NotExplosive

B R U I S E S by leafthief 2020-04-21T15:41:51Z

The art is extremely stylish and cohesive​. The color choice makes it feel like a real point-and-click adventure from the DOS era, but like... through nostalgia goggles of "what I remember it looking like" and not what it actually looked like.

It took me a bit to figure out that right clicking was different then left clicking. Once I did I got to appreciate the characters and writing a lot more.

I had a lot of the same problems I usually have with the Point and Click genre. I spent a lot of time hunting for the right thing to click on. To repair the torn message/photo, I saw posters that are TAPED to the wall and I'm thinking "Oh! I'll take the tape and use it on the posters" but instead I was supposed to click the box next to the posters. Which makes more realistic sense but I didn't realize the box was clickable right away so I got stuck.

I liked the picture/message re-assembly part as a way to vary up the gameplay. Although I found it kind of frustrating that if two pieces overlapped I'd almost definitely select the wrong one. It seems they lock in place if you put them in the "correct" spot. I wish it were more forgiving and gave some sort of feedback when you got it in the right spot. The message was especially hard to assemble. I got stuck at the message because I don't know how the game is expecting me to arrange it, I have some pieces in the right places so I try to align everything with those pieces and the game doesn't take it. It seems like there's an expected gap between two pieces I'm supposed to fulfill, but that feels impossible to predict. If you're able to patch this I highly recommend it.

This is the best writing I've seen in a Ludum Dare game, it's a shame I'm roadblocked by the gameplay. If it does get patched feel free to @ me in a comment and I promise to replay and re-rate it! I wanna see the ending!

Also: I somehow managed to get into a bugged state where text would appear and immediately vanish when I clicked on things. It might have to do with alt-tabbing out of the game? Alt-tabbing back and forth seemed to fix it.

Also-also: I think there's a typo "You wanna to skate gain?"

Grow! by alex457 2020-04-29T15:12:05Z

Our submissions are shockingly similar​! The overall concept is great, your incentivized ​to grow out and around and find patches of water, but you also don't want to spread yourself too thin because otherwise you'll starve. I also like at the end you're told how many days it took you to complete and your encouraged to do better. I dig it!

The turn-based/grid-based aspects of it are interesting. They make the whole thing feel organized and methodical, especially once you unlock pruning and the ability to reveal other areas. It really felt like you could min/max your way to victory if you planned ahead.

However there are a few little gripes I have that get in the way of my enjoyment. First off, I wish there were hotkeys for pruning/exploring/skipping. Clicking "Prune" and then clicking over at the one root I wanted to remove, and the repeating that process over and over was really tedious.

I also think that the "grow through stone" upgrade and the "reveal area" upgrade should be swapped. By the time I had the reveal upgrade, I had already hit "rock bottom" in the sense that I had nowhere left to explore that wasn't blocked off. So the reveal upgrade didn't do anything for me except for taunt me with areas I couldn't go to yet.

That being said, this is a really solid submission overall, especially for the compo! It looks like this is your first game on itch.io, which I assume means you're pretty early in your gamedev career. If that's the case then you're off to an amazing start!

Grow! by alex457 2020-05-03T17:42:44Z

@alex457 My game is at: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/46/lay-down-your-roots

(linking it gives me a warning about how linking my own submission in the comments is rude, but you asked lol)

For future reference you can click on my name in the comments and go to the "Games" tab, it'll be the left-most one because it's the most recent.

Body and Soul by blabberf 2020-04-21T16:02:54Z

Refined gameplay loop, polished feedback, interesting and varied upgrades. Wow. What a good-ass submission!

Lay Down Your Roots by NotExplosive 2020-04-22T14:52:21Z

@mathurin Thank you for the kind words! It stops at the fruit for exactly the reason you mentioned: framerate. It's not your computer, it's the game unfortunately. I don't know what causes it but I'll hunt it down soon. Otherwise I totally would have had a "Continue Playing" option.

I started with base-code of my Scene-Actor-Component setup and that comes packaged with like 100 basic components that I didn't actually use so my source is a lot fatter than it needs to be lol. Most of the "game" code is in the /ld46 folder and /data folder if you wanna see how it works ;)

Lay Down Your Roots by NotExplosive 2020-05-10T19:46:53Z

@tompudding Thanks for the tip about the sound on linux. No idea what's going on there but I'll investigate. Thanks for playing!

Lay Down Your Roots by NotExplosive 2020-05-14T00:20:34Z

@mika-la-grand Thanks for playing! That's definitely the fullest tree I've seen! It might be that it took longer because you didn't put many leaves in the sunlight (which doubles their output, which honestly is kind of broken how much energy that gives you lol). Checking out sunlit later today!

@groggi Thanks so much! I'll check out your submission. When I was rating other entries I found at least one other "2D cross section about plant growing where you grow both below and above ground" games. Apparently a lot of us had the same idea. As for the physics, I'm actually not using any library. Each stem segment is just a Position, Angle, and Length. Angle has some default value assigned at creation, and then fluctuates on a sine wave. Length is static (once it's done animating), and Position is determined based on the result of the parent's calculation. Happy to chat more about this on twitter if you're interested, I'm @NotExplosive on there.

