Anger Birb: World by Jezzamon 2017-05-16T23:50:36Z
Hilarious little game. Love the sound effects!
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → potatolain
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 50 | Delay the inevitable | Feline Flood Fiasco | compo | 40 | 4.00 | 3.91 | 3.41 | 3.83 | 3.76 | 3.68 | 3.11 | 3.57 | |
| 2021 | 49 | Unstable | Dream Dog Dilemma | compo | 45 | 4.00 | 3.67 | 3.73 | 3.91 | 3.95 | 3.61 | 3.38 | 3.75 | |
| 2021 | 48 | Deeper and deeper | Through Dimensions | compo | 39 | 4.14 | 3.95 | 3.88 | 3.36 | 3.97 | 3.75 | 3.03 | 3.92 | |
| 2019 | 44 | Your life is currency | Depths | compo | 14 | 4.09 | 3.53 | 3.76 | 3.71 | 3.82 | 4.04 | 2.82 | 4.30 | |
| 2018 | 42 | Running out of space | Closing In: Barney's Daring Escape | compo | 42 | 3.97 | 3.59 | 3.19 | 4.02 | 3.91 | 3.51 | 3.11 | 3.87 | |
| 2017 | 40 | The more you have, the worse it is | Fluffy Space Escape | compo | 64 | 3.90 | 3.78 | 3.90 | 3.94 | 3.75 | 3.52 | 2.90 | 3.61 | |
| 2017 | 38 | A Small World | Missing Lands | compo | 173 | 3.55 | 3.25 | 2.86 | 3.19 | 3.13 | 3.24 | 2.43 | 3.34 |
Hilarious little game. Love the sound effects!
Fun little game. The levels were interesting, though I did also manage to beat it with only double-jump. (The little smiley character near the end left me curious, so I had to see what was over him. You've gotten a lot of feedback already so I'm not gonna reiterate things. There's a lot good with this game, and there's a few things that could use a little improvement. (Still a great entry!)
One thing I didn't see mentioned much was the quick restart. I'll be honest, that felt kinda jarring to me. I like getting back to the action quick, but it's a little surprising when I respawn after dying and start moving again before I've fully processed that I died. The game was still completely playable, but I did get surprised by that a bit. (Also like someone else mentioned, I looked for a jump button for a little bit before figuring out I had to unlock jumping. Not a negative though.)
Really liked this! I wasn't sure what to expect coming in, but I got a solid little platformer. I really liked the physics in this; made it fun to play around with.
I tried to take the car with me, though I stopped before the thumbtacks. I'm glad I did because I would've gotten super sad when I hit the tall wooden wall!
Quite a fun entry.
I don't think there's much to say that hasn't already been said. I really liked this entry. I like the music/sound, and the gravity mechanic felt natural and was easy to get used to. It was that perfect kind of simple that made the game really fun to play.
Well done!
Nice little tower defense game - I spent longer on this than I realized. I got to 1008. Would have been fun to have a win condition of some sort, but it's fun even without.
A mining game in a ludum dare? This is new and welcome!
Not a whole lot to say that others haven't covered, but it was fun to play through. (No issues on win7 x64, btw)
Fun little game! I'll echo the other comments so far in that I like the art. Was simple to pick up and a nice little challenge to master.
I really like the "c to continue" after beating the game. Seems like kind of a free-for-all. I got 15 boxes (and 8 helicopter crashes :D) my first try on that.
This is actually a fun little game once you get the hang of it. Got up to $260 (if I remember right) before I died the last time. The mechanics work pretty well. Fun times.
Fun little game! I really like the gravity quirks with jumping and firing. X and C felt like odd keys to me (I come from a world where I use a lot of emulators where I find myself using z and x a lot... so I kept accidentally being one key over!)
I got to around 1,450 I think.
I love this in theory, but when I start it up I can hear the music, hear my typing, and see the blinking cursor... but my text is missing. Does the game expect a certain font to be installed?
Windows 7/x64, Java version's admittedly a bit old. (Can grab it if you need it.)
UPDATE: This worked on my Windows 10 laptop... might have been a font issue.
I managed to get this working on my laptop and found it pretty amusing. Silly, but fun. I think my issue may have been a missing font. Keyboard layout is us/english, and I couldn't get any characters to show up.
My Windows 7 desktop had the issue above, but my windows 10 laptop didn't. I'm wondering if perhaps it's an issue with a missing font. At any rate, not an issue for me anymore! Thanks for a fun game.
I'll second the pretty graphics; (and transitions) I like it. It's kinda fun to create your own goal, though I can see making a few goals being pretty fun too.
Gave better feedback on the NESDev forums but this is great fun. Always great to see more retro console entries!
I love games with simple mechanics like this; they tend to be really polished in most areas, and quite fun to play. This was no exception! The intro text was also great. Seems like I'm really rehashing other comments, so I'll stop there.
I did manage to get a high score of 470 though!
Quite fun, though very challenging. I love the pixel art and the music; that definitely shines here.
If I had to give some constructive feedback, it seems surprising that the enemies (and the player, actually!) don't get knocked back by attacks. I think it would make the controls feel a lot more natural.
The cellphone intro thing was kinda cool too; that's a different way of doing it. I'll admit it took me a minute to find the "Continue to Menu" text though. Thought the game just didn't have a menu :D
Not a whole lot to say that others haven't touched on, but I really enjoyed this. It took me a couple minutes to figure out what was going on, but the music and atmosphere kept me around long enough to figure it out on my own. The music and sound effects really added to the experience. Seriously, well done.
I had a couple thoughts on ways to solve issues others have mentioned - I'll share them in case they're useful to you.
As others mentioned, the goal was definitely a little unclear at first. I think you could have explained a lot by just always having the timer visible, but perhaps grayed out until you took all of your shots. At least for me, the second I saw that timer I thought to myself "oh, I get it now!"
Another thing - as other have mentioned, it was really hard to tell which side of the planet your shots were on. If the planet were less transparent (not all the way though; it's super helpful to see what's coming!) it would have made a lot of difference.
Lastly, the reunion scene was a little confusing to me - I actually thought it was another level. (Unless that was a level, in which case I fail :D) I thought there might be another puzzle element to figure out on there, with the balls smiling when they got close to each other. I actually had to come back to this page to figure out that I beat it. A little text congratulating the user could have made a lot of difference.
(Note: I used the web version on Chrome in fullscreen, in case anything I said was a bug. Happy to give more information if you need it.)
Don't take any of this as negative; this is amazing for a 3 day effort. Thanks for a fun game!
Ooh, a gameboy game! This was pretty fun - I like the odd reverse direction firing quirk. Always great to see more retro games in these contests.
I managed to get both endings and I have to say... this game blew me away. The graphics were wonderful, and the symbolism certainly wasn't lost. You nailed the atmosphere you were going for.
Thank you.
This is great - especially if you're really new to making games. You've already got enough comments explaining what worked and what didn't, so I won't repeat all of it, but this was a really fun game. I only got to around 700 points but I enjoyed getting there. (Those spray cans just wrecked me every time...)
The design was good, the idea was clever... the added audio was pretty funny. (Esp the intro) Well done!
Yep... I can do 6502 assembly but for that strict of a timeline, C seemed like the better option. I can do lots of fun (albeit painfully inefficient) things. The tools available are pretty mature, too. (Last LD I did, I made a gameboy game. I can't speak as highly of that toolset...)
I do kinda wish I had a Vectrex to check out your game on hardware. There are so many great older consoles out there. (But money and space are finite, sadly)
The web-based version of this broke for a little bit due to negligence on my part; it's back up again. (Rom download continued to work)
Thanks for the feedback both of you! I actually wrote a similar game for Gameboy the last LD I entered.
Also @kantieno, I technically wrote the nes-c-boilerplate library it's using in assembly... that counts, right? :D (Well, okay... it's less than 100 lines of assembly. shh >_>)
In all seriousness I prefer assembly to C for the most part, but in a game jam it's just so much quicker/easier to have a high-level language.
(Update: oh hey @mentions actually do something. Neat!)
Wow, thanks for that; very thorough!
I like your suggestions... they're things I always seem to leave behind (even in non-game-jam situations...) so I really should try for that next time. In particular, better/tighter collision detection, and the flat movement. Your assumption was correct - it's just flat. I've never quite gotten acceleration right, though I'll also admit I haven't tried too hard yet.
Empowerment/abilities would be awesome too - that's something I'd have to plan from the outset next time. I tend to rather like the idea of being a semi-helpless character, but at the same time... it certainly could have made later stages interesting. Something to think about, for sure.
Thanks for the feedback!
Thanks for the feedback to everyone.
And yeah.. I know I need to tighten up the collision boxes. It was on my to-do list and somehow got dropped. I even had extra time at the end - I could have done it.
I'm debating making a post-jam version with changes like that, some color fixes (it doesn't look that great on the real console; the greens bleed together a lot) figure out how to do movement with acceleration, potential level tweaks/abilities, etc... people seemed to really like this one so it might be worth the time.
@neontropics Agreed on the graphical thing - graphics just aren't one of my strong suits. The crab and skeleton actually came out alright. The rest... well, those are the crap sprites :sweat_smile:
I figured - the typo just made me laugh! No worries
@sgadrat - I really like em-fceux, except it has an odd bug on the Windows machines I've used it on, where the right key is always pressed. That's kind of a dealbreaker for me.
It's extremely smooth otherwise, and I haven't spent much time looking at it yet. If I can figure that out and either submit a patch (or fix an issue with my system) I'll likely switch over. I just don't feel comfortable directing people to an emulator I can't 100% support.
Thanks for the feedback!
@philomory I'd never seen that article before - that's incredibly cool. I might want to consider that one day, though figuring it out in the 48 hour window of one of these might be too much. Still, that's a different and unique way to think about it. Thanks!
This is an incredibly cool idea, and I loved the graphics. The gameduck is great, and the player sprite/etc look really nice, especially for the 48 hour timeline. You already know and understand my only real complaints so I won't go into them. Fun idea, and it'd be really interesting if you ever expanded it.
This was a fun game... like paperboy but the aggression against everything is intentional! It's one of those games that has a simple mechanic that's easy to pick up, and fun to master.
I did run into the bug someone else mentioned where I eventually felt the need to leave the world behind. (High score was 621)
going to spaaaaaaace.png
Not sure there's much that hasn't been said, but this is pretty amazing. The game's fun enough to keep playing for a bit, the difficulty ramps up as you keep playing, it looks nice, the music is enjoyable (I really like that it changes during munch mode!) the controls are solid, you get a good indication when munch mode is ending so you don't just get knocked out when it changes, and the world evolves as time goes on. I really enjoyed this one!
I got to 107k after 1:36. Thanks for a fun little break
Clever idea; really fun. Glad to see it's being expanded on post-jam., too! The collectible idea is really cool.
Would it make sense to make surviving give you points like before, then collectibles give you bonus points? It actually felt much less satisfying seeing a score of 1 after grabbing a note, but that might be due to my expecting a score of 20 or so by the time I got to it.
I tend to really like rhythm games and you don't see them often during contests like this, so that was a nice treat. Well done!
Fun game! This felt really polished for a 3d game in a game jam. (Esp. the compo!) I got to wave 7 before dying.
I didn't have issues with spawn rates or anything. The difficulty grew as I got to later levels. It seemed to work quite well.
It would have been really nice to have a way to regain health for your heart - maybe just another pickup or something. Also, trapping the mouse would have been good. I got knocked out of the game 3-4 times because I clicked outside the unity window. (I use 3 monitors on my desktop, so that's why) That said, this didn't hurt my enjoyment of the game.
Well done; thanks for a fun game!
Ah, I was wondering if I might've just missed it. Good to know!
This was a really clever/unique idea; I really liked it. I'll admit I didn't beat it, but I did get to 9 or 10 votes before dying.
I'll agree with others that the limited number of ballots kinda made it harder - starting over is painful. It'd be super fun to have people race on this, and have to come up with more efficient ways to combine them to compete. Having a few levels with different numbers of fish also would have been cool.
All that said, given the time limit for the compo, this is great! Well done.
Fun little game. Was sad to have no sound, but hey... 48 hours is only so long.
Only thing I'd suggest is - it might be nice if you made it clear which player was active when you're in 2 player mode. It's not that hard to take turns but a visual cue seems like it might still help.
I'm shocked there are so few comments on this - this game's unique and really fun. Very well done for a first game jam. It did take a little while to get used to the controls - it didn't help that I accidentally hit numlock a few times while playing. I found it quite playable though. The graphics are nice and the controls felt pretty solid, even if unconventional.
The collisions on the waves (swipes, I guess) were really loose, but it actually made the game a little easier/more playable so I didn't mind. The shield would've been nice as a toggle, or hold to keep it, but also just a nice to have.
Overall this is a great first game, and honestly a great game overall. Well done!
Pretty awesome stuff. Always great to see another retro console game entry!
Just dropping another comment in to say I remembered to vote on this. Great entry.
This was really cool - agreed with others; a game jam game that's online (and where the networking seems to work well, no less!) is a rare sight. I played for a while, though I never saw one side win or lose. This did keep my attention a bit longer than some other games.
I think this could be really fun if it were expanded a bit as others have suggested. I like the idea of matches ending a little more quickly. Well done.
