Sum Monsters by eonarheim 2024-04-30T03:46:10Z
This is a really fun game! I absolutely love this.
If you brush up the music and make this a full game (mobile or not), I would 100% buy this.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → gamepad-coder
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 55 | Summoning | π₯ | Tremblewood | jam | 105 | 4.09 | 4.19 | 3.46 | 4.40 | 4.17 | 3.73 | 2.98 | 3.91 |
This is a really fun game! I absolutely love this.
If you brush up the music and make this a full game (mobile or not), I would 100% buy this.
Vampire Survivors meets cube sommoning! Really fun! This is one of my favorite games to play in LD-55 so far!
If you keep expanding on this, consider addeing effects like a small radius of damage when the cube lands.
And adding some background music will make this 10x more exciting :)
Only real issue I had was after clicking a level up option, the keypress I was holding down didn't keep my character moving in that direction. So if you keep working on this game, definitely fix that sooner than later since it's really key for the player to feel like they're keeping up momentum (and that their input is responsive) in a game like this.
5/5 graphics and mood. Beautiful charming game.
Love it.
Really clever gameplay, and the camera for the rewarding Soula Cola is surprisingly cinematic!
I really enjoyed this game. Also found the "harvest everything before wishing at the well" hack, and it was really really relaxing. Even without the hack, felt like a very solid game. The music works great with the atmosphere of making wishes in the desert, and the farming and material harvesting was very satisfying.
Nice desert farming game. Charming graphics. Relaxing and satisfying.
Keep it up!
=== Pros ===
Visually beautiful, and great creative sounds!
And the blog posts + game page did an excellent job setting the tone for the game before even clicking play. After seeing the visuals and arcane sigils, I had to try it out!
Cool idea, pretty visuals, and great job making an experience out of the "summoning" theme!
=== Food for thought ===
Interestingly, geometric symmetry doesn't necessarily correspond to musical synergy.
If you ever expand this into a full game, consider keeping the same geometry (and symmetry / patterns) of the nodes on the circles, but change the radius of each circle as needed, so that pressing space bar aligns to some sort of music or rhythm. That way it becomes more of a rhythm game and you feel like each progressive ring is harmonizing as part of a greater whole to complete the ritual for the "summoning".
=== Gameplay Suggestions ===
If you wanted to, you could increase the size of the hit box on the nodes to make it a little easier to successfully press space bar. But overall it was relatively manageable and didn't feel unfair.
The mood and atmosphere for this were really great, but after a while I wasn't sure if it was randomly generated or if there was going to be a win condition.
=== Closing Remarks ===
Overall really cool + memorable experience, glad I played :)
Really awesome intro soundtrack. I absolutely love the first few bars. Sound for coin flip and battle was also really really great.
=== general feedback === I think this is a really really awesome concept.
The card art is really cool, I could see this being a really cool deck builder, either a rogue like like Slay the Spire, or even an RPG where you go town to town and gather new summons.
My gosh, and again: this music is incredibly great. Like better than a lot of games I've paid for before great.
=== small things to polish if you go further with this project === For the coin flip, in the future consider allowing the user to click on the coin itself instead of only the GUI element -- not a knock, but I find it's always really useful to think about how a user is going to think about my program when they see it for the first time (rather than how I intend for them to use it as a programmer).
For the "end turn label" consider animating it (soft grow and shrink, or glowing outline) when the player has no more moves. I just noticed the timer but it took me a while to notice this button even existed.
Keep up the great work!
Really great animation of the main character!
Simplistic level, but not bad, and for a game prototype it totally works! And great job with using mail for the "Summoning" theme, that's clever!
This is one of the most varied and engaging games I've played this jam. Love the minigames, and there's such a great mood + atmosphere in this one.
If you continue working on this, consider spacing out the intro tutorials and having the player walk up to each one and interacting with them to begin.
And do a little more "show don't tell" with the initial exposition.
But overall I was really really impressed with this one. Great job!
Really solid! I loved playing this one. Keep it up!
This game's blog post the other night caught my eye and cracked me up (and at the end of a very long day, it was awesome to end the night with a laugh, so thanks for that!)
I loved the silly intro (really great job setting the stage for what's clearly supposed to be a silly game). The voice acting in the intro was audible, clear, volume level was great, and it fit the tone really well).
Even after playing this for an hour, I still think the premise is hilarious.
=== Art ===
First off, the summoning art looks amazing. The sigil looks great, the synthesizer sound is a really excellent fit, and the hand wiggle while casting is a perfect balance of "wow that looks cool" and "lol wow that looks silly".
And if you're going to have a single mechanic be central to a prototype (or even a full game) you need it to be solid, feel satisfying, and not get annoying after repeating it 100s of times. Again, really great job with the summoning effects, really enjoyable.
As I left the tutorial area / shop, I had a legit (and unexpected) moment of awe in the forest. The level design and the models and leaves and small plants all look really really great. Really nice style, and I'd totally play an entire game with trees like this. Nice music too.
I loved the change in bg music as a sound cue that danger was nearby or approaching.
=== Gameplay ===
After I realized that punching canoes at the goblins was way more effective than just dropping a canoe on a goblin, I realized what the core gameplay loop would be, and set off grinding for money and powerups.
It took me a while to cautiously explore deeper and deeper into the forest (and further away from the potion seller, safety, and heals). When I realized I'd reached the edge of the level, I grinded a bit in the meadow there, then slowly made my way back to the potion seller.
I made it all the way back to the potion seller when something was happening in real life so I pressed Escape to pause the game. When I came back, I was a little disappointed to realize Escape had taken me back to the main menu (not a pause menu) and all my moneys were lost! Only real negative experience with the game, and wasn't too bad.
I rinse, wash, repeated, and finally got the super jump. Really fun + satisfying reward for players who stick with it longer, kept me playing and the jump was big enough to feel like it was worth the grind. I really enjoyed it!
=== Upward Spiral ===
After a few upgrades in move speed and power, it was awesome to realize I wasn't just buying more damage, but that the power was affecting the the physics of punching the canoe! Clever, silly, and really really fun.
I was almost ready to put the game down, then I thought "Hunh, I wonder if there's a limit?"
Fast forward a bit, and I could punch canoes into the sky.
Fast forward more, and eventually I'd purchased so many power upgrades that I had to stop playing: because my canoes moved so fast, they clipped through walls and immediately disappeared.
Overall this was a hilarious initial post, made good on the promise and was a very silly game, and I had a really great time playing it. After working 3 days almost non stop on my first game jam, this was the perfect way to wind down, chill out, and have a lot of laughs before I go back to work Tuesday.
Thanks for this.
I love the angle and mood of the cover art for the game. And it's a fun and clever title.
A lot of great things accomplished in this project! The lighting of the fireball looks great, and the overall flow from menu to level to countdown works great.
In terms of difficulty, having both a timer until the fireball dies && also collision leading to insta-death was a little too punishing. Though I think if you could use a controller joystick to direct the angle the gameplay would be a lot smoother.
Overall really fun concept for the theme, and really enjoyable puzzle game! Keep it up!