@japes Thanks for playing! I'll check it out!

Only one way by dfkgjndljf 2020-04-22T02:15:23Z

Interesting ideas and concept! I like the environmental storytelling of a robot taking care of a baby in an ice-cold environment while getting shot at by... aliens?

There were just a few niggling things that kinda salted it for me. For instance, why is the button to pick up the child different from dropping the child? I also can't see the kid's health bar if he's off screen unless I zoom out, which often leads to me losing without warning.

I noticed you made this in LOVE2D which is cool! Always nice to see other LOVE developers out in the wild :)

You're Invited! by Ellian 2020-04-21T14:54:27Z

Elegant gameplay loop and extremely efficient tutorial. 30 seconds in I knew exactly what I was in for! "Generic Rock Song" simultaneously made me laugh and feel called out for my music tastes. Very well done!

Restart Later by Theg 2020-04-23T15:06:11Z

I love the use of dark patterns! I did find the iteration time a little frustrating, I gave up after my third attempt because I was tired of waiting for the Decripter to unlock each time. Always a fan of fake OS games!

Me: Tree! by Groggi 2020-05-14T00:45:00Z

Hey, I made Lay Down Your Roots and I came to check out your game and wow!! You're right, our ideas were similar! But what's crazy is how they were almost _even more similar_. I had considered doing the UI similar to how you did, 2 clicks where the player chooses the exact angle, I ultimately chose against it but I'm not totally happy with what I chose (LDYR screws you over sometimes, maybe that's part of the game? :p). I had also considered the idea of having nutrients as a third resource, but I wasn't really sure how to differentiate it from water.

I love your color choice! And I love that you can play this in a browser, that's perfect for this style of game. Maybe I'm dumb but I'm having trouble getting started. I can't seem to figure out how to start gaining energy. I have 15 leaves but I'm gaining zero energy and then I just die..? I'm a bit confused about that. But from the screenshots it looks like it gets pretty wild in the late game

Also I can very very very faintly hear music when I play. But it's soooo quiet and my volume is cranked all the way up. Is there something wrong on my end or is the music really quiet? It's fine to have quiet BGM but I think it's _too_ quiet. If I had my volume any lower I wouldn't even notice it.

Really cool submission!

Desktop Garden by 0x0 2020-04-23T14:37:40Z

Absolutely delightful concept, I like how everyone probably experienced this game differently based on their desktop habits. The sound and graphics were really nice and pleasant too! You also managed to crash my explorer.exe which is a first so congrats on that also :stuck_out_tongue:

Gino the Neutrino by Dark_Power 2020-04-23T14:46:45Z

I love how much personality you put into subatomic particles. I never thought of neutrinos as "introverts" but now I can't un-think it! I liked how the music changed over time too. I found the gameplay a little lacking assuming I was playing it right. It seemed like my objective was to dodge everything so I just spent most of the game at the very top of the screen not moving. Perhaps if there were powerups to grab or some incentive to not sit still you could solve this problem? Overall though it was a nice submission!

It Alive by Mathurin 2020-04-22T15:02:27Z

Incredibly clever use of the theme, it works on several layers! Although I didn't really use the main mechanic until I got to the level with a ton of enemies. All of the other levels I could pretty easily platform around them. Perhaps there could be a level early on with narrow chokepoints that enemies block so you could teach the mechanic early on and gradually demonstrate wider use cases.

Very impressive for a compo game!

Egde Fault by crazyrems 2020-04-23T14:32:12Z

I love the art style! Also I love any game that features a Giant Enemy Crab.

Egde Fault by crazyrems 2020-04-29T02:35:04Z

@crazyrems Upon closer inspection it definitely looks like a scorpion. I think the color led me to think it was a crab lol

Woodpunk by elisee 2020-05-10T19:54:26Z

There is a LOT of content here! Especially for a Ludum Dare game. Every inch of it looks great and sounds pretty good too! However it took me multiple attempts and reading the itch page description to figure out how to craft, which is a pretty essential part of the game. Perhaps binding the crafting menu to the right mouse button would have made it more discoverable?

I didn't complete a single quest in the game. I would get a quest, not understand how to complete it, and then move onto the next area. I figured out what Onion Minions were and how to create them about 2 areas in and didn't feel like backtracking to complete the first quest. Maybe Granny could have mentioned something about "Pressing shift to open your crafting menu." Fourth wall breaking but entirely necessary for gameplay. Likewise, all of the enemies could be summarized as "click on them until they die," regardless of what type of ammo I was using. It seemed some enemies weren't even worth killing since they'd either just stand there or were easy to evade.

The world design is well done. It feels like an open world and yet I was constantly able to progress and continue onto the next area. I never felt lost. I made it all the way to the boat, where I was promptly stuck because I didn't know where to find planks. There appeared to be some planks in the basement of the castle area right before the boat but I think those planks were decorative planks and not quest item planks.

All this being said, this is an incredibly ambitious Ludum Dare game and I'm extremely impressed with how much game you managed to get out of the weekend.