Also, the music reminds me a bit of older SNES games, a la Illusion of Gaia or Chrono Trigger. Might just be that I'm a retro gaming kick lately, but it was still nice to listen to.
Fun little game - would definitely be fun on a phone. I could see this working really well with touch controls. The collision detection did get a little annoying, and it felt a little jittery (but that might be my computer)
That said, I love the Katamari series, and the game was definitely enjoyable. Thanks for a fun game!
I love it! Mentioned it on the NESDev forums but it's always great to see more games for older consoles.
Nice little game - the graphics stuck out as a highlight. I definitely agree that children would probably love this game. (And that's not a bad thing)
I'm guessing the levels are procedurally generated - you should call that out in the description! That's really cool - keep in mind your audience is mostly fellow game devs. We get why that's cool and worth mentioning.
Nicely done.
Heh, this was fun. Went well enough on a 1080p screen. I got to around 11k points before exploding. Like someone else mentioned, I accidentally skipped the win screen so that's about all I know. Fun times though, esp for 6 hours!
Hehe, I beat the last guy's score by a bit :D
good enough
Hilarious little game; definitely made my night a little better.
I can confirm what octonion said - the zip seems to be missing your data folder. Don't think I'll be able to play it until that happens :(
Neat little game - I loved the graphics. It felt painful to go back to the beginning after one death... but then again my game works the same way so I guess I shouldn't be bothered. I'll echo the other players saying the main character felt slow... but it was still completely playable. Well done.
I beat it! Most fun I've ever had shooting rocks in a desert :D
That was really enjoyable. I really liked the procedurally generated levels. That's something I've never experimented with but want to. You pulled it off well. I also liked the progression with difficulty and added life/damage. That worked well - I never felt like I was super over/under powered.
I did run into a bug someone else mentioned - sometimes the controls would lock with me walking in one direction - lost to a few bosses because of that.
The bosses also felt just a touch bland visually. (Any chance that was one of the last things before you hit the deadline? :)) Even a simple color change for each stage would've made it a bit better. I did notice the later ones were harder (that last one took me a few tries!) that was only a comment on appearance.
Overall though this rocked. Definitely one of the more fun games I've played through so far. Well done!
Pretty fun little game. No android device so I had to play with a mouse - I feel like it has to be a lot more fun with touch.
Fun little game - the art and a capella music are great. (Also, whee!) I got a city to it's 3rd evolution before the other ants overwhelmed me. It seemed like the way to get rid of them was to jump on them, but the hitbox was really weird, so I had a hard time hitting them successfully.
Still, it was pretty fun and I really liked the art. Well done.
I like it! I didn't manage to get very far (legitimately, read on :grinning:) - I think I only got 3 or 4, but the mechanics were really well thought out. The collisions thing with the slowdown really felt natural, and with a little more drive I could have probably gotten a higher score.
Of course, you included a feature you called buggy. I couldn't resist playing with it a bit, and, well...
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I got 104! Totally legit honest! :sweat_smile:
Okay, so really what I did was die once, then hold right click while spawning as many planets as I could. For some reason it counted a lot of them as having orbited (probably because they did) bouncing off of me with my short burst of invincibility. Got a kick out of that.
Really fun game all around; well done!
**Update**: I managed to safe a gif; it's pretty entertaining. Too big for the LD site though; it's here if you want to see it : https://imgur.com/a/8lssv
This is... incredible. The fact that you pulled this off in the compo timeline blows my mind.
The puzzles were the perfect level of challenging, for me. The story was... unsettling, but in a way that worked extremely well. It also linked to the gameplay mechanic really well. The theme wasn't super present, but of course it doesn't have to be. I really liked the subtle lava lamp.
You absolutely earned your win; congratulations!
Fun game - I got so close to winning but the pirates overwhelmed me. (97k and 1 asteroid very close to base) Liked the music and graphics quite a bit. Thanks for a fun game.
Cool engine and fun little game - very reminiscent of shooting games from decades past. However, I may have run into a bug - after getting the green skulls and using the green pad to open a green path, (near the blue one that said "two blue skulls are elsewhere") I used the warp point and died while getting the blue skulls. I succeeded on my second attempt, but the green path had disappeared and I seemed to be stuck.
There may have been another path around, but I looked for a little while and didn't find one. Still a cool game, at any rate. Well done.
Played throough it again post bugfix and managed to beat it this time; very fun. Thanks for a great game!
Managed to beat this one - the last few gems were in a sneaky spot, but I guess it's natural I'd want to check there first. I was panicking over where I could have left something behind. The graphics are great for the era you seem to be going for, and the sound's pretty nice too.
I have similar nitpicks to a few other folks, in that movement was a little hard to work with. I think if you had added strafing it would have made a huge difference. Also, I was able to use my sword to tap buttons through some barriers, and sequence break a little.
I was a little sad that there wasn't an end screen - the game just starts over. Still, super solid entry; thanks for making it!
Very cool idea - I'll admit I found the blindness levels impossible and quit early. (I even opened the game in a tab and tried to get it down, but couldn't get past the first level, so I had to give in. Well done.
Nice little puzzle game - the combining items mechanic was clever and not something you see often. It took me a little while to realize that there were multiple ways to work with what I started with (game jam games often really only have one path; it's not a bad thing, just not what I expected!) Thanks for an interesting game!
Fun little game! I'm a huge fan of retro consoles (my entry is actually an NES game!) so it caught my eye. The coin idea was really cool and I think you executed it well. Your graphics were also pretty spot on, as was the music. I got a real strong Link's Awakening vibe from it. The collisions are a bit off, (as others have noted) but it doesn't really detract from gameplay that much from what I saw.
If I had to give one piece of constructive feedback, I'd say the world felt a little big for how slow the player moves at start. Getting back to a dungeon after dying felt like an arduous task.
Fun entry; thanks for sharing!
Fun little game - though I think the corruptions might have an affinity for the right side of the screen. I stayed left and avoided most boxes at the beginning and managed to survive 3+ minutes without too much trouble. (The timer also breaks if you get past a minute :))
I really liked the music and graphics in your entry. Thanks for a fun game
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I really liked where this game was going, though I'll admit I didn't make it to the end. Not really much that hasn't been said - the sound is pretty awesome as others have mentioned. The floor tiles were a little distracting but I could work with it. Don't really tend to see rhythm games in LD, so that was cool. Thanks for sharing!
Neat little game - I saw on discord you might be expanding this with more vehicles and such, and getting something onto the Google play store. I think that's awesome and has a lot of potential.
I managed to get 1900 points at my best.
Good luck going forward with this!
Pirate cat in a hot air baloon with more cat pirates trying to take your cat treasure. Who would have thunk it? This is amazing/hilarious. Thanks for sharing.
I managed to get a pretty good score my third run:
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Cute little puzzler - thanks for sharing!
I had a lot of fun with this! As you stated the game's a little unclear unless you read the game's page. (I did, so I was fine :p)
I managed to get pretty far along. The mini game really made this entry for me. It's something I haven't seen before, which is always welcome!
Thanks for a fun game.
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Nice game! I haven't played a terminal-text based game like that in a very long time. (I made a tiny mario-like sidescroller in the same style when I was in college; this reminded me of that)
Thanks for sharing!
Neat little game - I don't think I've got anything to say that hasn't already been said - the movement does feel sluggish but the idea is pretty neat and the other mechanics play well into it. Well done.
Very cute little game, with easy to pick up rules - I like it! The graphics and music were both enjoyable. (also bonus points, I played it on Christmas since I just noticed one of you commented on my game :D)
My only complaint was that it didn't capture the mouse pointer in windowed mode, so it was a little awkward to play. I still managed, and from looking at other comments it was fixed in a newer build. So, no harm done!
Thanks for a fun game
Fun game - I ended playing through a couple times and getting 72nd on the high score chart. (Not amazing, but I'll take it!) Very clever interpretation of the theme. Thanks for sharing this!
Thanks for the great review comments everyone!
I hadn't thought of skipping the movement animation - that would be a cool feature. Given more time, I'd probably rewrite a lot of the movement engine - it's very hacked together, and unfortunately that shows. I also would probably want to add a skip/speedup for the level transition.
@jimbly I hadn't really thought about the theme like that; that's clever! I really only considered the surface-level idea that as you collect more gems, your movement speed gets worse. I can see where you'd get the idea though, and you're certainly welcome to think of it that way.
Thanks again for the great feedback everyone; it's always appreciated!
@torcado I appreciate the honest feedback on the music. If I'm honest, I feel music is easily my weakest skill when it comes to these game jams - I'm always surprised when people complement it. What I want to do next time around is have at least a few songs that I can switch between. I think in this case it also would have helped if I didn't restart the music between each level.
@kroltan I had never heard that song before, but I gave it a quick listen and I can kind of see it. Thanks for sharing!
I'm running out of ways to say great feedback, but it continues to be welcome, so thank you!
Now, for some specific concerns...
First, the movement concerns brought up by @tuism, @valkyrie and @frescogusto -- yeah, it's a problem. It's something I wanted to fix but I ran out of time if I actually wanted a working game. Lessons learned for next time.
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(longer explanation) It's really an engine issue - I did something very simple to make enemies try to follow you, and it sorta falls flat when you're close to enemies. I built a few of the earlier levels without noticing or getting into that situation, then ran into it and realized I would need to rewrite the engine to be smarter (I'm still not sure how to do that, if I'm honest) then remake every level I had so far. I would have had to sacrifice a lot to redo that, so I decided to live with it.
I tried to make levels that weren't negatively impacted, but it's really hard to think about all possible ways the player could move as they collect gems. Plus, working under a deadline is hard in itself. (I really didn't want to demote my game to a Jam game that far in)
If you're curious about the logic, after a player moves, each enemy calculates whether they are further from the player on the X axis or Y, then moves the full distance they are allowed to move in that direction. (Possibly passing the player) This mostly works, however if the x distance and y distance are equal, it always goes the same way. (In essence, I did if (x > y) { moveOnX() } else { moveOnY() } )
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@tuism thanks for the very detailed feedback - do you have any idea how I might make that clearer correlation you suggest? I likely won't be updating this game post-jam, but advice is always welcome for next time. (Note: If I hear a lot of interest in updating this post-jam I can be convinced!)
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@roy87 I've never seen that site before - it looks kind of interesting! That said, I don't think they natively support console games, such as the NES.
I might be able to get it to work, but it likely wouldn't be easy. Is there any real reason you want it on there?
You're certainly welcome to make a video if you'd like by the way; and please let me know if you do!
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@frescogusto Thanks for the comment on the level transitions. Interestingly enough they almost weren't included. That was the last nice-to-have feature on my list, and I started it 2 hours before the compo closed. I got it working with about 30 minutes to spare and decided to keep it!
(Sorry for the absurdly long comment - I'm off to play a few more games now :grinning:)
Thanks for playing!
@svr-audio - it's actually a real NES game - there's a rom download on the site you can play with fceux and the such. Thanks for the complement on the palette, but that's just what the NES emulator developers chose :)
@mipelius you're actually the second person to ask about the differences in tiles. I wish I had laid out the first level a bit differently - the tiles are simply there to make the levels look less boring. They have no special meaning.
For other rules... you are able to move x tiles per turn, and that number goes down each time you collect a gem. (Noted by your speed in the HUD at the bottom) The enemy movement is definitely confusing... they are tied to the same grid that you are, and have their own set number of tiles that they always move. They get a turn after you move, each time. They will try to do whatever moves them closest to you - preferring up/down if the horizontal and vertical distances are the same.
I think a second instructions screen that clearly laid out movement would have helped a lot, as well as some different way of dealing with enemy movement when horizontal distance = vertical distance.
Thanks for the feedback!
Fun little game - quick note, the web version doesn't seem to capture the mouse pointer so it's a little bit hard to control. The Windows version worked without a hitch though. I was able to get through it.
Worth noting - the door/wall in the starting area isn't solid; you can walk through it then fall through the world forever. Had to restart the game after doing that one.
Fun little game - I liked the music and sound. I only skimmed the text at first and was surprised when I couldn't lose or get a score, but you kinda already said that, soo, not really an issue. I kept it going a couple minutes. Thanks for sharing!
Well done - really liked this game - particularly the in-game music. I'm always a fan of simple graphics/gameplay and you made it fun. (Though I'm guessing that's more a consequence of the pico-8 target!)
Cookie clicker mixed with bullet hell - never seen that before. This played really well for what it was; I really liked it!
I did have the same bug as Thomas Molby described above at one point, which was a little bit frustrating. Seriously though, well done, especially with the limited time you described having.
Quirky fun little game - the voiceovers did make it pretty funny. (Though, the distortion on the voice sometimes got hard to understand.)
I managed to get 7th on the leaderboards for a bit (used name "throwitall")
I threw the phone in too; oops
Wow, lots of folks have played this already and there's not much that hasn't already been said. Incredibly good, well-polished game given the time limits. Well done!
Managed to get it working - pretty fun little game given the limitations. The controls felt kinda weird, but I got used to them.
M3gXmR8.png
For anyone who hasn't done Amiga emulation before, here's some steps you can follow: http://www.lemonamiga.com/help/faq_emulation.php - it took maybe 10 minutes to get up and running.
Of all the ways I could have ended my day, I never would have guessed I'd end up making futile attempts at making a cat faceplant onto a sausage, but such is life.
