Chess Hellevator by BoxedMeatRevolution 2021-04-27T21:14:06Z
Very good game! Combos were extremely satisfying, the themes and gameplay all tied together very well.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → pixelbug
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 48 | Deeper and deeper | UnderwOtter | compo | 328 | 3.60 | 3.69 | 3.39 | 3.93 | 3.56 | 2.87 | 3.57 | 3.52 | |
| 2018 | 41 | Combine 2 Incompatible Genres | DRAGON PET SIMULATOR (Virtual Pet + Stealth) | compo | 3.22 | 3.09 | 2.63 | 3.68 | 3.27 | 2.18 | 3.31 | 3.09 |
Very good game! Combos were extremely satisfying, the themes and gameplay all tied together very well.
Very well done! The game got me hooked after a bit and I played a lot more than I expected to. The main thing I feel mixed about is the fact that mashing click is basically 90% of the game, and while I'd be lying if I said it didn't keep me more engaged, I feel like it would've been less tiring to just hold click and have a shovel cooldown that could be upgraded. Still, the game loop is well-made and I was very happily surprised to find that the game even had some adaptive music. (It's also probably just a personal problem but I had a lot of difficulty finding the shop button + realizing that money carried over between rounds because I assumed the title screen meant that the game was over, and that the shop button was a quit button)
Love the aesthetic and general idea, but with more time I can see it becoming a lot better. The combat seemed a bit bare to me especially since the one enemy was very exploitable, but I'm assuming more enemies would've been added with more time.
@samdwester Thank you! I expected there to be font settings to make it more readable but wasn't able to find any, and once I found a font to replace it, I had already written all the lines and it required adjusting all the sizes and dialogue. If I make a low resolution game again, I'll definitely find a low resolution font in advance.
@ everyone else, pressing E felt like the natural decision to me while making it but I can definitely understand it leading to frustrating circumstances while running low on air, so it probably would've been better to make it automatic. Still, I'm happy so many people enjoyed it, and that the mechanics worked out since I wasn't sure how people would react to it while playing for the first time.
@madorly @kotzi Thank you very much!
I did a lot of testing on making sure the items couldn't softlock you, but since certain items were just outright better than others, I had to make a very specific build path in the beginning. Since the end goal of the game is to get all of the upgrades, and all the items add up to the prices exactly, you really have to explore every inch. That unfortunately means a bit of blind exploration, though everyone I watched play was able to get there eventually. (There miiiight possibly be ways to break it? But me and other people have tried to break it already, so for it to be possible you'd probably have to try REALLY hard lol)
There was definitely some room for more balance and making things easier, but I feel like if I expanded this game's concept sometime I'd have to make some big changes due to the inherent problems lol
Beautiful game, love the arcade feel with the graphics and sounds. Other than what's already been mentioned (the gun's/bullet's properties making aiming hard and kind of unsatisfying), one suggestion I have is having an indicator for where you get hit from, because I often got hit from the side or the back when I felt like I should've been sidestepping shots just fine. Maybe the game would've stuck with me more if I gave it more time, but still well done overall.
Very nice! Solid, charming app that's responsive and easy to play. I agree with most of the above sentiments, and if you continue to work on the game I can see the current mechanics helping it become really interesting. As a note about the mobile version, I think the left and right movement at least would be better as on-screen buttons so that responding to the rocks would be a lot faster and easier.
Nicely done! There were a few problems I had, the first one being pathfinding troubles (people getting stuck on rocks, and sometimes failing to interact with things close to a wall), and after having to deal with multiple low health members, I would've preferred if they were prioritized for eating berries rather than the ones already at full health. Towards the end the game started lagging a lot since I was playing the web version with all the people I had, but that's understandably harder to fix. Still, I want to emphasize that it was really impressive how many things you got into the game (it was a LOT longer than I expected), and it was definitely well-made.