Father... Musn't I Kill It? by Andrfw 2020-05-04T02:36:11Z

You bastard, how could you make me do this.

I love it.

Cosmic Felk is Dead! Long Live Cosmic Felk! by Qazikol 2020-04-22T15:30:38Z

Very well written. The visuals were great but I wish the textbox were a little more opaque for my feeble eyes. I loved all the goofy looking characters and the made up music genres. LONG LIVE COSMIC FELK!

Joe Biden Campaign Simulator by Kevin Sun 2020-04-23T15:09:48Z

spicy. surprisingly unique gameplay for a political shitpost

Rhythm Rifles by BlakeGameDev 2020-04-22T15:23:12Z

Simple and elegant game loop. Normally I don't like these "endless hoard" games but this one is different. The rhythm mechanic made it feel like every shot counts. Every beat I have to think about my position and line up my shot and fire on beat. It's incredibly satisfying to land multiple shots in a row, and genuinely panic inducing when you miss a shot you thought you had because now you're falling behind. A part of me kind of wishes that you'd fire automatically on beat but maybe that would be too easy?

The difficulty ramps up a bit quick with the curtain fire enemies, but the iteration time is so short that it doesn't really matter.

There's lots of cool potential here! I'm imagining this as a rogue-like with boss fights and different weapons that each have different tempos/effects.

Mind Defender by Laura del Pino 2020-04-26T16:17:03Z

I like the concept. Although I couldn't really tell what the difference between the 3 types of towers were. So I wasn't sure what trade-off I was making when I built a bunch of the same tower rather than a few of each.

The music loop has this gross "click" at (presumably) the point where it loops. Fortunately it's entire fixable, I've helped enough LDer's fix this problem I made a quick video about how to fix it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJUJezqdtqA

Shades of Deception by AMastryukov 2022-04-10T20:52:06Z

I loved all the name puns, you might say it was a "Fanny Game."

Seriously though, probably the best narrative I've played in an LD game ever. I loved how the mystery developed and the (spoiler!!!) twist at the end.

The audio mixing could use some work though, in almost every dialogue scene one person was too loud and the other was too quiet.

The Assessment by Okamit 2022-04-12T15:14:42Z

A reFRESHing submission!

Wickfall by OriginalDog 2022-04-05T19:19:13Z

Really cool game! It reminded me of Kingdom, which is a game I like a lot!

Healer's Handbook by javi7 2022-04-09T17:09:42Z

The runes is a really cool mechanic. By the late game I didn't need to reference the symbols anymore as I just knew them by heart.

Support Simulator by NotExplosive 2022-04-13T03:42:39Z

@birdwards Thanks for playing! I'm glad the MMO jargon wasn't too "in-joke"-y.

You're absolutely right, there should be an "i can't cast that yet" sound effect. Will include in the post-jam build :)

Support Simulator by NotExplosive 2022-04-14T05:51:48Z

Thanks @catellib

and thinks for being my 20th rating to push me over the edge ;)

Before The Bang by DGSpitzer 2022-04-06T22:21:10Z

Neat game! I played it solo but it seems like it'd be fun to play with a friend.

Protocol Delta by itsBoats 2022-04-07T20:27:51Z

Extremely cool!

lose95 by Sulo 2022-04-07T19:43:12Z

C:\This\Game\Rules

Seriously fantastic submission. My favorite game of the jam so far.

Sway by matrixcoder 2022-04-12T15:08:45Z

Very interesting control scheme!

I think the tutorial could have been clearer if the tutorial page were present on the first level. I missed that I had to press A/D from the tutorial so I fumbled for a bit on the first level. The screenshot of the tutorial on the itch page helped me break out of that though.

NewGame+ by deianeira 2022-04-07T19:31:06Z

The soundtrack is hype as hell. It would be cool if you shot automatically in-time with the beat (which was how I found myself playing most of the time).

One Long Night by RetroSpecter 2022-04-12T04:12:59Z

10/10 would get eaten by a shadow/spider again

Earl's Quest by wujood 2017-12-04T20:26:28Z

Fantastic aesthetic and I love the monochromatic green! I think it would be a lot better to have a visual map instead of a list of directions in order to get to places. Collisions are a little wonky and I finally got into the maze after a couple of tries. Perhaps adding a visualization of the game getting harder as you get coins would help because I'm unsure how much it correlated. Otherwise, fantastic job! I'd love to see this as a fully fleshed out mini game!

Speed Date Shuffle by NotExplosive 2017-12-05T01:40:32Z

Just made a quick patch that fixed a few of the issues people had. Thank you all for your feedback!

Speed Date Shuffle by NotExplosive 2017-12-05T01:42:20Z

@fskr Actually! You can lay down cards whenever you want, you just don't want to hit the "Play" button until the date stops talking.

Speed Date Shuffle by NotExplosive 2017-12-05T19:15:07Z

@smogen Thanks so much! I'm glad you enjoyed it!

Speed Date Shuffle by NotExplosive 2017-12-05T20:26:07Z

@dunin I absolutely agree about removing a card with right click. Unfortunately that's a complex to write with how I implemented mouse picking (I'd basically have to rewrite it). It's definitely doable! But not in the time constraint I had. That will be a quality-of-life fix for the post-jam build, as well as other things like volume sliders and such.

