energy. I think the levels are procgen though, it might be interesting to think about how to change the generation rules to result in trickier decision-making. For the time being though, this was still pretty fun to play through!
Great game! Polished, cute and fun. All that this would need is little tooltips somewhere telling you the current available action at your hex. That would probably be enough that the game would barely need any explanation text to read before playing, it would make it very self-explanatory! Also, some better visual indicator of the reduced efficiency of longer connections to your ship would help too, though I'm not sure what this might look like.
Ranked 11th/140, with score of 3754! Really fun game, very well polished and sleek, and a lot of fun. Figuring out the right kind of movement that keeps you safe but gives you room to collect the power pellets had a nice learning curve. One of the best games of this LD I played so far! The one issue I got so far was a lack of feedback for when you take damage. When I squeezed through enemies I couldn't quite make out whether I was able to slide past and avoid damage or not. Feedback is missing on your character object itself especially for this.
Excellent entry! Some solid atmosphere, feels suitably claustrophobic.
The actual levels looked a bit rough, but the play was a lot of hectic run and gun fun, and the cutscenes were great!
Its a good idea, a good start! I would recommend making the enemy and player units move slower, but make enemies spawn more often. This way, there is always *something* happening on screen, and you dont spend too long just waiting for more enemies to come in! That would be my recommendation here. Try to make it so theres almost always some sort of visible threat incoming, even if it means slowing everything way down.
Very solid resource management game! Also, appreciated the humor in the obituaries at the end.
This was really beautiful! The best looking game I played of this jam so far. I love the aesthetics here, the mood, its all great. The combat was maybe a bit awkward, could have maybe used some sort of regenerating health or something. Also, woah
This looks really good! A really nice visual style. I like using my shots as a light source too. Restarting the whole game on death was a bit harsh though, considering how quickly you can die. Restart the level instead!
Really solid game! There's a good skill curve to timing your jetpack boosts right as you fly past a target. Cant think of any criticisms here. If you want to do some post-jam work on it, id recommend adding some slight variation to the backgrounds. For a jam game though, it looks just fine.
The art is very nice! Those are some cute little reptiles. Dying in a single hit is a little harsh, I would recommend you reduce power on getting hit instead, giving players a bit more of a chance that way! Falling in a hole could also just reduce power a little, and then warp the player back up next to the pit. Another idea, it might also be worth it to place little pickups that recover just a bit of your power when you get them: not as much as the strawberries do, but could help make the beginning of the game a bit easier, and let you save your stravberries for when you backtrack later. Another little detail, is that its not obvious that you can kill the plants. The small monsters were obvious enough to crush, but the plants not so!
It worked fine for me! "Your majesty, come back." is pretty great.
Its a little too hard, I found even the basic crates to be hard to avoid, since its fairly fast and the crates are pretty wide. It could use to start a bit slower and speed up over time maybe!
Alas, I could never make it to the end. My endeavors were doom'd.... . . . Solid, challenging game. If anyone is having trouble, I think playing full screen probably makes it much easier.
Its great! Great mood, great atmosphere. But wheres the frogs?? I see a frog in the thumbnail, and some people talk about frogs in their comments, but I didn't see a single frog when I played!
Excellent game! A great idea, you could probably find a bunch more ways a desktop could contain platformer gimmicks, this seems like a well of good ideas!
This is an interesting game, but Im not sure the risk of running multiple trains at once is worth it? Might have to think about how to balance that trade-off a bit better. A great idea though, definitely worth putting more work into!
Interesting game, I like the approach of trying out an arrangement and then seeing the result, instead of something that builds progressively, it means every attempt at a colony is part of the game's learning process. I wonder what you could do to coax players to experiment even more?
Really nice style, I love how that little self-contained level!
That was very solid, I like how the shots orbit around the planet, it made the shooting way more interesting than if the shots traveled in straight lines. This seems like a great start!
I could not get the game to run, it remains blank at the end of the Made With Unity splash screen. I ran the Win32 build.
(edit): Never mind! I ran another LD game and found it had the same problem, so figured it was on my end. I rebooted my computer and then it worked fine!
The game is fun, there is something satisfying about getting a big streak without errors and typing away. You dont actually need to place the buttons in their correct place. But maybe you should? Thats an idea for a hard mode right there: if you swap two keys by mistake it actually changes their binding!
