Normality

Bake Me One More Time by hadesfury 2023-10-03T02:27:35Z

I didn't really enjoy my time with this game, the best I can describe it is a job with extremely low pay.

The game has three recipes two of which are to pick something up from the 'store' and put it into a stove then wait. Some things that I think you could have done to enhance the gameplay are; a burning mechanic when in the stove too long to make you want to use the counter space for something, toppings I thought that was what the butter was for (buttered croissant vs unbuttered croissant), and obvously more recipes even if there are only 2-5 more it would still make the game much more engaging.

The time to fufill an order and the time between orders is too low. As these two deal with the main instigator of making the player actually play the game they are important, no one wants to relax in a cooking game they want the feeling of frantic working in a kitchen. To make the current gameplay (three recipes) fit this you could have had customers come in groups or have a slow start then a frantic finish. The time between customers should also be increased because there is no time to prepare for orders, its perfectly timed so the second I finish an order a new customer comes in and makes it feel like a slog.

The amount of money made per sale is like $2, don't be afraid to have unrealistic numbers it's a game and people like them. Also I much prefer a rent/money per day system than the paying for groceries, if you wanted to have both you could have made them pay extra for *unused* groceries at the end of the day making the player careful on what they use.

And a large annoyance was that getting the right thing selected was hard and sometimes it wouldnt highlight it.

In summary the art, visuals and sounds are good, you just didn't make enough game for me to enjoy them.

re🟡cycle by Ovidios 2023-10-02T18:11:36Z

I love how everything feels, the sound, art, and squishing is very satisfying.

Personally the worst part of the experience is the quests, this is mostly because I dont know any of the possible answers without looking them up which I feel makes it less fun. Perhaps if there was a thing that showed all the possible answers (maybe a scrapbook but that would take a lot of time) it would help people like me experience the game.

Further I feel as if I have too much freedom with word choice, scrabble limits this by making you only useletter you own but that would be hard in something like this. I feel some more direction would help alleviate this feeling like if say five words were cycling every few seconds at the top of the screen and if you made the word while it was up there you got double points. Just something to make me want to continue to play the game.

I really think this game is good, but it's hard for me to keep playing because there is no short term goal for me to work towards.

Snake Snake Boom by cleitoneldorn 2023-10-01T23:36:52Z

I really like the sounds, visuals, transitions, start of the gameplay (when its slow), and the concept/idea.

My biggest issue is the speed increase of the snake, it seems like you wanted to to force the bombs by making the snake harder to control but it feels like I have no reason to use the bombs because the snake is hard to control. I feel like bombs should make the gameplay more strategizing than reaction based and that would be a more enjoyable expirience. Instead of feeling like I failed because of skill (something that has a cap and is much harder to increase), I would rather feel like I failed because I didnt think far enough ahead (experience/memory/knowledge something that keeps growing a lot longer) and you'll see most games at high enough of a level are decided by who has that experience and how good they are at applying it.

With how you did bomb price increasing it leans into that style of game more (how can I get as much use out of this limited bomb) but with the speed growing making it harder to focus on everything; the bomb location (end of your tail), the head, your direction, the apple, and all the rocks you have to think of a path around. The price increasing in that environment is not worth it and it is much easier to just play snake with a few things you have to avoid.

The rocks being the main 'selling point' and distinction from snake are lackluster (as how you can just play it as snake). I feel as if they would have been better purposed in the longer form game I have been talking about where strategy is the name of the game. Ignoring that they still dont have much purpose. Scale is my first thought, of course more rocks means they limit you more thus more rocks, but having clumps of rocks is boring/uninteresting (but works) so perhaps every new rock is actually a few rocks and they get placed like the snake (think mountain ranges). Now you have areas that are not simple [up] > [left] to get around, you might have to stall for a bomb to go off, they might have interplay and merge into mega mountain ranges.

Even if I say mental play is better than skill play I still think skill play is good games and that if you have both together you get something much more enjoyable and engaging than only a single one at a time.