What is Art: Things that can be Stolen by drzanuff 2017-12-04T20:28:42Z

I'd love to play because this sounds like a very interesting game, but the download links appear to be "invalid". Please update!

Interview at Cacophony by Christoph 2017-12-04T20:36:16Z

I loved this, it got super hard when I had to pick five instruments. I guess my ear is not well trained!

Shifting Dreamscape by Cruise Elroy 2017-12-05T03:38:15Z

Not sure if this is on your end or the website, but when I first attempted to play everything was so pixelated that I couldn't make out words. Perhaps a bug? Anyways, great game! I wish the keys were mapped differently but I love the look and feel of the game, congrats!

Contraband by AdamCYounis 2019-10-07T16:47:08Z

I like how you gain mechanics over time, that's super cool! The animation work is really solid too. I got stuck in walls twice which didn't feel great but half of gamedev is wrangling third party physics engines so I don't blame you for that. Great submission!

Small Town by Emiliabea 2019-10-08T05:19:37Z

Short and sweet like an LD game should be. The art looks beautiful, and I loved petting all the cats. Great work!

Asset Stream by aevek 2019-10-08T03:09:31Z

I liked the intro sequence and the overall concept! I found the precise platforming a little tedious after a while, especially with how slippery the character is. However the sound design was on point! I especially the sound it makes when you hit a checkpoint.

Trelet ~ The Land of Words by Ovidios 2019-10-07T08:16:20Z

I love the concept! However I think the punishment for failure is a little to big. Maybe if there were several short levels instead of one?

The Adventures of Hugh Mahn Through Time by Ninnec 2019-10-08T02:52:06Z

Heya! Those links don't work, I think you need to make the game Public on both itch pages.

There was something here by Adrien Dittrick 2019-10-07T07:50:36Z

There were at least 2 moments where I thought "oh I get it, I understand what this game was about" only to be proven wrong a few minutes later. Nicely done!

In the Rain by NotExplosive 2019-10-12T21:58:10Z

@weeping-rupee Thanks for playing! For the record the coin counter is at the bottom of the screen, it looks like it was obscured by your taskbar.

In the Rain by NotExplosive 2019-10-19T00:30:14Z

Thanks for playing @nisovin, do you recall what room you were in before you were caught int he loop? I know what causes that bug and can fix it if I know what room caused it. If not no worries. Thanks again. :smile:

Nothing to Say by celia14 2019-10-09T19:22:04Z

A flawless execution of an incredible idea. I want more!

The Discloser by agentparsec 2021-05-06T15:13:16Z

I'm a big fan of mouse-driven UI games. I played this for almost an hour and I lost (even though I still had plenty of turns left?) but I enjoyed it none the less. The random generation rogue-like-y nature of it is a really cool twist. I liked how the tiredness mechanic worked, pushing forward on the task at hand despite being too tired to continue and failing due to fatigue feels very relatable (especially in a game jam). It felt very strategic when I was trying to most efficiently use my time to investigate all my leads and reach out to my contacts. The music is nice and I noticed the music changed partway through which was interesting but I don't know what triggered it.

Although I do have some nits here and there if you're looking for feedback for a post-jam build: - It's nice that everything was mouse-driven, but having hotkeys for the 4 basic commands would have been really nice. - Typo: "but from hom?" when I think you meant "but from whom?" - Unclear on the difference between a "turn" and a "day"? Are they different, why is there a difference? - I wish the icons on the sticky notes aligned with the icons on the left, Decipher is a sheet of paper on the left but a pentagon on the sticky note, for example. - When I didn't have any leads (AKA: all I can do is "Research") it was unclear to me what the best use of my time was, I kept researching the same two notes that had red lines connecting them trying to turn them green and I kept coming up with nothing. - Although the music is good, the sound effects are really lacking

Dreamer's Depths by Kraemahz 2021-05-05T02:09:55Z

Some cool ideas but the jumping felt really inconsistent because half the time I was technically "in the air" and therefore couldn't jump and would hit obstacles. I think instead of a health system I would have rather died in one hit and just had more forgiving checkpoints throughout the level.

It felt good to dash up a shallow slope, especially when it wasn't the clear intended way to get through the level!

dig deeper by The White Kiwi 2021-05-04T03:34:31Z

Really neat concept, I did enjoy playing it and it was well written. If you'll indulge me I have some UI gripes that I'd like to soapbox on for a minute (maybe feedback for a post-jam build): - The intro sequence should not have the text box, I kept on starting to type a command and then more text showed up. I think the text pages over every time you hit a key (maybe?) but I didn't realize that at first so I started typing. - The "help" shouldn't show up until _after_ the intro. You have us memorize a bunch of commands, then do an exposition dump, and then we start the game using the commands we learned earlier. It's nice that "help" shows us the commands, but I think if the help page was shown later I wouldn't have needed to fall back on it. - The location names were very specific. `go toms bedroom` doesn't count, it has to be `go tom's bedroom`, I think if I was specific enough the game should have allowed it. - (screen resolution dependent) It looks like from your screenshot that `Jessica's Bedroom` is on one line, on my screen (4K, 16:9) It was on two lines, making it seem like `Jessica's` and `Bedroom` were two separate places.