Quirky little game - I found 8 of the 10 myself. Quite fun! (Also, I was surprised the music wasn't just someone going "na naaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa nanana na na na na this isn't katamari" (But the included music wasn't bad)
I like it! The gameboy asthetic hit well - it's simple but works well for the game. (Though, I almost wanted to think of it more as a game-and-watch type game) I tend to build and be drawn towards that style, so that gets points from me. Didn't record my high score, sorry! :(
I did have a little trouble determining which platforms were fire vs water - I had them backwards for my first play! Once I had it figured out it wasn't bad though. Thanks for a fun game!
This is a hilarious little game - I think my only real frustration is that I can explode my head with zero coins by simply walking into a wall the wrong way. The head explode sound cracked me up. Great entry; thanks for sharing!
Pretty fun game - the main character is adorable and I got drawn in by that.
I'll agree with other comments that it was very easy - but I really loved the graphics. I didn't really have trouble seeing anything, though I'll admit I blew by most of the cannons without them getting a chance to aim at me.
Fun game; thanks for submitting it.
I just noticed that I completely missed your comment on my game from a few weeks ago; I try to make a point to play and rate anyone who plays one of my games; I feel really bad about missing it; sorry! Just gave it a quick try now.
Your art is really unique; I liked it quite a bit. The atmosphere is pretty good too. Otherwise there's not much to said that hasn't already been said. Thanks for an interesting game.
Windows build worked for me - this is so simple and fun; I loved it! The drunk mechanics were fun to play with (I got my character blasted and still managed to get to about 30)
One nitpick - it'd be nice if the restart key weren't the same as the jump key - I missed my score a few times because I was trying to do that last jump and missed.
Great entry; thanks for sharing!
2017-12-04 13_41_48-ParkourGame.png
I was actually thinking to myself this would be a great mobile game when I was playing it. You definitely should!
Short little game, but quite funny.
Fun little game - I managed to beat it on my second try - never used the crystal blast. (I honestly forgot it was an option) It was hard but mostly fair. The music was pretty great. I didn't find the shoot sound effect grating - perhaps a little loud as others said but it didn't really detract from the game.
I did find the hitbox for the crystals (or perhaps the length of the hook vs how long it looked) a bit frustrating. It seemed like the grappling hook would sometimes hit a crystal and it wouldn't actually count.
Well done overall!
What on earth did I just play? :D
Odd little game, but quite fun! I will say it felt a little easy, (the mother fight I just strafed backwards and hit cookie until it ended) but still, not a bad entry at all. Thanks for making it!
Fun game - I really liked the slow distortion of the game's appearance and sound. I managed to do alright.
2017-12-04 15_37_55-Let's mix some drinks!.png
Not much to say that hasn't already been said; this was fun and the temperature idea was really innovative! Unique take on the theme, too. Thanks for a fun game!
Wee, chiptune-ish metal-ish that-one-jerk-at-the-metal-show simulator!
This was pretty great, and a unique take on the theme. Gave a good level of challenge and didn't overstay its welcome either. I managed to get a high score of 450,328.
Thanks for a fun game
Dang, I was entertained with this before I realized the constraints you worked with. This is _incredible_ for 2h30m. I don't think I have much to say that hasn't already been said, but very clever interpretation of the theme, and definitely something I've never seen before. The fact that you packed it into 1kb is also really impressive!
Thanks for an entertaining game!
ps: Semi related thing you might get a kick out of: someone got [defender running in a browser's favicon](http://www.p01.org/defender_of_the_favicon/) a while back.
I really liked this entry a lot; well done! As someone else mentioned, I really like that you have checkpoints; that's something you don't see often and honestly kept me playing after a frustrating death! I also really liked the graphical style, and how you reused the same area of the level multiple times with the different powerups. (Plus rampaging through the level in the final form felt awesome)
My only complaint about this is that it was a little tough that enemies respawned the second they went offscreen - those little guys got some real cheap shots on me as a result. I was kinda surprised that block breaking was persistent but they weren't. That said, it didn't deter me much and I still beat it!
As a retro lover (and dev!) myself, this really hit a sweet spot. Thanks for a great entry!
Always awesome to see another retro console game during Ludum Dare!
I absolutely loved the graphics and music; I haven't gotten around to playing many homebrew genesis games thus far. I didn't have a second controller so I kinda just went as long as I could with just the bird. (Which turned out to be pretty long, since the bird can just leave the screen if it wants :))
I don't have a genesis flashcart right now so I can't play on console, but definitely enjoyed seeing this. Thanks for a fun entry!
Definitely a cool idea; I liked the shrinking window as the player gets hit! (Though I'll admit, as others have said, the controls were a bit tough) I think I got through 4-5 dungeons.
Thanks for a fun game!
Wow! I followed you on twitter from a past LD entry; your games are unique and generally really enjoyable - visual novels just aren't a thing I run into very often during these. I liked the story, and I actually got all 4 endings. Graphics are great too.
Thanks for a great entry!
Not much to add - super nice graphics but as you've noted, not much game! Still a cool concept, and maybe the start of a cool game :grinning:
Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for the feedback thus far! (Also, that NES isn't in the background, exactly... it's running the game :wink:)
I'd really like more information about the door crash - I've never experienced that and it sounds really bad. It might be an issue with the underlying engine, and I really want to fix that if so!
@ghen If you get a chance, could you let me know any of these details you remember? 1. was this the first door you saw? If not do you remember what level it was on? 2. Were you able to move the character? 3. Did the darkness eventually catch up and reset the level? 4. Did the music keep playing? 5. Is there anything else you can remember?
No hard feelings if you don't get to it, but I'd be really curious if you can share any of those details. If anyone else hits that, please let me know.
Thanks for playing, to everyone who has!
Hello!
I super look forward to your video; it's always great to see someone play through.
There are actually 13 parts, but only 12 are required for the "good" ending. There are a couple that you could miss if you're a bit slow at some points, and there's one that requires exploring a branched path (look for an arrow on the ground).
They key thing could definitely happen if the darkness gets to a key (or a vacuum part!) before you do, which is pretty game-breaking. (I actually bet that's why you couldn't get all of them) I hadn't realized the flaw in my logic until now. That seems like the kind of fix that is allowed post-release, so I will try to get something out to remedy that. [rules, for anyone curious](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/rules) -- see the additional notes section.
Thanks for pointing this out; it may also explain an earlier comment.
Also for the map bit, I tried to catch all the places but I guess I'm not shocked that I still missed a few. Hopefully none were game breaking.
**Update**: Fixing this was very simple, so I've already released it as build #22 - the web version is up to date, and the changelog section has links to both the original and updated roms. Thanks again for pointing this out; I think I would have taken a long time to realize the problem if you hadn't!
Thanks again for all the kind comments! (And of course the lovely video!)
Also, wow, I never thought I'd hear that a LD game I made might be too long, haha... that's not a bad point though. People have a limited attention span for these games considering the number they have to play, and I probably could have cut a few levels and ended up with a more appealing game. Honestly, I got excited at the extra time I had using the new engine, and got a little carried away with level designing. Thanks for the honest feedback! :)
As always, thanks for the great feedback all!
I think my main issue with the online emulator is input and sound both lag a bit. It's thoroughly playable; it's just way better in a non-web-based emulator. (Also hi I'm running around rating all kinds of things on the site so I saw this almost immediately)
Thanks for the feedback! I'm not shocked people ran into enemy collision and stuck-in-wall problems. It's something my engine just doesn't protect well against. I really need to figure out if there's a way I can make my map converter warn about that, or something similar.
It's definitely been something that's on my mind, so thanks for bringing it up!
Hey - thanks for all the feedback! I've played around with hitboxes quite a bit I'm still not quite happy with them myself... will definitely keep iterating.
For collisions, did you play the for-the-deadline version, or the newer one? I know I caught a couple spots where you could walk off the edge and released a new version soon after. I wouldn't be shocked if there are more, but I haven't found them. Hope you were able to get through ok!
Thanks for playing :)
One more thanks for all the feedback. (though I promise I'll keep coming back and looking at this sometimes if people have more!)
Even more thanks to all the reviewers who scored this so highly! I'm absolutely ecstatic to see this break the top 50 overall. Almost makes me want to carry this forward, though I'm not sure where that would mean.
Thanks everyone!
Fun entry!
First thing's first; I really like the graphics. As someone else mentioned, they reminded me a lot of the Legend of Zelda series; especially the Link's Awakening/oracle series. I tend towards retro gaming a lot, so the gameboy-esque feel is quite nice! The music was pretty enjoyable as well.
I will say that enemies destroyed me very quickly - making the character invincible for a second or two after getting hit makes a world of difference. The game was very difficult, and I think this might have made it more bearable. It also seemed like there must be an optimal way through the dungeon - I found myself walking into enemies as soon as I went through a door very often.
All that said this was still a super fun entry to play - great accomplishment for two days! Thanks for a fun entry.
I really wanted to play this, but my iphone is a bit behind on ios versions and I don't have the ability to update it right now. Unfortunately that is the challenge of making things for systems with limited availability. I really hope you're able to find people that can play this.
Based on the video this looks really playable and seems like it makes good use of touch controls.
Thanks for sharing, and sorry I couldn't play this!
I really liked the quirkiness in this game and the changing dimensions - I almost stopped after the 2nd 2d level if I'm honest, but the game did a great job of re-grabbing my attention. Definitely an impressive accomplishment for 48 hours!
I was really excited for the 5th dimension idea -- not sure if I hit a glitch or it just wasn't fully fleshed out, but I never saw the universe split. By no means a deal-breaker though. The game was still really enjoyable.
Thanks for a fun game!
Fun little game! I can't really think of much to say that hasn't been said, but I quite enjoyed this. Thanks for a fun game!
Just got around to playing this - major props for procedural generation; that's always cool to see in a game jam. This isn't my normal style of games so I'll admit I was a little lost. I managed to rack up a planet score of 9.
The graphics were quite nice and it's definitely a cool idea! (Apologies for not being able to provide better feedback on this one)
I... I have no words.
Thank you for making the English translation - I would have played it in French if you had not, but my French is extremely rusty (High school was a long time ago for me...) so English was probably better.
I really like that you had different music in each scene. While the game itself was simple, the premise/story were something else entirely! I've played a lot of Ludum Dare games over the past few years, but this one stands out.
(PS: You should totally give a way for people to follow what you both do somewhere!)
Thank you.
I'm trying to stay in the habit of giving feedback for any game I rate... I don't have a lot to say that hasn't been said here though. The pixel art is wonderful, and the story shows through well.
I actually really liked the bouncing text mechanic; it really quickly drove home the "oh, crap, I'm a drunk, aren't I?" idea. It was hard to get right but I could tell that was the point.
Thank for a good game.
As others have said, the mechanics are very simple, which makes it easy to pick up and play. That combined with the relaxing background music make it quite enjoyable.
As another commenter mentioned, it's possible to leave the screen completely which makes the game rather hard to play. (Though I did manage to rack up a score of ~72 by just hitting the first two collectibles I saw, then just holding left indefinitely!) I'm not really sure what you could do to help that; one way might be to restrict spawning of powerups when you're past a certain distance from the edge. (Easier said than done, I'm sure)
The only other thing I'd mention is, it took me a very long time to figure out how to get the shield (pill item) - I assumed from the help screen that the pill would move me further out like the balls did, and just never picked one up. I almost missed the detail in the description about it.
Thanks for a fun entry!
Cool little game! I really like retro consoles; been meaning to play around with pico 8 fantasy console for a while. Most people who have tried it love it. (My entry actually targets the NES; I find the restrictions really help me make a good game)
I know it would've been hard given the time constraints, but having a 1 player mode with a dumb ai would've been really nice. I wasn't able to chase someone down to play this with, though I think it would have been fun. I like the simple graphics and the destructible terrain worked well. It definitely fit the theme.
That said, I agree with the others that this entry does not meet the requirements for the compo. I really encourage you to switch to the jam, or you may find that your scores reflect that fact.
Not a lot to say that hasn't already been said but the game's graphics and music are both amazing for a game jam game. I absolutely love both.
The game itself was a decent level of challenging - I kept at it for a while but I never got past level 2. I have to admit, level 1 was a good introduction but felt a little bland. I got to level 2 and saw the new attack patterns and more creative stage design and immediately thought "oh there's more here!". Controls feel good for the most part, though I was kind of surprised at the lack of a jump, just since it was pretty easy to get stranded.
Thanks for a fun entry!
Thanks for the reply! I sorta realized that, but I guess I found it kind of finicky. It seemed like a lot of the time I'd dash and end up in the hole as a result. Might've just been unlucky of course, but I started to avoid using dash as a result. (That said, it really didn't detract much from the experience!)
Very cool idea! This was quite fun to play through and I struggled guessing the values of the items. The last thing I got rid of was the Anonymously donated locket and I was struggling over whether it was gonna be cheap or extremely expensive.
I managed to get a seemingly high score until my last item popped up... and either I broke it or I got a super cursed item :grin: (My guess is you had an integer overflow from having a score way too big for the data type (int/long/etc) it was stored in -- unless you really meant that sword to be cursed anyway!)
bloopa.png
Didn't really take away from the fun of it at all, either way.
Thanks for a fun game!
If you follow up on this, I'm definitely interested! The controls felt... not great if I'm honest, but as you said the game's incomplete so I'm not shocked. The atmosphere showed through very much. I thought of LiS/Captain Spirit _before_ seeing the text, for whatever that's worth! (Mainly because of the music) I feel like there's a ton of potential here.