Unlocked Googly Eye Mode!! Ended with 472260 pts, 0.29% accuracy! This was really fun! A good idea, was a nice surprise when the second planet showed up. The levels where planets are further apart can be a tad frustrating since you can only have one bullet fired at a time, sometimes their trajectories just keep going for a while. Had one bullet that flew for maybe 10 seconds, making a figure 8 trajectory between the two planets for a while!
That was a fun game! Funny! I like that it made me actually think about what to consider when deciding who to save and who not to save. Although I opted for a pretty boring rule, just going for largest populations, with little regard to what they are like... what does that say about me? :O
Played the game here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139989925 (at 0:03:27)
Trying to make an RTS during a game jam is a mistake I made once, as part of a big team (that included some industry pros!) in a Global Game Jam a few years ago. We didn't end up with much more than what you have here. And we were a whole team! That game genre is a tall order for sure. I hope you keep working on this a bit, it could turn into something cool! Maybe I aughta give an RTS a shot again sometime.... somehow an RTS that doesnt need pathfinding maybe, that would already be a big help! (I notice yours does have pathfinding, that must have taken a big chunk of time all on its own!)
Played the game on my stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139989925 (at 23:46)
Good idea overall, its simple but it works! Like I said on stream, the powerups spawn a little bit too far away from one another, so you aren't likely to try and take a chance on grabbing more than one at a time. My two recommendations are,
1- double the amount your house grows when you take a powerup, so you might consider grabbing a second one to shorten the distance of your walk back to the house,
2- grabbing a powerup has a chance of immediately spawning a second one, a little bit further away, to tease the player into going further out.
Played it on stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139989925 (at 34:22)
That was a fun little platformer, a good start! Reminds a bit of old DOS platformers. Its a bit on the simple side though, might be worth thinking of a little twist or two. Here's a simple idea: how about, instead of having to take all of the treasure on every room, you had to reach a cash amount, like say a thousand dollars, and different items in a level had different values? So the player could look around the map and decide whether to try getting that really tricky but high-value item, or to get more lower value ones instead. That could add a bit of fun decision-making for the player to think about over the course of a level. Just an idea, do with it as you please! I played the game here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139989925 (starts at 00:54:50)
Some sweet-ass parallaxin' going on here! Gotta love that parallax. I narrowly escaped death that one time, barely grazing the event horizon of the black hole as I slingshotted past, that was cool! I ended my journey between a rock and a hard place, squeezed between two planets caught in a compromising position. Trapped in double gravity well hell! Great atmosphere and beautiful look, I had a good time :D
Played the game here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139989925 (starts at 1:09:00)
Not sure if thats a bug, but I couldnt keep walking by holding the up key, I had to tap it? And tapping it repeatedly seemed to do something to the sound.
It looks neat, I like the visuals of the outlines. Its unfortunate that the "joke" of the game is kind of ruined by knowing the theme of the jam! As soon as I saw the same guy show up again, I knew this was gonna be it, ha.
It might be a cool starting point for a bigger kind of game that sticks to the same visual idea. Maybe you encounter different people, maybe some walk with you, and the environment changes as you travel between different kinds of places, maybe generated from random images and color schemes. Thats the kind of game I imagined I was playing at the start! I mean, obviously, the point of this game here
Played the game on stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139989925 (starts at 1:26:13)
A solid little puzzler! It becomes very interesting after a few minutes, but the beginning feels really silly in its simplicity. I think the game should probably start with 3 airports right away, since there is more or less no decision-making before that point. Also, I would definitely recommend a longer background music track, or several tracks that change randomly over time, it must have looped fourty times during my game! Very strong entry overall, great work.
I played the game on my stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139989925 (at 1:36:21)
This is one of the stronger entries I played so far on this LD, though I couldn't beat that final boss!!
Great simple but stylish visuals, gameplay is suitably hectic and stressful, feels satisfying to blow up those ships (though maybe that could use a bit extra oomph?). I would recommend a more obnoxious effect to warn you when your little ship gets hit, and to warn you when the planet is getting shot at. Maybe even having arrows appear on the edges of the screen pointing you towards the ship currently shooting at the planet? It often felt a bit of a surprise when I noticed my ship was in the red, or that my planet was severely hurt, it easily gets lost in the action.
Played it here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 4:39:03)
This is a good start, but it needs some tweaking and polishing! A difficult platformer is very hard to pull off well in a jam, because those games need a lot of tweaking to get the difficulty just right. I'd really recommend making things more forgiving as a rule, especially if you have some really impressive stuff later on in the game that you want people to see! You can always go back to it after the jam to make it more difficult, because then you have all the time in the world to tweak that difficulty carefully!