The one non gameplay thing I noticed was that there was little feedback to pressing a button. Perhaps the snake sprite faces towards where he is going to go next the instant I press instead of after he has moved.

Genuinely I like the style of the game but its very bland especially once you have to do the same _identical_ thing over and over because of you being unable to process and react to whats on screen.

Turn it ! by Kaimon 2023-10-02T17:47:55Z

I think the idea is good but I do have a few issues. Keep in mind that I did have fun (finished it all) when playing and these are my thoughts.

When you are adding resets (through death in this case) it often gets frusterating for people who can't do everything perfectly and especially when its been a while since the place they would go back to. A platformer that handles them well is celeste, it give you a checkpoint each time you change a level. In this case you just have one open level so you can't easily do this. I see two ways this could have been done, adding checkpoint flags that change from one color to another when you touch them and each 'puzzle' your camera moves freely but locked to the 'puzzle' until you finish and reach the next one.

Another issue with the camera and that makes me think option 2 is the better one is that sometimes in the midst of one puzzle you'll change where your camera is. The issue comes in when you have a vertical transition and you need to jump, you just have to hope your platform is in the right place and that you can jump to it.

The game is very much not a puzzler, the only times my brain actively tried after I was taught the mechanic was the final jump in the final level. The ways to improve the puzzle aspecs I thought up are, changing the rotation area, not letting the blocks go through walls, and limited area that you can use your rotation magic. While I think that it could be a good puzzle game it's not, there just is not enough thought put into it other than the same repeated motions to movethe blocks

I dont quite see the theme other than its in a cave which is limited, I am probably just not seeing but it feels like its just a platformer that you made.

My feedback isnt all negative, I really love the art and art style though its very charming, and I think the audio is good too. Was fun!

Flicker of Lumina by Nash 2023-10-02T23:53:36Z

First of very good mood, everything feels cohesive and is well done. A survivor game with limited space works really well!

Biggest gameplay issue was that the hitboxes for taking damage seem slightly taller than the visual representation and most times I took damage was because of that problem. Even if you couldn't have fixed it due to some limitation you could have added a shadow to warn/indicate that you dont want to be near them (dark is bad). The shadow would also more clearly convey that they are evil (dark is bad) so you instantly know they are enemies instead of wondering the first time you see them.

Most of the upgrades don't have much use, I think you should have made more upgrades that affect the way the combat plays than stats of things like run speed and potion chance. The lights emit more light upgrade is the top tier upgrade and having a couple more that contest it would be nice. Things like enemies move slower in light, lights change direction when hitting an enemy, etc. Changing the combat fundamentally would have made the game much more interesting on replay instead of just do the same thing again until you make a mistake.

Smaller issue but the upgrade image for 'lights are pushed further' seems misleading for what I think it does. It looks like it increases the distance you can push and the name being close to 'lights are pushed from further' doesnt help. If it is 'lights are pushed from further' instead of 'light are pushed harder' then the effect even after two purchases doesnt really feel like it does anything.

The timer wasnt really explained and if it is a game over I feel like that was a mistake. Lots of what I like about survivors games and keeps me coming back is how you feel super over powered late game and at one minute left I started feeling a lot more powerful and if at the end of the timer the game just stopped I would have felt robbed. Many more recent games with that scaling power include a continue feature (crab champions, SNKRX) and while maybe the game is not balanced for continuing, it doesnt have to be because feeling liek you broke the game is many times very rewarding.

It was fun though even if I found a few issues you can't make something perfect easily and many things require itteration and time. Great game and great job!

Shipped Off by fnelix 2023-10-04T21:02:09Z

I loved it and thus I don't have much feedback. Very well balanced and the endless mode was exactly what I was wanting and when I realised it was endless I got excited.

Very good job on the game design and the idea (also graphics and music were very good too).

Stacked by Skvader_418 2023-10-04T21:15:45Z

Nice game! Don't have much feedback other than it gets too hard for me real quick.