If this is something you plan to follow up, how can we follow this project? :grinning:
This is a fun little puzzle game. You've already got comments that say pretty much everything I could come up with. I didn't actually have major issues with the controls - if the game weren't turn-based they might've been a problem, but where I knew I didn't have to rush it was fine.
My only suggestion might have been to just stop the player from moving into a tile once it was completely removed; I kept accidentally trying to bump through a block I knew wasn't there anymore. (This would have, of course, required other game changes too; I realize it's not that simple!)
Overall I quite liked it though - thanks for a fun entry!
*Update*: Almost forgot; my score was 76000.
Don't think I have much to add but I really liked the various screen sizes and decrease in pixel density and all. It was definitely a little tough but as a retro lover I had to appreciate this. Thanks for a fun game!
Kinda neat - I ended up floating around the level on my tank's cannon! I survived a while then a huge influx of people came in and I died... I made it to somewhere past 3k points. Thanks for a fun game.
Very cool game! Definitely brought back memories of fighting with games back in older days (or Minecraft today). I liked the graphics and the menu quite a bit. The music was unintrusive, which is good considering how long I ended up playing this one.
I got a high score of around 15k - didn't unlock the recycle bin but I only have so much time to play games. The memory mechanic was very clever, and worked well. (And made it really challenging!) I didn't run into any major bugs, and the game felt pretty solid.
Thanks for a fun game!
This was a really fun one; a bit short, but exactly long enough to keep my interest. The concept worked really well and the title/premise added quite a bit.
Also I'd never seen puzzlescript before but it's pretty amazing and gives me ideas for things I want to experiment with! Thanks for mentioning it, and thanks for a fun game!
Don't really have anything to say that hasn't already been said - some form of checkpoints (even just every 5 levels) would've been nice, but it's not bad as-is. I found the simple graphics quite appealing. Thanks for a fun game!
Not bad for a first entry! Nothing to really add that hasn't been said already - movement felt a little slow, a little animation could be really cool next time, etc. I did also like what you did with the theme.
It seems like you have some good ideas on what you'd improve next time (or if you keep going with this) - that's awesome. In my case, taking the time to think about things like this helped me a lot over my entries. (One other tip: playing with the tools you use to make the game in the weeks leading up to the competition helps more than you'd think) I think that is going to help you a lot; so keep it up! :)
I suspect if you do another one of these at some point, you will be surprised how much more you are able to do in the time given. Thanks for a fun entry.
Not bad for a first entry! Nothing to really add that hasn't been said already - movement felt a little slow, a little animation could be really cool next time, etc. I did also like what you did with the theme.
It seems like you have some good ideas on what you'd improve next time (or if you keep going with this) - that's awesome. In my case, taking the time to think about things like this helped me a lot over my entries. (One other tip: playing with the tools you use to make the game in the weeks leading up to the competition helps more than you'd think) I think that is going to help you a lot; so keep it up! :)
I suspect if you do another one of these at some point, you will be surprised how much more you are able to do in the time given. Thanks for a fun entry.
Neat little game - I also think the enemies thing would've added some fun to it. Still, not bad for 3 days :)
This was a really cool game - just got right into the action. I managed to survive somewhere around 45-50 seconds. For me the key was to stick towards the top center and let the lasers do most of the work.
As some others mentioned, the enemies spawning into you was a little bit unfair; I managed to find some spots where they don't spawn, so that worked for me.
Thanks for a fun game!
Very cool; I really liked this! I managed to survive around 75 seconds. I liked that I was able to explore more of the playing field as time ticked down. (Since I could go up further)
My only nitpick is it took a moment to figure out the controls; I actually wasn't sure if there was a jump at first! It might not be a bad idea to put that in the description in the future.
Still, this was a simple concept executed really well, and turned out really fun!
Thanks for a couple fun playthroughs!
Seems like you've already had a lot of very detailed comments, so I'm afraid I'm kinda stuck leaving the "nice game!" comment. Had quite a bit of fun with this - I'm usually not a huge fan of the super-tough-endless-runner style but this one kept me going for a while. The checkpoints definitely helped; when I first died I was dreading going all the way back!
Anyway like I said, not much to add, but thanks for a fun entry!
Really cool idea! I liked how it worked, and it was kinda neat to figure out when it was safer to go straight and skip over memory vs staying on the stable path. Fun application of the theme, too.
If I had to give a piece of constructive criticism, it felt like the difficulty went from very easy to very difficult kind of quickly. The first level gave a great introduction to the mechanics.
Thanks for a fun entry!
Fun quirky little game! I'd write up more but the comments above have more than covered it. The controls were a little tough to figure out at first, but once I had that sorted out I had fun with it. Seems like it'd be quite good with multiple players.
Thanks for a fun entry!
Awesome; there are a apparently quite a few retro games this time around! I really like this - it's a little bit of a challenge to get set up, but once you get there it's a solid game. (Though apparently I need to work on my software dev skills :D) This feels like it'd be right in place back in the day, and also as a lifelong coder I really liked how you had energy/sleep/refactoring/debugging set up.
This is the 3rd retro game I know of in the competition. (I did an NES game, and there's a 2-player Genesis game called Rad Rhino out there too). It's always awesome to see.
Also... I don't know if you're interested but I did manage to get it working with a web-based emulator! I hosted it [here](http://cpprograms.net/devnull/roor/), or if you'd rather host it yourself here's all the files involved: [roor.zip](http://cpprograms.net/devnull/roor/roor.zip). Just hit space to start; it seems to work alright! It's using the [emscripten port of vice](https://github.com/rjanicek/vice.js)
Thanks for a fun entry!
Ah, ok... I can remove the links in my comment if you'd prefer; just let me know. I didn't see any issues but I very well might've missed something as a random player. My only hope was to make this game a little more accessible since I quite liked it.
Ok, I think I misread your comment as you not wanting the web version for some reason. My mistake - if you like the web version, definitely carry on! I'll keep it up at least until judging ends :)
Feel free to ping me if you need any help with setting up the basic version, too. I've worked a lot with web-based software and emulators.
So many comments already; not much to add. I had a really tough time with the controls as others said, but the general idea was really cool. Thanks for a fun entry!
Very cool - nothing to say that hasn't already been said but I quite enjoyed this, especially that the mechanic continued when I left the first puzzle! You nailed the surprise. Thanks for a fun game!
Not a whole lot to add that others haven't said, but I enjoyed this entry a lot! I liked that you added upgraded car graphics on each entry, and the resource management thing was cool! (Though I fully admit I completely missed this on the first playthrough and got confused when cars exploded... oops >_>)
Nice entry; had a lot of fun with this one.
I really liked this simplicity of the gameplay and the upgrade system. Though it was simple, this was really fun! I had a couple pretty solid runs going, but the best score I actually saw was 32. My longer runs I ran into crashes multiple times :(
Here's an example in case it helps:
```
___________________________________________ ############################################################################################ FATAL ERROR in action number 1 of Step Event0 for object oHandler:
Variable
I'm not sure I've ever quite played something like this, and the theme was executed pretty well. Nice entry!
ps: If you need more crash info from me, let me know with a ping! I didn't pinpoint anything I did in the game that triggered the problem; it just seemed like it would crash randomly. (Maybe when it was spawning hearts or spikes?)
Nicely done! Pretty common interpretation of the theme, but you executed it pretty well. It took me a few tries to get through.
I liked the graphics and music quite a bit; they definitely fit that retro vibe.
I always try to provide a little constructive criticism where I can, so I'll mention that the combat was a little bit tough with the staff. I think making it short definitely added temptation to use the spells, but perhaps it was a little too short to be feasible without hitting the enemies a lot. It also would've been kinda cool to see a couple enemies added in for the final return trip. (Or just make the exit door conveniently close to the amulet, of course)
Don't let that take away from my praise for the game; it was a fun one! Thanks for a good entry.
Nice ! I haven't played something like this in a very long time!
It was incredibly fun for a short half-day endeavor. I did manage to beat it and get to the thanks screen. Thanks for a fun entry!
Oh hey, another retro game!
Always excited to see other games for gameboy/nes/other retro consoles in these jams. The restrictions tend to lend themselves to short-but-sweet games like this.
I really liked the graphics you made; it was a very pretty game. The use of the theme was pretty solid too. With some additional time and effort after the jam you could definitely make this into something quite great! It'd be really fun to see more enemies, etc.
I always try to give a little constructive feedback when I can, so I'll admit, the collisions and movement felt a bit clunky. I was also sad there was no music or sound. (Though I've worked with gbdk before, and I know it's pretty hard to get going; I can totally see why that was skipped!)
Thanks for a fun entry!
I really like the mechanic you used here - it has a lot of potential, and could definitely lead to an interesting game beyond the scope of this jam. It took a couple moments to pick up, but once I got it I was able to progress pretty easily.
I'll agree with others that checkpoints and an ending might've been nice - I think they would add a lot. (Getting across the moving bridge was frustrating after having done it once already)
Still, this was a very cool entry, and I think this mechanic has a lot of potential!
Hey there!
Just a heads up, using someone else's music/sound effects isn't really allowed in the compo; this should probably be submitted to the jam instead.
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/rules#the-compo
It looks pretty interesting though; I'll definitely give it a shot if you swap it to a jam game!
Neat entry - I liked the art a lot, though the combat was hard, and the hitboxes were a bit confusing. The use of the theme was a common one, but it worked well. Fun entry!
Nicely done!
I'm so happy to see more retro games in this jam! I've seen a bunch of gameboy games and NES games, (and made one) but this it is the first commodore one this jam! I really liked the graphics and the music (though I know the music wasn't made explicitly for this)
Thanks for a fun entry!
I LOVE THE ART!!
Short, simple, and just enough challenge to keep it interesting. Plus the movement system was unique, and not super hard to pick up. Really fun entry!
I always try to give a little constructive criticism, so I'll mention that aiming felt a little bit clunky. I found I kinda had to get directly above/below foes to hit them. (If I could've hit the slimes aiming straight I probably wouldn't have had this complaint) I also somehow got stuck in the bottom left of the map once. (had to restart) I didn't think to get a screenshot >_<
This was a great entry; well done!
Nice puzzle game! My inner nerd definitely enjoyed that one, and I managed to get through all 9 puzzles. (Nice addition of the 5th line for the last one; took a little extra time) Just challenging enough to get me thinking. The mechanics were clearly explained, and worked the way you'd expect.
If I had to nitpick one thing, it would've been nice to have a way to speed up the puzzle solving - it certainly wasn't a dealbreaker, but it felt a little bit drawn out.
Overall a great entry!
This is a super impressive compo game! It felt very complete and polished, and actually got me to laugh a good few times! (You got my highest score thus far in humor) The controls were a little out of the ordinary and I quite liked them. The music was also extremely good for a compo game.
I try to give constructive criticism whenever I can, and the only thing I can really think of is that the field of view was rather small. (This might be because I used webgl, though I did fullscreen it) Once I figured out where the map was it got easier.
This is among my favorites from this compo so far; very nicely done!
I really liked how short and sweet this game was! It was very simple but that was kind of its charm. Simple controls, very easy to pick up what to do, and some good humor in the instructions. Well done!
The graphics on this entry are absolutely gorgeous. The gameplay is also pretty fun. (If a bit unforgiving) The heart atms were a unique thing, and worked well. Overall a very solid entry; well done!
Not much to say that hasn't been said already; this was a good challenge, without feeling impossible. I did appreciate that the cheat code was added so that I could see the boss, even though I didn't quite devote enough time to get there legitimately.
I quite enjoyed this; thanks for a fun entry.
Very cool little game! I liked how you worked the theme in- that's a great interpretation and not really one I've seen thus far. I think the simple player model actually worked in your favor; it certainly didn't take anything away. The court and scores and everything too actually looked more polished than a lot of 3d games I see in the compo too.
Nice entry!
Thank you all for the kind words!
@fatcrow just so you know, your comment made my night.
Thank you for the kind words everyone! They're very much appreciated.
@vectrex28 That's fair on the difficulty - the "hard" mode was actually the original planned difficulty, but I made a late decision to ease it up. My thought was that with the theme of this game, I'd much rather anyone be able to complete it, rather than giving a really tough challenge. (Especially with the attention span most people have for game jam games)
Fun fact on that difficulty switcher, I actually implemented it in the last 20 minutes of the compo. The commit came in 2 minutes before the deadline!
And mikelovesrobots, I'm so, so sorry this game brought that memory back up.
Thank you all again for all the positive feedback! This was one of the most challenging games I've done for a Ludum Dare, and I'm so glad to see people enjoying it.
@tddawson Thank you for the bug report, and sorry for the frustration! That's a known bug sadly. It's an [issue with nes-starter-kit](https://github.com/cppchriscpp/nes-starter-kit/issues/15) that I've been trying to squash for a long time. I think I may need to rewrite a lot of the engine to avoid it. Getting stuck between two sprites is new to me though. (and definitely not good >_<) I probably won't fix it for Depths, but I'm definitely going to try to fix it in the engine!
Thank you all yet again for all of the wonderful feedback!
@mutt You should totally do it! There's a ton of really good tools these days; it's easier than ever to get started.