Things I recommend:
1- Add one of the star enemies to the very beginning of the level, or place a checkpoint just before you first see them, so that the player feels safe enough to experiment with them and realize they can be crushed by jumping on their heads.
2-Add more checkpoints overall!
3-Spikes seem to have very wide hitboxes. I got hit a few times when it felt like I shouldn't have. Considering they kill you in one hit, its really important to make their hitbox forgiving!
Stream where I played the game: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 4:17:12)
A great little puzzle game! It starts out being a bit more about experimentation as you find out how the tiles interact, and but it slowly becomes more and more of a logic puzzle as it goes. A very fun sort of transition to have in a puzzle game I think! Cant think of anything to criticize here, this is a really strong one. Played it here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 3:50:40)
What have I done When I close my eyes all I can see is their cute little sprout faces
and the branches
and the stones
and the fire
and the fire
what have I done
(streamed at https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 , starts at 3:40:36)
Strong mood with the glowy lights in space. Felt very lonely at first. And at the end, with what felt like a mocking little list of what you've done during the game. It felt nihilistic. Something about how pointless and lonely life achievements are, leading up to your death. Death in this case wasn't inevitable, wasnt a some threat or danger, it was just something to get to once you've exhausted everything else, because it has to end somehow. Death as a last point on a checklist of pointless things you will have done, down there in the abyss!
Stream where I played it: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 3:31:31)
Like I said on stream, I think it might be worth it to simplify the 3 gun types down to one gun and a secondary "bomb" button, and to lock the camera to point down at the player instead of letting the player spin it around. Also, make that life meter a bit more obvious, it could be like twice the size it is now I think!
I like the look of the game, and I wonder if the visual idea of playing around a planet like this could inspire some stranger additions to the game, like enemies that are not on the planets surface but flying around freely? Or things orbiting the planet that might shoot lasers straight down onto the surface in regular patterns, maybe?
link to the stream where I played: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (3:18:48)
That was fun! A simple little physics platformer with a fun twist on how to tie the levels together. The physics of what happened to your ball during rotation felt a bit weird though. It felt like the ball got some weird momentum that took a while to get used to, not sure how to describe it. Might be worth it to make the collisions a bit more forgiving with the lava pools! All in all it was fun though. Link to the stream where I played it: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 3:10:13)
Something feels wrong about dying from falling off the edge in this game! It doesn't really fit, it feels like it should just focus on the shootbangs and have falling off a ledge just respawn you with like 10 life lost!
Put some powerups in there, slap in a few extra enemies and bam! Done. Maybe some variation on the big gray platforms too. Heck, thinking about it, you could make it into a sort of smash TV sorta thing..??
stream vod link: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (played at 2:59:25)
This is a very solid base for a "god game". The voice acting was an unexpected surprise! The beginning is a little slow because of how little mana you have at the beginning, it might be worth it to have an extra early objective to incite the player to have a second temple and more villages, to gently influence them towards building up mana early on. There is definitely a problem with lava though, it spreads so quickly that if you don't know how to act right away, it can just ruin your game entirely. It might be a good idea to have an in-game message warn you about how to deal with lava when a volcano first erupts, telling you to use rubble to block its way immediately. Might also be a good idea not to let lava spread diagonally, that feels very unexpected! Played it here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starting at 2:33:24)
Had a lot of fun playing this on stream! It wasn't so bad one-on-one, but it really shined once more people joined up! This is definitely worth putting more work into. I really have no criticisms here, this works exactly as intended. More power-ups and some different levels would be where to go next, but thats pretty obvious. I'd say to be careful not to put in too much extra features though, or it could lose a bit of its charm! Also obvious addition would be bots, not only so you can play until real humans show up, but also to possibly add a bit more chaos to multiplayer games too. Could even play around with some extra game modes too, like Co-Op king of the ring where human players team up to kick off hordes of bots! https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (playing it at 2:12:00)