All that being said, I really love the look and feel of this game. It's sleek and simple while still being a vehicle for a very deep story.

Oculus Leviathan by NotExplosive 2021-04-29T15:00:45Z

@thegamer1123211 Sorry that it crashed! This is my first game made in this framework so I'm not sure what logs it generates (if any), but any info you can give me would be great. I'll also look into better crash handling/logs. If you don't want to post it here you can DM me on twitter @NotExplosive

Oculus Leviathan by NotExplosive 2021-05-07T16:11:10Z

@thrawn911 Glad you enjoyed it, can you elaborate on the crash? When you say "Depth 1" what do you mean? Do you mean right after the intro cinematic?

GRAPPLE the Abyss! by lectvs 2021-04-27T15:55:50Z

The first "video game" game I've played so far. Really cool mechanic and nice gauntlet of puzzles to explore it. The checkpoints were nicely placed so I never felt like I had to redo a ton of content. Definitely cheesed the boss though :stuck_out_tongue:

The Plummet by cakts 2021-05-05T01:50:36Z

Super impressive submission! I love the concept, it kind of reminds me of Noita or Spelunky. I felt like I kept getting randomly generated levels that were impossible. I got spawned on a tiny ledge where my only options were to fall to my death or blow myself up. I think fall damage is a good feature in general but I think there should also be some way to mitigate it. I tried using a rope to bungie jump down but that didn't work (imagine if it did though!!)

System.Override by Arctiform LLC 2021-05-04T03:12:10Z

I think the "How To Play" was unnecessary, not to say that I figured out how to play right away (I didn't, I needed the tutorial), but you could have just made the tutorial the first level and just had one "Play" button. I also shared the same struggle as everyone else in that I couldn't figure out how to actually play. I was stuck on the first level, then I quit to do the tutorial, which I got through somehow but I don't really understand what I did. Then I was stuck on the first level again. I put both the wires in the console and then the door still didn't open?

Into the Castle by groverburger 2021-04-28T15:32:34Z

There are so many little polish things you get right, absolutely incredible work! I love how you turned the level transitions into a mechanic, the art style is great, the squash-and-stretch on the jumping.... it's all so good!! The fact that it was a compo game makes it even more impressive!

The Whole Game by NBumgardner 2021-05-04T03:52:59Z

The MS-Paint art is cute! I think overall the game is a bit too easy. The character moves so slow but most of the threats are either stationary or way too far away to be concerned about.

Also, since the turning is pivoted on the front of the character (the "drill" part) turning moves your hitbox. This means if you move towards an obstacle and then turn around, you might hit the obstacle simply by turning around which feels a bit unfair.

catch the fishies! by Jamie simpson 2021-05-04T04:04:34Z

I liked the doodle style of it all, particularly the tutorial. I wish the arm were a bit more flexible (like maybe if it rotated towards the mouse?). I loved how each time a shark chased you it had some cute remark trying to lure me in (almost worked!! very persuasive). I was able to farm a bunch of points when I discovered the edge of the level where a bunch of fish were crowded up.

Walls by Omiya Games 2021-04-27T15:41:29Z

Really neat game! I have some tiny nitpicks about UI (clicking on a lock doesn't unlock the door, clicking on the door does) and some texture on the walls would have been nice to get a sense of when stuff is moving around. Overall though it's a really solid entry!

Feelings Not Yet by crazyrems 2021-04-27T15:44:47Z

I love to see more narrative driven LD entries! Great work!

Digtet by Sentmoraap 2021-05-04T03:47:36Z

Really neat concept but I had a hard time wrapping my head around the rules and the controls.

Onion by kameia 2021-05-04T03:37:09Z

I played this for 30 seconds and I already love it. Very clever interpretation of the theme. I wish there was a bit more too it though, music (or any sound at all for that matter) would be great. The screenshake polish you have is great but I think I would have liked a bit more rewarding effects for succeeding, particles, fanfare, etc.

DigSweeper by radmccool 2021-05-04T00:45:13Z

Cool concept but I feel like it needs a bit more to it? Minesweeper had the number system to hint if there was a mine nearby, maybe that could have added another twist that makes mining a mine more consequential.

PICO-8 Hexagon Topology Generator (updated version) by evn 2021-05-04T03:05:52Z

I don't entirely understand what's happening but it seems pretty neat!

ChronorhC by NikorasuChan 2021-05-06T15:30:10Z

I love the core mechanic but I'm a bit confused about how it works. It seems like my past self only moves when I do (Super Hot style)? That seems to be the case except the past self moves for about a second after I go through the portal? I throws off my sense of timing and adds a degree of challenge that I don't think really adds anything to the experience. I really want to like this game but I'm just having a hard time wrapping my head around the timing.

I think something that would be nice is a "soft" reset button for when you've already gone through the portal. It would reset you to the point where you went through the portal, so your past self is locked in and you're just executing on the second half. The idea is that this is a separate button from the regular reset which you'd still need if you want to adjust your first run.