If you haven't seen it yet, the recently-released [GBstudio](https://www.gbstudio.dev/) is very easy to pick up, and will help you create a decent game for the gameboy. (It's also free)
[NESMaker](http://www.thenew8bitheroes.com/) also exists, though it's not free, and I'll admit I had a hard time figuring out how to use it.
I'll also shamelessly promote two projects of my own: you can make a very simple puzzle game using [NES Puzzle Maker](http://puzzle.nes.science) (the editor is actually an NES rom; you can run it on a console if you want!) The end result is a downloadable NES rom.
Finally, the engine I made this with is also open source: [NES Starter Kit](https://cppchriscpp.github.io/nes-starter-kit/) -- it's a little harder to pick up but I'm always open to supporting it.
I'd love to see you jump into the retro scene!
Thanks for the feedback and kind words again everyone! I can't overstate how much I appreciate it. Thanks for playing!
Jimbly- That's unfortunately known issue with the engine I used - I really need to figure out how to take care of it. (It's not a simple fix...)
Now that results are out, I just wanted to extend one more honest heartfelt thank you to everyone that played and rated this. (As well as to anyone who takes the time later) I'm absolutely humbled by where this game landed in the ratings.
This was honestly a scary game to make and release... I seriously considered not doing it, or not sharing it multiple times due to the subject matter. I'm really glad I did now. I'm so, so glad people enjoyed this, and the message came through. The ratings really helped cement that I accomplished my goal.
I'm not sure what the future of this game is - it's kind of complete, but part of me wants to take it a little further. I could possibly do a cartridge release, and there are definitely some post-compo fixes I could make to improve gameplay. If anyone is really interested, please let me know!
Any future updates will be shared on my Twitter account: [@cppchriscpp](https://twitter.com/cppchriscpp)
Thank you all so much!
Nicely done! Be sure to play and rate some games so you get enough ratings to get a score! It'd be a shame to miss out, especially since I think you'll do pretty well.
I like the simple gameboy-esque graphic style a lot. The gameplay was very simple but effective, and I think there's a lot you could do with it. This was one of the most creative uses of the theme I've seen so far too, so kudos for that.
My only feedback (like others) is that it left me wanting more levels. (I do get that it's time consuming though; it's always surprising how long that can take, especially with puzzle games!)
Thanks for a fun entry!
This is a really cool idea - I liked how you implemented the theme with platforms. The controls were a little bit weird, but not to the point it affected my enjoyment at all! The mechanic seemed to work well. I didn't think it was hard to tell where the platform would form;
I always try to give a little constructive feedback, so I do kinda wish that you had implemented a reset level button (r key?) -- it was frustrating knowing I couldn't complete a level, and having to wait 3 seconds to create a bogus platform multiple times to restart. Even basic sounds would have also added a lot!
That said, this was quite a fun game - I always like unique mechanics like the platform one. Thanks for a fun entry!
This was really beautiful - no wonder you got 1st in mood. I actually found this on steam - I had meant to play it when I looked at the winners of the compo, but I think I accidentally closed the tab. I'm so glad I found it again.
Good job - you absolutely earned your position with this. Thank you for an amazing game.
Very cool - don't see a lot of dreamcast games in Ludum Dare! I'm a complete sucker for quirky+retro console stuff so I enjoyed this a bit. Your dialog was great.
I try to provide a little constructive feedback when I can, so I'll mention that I was a little bit surprised the edges of levels just let you fall off, rather than stopping you. I think it might have felt less weird if the screen kept scrolling past to show the hole. (Or if the edge of the screen had collision of course)
That said, that's a super minor point. Well done!
Very interesting design, and a cool idea for the story. I'll admit some of the levels were a bit hard to navigate, and it felt cheap how quickly the crypto-zoologists found the unicorns at their starting place. The controls felt solid though, and I enjoyed the graphics a lot!
Thanks for a fun entry!
Fun little game! Very short, but as others said it's replayable. Also always appreciate seeing retro-esque entries :D
Cool little tower defense game! As others mentioned, it was a little bit easy - I got to level 21 then shut it off. Was fun up to that point for sure. Not a whole lot to say that others haven't covered. Nicely done.
Nicely done! First infinite runner I've seen in this playthrough, and it goes really well. I appreciate that you called out the known bugs in the description; I did hit the platform bug, and would've been pretty bothered if I wasn't sure it was just the first one/how to restart.
As others mentioned, the music did get a little repetitive. That kind of thing happens a lot in these competitions (I've gotten this feedback quite a few times too!) I really like the way you did the life/upgrade mechanic - very simple and effective.
My high score was 1970.
Thanks for a fun game
Glad to see you still making games!
The graphics for this were quite cool, and I also really like your use of the theme. Rock on!
I liked the graphics you used for the scenery.
I hope for the best for you and your family. Good luck.
I don't think I have anything to add that hasn't already been said, but nice entry! The sprites/tiles stood out to me. I did have some challenges with collisions (as others have mentioned) but I was able to complete it on my second try. Good entry.
I don't have a whole lot to add that others haven't already said, but I really liked the combination of music and gameplay this entry provided! It was really fun to get the hang of, even if the timing seemed a little off.
It wasn't super clear what winning and losing looked like - I think I "won" twice and thought I missed a guy running up to me. It'd be awesome to have a win stream (unless I really did get picked off those times!)
That said this was a highlight of the games I've played so far. Great entry!
I liked this a lot.
Short platformer, with a bunch of cool mechanics. I got very good at using the warp mechanic (and I liked how you made me use it to get gems at the start)
The engine also felt pretty solid - I thought I had broken it by warping into a wall, but all I had to do was jump. The only weird thing is that I hit escape in a "u to upgrade" screen and it seemed to crash the game (html5 version). I had a sudden urge to see if there was any other way to progress. (Also, scrambling the name early on was a cool effect)
I felt myself really wishing there was a way to get a second ending, but alas, 48 hours only allows for so much.
Nice entry!
This was definitely an amusing entry! It was quirky for sure, and I got stuck in the walls a few times, (good idea adding that reset button) but I was able to beat it. There's not a whole lot to say that hasn't already been said - the movement was a little bit weird (and maybe slow?) but it was workable. I liked the nod to metroid at the end, as well.
Overall a pretty interesting entry.
I really liked the graphics on this entry; it was really pretty. I also really liked the idea of having separate methods of locomotion as you grow. The first stage was quite fun to control and really pulled me in. I really like what you were going for!
I try to give a little constructive feedback when I can, so I'll mention a couple things... it really felt like it took a long time to go between movement types for me, to the point it started to feel a little repetitive in the walk stage. I honestly think halving the times per stage might have helped.
I also ran into a really discouraging bug(?) after getting to the flight stage... I got knocked back into walking as I got hit into the buildings, and as a result I had to start the walk stage completely over. It seemed like every stage was a checkpoint, so that felt crummy.
Still a great entry - don't take any of that the wrong way! Thanks for a good entry.
This was a fun interpretation of the theme! It's not the first game I played using the theme this way, but it executed it well.
I managed to survive without shooting at all until I got to the first boss, which was pretty challenging. Having the large balls drop gold made the fight much more feasible. (Though certainly not easy!) I quite liked that you showed what was required for a checkpoint as you progressed through the level. (Bonus points for changing the color based on whether you had it or not!) The tutorial area was also a nice addition, as well.
Congrats on a fun entry!
I managed to beat this with 20 blood to spare! Interesting take on the theme. Sound would've been nice, but overall I enjoyed it. Thanks for a fun entry.
Fantastic entry!
I really liked a lot about this game - I actually didn't have much trouble with the controls personally. They felt just intuitive enough. The game was also the perfect length/difficulty for one of these jams. (Also the final level was a nice touch!)
I try to always give constructive criticism, but nothing really stuck out enough to mention. Well done!
Fun entry!
I absolutely burst out laughing at the human and alien voices the first time!
The pong game was fairly simple but did its job. Dialog and graphics were both pretty nice too.
Great entry!
Yess, another NES game! I love seeing retro games in the compo/jam; I feel like the limitations tend to lead to a very focused and complete game.
The gameplay was simple and effective, and I liked the basic sound effects. (which don't show up in the web-based emulator; more on that in a sec...) The graphics looked pretty fantastic. For a first NES game ever, this is really impressive! You should be proud. I hope you had fun making this, and I hope I'll see more from you some day! I really liked this entry.
To note, JSNes doesn't do a great job with sound - I used it for a pretty long time. One of the folks on the NintendoAge discord made his own js emulator called [Nez](https://github.com/Sumez/nez) that does audio right, and I basically swear by it at this point. I made some tweaks to it that make it easier to set it up to host your own game. Here's [my version](https://github.com/cppchriscpp/nez) -- no pressure on using it; just wanted to share the option!
Nicely done! The graphics in this are simply stunning - the things you do with the NES limitations never cease to amaze me. The engine felt solid too. And, an NES game within the constraints of the compo is always cool.
I always try to give a little constructive criticism, so I guess I'll mention that I occasionally had a bit of trouble telling what was foreground vs background. Like another poster, I was also confused when I didn't see clear indications when an enemy was hit. (I often make the enemy flash for a second or so) - I heard the sound but initially thought the snakes were invincible.
Overall, very nicely done!
Fun game! You've had a lot of comments already and people have generally said just about everything I could come up with, but I still wanted to add something. This did feel very polished, and the music was pretty solid. The execution of the theme was solid, and focusing on money made it just a little bit unique.
I'll admit having to constantly jump to hit enemies got a little tiring, but it didn't detract much from the fun of it all. Thanks for a fun entry!
As others said the art in this one is pretty great! I'm always a fan of keeping it simple. (I've actually never done a game in black and white like that; maybe I'll give it a shot some day)
It definitely had a feeling of an 80s-era arcade game. Thanks for a fun entry
Not a whole lot to say that hasn't been said, but great entry! It took a minute to figure it out, but once I got there it wasn't bad at all, with just the right amount of challenge for a game jam game.
If I had to give one bit of constructive feedback, my robot's move speed felt a little slow. It was perfect in relation to the bigger robots, but the game felt a little bit sluggish to me. That's nitpicking however, as I thought this was a great entry.
Well done!
Not a lot to say that hasn't already been said but this is a fantastic entry! The mechanics were great and felt solid, and you nailed the theme. I liked the switching polarities idea, and love that you added a boss at the end.
Thanks for a fun entry!
Nicely done for what you did accomplish! I was sad to not see a full game, but the mechanics you put together are pretty solid, and as others mentioned your graphics are great! (Did you intend to opt out of graphics, btw? I would have rated pretty well) I really liked using the objects to control your speed/health.
Thanks for a fun entry.
Pretty cool game! The idea is cool, and I liked your take on the theme. The controls weren't half bad either; I didn't have much trouble with that. (Though if the cop car pinned you in the wrong spot, it was all over)
I try to always give a little constructive criticism, so I will say that 5 minutes felt like it dragged on a little bit; something like 2 minutes might have been a bit more fun and kept the game moving. The voice acting and music and such were all quite good and helped this feel more polished.
Nice entry!
This was a very cool idea! I got up to about 50 before I decided to see what weird stuff I could do with it. I got to somewhere over 100 and gave up, not realizing it had an end. One of few games this jam to really get me to think!
Simple effective graphics, and I'm always a sucker for a good retro game. (Pico 8 counts, dangit!!) I did an NES game myself; the limitations just seem to help make a more focused game.
Nice entry!
I love your art!! I'm excited to see so many retro entries this Ludum Dare. Usually there's only one or two; I'm really excited to see programs like GBStudio getting people like you into game creation.
I'm kind of reiterating what people have already said, but this was a very fun entry. I liked how you used the theme, and you managed to make a very fun experience.
Thanks for a fun entry!
Very cool idea! I think you could definitely build this out into something quite cool. I did also fall into the summoning loop other folks already mentioned. I haven't seen a whole lot of strategy games in Ludum Dare games, so this was welcome.
Nice entry!
This is a really clever mechanic! It wasn't hugely related to the theme, but eh, that's only one category. It did get very frustrating at times having the cats randomly projectile themselves off the targets (though, very like herding cats!) A little bit of sound might've made a big difference, but it wasn't a huge detractor. Overall this was still fun.
Cool little game!
Not a lot to add that hasn't already been said, but this was a fun little game! I managed to survive 13 waves on my first try, and from the look of screenshots it seems like it could've gone a lot longer with a bit of strategy.
I don't really have any feedback that others haven't suggested at this point - sound would've been nice and such. Still, fun little game.
I totally want to play this, but it looks like your download links are gone?
I'm excited to see gbstudio entries starting to show up in Ludum Dare! I've made a few retro games with my own tools, but GBStudio seems like it opens up a whole bunch of new doors.
Will check back later!
Managed to play it this time - fun little game! I liked the graphics, and think you used GBStudio pretty well. Finding all of the endings was pretty fun.
Always glad to see more retro games in the jam!
The art and sounds on this game are fantastic - the first time I heard the squirrels chatter I cracked up. I have to admit I didn't expect the reveal at all - that was amazing.
I did struggle kind of a lot with the jumps - I won't harp on it since a few people already pointed it out. Once I realized holding jump made me go higher I struggled a bit less, but it took a good bit of getting used to.
That said I had fun with this, and it got a good chuckle out of me too, which is always a plus.
!> Can't sleep squirrels will get me Can't sleep squirrels will get me Can't sleep squirrels will get me
It's always awesome seeing games created for older systems during these competitions - this is the first time I've seen an MSX game!