Very nice concept! I like the inversion on the theme, and the particle effects and screenshake work real well for the game feel. While the base gameplay works well, I feel like it stales a bit due to the endless nature of the game and think it'd be more interesting to have more things happen over time. My thoughts would be things like more missiles over time, countered by upgrades that would allow you to throw more rocks or throw rocks faster (with the currency probably being the counter on the top right).
Very well done! Not only was the gameplay surprisingly tight and clearly made with care (realized that the collision hitbox was very generous and let me survive close calls, thank goodness), I was also impressed with how well-animated the main character was. I wasn't quite able to beat your high score on the first level, but this was my best score. high score.png
Most problems I had with the game have already been mentioned (or fixed, as I see in the update), but still wanted to say very very well done on the graphics, I'd say it matches some published games' quality.
Really liked how it controlled and the stomp is very satisfying. I also thought slow mo would be OP at first, but I think switching back and forth is actually really important once you have to start dodging enemy bullets, which requires dash. The enemy attacks would probably have to be less underwhelming to emphasize that, though. Still, the base gameplay is really good and that's the best thing to get down imo
Very nicely done! I really liked the atmosphere between the minimal color palette and sounds (despite being just one sound, the ambient ringing worked really well), and even with just the current setup I can see it being a very solid game with only a few quality of life improvements (mainly the AI, already mentioned here).
Love the idea and I can see some potential in it, but the game didn't really come together for me. The goal wasn't clear after defeating all the robots, and while you got the rhythm gameplay down (even without music), it doesn't seem to make sense with the theme. Personally I think the game would work perfectly fine as something like a roguelike with the current setup, and the combat having more depth would be nice.
First off, BEAUTIFUL game, love the effects and lighting. There were a few things that were confusing at first, but they all made sense in the end (e.g. running into walls felt awkward but it also felt realistic, getting trapped by the squid felt inescapable but I reread the controls and realized I had to mash Space rather than just pressing or holding it, and I wanted a way to heal but the focus was on a survival game). The kelp disappearing forces you to go deeper which is good, and once I figured out the gameplay loop it was nice. Would only suggest more things happen as you go deeper, because while it does get harder it's also still slow and the same loop in general, at least afaik.
Beautiful game! Love the storyline and humor. The clunky gameplay worked really well for the mood, but was a bit difficult at times, though I think the level design usually made it clear how and where to use it. The charging time could've been lowered by a bit to compensate, though, since it adds a lot of time to clearing levels. Still, I liked how the terminal velocity meter helped create that tension before landing where you aren't sure if you'll make a jump or not.
Very nicely done! The artstyle is very good, but the main thing I would suggest is just some sort of seashell counter, since there isn't much feedback for collecting them. Still, it's a solid game and the level design helped guide me well even with the small camera view.
There's a few things I think could've been improved (for example the minigames seem to keep going even after you win), but the concept and mood were pulled off really well. Getting stuck in a room with rows and rows of arcade cabinets (which quickly becomes a maze) and even having an exit door just to find that it's locked really add to the mood.
Pretty solid game, but I got stuck on the fourth level (walljump made me auto wall jump, but once I reached the ledge I just fell down?)
Worth mentioning that the code is probably covered with bad practice. I haven't 100% learned GameMaker but I really wanted to participate this time, so I went for results rather than learning everything bottom up.
@Ryunos Yeah, I was planning on doing different stealth segments but I gave up in the end because it became a lot harder for me to do than I thought it would lol
Technically there's 8 endings (I'm leaving the number at 7 because 2 of them might be hard to distinguish between), but there's 3 main endings and the other ones just have a different message at the very end depending on what you do.
@david-boeger Thanks for the feedback!
Since this was my first game jam (and actually the first game I've ever published, too) I decided to scope it down a lot because I didn't know how long it would take. The multiple endings were actually added on as extra (and was something I decided to do pretty late in development), so some of them literally were copy/pasted and edited.
Not using these as excuses, but these are the reasons for how it turned out.