Parking HELL by Vollfeiw 2023-10-03T00:03:43Z

I had to give up the game because it's not really for me. I think it's good but I would have liked if the car didn't explode when I speed up after already being in contact with a wall. Sometimes the car would be in a tight straight space and I accelerate because im already touching the wall I expect that I will just slide along the wall. Its annoying to have to go slow when it feels like I should be able to go fast.

Its pretty good, though I didn't play more than 5 minutes so I don't have much useful feedback.

FROUST! by Kupnu4 2023-10-04T13:58:32Z

Very nice game. Some things did bug me though but overall I enjoyed it and it being a complete package definitely makes it better.

Controls on web, it is very frustrating to control. I would rather that the movement circle stays where I started the movement from instead of staying in range of the mouse, many times I would run out of screen space or be unable to find what direction I am moving in because I didn't know where the mouse was relative to the movement circle.

Although the lack of variety isnt that big of an issue it still made the experience more bland, perhaps something like a larger version that is rarer but takes less knockback and sinks the ice more would have been nice. But it is a jam though so I think it's alright

Weirdly it got laggy near the end. I had like 10 on the screen and was lagging, I have a pretty powerful pc and I wonder what the experience is like on android if I am having performance issues.

I did really enjoy the music and graphics though, plus you really caught the feeling of a mobile game (short and sweet) so massive props!

Critical Core by Benjamin Halko 2023-10-02T23:20:43Z

Very very very fun. I have some complaints but they are more nitpicks that I feel would enhance the amazing experience you made.

The music never felt repetitive and always had me on edge, the stage dynamically changing size got me to think about how to get the most points in the fastest time possible. The visuals are a treat even if they are pretty simple shapes you use them well and make them go far. Being a reverse bullet hell in a tight space is something I never even thought I wanted.

I have an issue with the early game difficulty, for the first 5-7 rounds you are able to just stay still and wait and you will get enough score *and* you wont die. I'm not too sure how to fix this without breaking the late game but I want to point it out.

I also found round 12 to make the game much harder due to the shrinking of the stage being so much more excessive. It starts to make the rounds less about dodging and more about planning and luck. This difficulty jump while making the game much more intense feels very sudden as all thre previous rounds lacked this time issue. Again I don't know how to fix this as all my ideas would make it worse but I would just like you to be aware.

The hiscore showing as the global highscore feels misleading and I thought something was bugged until I saw the final score screen. Yes there is text saying pb but I feel as if naming the pb as hiscore and hiscore as leaderboard. Thats a nitpick though (they all are really) so you didnt really make a mistake.

Overall very fun and extremely good job!

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-02T16:09:36Z

@2thegamechanger Yeah I didnt end up getting the hyroglyphs for telling you to hit things done before my time ran out.

For anyone else that that is lost you interact with the world by ramming into things.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-02T17:49:59Z

@binroot Yeah you have the right idea and it seems the tutorial like thing wasnt as intuitive as I thought, if you shove the yellow thing onto the empty air it will create a new platform (I called it the printer).

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-02T17:51:45Z

@holyblackcat I actually used to have the turning like that then changed it, I agree with you that it was easier that way, I don't know why I changed it but in my mind it was along the lines of this is how its supposed to be.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-02T17:53:02Z

@nash I tried to make the tutorial (the first place you start) not tell you how to play but I think im going to add a short written tutorial of how to play in the description. Thanks for the feedback!

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-02T20:38:26Z

@kaimon Thanks for telling me, I'm wondering if you could check the new one and if that clarifies how the game works? I added what things look like and what the goal is if that helps.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-03T17:50:54Z

@osh-studio Personally I have not used any other game engines but gamemaker has been able to do almost anything that I want to put in a game.

I would say from my perspective that the ability to have everything in one place (art(sprites), code, objects, levels) is very useful for quick protypes and testing out new ideas. The thing that causes the most friction personally is how code is very segmented for organization but can be hard to navigate quickly when you start having a lot of seperate objects and scripts.

It definitely takes time to learn but it is good enough that I don't think I will switch unless they start doing some shady money grubbing stuff.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-03T17:56:20Z

@a327ex Thanks for the thoughtful feedback, some ideas I've had for how I could've made the movement better are controller stick or trying to move towards the mouse.