The graphics feel exactly as they should - you obviously had to stick with the limitations of the hardware, and you made good use of it. The mechanics also worked well - this would feel right at home in the era of the ZX Spectrum in my opinion. I was a little bit sad about not having a real end state, but of course, game jams are very limited. (Especially when you're working with a limited system, that likely doesn't have much in the realm of game engines to build off of.)
Thanks for a fun entry!
Sorry! I meant this was the first time I had seen a ZX Spectrum game, not an MSX game. I even wrote the right computer later in the comment, not sure why I got it wrong. :laughing:
I'll admit, I'm not intricately familiar with the differences in computers of that era. I was born in the late 80s so I only experienced them much later. So, that difference from other ZX Spectrum games was lost on me. Either way I really liked it!
I'm not gonna lie, when I first saw this I thought "oh no, another breakout clone..." - I gave it a shot anyway and I'm super glad I did! This was oddly calming and a clever use of the theme. I never knew I wanted a breakout idling game, but now I'm really hoping you'll take this idea further!
I always try to give a little critical feedback, so here's that. Unfortunately I hit a crash eventually, though I managed to get to layer 70 and unlocking a few 250 coin artifacts first. I was a little sad because I wanted to keep playing, but at least I got a good taste of the game. I also got into a couple situations where a ball got stuck on the side/bottom of the screen, and I couldn't seem to get the arcana to move it.
That said I really liked this! The sound and graphics worked really well to help sell the calm mood. Thanks for a really fun entry!
Thank you for playing! I did purposely add an extra gem to make it less likely that players would be stuck with the bad ending on first playthrough. If this were a full-length game I would likely not do this, and have a level select, etc, but I digress.
As for the tree thing, that stinks! I'm glad you were able to enjoy the game anyway. I did find a spot where that could happen and force you to restart - I just published a bugfix.
(ps: If anyone else encounters something like this, screenshots are super helpful!)
Wow, so much positive feedback from everyone! Thank you! This is the part of Ludum Dare that's always the most fun for me; playing a bunch of games and hearing honest, well-intentioned feedback.
First off, I'm sorry so many people hit the bug with getting stuck in trees and rocks. I've just published another new build that fixes the spot I think most people are referring to. The screenshots were hugely helpful in identifying the problem spot! Thank you both @bassguitarbill and @assertfailure for those.
@bassguitarbill A restart option is a fantastic idea, and I've done that in the past. I can't believe I let that slip through the cracks here. If people keep reporting getting stuck I may add it, but I'm struggling with whether I can get away with calling that a bugfix.
Someone commented on the music needing work, and I have to agree. Music's always been one of my weaker spots, and I've gotten out of practice lately. It would have helped if the music keep its position when transitioning between zones, but the engine doesn't support that and I couldn't hack it together in time.
Thanks again for all of the feedback everyone!
Thanks for the feedback!
The tiles definitely need some help around what's solid- that's feedback I've seen a few times now. Honestly I was thinking about that a lot in the final hours of making the game, but other things ended up taking priority. (Making the levels reward you for using mechanics was a huge struggle up to the last minute...)
The enemy movement is a bug with nes-starter-kit. I need to figure out how to handle enemy AI better, but I've never really spent the time.
About scores, I dunno, your game is some fierce competition. I'm pretty sure you one-upped your previous entry, and that fared extremely well. I'll be excited to see what the scores say!
Thanks for all the feedback. @shell-pirate I really appreciate the detail you went into.
I actually really wanted to do what you described with music, but I couldn't get the music engine I use to cooperate. It doesn't support resuming a song in the middle officially, nor changing out instruments without some serious low-level hacking. (With a more flexible timeframe, this would of course become possible!) I had the tempos aligned when I tried this, but I opted to change them up to try to make it feel more different. It seems like this didn't work, but hey, this is always a learning process.
The death screen feedback definitely hits, as that's usually feedback I have for any harder game I try. I'll keep that in mind going forward.
Thanks again for the detailed feedback - I really appreciate comments like this.
Wow, thank you so much for the support! I'm glad you've been able to enjoy my games. The issue in your screenshot should be fixed in the latest build - I just noticed the download link on my personal site was outdated and fixed it now. I'm sorry you ran into that.
If you're interested, there are actually a few NES games entered into the jam this time. Here's a list: https://ldjam.com/tags/platform/nintendo-famicom . I played both finished games and quite liked them.
Thank you the feedback and support.
That's such a cool picture! Thanks for sharing
@100th-coin This just made my day; dang that's cool! You got some pretty tight movement in there. Thanks for sharing this!
It's time to close the book on this - I'm really flattered by how well this game ranked.
The dedicated feedback that games get in Ludum Dare really make the event for me. People really care about helping others improve, and it shows.
It's been a fun event. Thank you all one more time for the great feedback, the bug reports, the ideas, the picture of it on a console, and even the TAS video!
Wow, this is impressive! The first level really nailed down the feel of a game and watch game perfectly. I really liked how creative you got with the later stages too. This was a joy to play. (I will say I'm very glad you added continues/checkpoints - I could not have survived that on hardcore mode) The atmosphere you developed is great, and the ending got a really good chuckle too. This is definitely one of the higher ratings I've given out.
Oddly enough I didn't hit the fingers bug on the web version that others mentioned. I didn't really hit any noticeable bugs.
With any entry I try to give a little constructive feedback. So - the mine level felt a little slow/off compared to the rest, as a couple others have mentioned. I really like what you were trying for there - it felt sorta like an early handheld, but it felt a little bit slow and it was very hard to see where was safe until it was too late.
Constructive feedback aside, you really nailed a lot of aspects of this game. Thanks for a fun game!
I really like what you did with this! (Though I'll be the first to admit, I was a little worried after a previous game about a literature club went... places, but I digress)
I feel like I never see narrative games in jams like Ludum Dare, and that's a little sad because I really enjoy them. This is one of the better uses of the theme I've seen so far. The art and music was also great, and really helped create a comfortable aesthetic.
I try to give a little constructive feedback for any game I play, so I'll mention that I got to the text "Just to set myself a challenge..." and the game seemed to freeze. I'm guessing that was the end of the prototype - if it was, a little "to be continued" would have helped.
I also managed to time picking a word right as the countdown ended and managed to get it to count backwards, which was kind of amusing. (It still moved on as soon as I picked one more word - I wasn't stuck or anything.)
u1j0tcx.png
That aside I really liked this, and I hope you'll continue with it. To steal words from an earlier commenter, this is a charming prototype. Thanks for an interesting game.
The graphics and audio are great! I really liked the feel of this entry. The pixel art worked really well.
I always try to offer some constructive feedback, so I have a few things. First, I didn't notice the message saying r to restart much like the last commenter, and had to refresh the page each time. I like the communication via messages during gameplay, but I didn't find myself looking there often enough. Someone else mentioned checkpoints and I think that would have made a huge difference. It's discouraging to have to go back through each step every time you die, especially when the game has some length to it.
Overall though I quite enjoyed this entry. Thanks for a fun game!
Always great to see more retro console games in Ludum Dare!
I quite liked the graphics, and the idea incorporated the theme pretty well. I also liked how you used the palette to show how deep into the water you got. I also liked how you used a and b to punch in opposing directions. (Though calling this out explicitly in the description might be good! It seemed random at first) The intro and ending graphics are also quite nice.
I always try to give some constructive feedback, so I'll give a little. This was a pretty tough game - the hitboxes on the fish seemed a little big, and I could swear I punched a few fish that got me. (btw, the idea of a worm punching fish is fantastic!) I'll be honest, I ended up resorting to VBA's rewind feature to finally beat it. That said, I did beat it!
I hope you're able to continue with this to make it the game you envisioned. Thanks for a fun game.
I really enjoyed this! The music and graphics really tied together to make a cool tron-esque feeling. I also really liked the sound effects for collisions.
I did also see the same bug with respawning facing the wrong direction. I used version 1.2 from itch.io if that helps. It wasn't too detrimental though; I was still able to enjoy it and beat it.
I will also mention that I had a hard time getting enough speed to land in the sun-sorta-thing that ends the second stage. I had to retry the level 3 times to finally get to full speed. Some sort of simple win screen also would have been nice to have.
All that feedback aside, I definitely enjoyed playing through this. Good luck with your post-jam endeavors! I can see this turning into a pretty impressive game.
Wow, you outdid yourself with this entry! I think you hit a lot closer to a balance of difficulty - I was able to beat it, but definitely had to use a few continues. I didn't ever find myself looking for oxygen, so perhaps that piece was "too easy", but honestly it didn't take away from the gameplay.
Personal opinion, but Ludum Dare games _should_ be somewhat easy. As part of the contest, we're expected to play and rate at least 20 games (and many do more than that) - people don't have super long attention spans, and the goal is to get a quick taste of the game. This is a long way to say, I think you nailed it.
The graphics are your typical brand, and they look stellar. This would look right at home in an arcade from a few decades ago. I did also struggle a bit with the HUD - I actually thought the characters to rescue were lives until I realized it was ticking up.
The sound was simple, but very fitting of the arcade feel you're going for. It could have potentially benefitted from a quick song, or maybe just an intro jingle, but overall it sounds pretty good.
Don't let any of my critical feedback take away from it though - this is a fantastic entry that I really enjoyed. Nicely done!
I really like the idea you went for here! I also always like seeing other retro console games in these jams. I'm so glad GBStudio came around.
I liked your book-ish graphics and the design in the later sections. I also liked the idea of multiple gameplay styles. I think varying styles like this could be a lot of fun in a fully fleshed out game. This was also a clever use of the theme.
I always try to give at least a little constructive feedback, so like someone else mentioned the music was kind of a weak point. No one particular song stood out, but the songs felt very simple/short. That didn't take away from the game though - it was still fun!
The game ended with a to be continued, so I hope you're able to build this up into the game you envision. Thanks for a fun game!
First thing's first: I LOVE the music and graphics in your entry. They build a great atmosphere. A lot went into them, and it shows. The gameplay was simple but responsive. I really enjoyed this entry.
I always try to leave some constructive feedback, so I'll mention that I feel like putting a checkpoint or two in the levels would help a lot. I found myself getting a little bit frustrated having to re-play the first half of later stages a dozen+ times, though I would understand if difficulty were part of the game's draw.
I felt like the ending was a little unclear, but maybe that was the point. This game's going to keep me thinking about it for a while. Thanks for a fantastic entry!
Nice little game! I'm always happy to see other games for older consoles like the gameboy. Getting a game working in assembly during this event is no small feat - this is really cool!
I liked your graphics, and the puzzle mechanics were nice. It took a little time to get used to the mechanic, but it works really well. I can see this working in a longer game if you wanted to take the idea further. I did manage to get to the corrupt title!
I try to always give a little constructive feedback as well. As others mentioned, it was a little frustrating to have to restart the game any time I made a mistake - checkpoints could help, especially if combined with a pause menu that lets you reset. (This is advice I wish I had taken in my own game, too)
This is a really fun concept, and I think it would be fun if you continued after the competition. Thanks for the fun entry!
This was a really fun entry! The simple controls really worked well, and I really think you nailed the difficulty curve. The graphics were simple but effective. I had no real trouble with the controls either. I got a good chuckle at the end too.
I always try to give some critical feedback, so I'll mention two things. First, I really wished there had been one more checkpoint right before the gauntlet at the end - having to replay the level just to get there was a little annoying. (I got it second try though!) Second as others mentioned having it randomly generated could give you an impossible pattern (which happened on my first attempt). I also at one point got stuck attached to a wall for a second or two - I jumped and got unstuck though so it was a minor annoyance.
All that said I really liked this! You took one mechanic and executed it really well. Thanks for a fun entry.
I got serious golf with your friends vibes from this. There's not a lot to be said that hasn't already been said honestly. The reveal on level two was unexpected (even reading the description) and very welcome! I like the idea of a non-traditional course too. It'd be really cool to see this idea evolve into a full game.
I always try to give a little critical feedback, so here's that. As others have said though, level 2 was a huge difficulty jump. I'll +1 the suggestion of an option to play without a stroke limit; I think that would have made it more enjoyable for me. I hit nearly 200 strokes by the end, and I came close to giving up a few times.
Don't let the critical feedback take away from this though - you've got a great entry, with a clever use of the theme. Thanks for a fun entry.
This is definitely unique. The use of the voice synthesizer was cool, and I sorta like the wacky graphics/sound/feel. As some others have mentioned though, it's pretty hard to control. Thanks for an interesting game.
Yess, more reto console games in Ludum Dare! From some very familiar names, no less.
I loved this! The controls felt extremely solid, and I really liked the bubble bobble-esque mechanic. I was surprised I could move the bubble, but it's not hard to get the hang of, and it works. The graphics and sound were also pretty fantastic. I liked the minimalist take on the graphics, only using 2 palettes for tiles and one for sprites. Overall this is definitely among my favorite entries so far.
Of course I've gotta give some constructive feedback too, so I have to mention a few bugs/issues. First, collision with spikes anywhere other than the ground doesn't seem to exist, at least in the few places I missed. It's not a huge problem, but might've made the game a bit easy. It's also possible to clip through the ground with the bubble when holding up - combining these two I got myself stuck in a soft lock here:
cQ29LII.png
Luckily I was using mesen, so I just rewound to before that point and was able to continue.