Leave Me Alone by crazyrems 2021-10-07T03:04:50Z

Graphically it looks great! The character's cute, the parallaxing background and the warping of the black hole all look super cool. That being said I found the gameplay a bit lacking. I didn't really feel like I had much agency or strategy beyond clicking in the direction away from the black hole but towards the nearest debris.

Drillbit Junker by nanobuilder 2021-10-09T06:51:14Z

Wow. This is really great! I love Spaceteam so I love this. You chose the perfect set of actions too, I particularly like the gear shift, that's clever! I love the repair mechanic too! It's a tangible reward for performing well.

The art looks awesome too. Sound and music would have really tipped it over the edge, but really solid jam submission as-is!

Black Cat Apothecary by Omiya Games 2021-10-07T03:17:09Z

The concept was interesting, but I wish it went further. At first I thought I had to discover what potions did what with trial and error but when I discovered the cheat sheet I felt like the game became too easy. A way to take this a step further is if you had to mix the potions yourself and you gradually discover what ingredients cure/cause certain ailments.

The Goose Bureau by Tricky_Fat_Cat 2022-10-08T05:04:01Z

It was pretty fun once I got past the first level! The art is nice and the little signs are funny!

The one thing I'd change is to shorten the iteration time between failing at an obstacle and being able to try that obstacle again.

Ten-Second Murder by lectvs 2022-10-04T03:54:44Z

Loved the framing and style. Chef lookin sus tbh.

Come Shell or High Water by ursagames 2022-10-03T22:52:24Z

I died and the game told me how much the sea level would rise if all the polar ice caps melted. That made me think about how we're all going to die someday, but that day is probably not today. Today I can be a crab. 10/10

Macaques: Caged by Sean Carrick 2022-10-04T00:32:12Z

This is really cool but I don't think I... get it?

I really like the look and the music but I don't really understand what's going on. Sometimes I can shoot sometimes I can't. Sometimes enemies run at me, sometimes they don't. It's unclear to me what the status at the top means when it says something like "Butterfingers."

Could you spell out how things work in the description a little more to help out dumb-dumbs like me?

Holding off on rating for now because I think there's a really cool game in here once I figure out how to play it!

Simple Geometry by HKSpadez 2022-10-05T15:40:53Z

Incredible presentation for a very fun idea!

I wish I had a bit more clarity if my shots were going to hit or not-- sometimes I would line up a shot that felt like a miss but was actually a hit, and vise versa.

Also _tiny_ UX nit: You have N for next level, R to restart, and Space to start the level, why not just bind all of those to Left Mouse Button? The whole rest of the game is played with the mouse so I found myself having to take my hand off the mouse to hit R and Space every time I messed up.

Citri Plays Noirwood by AploveStudio 2022-10-04T04:22:23Z

My first run I got 6/7 relics and I never got that far again. The presentation is top notch!

À la carte by Steing 2022-10-08T05:37:09Z

This was so cool! Probably the most fun game I've played this jam. My only suggestion is when I unlocked the cutting board/mixer, I wish I could keep them in future rounds.

Harvest Golem by NotExplosive 2022-10-04T03:42:20Z

Thanks! @retrospecter.

There is a goal you're working towards, it just isn't very well explained: If you get a Kohlrabi and harvest it, you'll get a Pumpkin seed. Once you grow the Pumpkin (through disposing cards) you trigger the end cutscene.

You can also play like @samkee00 and have your goal be to restore the world to 100%. Which is what the introduction hints that you're supposed to do. D'oh!

Harvest Golem by NotExplosive 2022-10-04T15:07:23Z

Thanks for the kind words @otterfaelure , sorry about the softlock! I think I can disable the mouse being picked up while the window is out of focus/minimized (I noticed that too while I was developing it! very annoying!). I'll look into that for the post-jam build.

@ursagames Would you say you :sunglasses: "Shouldn't mix those"?

Harvest Golem by NotExplosive 2022-10-05T03:35:35Z

Thanks @jirrev! I'm curious, what is the 10s rule?

Harvest Golem by NotExplosive 2022-10-07T06:10:38Z

@nardandas sorry about your pumpkin! That was an oversight in the design I didn't notice until it was too late. Thanks for playing!

10 Second Wordle by Jezzamon 2022-10-04T15:36:55Z

I had a slight issue where it felt like my keyboard inputs weren't registering (usually at the start of a new word). Not that it mattered because most of the time I just sat there motionless because I couldn't think of a single word!

autoball by torcado 2022-10-04T00:22:51Z

Dammit, I have other LD entries to rate, but now all I wanna do is play autoball

bäbäböx X by Kultisti 2022-10-04T04:07:41Z

Looks and sounds AMAZING! The game loop is really tight and fun and gets chaotic fast! Tiny UI nitpick: I thought the lives counter was something I could collect, ironically I lost a life trying to collect the lives counter. :face_palm:

Just a Minute by Britt Henderson 2022-10-04T04:02:22Z

Very cool interpretation of the theme! My one complaint is that it was a little hard to tell which ~~amogi~~ crewmate I had selected.