I kinda wanted it to be a physics based management game to act as an 'enemy' that the player has to contend with kind of like how in a platformer you have to fight gravity (in a sense). I wonder if making the players movement more simplistic/straight-forward would improve it making it feel less like you are trying to wrangle the player so you can focus more on managing and dealing with the asteroids.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-05T00:46:16Z

@marcus-otterstrom Thanks for the detailed feedback, I really appreciate it!

I see how a lot of that is unclear, since I wrote how it all works I guess that just slipped my mind on how confusing it all is. Its meant to give you points based on how many surviving grass you have at the end of an asteroid swarm. I wanted to have the total score displayed at the same time but I thought that it would be better if it was hidden and you only got to see it after you finished but looking back that was probably only because I knew how it all worked.

Yes I agree that is repetitive and I think in part thats because (I think) there is a bug in the asteroid spawning code somewhere that spawns it in a place that doesnt actually hit your platforms but worked most of the time and it slipped through.

For camera shake do you think some sort of interpolation would make it better? Less of it and only on very important things? I really like lots of camera shake and I guess I'm not the majority there.

And again thank you for taking your time to play and formulate your thoughts for me.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-05T01:52:33Z

@viktorthegreat I appreciate the honesty! Im not too sure how the best way to implement the type of movement I want is, I did think through quite a few different movement systems but I find it hard to achieve what I want with them. Perhaps if the tutorial for the game had a section that tried to get you familiar? Like an area that you have to turn around a few bends before it asks you to aim so you at least have a bit more familiarity with the movement system?

Also I was thinking but didn't end up adding it that maybe turning speed should be adjusted depending on how fast you are moving so the turn radius would always be the same, thus making it feel less unpredictable. But I probably still should have looked into alternative movement systems.

I'm not that good at art and I really just chose what felt 'right' after testing a few options without thinking about how they work together. I'll make sure to keep in mind how they do in the future, and thanks I don't think I would have spotted that one.

Would you say that the dizziness might have been caused by the camera being very aggresive? That seems to be an issue too.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-05T22:22:06Z

@tesseract Yeah I have had some issues with the stickiness but they were rare and I added the walls in the tutorial after I had already made most of the game so didn't even think about that and it had little test time (just enough to make sure it was playable and shouldnt lock you out of completing it).

@sudocoffee Thanks for the solutions for camera shake (And playing the game)! There are solutions for snapping to the pixel grid so thanks for bringing that to my attention. I agree that making you have to focus is important and part of what I was trying to do but I think I should have made the controls a bit more accessible be that slower speed or consitent turning even if the style stayed the same.

Space slug by Normality 2023-10-07T04:45:13Z

@aweskybear Thank you! This has definitely been an issue... I'll see if I can figure out how to get a video on the site to make it even more clear.

Space Limiter Warp Drive by 2TheGameChanger 2023-10-04T21:08:35Z

As you probably know the controls feel horrible. The only time I feel like I have control over the player is when Im not moving. If it tracked the mouse perfectly or even smoothly it would be fine but I have no way of knowing where the player will be and having to dodge things in that state feels like pure luck.

Clearing space by Sevansevan 2023-10-02T16:34:40Z

Very good game. The puzzle design was my highlight with tough but beatable puzzles and clear thought put into how you would react to the layout and how to use the very simple mechanics to their max.

My only issue is with the no audio, while I understand that maybe its hard to add or you don't have experience I can 100% say that even simple sounds (rubbing cloth, hitting something) contribute a lot to the experience and how much I enjoy a game. If you want to look at making audio Audacity is a free program for mic recording and sound editing and Jonas Tyroller has a good video going over how to make some simple audio and how to use Audacity.

The only other thing I could think of is maybe displaying some congratulations screen or the player gets a golden flower each time they beat a level and it shows how many out of the total amount they got. This would let me the player know how far I am in and stave off the feeling of failure after trying the same level over and over again.

Still though very good job!