That aside I can't overstate how much fun this was. Thanks for a great entry!
Great entry! As others have said, the graphics are fantastic. I really like the retro feel, and using the pico8 certainly helps with that. It took me a good minute to figure out what the divers looked like, so I was driving around aimlessly until I figured that out. Once I did though I had a lot of fun with it! I managed to raise $1000! :D The music also fit really well, which is always hard to do in the constraints of the compo.
The biggest constructive feedback I could give you've already gotten a few times - the sonar is a bit hard to see. (but a great idea otherwise!) Showing what the diver and sonar look like on an intro screen might have helped a lot too. Lastly, I'm not sure if this was expected, but a lot of the time my sub seemed to face a different direction than I was travelling.
All of this feedback aside this was a very fun and pretty game. Nicely done!
There's not a whole lot to say that hasn't been said, but I liked the graphical design of this game a lot. It has a mood and sticks to it.
As others have said, the lack of sound hurts a little - you could do a ton with just a little bit of ambient noise. I did get pretty frustrated with combat too; others have outlined this so I won't harp on it.
None of this takes away too much from the entry though. Thanks for the game!
Thanks for a fun game! You've gotten a lot of early feedback so there's not really much that hasn't been said. The music loop was nice, and the graphics are solid.
I did struggle a little bit with the difficulty curve, but you already addressed this. Great entry!
What a unique take on the theme - it's a stretch, but the best ideas often are. Any game that can get me to exclaim something about "burger antlions" gets a few points from me.
I liked the mechanic of slowing down as you powered up. While it took me a few seconds to realize the bell wasn't vulnerable all the time, and enemies came in waves, it worked pretty well. (I think there may be a bug where the "The bell is vulnerable" text doesn't always show up) The laser knockback was also an interesting mechanic.
I thought the shield enemies were particularly clever and worked well to up the difficulty. I do think the last wave might have been just a touch too tough, cutting down on the enemies just a little might've made it less painful. That said, I did beat it after 3 tries, and you got an actual out-loud laugh from the ending. Of course, that was the only way for it to end!
I try to give some constructive feedback on any entry I rate, so I'll mention that the audio got a little bit repetitive over time. Making the repeated loop a little bit longer, or adding another instrument might have helped.
Lastly, I'll try to give an opinion on the audio thing since no one has really mentioned it. I'm honestly not sure if that's okay or not - it seems like a bit of a gray area. In the future I'd probably create the sound effects from scratch for the compo just to be safe. I don't think people get disqualified for that, but some folks rating the game might rate it lower because of that. (Of course, if you entered the Jam instead of the compo, you'd be fine.)
There are some great sound effect generators out there - or some of the more memorable games I've played have had sound effects that were just the creator's voice distorted a bit! All that said I won't rate you down for it; you were honest and did your best. Sorry there's no clear answer here.
Thanks for a fun entry!
This was a fun little game! I managed to get to 979m - the flippers and rebreather help a lot! It would have been interesting if more enemies started appearing later, but of course it's a game jam game and there's only so much time. (I saw you addressed this in previous comments)
I like the simple graphic style, it worked well. A little bit of constructive feedback - I was surprised I got all of my air back the second I hit an air pocket; I kind of expected it to tick back up more slowly based on other games I've played. I also ran into some sort of graphical glitch that seemed to draw a bunch of boxes over the screen for a frame or two every few seconds. It didn't interrupt gameplay and wasn't too disruptive, I just mention it because it was odd.
Overall this was a really fun entry; thanks for a fun game!
wxEL2hS.png
Sure! I was on html5 fullscreened on windows 10. Let me know if you need anything more, I can hop back on and see if I can reproduce it.
Wow, after what has to be 100 comments I can't think of much to add that hasn't been said. As many others said, you absolutely nailed the mood here with the music and graphics. Not a lot of entries go the emotional story-driven route, but they're always a treat.
The hints on the puzzles in the description helped quite a bit - I can see myself having been pretty stuck on a few of them without them.
I will mention that I didn't get the credits after running for a while, and actually thought the game just ended in a field with music and the few final messages. I did manage to hit the edge of the world, if that helps. I apologize - I know that's not a super descriptive bug report, but I'm not sure what I might have done differently than the average person.
This didn't take away much though - I did see all the final messages, including the "I can choose to be happy". (I saw your comment earlier about changing this wording, and I agree that would make a big difference.)
I hope for the best for your studio! If you can do this in a weekend, I'm sure you can do many great things.
I really enjoyed this! Your graphics are great, and really create a nice undersea feeling. I see a few mentions of the jumps being difficult, but I think the last commenter really nailed it with saying it was challenging but fair. The mechanics felt smooth and consistent, despite the difficulty - it's pretty obvious you put time and effort into this. The last stage or two were hard but I got through, and it felt dang rewarding to get to the final screen.
I really think you nailed how long/difficult to make screens, and saving your progress every screen definitely helped too. This is one of few games in this style that I have really enjoyed; most of them are too hard/unforgiving for my liking.
I always try to give some critical feedback, (especially when the creator is looking for some!) so I'll mention that music might have helped the feel of the game a bit more. That said, I don't really have a lot else. Your graphics and game mechanics were extremely solid, and those are two of the bigger things for me.
Thanks for a fun game - this is probably one of my favorites so far!
Internet saved!
I liked the controls of this, as others have mentioned. They're very easy to pick up and work well for this type of game. The graphics are also a charming kind of simple, and the idea of repairing undersea cables is a fun one. This was a fun entry.
I always try to give some constructive feedback on entries, so I'll mention that it took me a few seconds to realize I had to drive into a cable to fix it. I tried shooting it and a few other things first! (Though, at least there weren't really any enemies around the first time.) As others mentioned, the music was a little loud.
Having the ability to shoot as a submarine felt natural, but I pretty much never used it. I pretty much just tried to avoid the enemies instead, which worked well enough. (Games don't always need a way to fight back against enemies!)
Overall I quite liked this- thanks for a fun game!
I really liked the graphics on your entry, and the method of controlling the ship was really welcome. I do have to echo the feedback of some of the other players around the early area being tough, but I managed to at least get to the second set of ships. I also got to massively upgrade my weapons early on due to some good luck, so that was pretty fun.
This is a really impressive base, especially for 20 hours. Nicely done!
This is an absolute joy to play! I decided to see it when I saw the winners, since the screenshot looked charming. You should seriously consider expanding this into a full game; the mechanic is really solid and you could probably make a few bucks off it if you wanted to. I'd definitely consider picking up a copy.
Man, I thought I was being somewhat original building for a 30+ year old console, and you folks are out here making a solid game for a dang oscilloscope! This is definitely one of my favorites from this jam.
The controls are incredibly solid, and I really liked the unstable damage effects. The music also definitely gave me some doom vibes. (Beyond just the instruments/tools used) Thanks for a really fun entry!
Fun idea! I managed to survive up to 31 points. I feel like I don't see a lot of unreal engine games, so that was kinda cool to see too.
There's a lot of room for expansion here. I'll also mention that it might be kinda cool to have levels, maybe with different floor designs and a goal score you want to survive until? This was still a really fun entry - thanks for creating it!
Nicely done game! I especially like the graphical style, I can tell where you got your influences, for sure. The mini-map helped a ton, and I appreciated that it showed where corruption orbs still existed. (That said, it took me a while to figure out what it all meant, and which tile was me! It might help to put a guide somewhere)
One bug I wanted to point out, which might be making this harder than you intended - it seems like the first time you see an upgrade/item on a screen, it is marked as collected. So if you, for example, die on a screen with a heart upgrade (or just transition away without collecting it) that upgrade is gone for good. I ended the game with 4 health - I think I had the option to get 6, but those items disappeared.
As others have said, the combat is a little hard to get used to, but that doesn't take away too much. Thanks for a fun game!
Nice game! There's not much for me to add that hasn't already been said - the music stood out to me, and I really liked the idea, even if there was a lot of guesswork involved. I'll also point out that I think the tutorial screen helped a lot! I would have had no idea what to do without it, and it was easy to find (even if I didn't read your description)
Thanks for a fun entry.
As a software engineer by trade, I greatly appreciate your sense of humor! You could definitely expand this to be a really fun puzzler. As others have mentioned, the clear explanation of what went wrong helped a lot. (Also as someone who was once responsible for the scheduling system for morning reports in a complex system, I feel your pain on DST/timezones on a spiritual level :sweat_smile:)
I always try to leave a little constructive feedback, so I'll mention that when I started, I really wasn't sure what the doors were supposed to be. This was pretty quickly resolved through playing a little though. I really like some of the other planned ideas - there's a lot of potential here.
Thanks for a fun entry!
Great entry - definitely enjoyed going all kirby's dream land on those ships! I'm not sure how I missed this until now, I go out of my way to find games for old systems whenever I compete, but I'm glad to have found your entry.
There's not a lot to say that hasn't already been said, but I really like how you did the transformations between ships - the attention to detail with how they behave made it quite interesting. It could be pretty fun to see this concept expanded if you ever wanted to.
Thanks for a great entry!
Wow, that was a fantastic entry! Easily one of my favorites I've played so far. I really liked the level designs, and you created a lot of content in the context of the jam. The levels were just the right level of challenging, and the mechanics were easy to pick up, and fair. The music effect you used was really cool too. I managed to beat it, but not without a good few deaths! If you wanted to, I bet you could expand on this quite a bit.
I really have nothing but positive things to say - thanks for a really fun game!
I managed to finish it! Cute little game for the compo.
I will mention I ran into a few bugs that made it challenging. The ship control bug mentioned above really threw me for a loop, I actually had to restart the game to get past it. I'm not sure if this was supposed to happen, but later in the game, maybe 4 or 5 pieces of trash got stuck on the far right wall in the life support system, so I could only get the health back up to 50% or so. I also had a really hard time getting rid of the trash on that system, since you let go of trash as soon as the mouse leaves the game area. (Making that just a few pixels bigger might make a world of difference)
That aside, this is a really cool game! It's definitely impressive to get multiple small games working in the compo timeframe. I actually thought the length of the game was perfect - just long enough to experience all of the minigames, and start having to prioritize things. I also really liked the music - it created a chill atmosphere. (And helped balance the anxiety of watching all the things!) The slow introduction of minigames was also really helpful, as someone else already commented.
Thanks for a really fun game!
Thank you for all the kind words and reviews! I really appreciate it.
@vectrex28, good find on that death-on-spawn issue - thank you! I just issued a bugfix version to correct it. The "idea" was to nudge the player to go back to the desert layer before going to the next screen, but that kind of falls apart with how I do checkpoints :face_palm:
@rogual, that was definitely not meant to be the en - thank you for reporting this! (There's a real ending, with credits and story and stuff.)
There was a bug where if a corruption triggered at the exact moment you move between screens, the game would crash. (For the curious, it had to do with obstructing sprite 0, so the scroll split did not work) I just released a new version that fixes the bug.
(And yeah, telling solid tiles apart is a problem - for some reason I struggle with this more than any other aspect of game creation.)
Thank you again! I'm really glad people are enjoying this.
Thank you so much for the kind comments everyone!
@python-b5 yep, that's intentional. Things get more obvious on layer 5 - it's meant to be slightly disruptive. (and is also why I added the epilepsy warning)
@mathiouza You should! There's a pretty big community around it these days, and the tools around making NES games are better than ever. You can work with either assembly, C, or visual tools like NESMaker. (Though personally, I find NESMaker a bit more daunting than just writing code) If you like Gameboy games, there is also a fantastic tool called GBStudio that is super user friendly.
No pressure of course, I'm just always happy to see more excitement for older consoles.
Also about RusticNES from Zachery's comment, it definitely has my attention - I am glad to see more web-based emulators coming around, and that seems like a solid one. I really like that you can just pass a rom in the URL like that!
Thanks for the kind comments everyone!
itzemii, there are 5 layers. Also, the out-of-phase/blinking humans pose no threat to you. (You can actually still talk to them - though they won't tell you much useful) The only enemies that can actually harm you are the weird blob enemies. The world has holes that you can fall down too, but otherwise the game tries to focus more on puzzles than enemy avoidance.
@samuli Oh no, that was pretty late in the game, too!
Really cool to see someone else playing it on console, on a CRT no less! (I don't have space for one right now, though once I move I'll have to get one) Thanks for playing, and appreciate the kind feedback!
Thank you for kind the feedback everyone! It is always appreciated.
I agree with you on knowing which machines/radios go where; I actually had the thought during the jam but couldn't come up with any way to show it that could implement quickly. That said, I wasn't thinking of it like up and down - your question actually suggests a way I could have done it, with arrows pointing up and down. Thank you for the idea, and really appreciate the kind comments.
@lee-reilly Thank you so much! I appreciate the kind words, and I'm glad to see a few of the other really fun games I played on the same list.
What a clever idea! I had a lot of ideas when the unstable theme came up, but this one didn't even begin to occur to me.
It was short and simple, but in a jam like this, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. You definitely achieved the chill atmosphere you were going for. Thanks for a fun entry!
I want to try this game and probably like it, but unfortunately it just doesn't seem to run very well on my machine. I seem to get about 5 frames per second running it, and the first room is extremely dark. (Maybe this is expected, but it seems surprising) The button in front of me at the start seems to impact the doors somehow, but I haven't really figured out how yet.