This is a very, very solid little game. It feels hectic, especially when you realize the blue coins speed up your magic regen which lets you go really fast looking for more gold. It only gets a little sluggish when you run out of mana, but I see you have updated the game since with some tweaked mana regen and with coins giving a little mana boost, so you probably have that covered. I would suggest you simplify the mana regen thing, and not have different regen speeds on different tiles, I feel thats an unecessary bit of complexity thats not obvious enough. I'd recommend trying some more obvious stuff instead: either more obvious special tiles that boost mana regen speed (like, big glowing runes or something), or maybe have mana regen faster if you don't move, and slower if you are in mid-air? That way you could end up playing chicken with some incoming monsters if you are hungry for mana and at a dead-end. That might be fun. Although, it might also slow the game down, since that would reward players for moving less... but with the game collapsing around you, I'm not sure that would be an issue! Anyway, again, this is really good! Played it on my stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (at 1:59:10)
Very good space-warping platformer! Its a solid start, it could definitely be made into a full game. Loved that you could collapse the world from any direction. Theres a few times I forgot that I wasnt constrained by four sides! Definitely a fan of the slugs with knives strapped to their backs. Also, that final ending image was gr9 Played it on my stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (playing at 1:46:20)
A really pretty game! I love those cute little environments, really impressive to have done these two detail-filled mini sets over the course of the jam! Really amazing work here. Played this on my stream: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 1:38:48)
Really beautiful game, and really cute! Also, nice little surprise at the end! No criticisms come to mind at all, this was really nice. One suggestion though: before you have electrons around you, clicking should do something visual. Like maybe it should send a little pulse, even if its purely visual, so people know to try clicking again later! Played on stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 1:29:47)
An excellent puzzle game! I wonder if some slight visual aid on where you can build any given building in the current grid would be a good idea, or if it would make the game too easy? Like, imagine if clicking on an building in the sidebar indicated all spots where that building can be put down right now? On one hand, this would definitely make the game more accessible to learn, but on the other, maybe that would be doing too much of the players' work for them? What do you think?
I feel that this could be a very solid base for a mobile game. You could make all sorts of slight variations on this, with different grids and specific goals. Some levels could be very densely designed (imagine a grid with a lot of water and a handful of pre-placed buildings in which you need to somehow fit 6 factories, or 12 windmills, or 3 rockets etc)
I played the game on stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (playing at 1:05:20) (although a live stream really wasnt the best place to play a game like that, I don't exactly make a great display of it there :) )
I love dem wiggly lil spiders, and the way the player character moves, although it could use some sort of light arrow on top of its head pointing forward, could make it more obvious where you are facing. Took me a bit to notice where the computer chips fit on the first stage, and in a later stage I couldnt always tell what parts were loose, but that could arguably be part of the game. All in all a fun lil arcadey thing! Played it on stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starts at 57:30)
Kind of like a room escape puzzle thing of sorts, except the malevolent entity keeping you captive is your own brain! It was fun to click on all the things and figure out what they did. Once you learn what everything does, things fell into place pretty neatly. Played it on my stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (playing at 43:40)
Its a good start for a puzzler! I would say the main thing it needs is some camera controls. You could also consider randomizing the terrain and the citizens starting locations! Playing the game here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/139473859 (starting at 21:25)
Interesting idea! Though I find having more characters to move around the same dungeon feels a little tedious. Maybe there should be some sort of exploration mode that "groups" the party to move as one, which you can switch in and out of for battles?
Also to consider if you want to work on this some more (and you should!) is to try to clarify a little bit more what the DNA merging does exactly, and how it works. Having only the vaguest idea of what it does means I didnt feel I was making informed decisions when merging. Still, this is an interesting prototype, you should definitely keep this going!
Really cool game! Both on the visuals and audio. The idea of exploring a maze through breakout gameplay is simple but works very well. Solid job on this!
It seems your link doesn't work, it gives me a 404 not found error!
I cant unzip the file either, sorry.
Doesnt work for me either, sorry! It gets me to a title screen, don`t know how to get past it.
Very fun game! Will be playing more of this. I don't play many card games like this, so I suppose its hard for me to compare them, but I had a lot of fun.
Good shootin'. Some quality shootin'.
It was kind of confusing! Not sure I understand it still.
The hitbox on the ship is too big for the size it looks! You should either shrink the hitbox or make the sprite larger. Preferably shrink the hitbox!
Great job on making this!
That was really darn good.
Very strong entry. those red laser guns killing you in one hit tho, cmoooon... Not in a checkpoint-less game with health!
Actually, just making all the stuff that kills you in one hit reduce life instead would have made the lack of checkpoints a lot more fair, its that mix of one-hit-KOs and the long level that's problematic really. Makes a huge difference.