Ten Second First Dates by Rose 2022-10-05T03:51:14Z

I got through the first 3 dates thinking "this is cool but it's a little easy" and then I failed every single date after that. Really creative and tightly designed!

Game Name by Strega 2022-10-04T15:27:57Z

It's like I was really there! I love that sleeping is a minigame you can "be bad at," extremely relatable.

Silvi by nardandas 2022-10-04T15:15:18Z

Very peaceful and relaxing. It's nice to play a game jam game that doesn't ask much of me :)

Virus Vanquisher by lectvs 2024-10-12T15:39:21Z

Very cool game! Can't wait to see it at the next GDQ! :sunglasses:

Bobby's Beautiful Bugs by suvi 2024-10-18T22:06:44Z

I've been doing LD for so many years but I don't think I've ever played a Solitaire-like submission until now. I liked it!

Critter Season by Trezark 2024-10-18T21:56:33Z

There's a lot of cool ideas here! The controls and interface make it difficult to really engage with the mechanics though. I wish I could pan the camera with the keyboard (and turn off edge-scrolling, which didn't work properly on my 2-monitor setup) and I could see the costs of things without having to have a worker dragged in hand.

All that is very fixable in a post-jam build though! Overall a very good submission!

The Ritual by krit1k 2024-10-18T22:22:32Z

Overall great submission. I wish the objectives (eg necronomicon) didn't appear once you learned about them. I kind of wish all the pieces were there ahead of time and the NPCs would hint the solution to you rather than being explicit milestones you need to complete.

The sound design was quite good! Especially inside the church!

Vox Regis by Sheepolution 2024-10-18T21:39:45Z

I got it in 32 speeches! Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet! Great game! Although I think 5 minutes might be a little bit too long? I feel like by minute 3 I was like "OK I get it" and I had a strategy that prevented any faction from going past 13ish.

GO BLO by deniskazantsev 2024-10-18T22:27:33Z

That was fun! I love how each character was basically a ㅊ and the walking animation was just a 15 degree rotation. Loved the pitter-patter sound too!

Creative Types by Rose 2024-10-12T19:03:06Z

Very cute and creative!

Feast of Fools by ehgoodenough 2024-10-12T15:51:44Z

I like the narrative flow, the setting felt very unique and distinct. The art was also super pretty, loved the portraits, the font, and the whole vibe! I think I'm not super well-versed in the genre conventions so I got confused why I could attack sometimes but not other times.

Critter Switcher by torcado 2024-10-18T16:18:54Z

Very cool submission! I wish that the swapping mechanic got introduced earlier. I got to the rabbit and died before I figured out how it worked.

Build The Sun by TRASEVOL_DOG 2024-10-18T15:59:02Z

Very good submission! I have a few gripes but these are small complaints on the best game I played this jam.

It felt fatiguing to have to hold down the mouse button all the time. Especially when it's ambiguous if I have enough of a given resource. I found myself asking the question "do I need one more stone or is my last wood-holding critter somewhere across the map slowly making his way here?"

What if: - You click once to issue an order (eg: harvest this tree) - You only get ONE "task" you can issue at a time - BUT you can unlock more "task capacity" as a resource. like maybe for every campfire you have you can issue one more order eg: I have 3 campfires so I can request 3 tasks simultaneously.

That would make me as a player feel more powerful over time, like I'm issuing high level commands like "harvest this whole forest" rather than still holding down the button on each and every tree.

Deep Space Delivery Office by JHax 2025-04-09T02:54:39Z

Very cool! I don't think I've played anything quite like this!

I also crashed when buying the Small Tanker about 5 minutes in. I remember I had a full inventory and I had sent out 1 probe before that.

Deep Space Delivery Office by JHax 2025-04-09T14:13:40Z

@jhax I'm using Brave browser

Plundersea by Hugimugi7 2025-04-08T15:03:08Z

Very cool and calming vibe! I am very bad at minesweeper so I appreciated that I had a health bar (and the ability to restore it). Dividing the board into three segments is a really interesting twist!

Crates of Hell by dmaerzendorfer 2025-04-08T15:01:07Z

The control scheme was very unique!

Explorem Ipsum: Catacombs of Time by NotExplosive 2025-04-10T21:22:36Z

@python-b5 thank you! Undo button is top of the list for post-jam. Although the tech to make it work might be tricky, I definitely agree that this game needs it

Drill Crew by lectvs 2025-04-08T15:10:42Z

ROCK AND STONE!!

DI(V)E - Beneath the Waves by HowToBeHayes 2025-04-08T15:10:02Z

The intro cutscene was INCREDIBLE! The tone and vibes are just incredible. Great work!

Abyssmall by VladImperator 2025-04-09T03:19:45Z

This is super cool. The soundscape is incredible! I also tripped over the tutorial due to the invisible walls (I ran out of air but I couldn't come to the surface because the tutorial wouldn't let me). I also agree that by the mid game I was ignoring pearls all together. They were just obstacles that were in my way for collecting the real treasures.

Also nice to see a fellow custom engine dev! You love to see it!