I'd say, either make everything kill you in one hit but add checkpoints, or make most (if not all) things damage your health and leave checkpoints out (or have very few of them)
Simple idea making a great result! Its very tricky to wrap your head around how the movement works, especially when you need to both switch planets and directions quickly. The constant turning means you also have to react quick, that makes the game a lot harder than it would be otherwise. This is pretty much a finished game, congratulations! One of the most complete games I played here so far.
(originally posted this at the wrong game page, whoops!)
I got stuck on that one where you start pushing crates into holes that teleport the crate to the other zone! Stuck at the end... It was cool tho!
It seems obvious you ran out of time haha, it is little more than just moving from station to station right now, following the arrow! But its a good start, obviously.
I'm curious about what you were going to do with those drones and things... Protection against enemies, perhaps?
Where were you going with this? Any plans to keep going?
This is a great entry! Its really simple as it is, but I think there is a really good game hiding in there.
If you could figure out a way to make the terrain affect the battle once it starts somehow... Maybe a secondary enemy type that pathfinds its way to the frog? Stuff like that.
You gotta keep working on this, I think it could result in something really good and unique!
This was cool! At first I was kind of wandering around for a while, for some reason it took me a long time to find that dark world portal, I kept walking past it??
Just add a tiny bit to the normal world and you got yourself a pretty complete game, there. Also, I would make those purple slimes a tiny bit slower, or keep that speed but make short pauses at regular intervals, so if one of them is chasing you, you have a way of getting some space between you and it before you turn around and shoot.
The core idea is cool, a game where you just have to keep some things alive for as long as you can with limited resources.
Its kind of simplistic here, but I'm sure you could take this somewhere if you made it a bit more complex.
An idea: Maybe you could make it a bit less harsh, make the player lose more "progressively": instead of players losing as soon as a planet runs out of life, that planet could instead get "worse" in an irreversible way, which would make it more hungry for food. Maybe the planets would have three progressively more "damaged" states, and you lose as soon as one of them reaches the final state and dies again.
Its just an idea, I'm sure you got plenty of ideas while you were working on it, or after finishing it.
The gravity wells made for some tricky flying, some enemies and this could be a pretty cool space dogfighting game!
I liked going on a crazy spiral with the hook spinning around the ship and increasing in speed. Reminded me a bit of Solar Jetman...
It was fun! Its pretty tricky to avoid projectiles with tank controls, but being able to rotate around to avoid a shot at the last second made up for it a little bit. I got on the leaderboard, oh yeah!
I got stuck on that one where you start pushing crates into holes that teleport the crate to the other zone! Stuck at the end... It was cool tho.
Simple but cool idea, to have the player basically play several tower defense games at a time. It makes it more like a "campaign" than a single battle.
Maybe you could go in that direction, too. Some things that affect the global situation rather than a single planet, to tie those battlefield together some more? Maybe things like having the player "research" new constructions?
My dodos got clobbered.
Never made it past 1560!
Got lost in space, but found my way eventually.
Love the style of this, and the player's movements are very fluid, satisfying. Just fix that checkpoint thing...
Im still not entirely sure how you get to gain new astronauts to shoot with!
This was fun though, once it started to pick up. Maybe id add some sort of dotted line showing where your astronaut is about to jump once you disconnect from a planet, maybe highlighting the current target? The game looks really cool when you're shooting.
Played this on my stream. Cool game, it was satisfying to whack a lot of asteroids in one swing of the planets. Maybe that could be an angle to work with if you keep working on this?
Like, maybe making the movement of the sun affect the planet's orbit speed could make it even more satisfying to knock a lot of em out with a swing. THWACK
I think I reached 96 points.
Its a cool base for a puzzle game. I wonder what you could do to tie the face drawing idea to the rest of the game a bit more? Maybe several gameplay elements could be introduced over time, and every time you get to draw something for it?
Super solid game, takes a little while to get the hang of those controls, but really satisfying once you nail that landing. Extend it a bit and you could sell this on mobile, definitely.
This was fun, but very slow at the start!
Like I said on the stream: Start the game on the equivalent of wave 5 or so, and add an arrow pointing you towards the nearest incoming dino so you don't need to search for em as much, and you dont walk in the other direction.
Excellent puzzler, great job on this!
Great game! I love all the little rooms, it was fun to explore.
Whoop I hadn't commented on this!
It is one of my faves of the ludum dare for the theme and mood ! Also the audio and visual style are both super.