Shape Collector by rhewid 2025-10-11T05:01:32Z

You've distilled the "Pick 1 of 3 Upgrades" game into the most distilled form.

Unwordy by Omiya Games 2025-10-07T02:14:19Z

This is so cool! I love the prisoner's dilemma-esque problem of coming up with words that most other people wouldn't think of. I think I got in pretty early though considering most of my words were brand new.

I tried to play a second round and all my submissions on phase 2 were stuck on "checking..." so I think I lost connection?

Loot Goblin by Ydindamin 2025-10-11T04:56:49Z

I loved stealing gold while a slime and adventurer were locked in combat in the next room. I kinda wish I didn't have to click directly on an object to pick it up, I kept stumbling on that.

My Friends the Monster Trainers by celia14 2025-10-07T03:16:52Z

Well that was delightful! Such a fun interpretation of the theme.

Trash Game by ursagames 2025-10-07T01:59:18Z

(brock voice) i can turn my trusty trash can.... into a cash can!

Frogs' Boon by Hugimugi7 2025-10-07T02:06:53Z

This reminded me a lot of Paquerette Down the Bunburrows. I love sokoban!

Solatro: A Solitaire Roguelike by NotExplosive 2025-10-06T16:31:11Z

Thanks @rhewid and @spacecadet -- I fixed both of those issues!

Taxbear of Haybrunn by spacecadet 2025-10-11T05:05:24Z

I hate when the Tax Bear comes to my house and steals all my corn!

Idle Badger by lectvs 2025-10-06T19:19:50Z

Love the Trash Can, instant pick for me!

Galactic Petting Zoo!!! by BoneDaddy 2016-12-13T02:13:00

When I hold down the mouse button my view freezes but the mouse doesn't move, it seemed to jitter a little bit the first time but after that, nothing.

Help Wanted! by TeamBALD 2016-12-13T02:42:00

I like the art style, everything visually fits really nicely together. I also like your concept of "lots of detail in one room and let the player walk around and explore it"

I came across a few typos: "I don't know how (you) can sit there with that thing starting (staring?) at you"

I'm happy to say this is the first LD Game (so far) that I have played through to completion! To help future players, the clue indicates an object that you have to click on to proceed.

1 Room and 48 Hours by meg 2016-12-13T04:54:00

"Played for a few rounds, it's ok"

Seriously though, solid idea and well executed. The beeping stressed me out but I guess that was the point. Also I like how hygiene slowly creeps up but is never addressed. ;)

Police Interrogation Simulator 2017 by interfect 2016-12-13T02:08:00

Regarding sounds not exporting. I know with Superpowers (another game engine) many .wav sounds don't play in specifically Firefox, but everything runs fine in Chrome. So I would check to see if it's a browser specific problem.

Tangent by rxi 2016-12-13T04:15:00

Very clever interpretation of the theme! Also excellent succinct tutorial.

I REMEMBER NOW by Awpteamoose 2016-12-16T07:47:00

Well done! The interface of "branching" took some time to get used to, it did not occur to me that the order in which I looked at things mattered. But this was a really cool take on the theme!

TILT Service by parahunter 2016-12-13T03:43:00

Hiya, you reviewed my game (Puppertrator) so I'll review yours!

I loved it. Short, snappy, and hilarious. You have one joke and you tell it really well.

My only gripe is the warp effect made me dizzy.

Room Kingdom by Oxeren 2016-12-15T07:37:00

I just pressed all of the buttons whenever they were off cooldown and pressed "yes" to every question. My gold kept climbing and the face stayed happy. Being a king is easy!

Really nice graphics, the "isometric" text was hard to read but also kind of cool so I'm not sure how to feel about it.

I liked the explanation of why the king stays in the room, clever take on the theme! Overall, pretty solid for a compo entry!

The Employee by pLaw 2016-12-13T03:54:00

Incredibly cool concept, I love your take on the theme.

Mortal by Robert 2016-12-13T02:29:00

You should really separate the 32 / 64 bit into two separate download links, that way your user only has to download the one they need.

Like many other people here I got stuck on the second puzzle. I tried to throw the first ball at the second to knock it down but there's an invisible wall there. Whelp. I'm out of ideas.

The ball impact noises feel really nice.

KonMatch3 by sugarbyte 2016-12-13T02:19:00

The music was really nice and you had a really interesting take on the Match-3 genre.

Nightowl by Miko 2016-12-13T03:17:00

I read the description on itch and I'm pretty excited. I liked Emily Is Away which this reminds me of a lot.

The story is well told and well presented. A few typos here and there but otherwise very good.

What happened to Michael? by BubsyPoochies 2016-12-15T00:59:00

Neat idea and well executed.

Also break* not brake. ;)

Jewel Defender by kd7uiy 2016-12-13T04:06:00

Consider itch.io for downloads instead of dropbox. ;)

Thanks for reviewing my game, to return the favor I'll review yours!

I figured out the mechanics and what I supposed to do pretty quick without the game needing to explain it to me, so good job on that front.

It took me a while to figure out what the rotate buttons were for. Once I did I wished there were hotkeys for them.

Pretty good for a first timer on your own. ;)