WHOOOMBA!!
Nice game. Yeah, sounds would definetely be a plus! Also sometimes there just wasnt any fish it seems. Im not sure what triggered the angler fish to show up and eat you, was it to go deep under the sea or running out of stamina?
Good idea, well made, simple but fun.
I loved the music. Really cool! I wonder if its just one track that gets progressively weirder, or if its random sounds that play more often as time passes and as loneliness rises... Sounded like one of those weird psychedelic bits in the middle of a ridiculous 20 minute prog rock epic. Or like the kind of music you hear while Captain Beefheart talks!
hahaha. "NO"
very nice.
Very cool game, loved the style of it. Especially loved the simple diversity of the enemies, with some sitting on chairs and stuff, and the nice derelict look to all the levels.
Could you destroy the bus stop? Couldn't figure out the controls.
Yeah, that was pretty tough! I couldnt get past that level just after the parachute is introduced...
Nice puzzles.
Hehehe, its a weird kind of lil game, but the visuals are charming, and its fun to see your little robots doing their thing. They get stuck pretty easily though, dont they?
Fun game, its got the arena shooter thing right. I seemed to die almost instantly when I got hit by an enemy though, maybe there isnt any temporary invincibility when you get hit? It was cool though. The visuals reminded me of skifree!
A fun mechanic. Those missiles are kind of awkwardly fast though. It seems to be more about luck than skillful tongue-work...
Yeah, there is a cool idea in there. It looks like the kind of puzzle youd have in a Space Quest sort of game. Or maybe have an entire game around it, but that would need some more depth obviously.
That graveyard is REALLY nice. im ALWAYS there. BZZZT
Cool visual style, cute main character. Dashing was fun, and the bits where you move the view back are really cool. Very nice execution overall!
Nice! Very dark and moody. Kind of expected a light behind a fan somewhere... Also, I used up all of my spells before seeing any enemies, not knowing I had limited ammo. I just ran away from em though.
Cool game. The freakish 3-eyed creeps will haunt my nightmares.
haha you had my hopes up with the intro. Then it turned out to be a sliding tile image puzzle. N...Noo... nooooooooooo :( !!!!
haha that end was kinda weird. A long fade out and then... it just closes.... No idea what this thing I touched was. Was it a person? Cool moody game, anyway!
Beat the game. It was pretty cool. Had nice mood to it. Not sure I get the final room, it made me think I missed something earlier...
aaaah I fell in love with a kitten! Thats both adorable and disturbing!
Very cool idea!
Nice concept, excellent game overall!
Neat game, but even though I managed to beat it im still not entirely sure how it works!
I say, mighty fine game there. Amusing visuals and it works pretty well.
Its an interesting idea, but it doesnt really work! I dont really understand what I can do at all.
Awesome.
Nice game! Was cool to be looking for guns and remembering where you had ammo caches.
VERY cool! I love how you interact with the little cube, it seems to have a lot of personality. Is it me or the little square cuddles up with you for a while if it takes damage? I wonder how much of it is intended and how much is just me making it up! All in all, very cool feel to it. Its too bad it doesnt have a goal, Id probably be playing it much longer.
It worked for me! Its a neat idea, the game is ok.
Yeah, im curious to see what you would make from this!
Adorable game! Not sure if I got to the end or not, though.
Im getting the same error, yeah. Mono:failed to load dll.
Its a little odd to see this elaborate story written for a game that looks so abstract and simple, with no story element actually appearing in the game. Is it because you're planning on expanding on it somewhat later? Such a weird thing to focus on otherwise!
I dont really get it! Maybe its mostly because I didn't really understand the speech much except for a few clearer bits. maybe subtitles would help?
Hahaha woa
thats
something
That was excellent! Very nice puzzles.
It looks cool and the puzzles are nice, but jeeze, death is way too harsh, it makes the game super frustrating to play! Especially with how long the intro is to go through every time. I quit out of frustration after just my fourth death on spikes!
What an adventure! Very moody and cool. Kind of harsh on the difficulty though.
Game is simple but has style!
Hahaha, I love them' breakdancing zombies. One of them was doing the worm!!
Hug monster, what a creep! Personal space!
Neat game!
LD55 — Summoning (20)
Fashion Demon by Zoeluci 2024-05-03T23:37:48Z ♥ 1
I like the little ending illustrations!
Brew Some Unique & Appetizing Potions! by HacksawUnit 2024-05-03T23:24:49Z ♥ 1
Very solid, polished little puzzle game!
Medieval Command by someoneman 2024-05-03T03:41:59Z ♥ 0
Needs more visual and audio feedback for when you click things that the game responds to, or it feels like the game isnt interactive at all. Little arrows popping up towards the castle when you click on a knight, and little arrows from the castle to the place you clicked when you send them out would make the mechanics very self-evident. Another note - its not clear how you generate extra knights. Is it when knights stay at a village for a while?
Phasmophile by Joschino 2024-05-03T03:18:54Z ♥ 1
Where. Is. Johnnyboy?!
Death kingdom by Loki Drams 2024-05-03T02:44:51Z ♥ 0
I didnt have enemies spawn in until I went to explore very far to the west, when I found the portal that enemies are meant to come out of - then one enemy did spawn and kill me! I think maybe the portals are too far away and inactive because of that distance?
He Who Sleeps by benskca 2024-05-03T02:27:51Z ♥ 1
the sheep went "baa" and that added and extra .5 to both the audio, the humor and the mood ratings imo
Invocation: Valdis by FoggyWonk 2024-05-03T02:06:03Z ♥ 0
Biggest issue I think is the lack of feedback when you click the buttons, or even when you highlight them. Would make a big difference!
Crimes Against Carrots by NonDev 2024-05-03T02:00:22Z ♥ 0
I punch the carrot!!! Bagoof! Thank you for video game
Asmodeus Web Summons by snesgaard 2024-05-03T01:50:11Z ♥ 0
oh NO I SUMMO)NED IT
Dominion by Durrani19 2024-05-03T01:44:31Z ♥ 1
Top notch entry, good job!
Harmony Forest by Argon 2024-05-03T01:24:44Z ♥ 1
Very beautiful and mildly bewildering, I did not understand what I was doing! Also, this could really use some audio, considering all the musical theming. I was certain at first that the sound was turned off or glitched out!
Summonere by Ace17 2024-05-03T01:09:43Z ♥ 1
Really nice! Seemed simple at first, but combining the summons made for tricky puzzles. I was stuck for a while on (spoilers:) the first one where you need to stay on the lever to make it alternate
Summoner's Clash by Hector 2024-05-03T00:42:45Z ♥ 2
I think a game like this needs something on-screen that remembers the last few combinations you attempted and their effects. As soon as I cast something, I immediately forget what the combination was, so I have no hope in hell to make use of any of the information. Maybe it should remember the last 3 combos and their effects, and maybe you can click a combo so it isnt overwritten, like you have a 3-spell memory.
Eyesore by Liquid 2024-05-03T00:04:24Z ♥ 0
Nice pixel art, visually its just missing a bit of hit feedback on the player and enemies!
The Lazy Archdemon by Aggrathon 2024-05-02T23:59:17Z ♥ 1
Good idea! Though its not clear what the advantage is of summoning more demons at once or fewer for each circle, it seems to reduce the summoning speed proportionally to the number, am I missing something there? Also, is the archdemon boredom just a timer or is it based on amount of summons?
Bad Rooms by kjscott 2024-05-02T23:44:33Z ♥ 1
Took be a little bit to realize how summoning works, ha. But this is fun, a bit hectic! could use a bit of in-game explanation of the different spells.
Monster Legion by LiveInside 2024-05-02T23:38:44Z ♥ 0
Could use a bit more damage feedback to have the battles feel a bit more like battles. A little shake and sfx on creatures that take damage can go a long way!
DemoNoloGist by Neon Glass 2024-05-02T23:27:39Z ♥ 1
Nice! The double wheels were a nice surprise especially! the characters were sometimes hard to read because of the font scaled down, or sometimes because the green guide lines partially overlapped it. Also, fun demon designs. Give them funny names when theyre summoned too, maybe procgen names?
Pent8cle by samh 2024-05-02T23:19:59Z ♥ 1
Nice, simple idea. I am awful at it. As soon as theres more than 2 steps I become absolutely useless, ha
Demonic Dominion by LaserPanzerWal 2024-05-02T23:09:41Z ♥ 0
Real nice little roguelike with summoning! I could never find anything that raised the soul limit, so I could never try the fourth summon type! Also wasnt clear on how the armor worked, some had damage ratio above 1.0 and some had it under 1.0. Finally, sometimes chests appeared blocking a corridor.