I see some writing on the wall but I can't make it out. If I run through the door nearby and screenshot I can get about 1 second of enough brightness to read the bottom text. Here's what that looks like: 1.png
Here's what it looks like normally: 2.png
Machine info: ``` Windows 10 Pro Ryzen 9 3900X 64GB Ram GTX 760 (I know, I know - the gpu shortage has caused me to hold off on upgrading) Resolution: 1920x1080 ``` If there's anything else I can provide let me know.
Thanks for the effort! That did improve the framerate a lot, but unfortunately didn't really change anything appearance-wise. I did manage to navigate mostly through the first level in the dark, (I think) but it's not clear what to do from there. (for obvious reasons)
That said, this does seem like a really cool idea, and a great take on the theme! I wish you the best of luck.
What a clever idea! I really liked the music on this, and the general idea is cool too. I survived for about 6 minutes on a rooftop. I will say the pacing felt a little odd to me - I'm not sure how I would have done it differently, but it felt like there was a lot of waiting. Maybe a toggle button for speeding up the rate of water would help?
Either way, thanks for a fun game!
ps: While I was writing this, I left it open in a tab and learned that couches can float with the weight of a small child in this dream world. I think I win!
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This was pretty fun! I ended up doing it in 143 seconds! It was definitely a bit easy, but I really liked the walljump mechanic. The music was great, though I do wonder if it would have felt better if the music continued between levels. I heard the intro a whole lot of times. Thanks for a fun game!
Dang, that was kinda stressful! I managed to get to day 15, though barely. I wasn't sure if there was an end at all. Definitely a cool idea, and I liked how the difficulty escalated. An endgame would have been kind of neat and rewarding, but otherwise you managed something really cool here. Thanks for a fun game.
2021-10-20 01_19_15-Mars Colony Alpha by Max Schmoecker, Falzock.png
I really like the graphics and effects on this! As others have mentioned, it would have been cool to see a high score page, or at least have it pause when you lose so you can see your score. I think I got around 22 points and survived 30 seconds at my best. Thanks for a fun game!
This is a really cool idea! The gameplay was short but sweet, exactly what you'd hope for in a game jam like this. I really liked how you interpreted the theme and used gravity. Others mentioned that waiting might be a problem, and I think that could be true if you extended this to the length of a full game. At this length though, I think it was just fine!
Thanks for a fun entry
Nicely done! It's been really fun to see the progression of games you've made as time goes on (especially as a fellow NES dev) and this is your best yet. The concept you used is pretty great - fiddling with tvs was fun. I also really liked the enemies you added - they were easy to predict, but still a challenge to get around. (The cat sound effects were also perfect)
Your graphics were top notch (as always) and I think your intro screen provided the perfect amount of context. Also, it looked great! Simply varying the text color and example sprites, paired with the font you created makes it feel very polished. I also liked that you had a name entry screen, and used it in the game. (Major bonus points for not just leaving extra blank spaces at the end of shorter names, too)
I really only encountered one bug - on the name entry screen, it feels weird to leave "Player 1" in there - if you aren't careful, you end up with a name like "Chrisr 1". That said, if that's the only bug someone encounters, you're in pretty good shape!
Thanks for a great entry!
Huh, clever idea! I never knew I wanted a flappy bird shooter. It's simple, but that's kind of the appeal of games like this. Thanks for a fun entry.
Oh wow, this is a really fun one! I managed to beat it with 94 points. It controlled really well, and the graphics were great. Very polished entry. Thanks for a fun game
This was pretty fun! I managed to beat it after a few tries - like others said, RNG definitely played a big part, but it was a good level of challenge for a game jam. The graphics were simple but charming, and the music was pretty solid too. Thanks for a fun entry!
This is a really unique concept and a great take on the theme! Nicely done.
As some others have said, the gameplay is a little bit repetitive, and a sort of progress bar over characters might have helped. I found myself kind of lost as to how I was doing at times. I had to give up on the level with the 2 tinfoil hats unfortunately, I just couldn't find a way to make progress. I guess society is doomed :sweat_smile:
Two other things - first, it might be nice to allow skipping cutscenes - they're amusing, but after the first one you kinda know what's going on. Also, something that might be kind of cool if you ever decide to expand this, it'd be fun to have some way to separate people off from the rest, so they can stay happy. (or keep their literal tinfoil hat conspiracies to themselves!) Maybe a way to build walls or something.
I always try to provide some constructive feedback like the above, but overall I quite liked this. Thanks for a fun entry.
Interesting idea! I got through about 20 calls then got fired when I couldn't keep up. The audio and graphics helped make it feel almost spooky - thanks for a fun entry.
Cool idea for a game! I did appreciate the physics, and the idea is cool.
I did hit a bug a few times - if you fail to shoot the ball correctly, the game will close the ball launch area with the ball in it, causing the game to lock up and become unplayable. I ended up never finishing a round because this kept happening.
Still, this is a really cool idea, and you could do a lot with it. Great take on the theme, too
Hi, this is your boss, Beef Jezos!
Interesting concept, it got really interesting when another portal got introduced. Unfortunately I also ran into the voiceover loop issue, which was slightly annoying. (Nothing show-stopping of course!) Thanks for a fun entry
This is a really cool idea, and the controls are pretty interesting once you get used to them. I agree with the other person that said it felt like the sun's health went down really fast - I didn't really get much of a chance to figure out the controls before I needed to have fed the sun. I only got one planet (and almost a second) on my first play. (Alternatively, if the planets gave the sun just a little bit more life it might also be a little less difficult.)
That said, it's still fun! I always like seeing unique ideas being executed. Thanks for an interesting entry.
Well, when I think of "unsable" gbdk is one of the first things that comes to mind :laughing:
I just grabbed the game in the past 5 from the main branch on github (the link provided here) and gave it a shot. The sound is interesting - it feels like it's coming from a boss level at the end of a game, but glitchier. That was pretty cool.
The glitchy graphics and graphic swaps are a cool effect. I'll admit I still had quite a bit of trouble with the platforming though. With the glitchiness it's kind of hard to tell where is solid and where isn't, or why you die at a certain point in a jump.
Still, it's a fun game, and I always love seeing entries made for classic consoles! Thanks for an interesting game.
I unfortunately barely missed rating this due to the cutoff, but I wanted to comment anyway. I really like what you did with the graphics here - it looks fantastic! As others also mentioned, I had a bit of trouble with the controls and couldn't get past the second level - I gave up after maybe 15-20 tries. The fixes described in an earlier comment seem like they would make a world of difference there.
I really liked how the first stage worked - the block breaking mechanic worked nicely and was just the right level of challenge. (I also appreciate that you put checkpoints between each stage)
You definitely nailed the retro aesthetic in a lot of ways - thanks for a great entry!
Congratulations on a great first entry! Sometimes simple games like this can be the most amusing. I really liked that you had the difficulty settings - I found 3 too easy, 4 was easily beatable, and 5 was a good solid challenge. (6 was as you stated, haha)
Also for what it's worth the graphics on this were one of my favorite parts - they're simple but effective. Definitely a lot better than I did in my first compo!
This could definitely be fun to expand on - thanks for a fun entry.
This was a fun little game! I love the aesthetic you've created between the music and the graphics - even without sound effects this game really stands out. It took me a little while to grasp what was going on - I actually thought the floating blocks in the background were something I was supposed to land on, and had decided the target platform was a piece of the background until it occurred to me to try hitting every platform. Once I did though, I managed to get a decent way through.
I will say I found the isometric controls hard to grasp. One option that might have helped me was making the movement more tile-based - forcing me into that grid a little more might have helped my brain get around it. I did really like that you showed where the cake was going to land - that would have been extremely hard to judge without it.
Thanks for a fun game!
This was a really fun one! I managed to beat it fully, but it definitely took some doing! The progression on the puzzles was great, and I also really liked the sound effects. My only one "complaint" was that it was weird to have turning cost a move. It worked though, and made some of the puzzles more interesting. (Though, it also made me question if I was going to have a problem if I started the level facing the wrong direction.) Overall this was fantastic though, a highlight of the event for me. Thanks for a fun game!
Simple and fun! Sometimes that's just what you need. I'll admit it took me longer than I'd like to admit to realize the "1x" in the corner was a button I could use to adjust speed. It felt dreadfully slow until I realized that, though in retrospect it seems obvious.
I managed to get to wave 47, and dang near beat it too.
Pretty fun game! I like that you added some story to it as well. I survived the first couple waves without issue and had some fun. At that point though, I tried to figure out how to change direction (using a 360 controller) and discovered that the y face button ends your game without confirmation. I had checked the controls at the beginning, but nothing was listed. So that was a little upsetting.
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(Warning: this section is a little pedantic)
Just a heads up, I'm not sure it's allowed within Wolfram Alpha's license terms to use their music in games. I've seen a github post saying the compositions are cc0, but I've never been able to find proof. [Their license page](https://www.wolfram.com/legal/terms/wolfram-tones.html) however says:
Unless otherwise specified, this Site and content presented on this Site are for your personal and noncommercial use. You may not modify, copy, distribute, transmit, display, perform, reproduce, publish, license, create derivative works from, transfer or sell any information or content obtained from this Site. For commercial and other uses, contact us.
I didn't mark you down for this, just wanted to mention so you don't get in trouble! Especially if you expand this past the compo.
ps: If I'm wrong please let me know! I have had a few projects I wanted to use it for, but didn't feel I could
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Pedantic warnings about licenses aside, thanks for a fun entry!
Yeah, you got it on why I tried to change direction. It just felt like I had to be missing something, though after reading the comments I clearly wasn't :sweat_smile:
And I don't think Wolfram Alpha would come after you for a ludum dare game, but if you ever tried to monetize it or get it out there past LD, it'd probably be a risk. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news on that D:
This was a really fun one! I got the vibe of games you would play on an older mac from the system 7/mac os 8 era. The graphics and the music/sfx really helped that. The mechanics were really clever and unique. I can't really write much more without just rehashing what other people have already written, but this is a fun one! Nicely done
That was a super interesting entry - I've never really seen one like that before! I did run into the same challenge as PerfectSquare above, though I was usually able to guess. At first I had assumed I had a limited number of wake-ups with space, but I totally get what you were going for by not doing so. This could be a really fun concept to expand on too. Thanks for an interesting entry!
This was a really fun one! I managed to get up to 17000 points, though it seems I've been massively outclassed. I suspect I would have gotten a bit higher, but this little jerk of a slime decided the space between two layers was _the absolute bestest place on the entire planet_ to hang out.
jerk.png
Silly me thought "oh, it has a 5 minute timer, I can't be on this too long". I definitely spent like 20 minutes+ playing. Thanks for a fun one!
Edit: Maybe it was 27000 - I did eventually beat this guy and another world or two. I just noticed my score in this was already 19000 :sweat_smile:
Hey! I had the same issue with the emulator not starting- both on Windows/Chrome and Ubuntu/Chrome. Windows/Firefox worked okay. I've got Mesen around so it didn't really stop me of course!
Here's the log of it loading the rom, and everything after:
``` Loading game... app.js:1 app.js:1 PRG ROM: 4 x 16KiB app.js:1 CHR ROM: 1 x 8KiB app.js:1 ROM CRC32: 0xfa1a5a6f app.js:1 ROM MD5: 0xeb317986c97b94473530c19bfadcf4ee app.js:1 Mapper #: 4 app.js:1 Mapper name: MMC3 app.js:1 Mirroring: Vertical app.js:1 Battery-backed: Yes app.js:1 Trained: No app.js:1 Video system: NTSC app.js:1 app.js:1 Power on fceux.js:9 [Deprecation] The ScriptProcessorNode is deprecated. Use AudioWorkletNode instead. (https://bit.ly/audio-worklet) ```
It very briefly shows the "select game prompt" then fades to black afterwards. I've had weird issues with em-fceux before, but I can't say I've ever seen that. Not sure what it could be - very odd!
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Anyway on to the feedback!
First off, hey I know those songs! I recognize that cc0 music anywhere, Tedd Kerr/Wolfgang is really talented! I really appreciate that he released those.
This was a fun entry - short but sweet. I managed to beat it with 60 stars (after a good bit of rewind - I wanted to see if there was an end :p). It's always cool to see more retro games in the game jam!
A couple things I noticed and thought I'd mention -- none of these really bring the game down, I just would want to know if it were my game * The music is a little glitchy compared to the originals - if it helps, the times I've run into it in the past it was a prg banking issue with the famitracker/famitone engine. (If your music isn't in a loaded bank 100% of the time, weird glitches happen. I can probably dig up a code sample on how I fixed it for mmc1 if you're curious!) * If I full-height jump from the highest block I can find, I'll wrap into the death plane at the bottom of the screen and die
Thanks for a fun entry!
This is really fun! The music was a highlight, though you have to get kinda good at the game to hear it in all of it's glory. I managed to get all of SKATE (admittedly with a few savestates) and a score of 8963. I had a lot of fun with this, thanks for a great entry!
Thanks for all the positive and constructive feedback! I always appreciate it!
@vectrex28 I think you've probably got this one - your game's really solid! (Seriously if you like NES entries, go check his out too!)
Unfortunately I got pretty sick on the last day and had to cut the scope quite a bit. Part of it was rearranging the stages - I did a quick runthrough, but I totally agree the order isn't great. (Also of note, I never built a way to sort levels in retro puzzle maker, so I had to do it by hand. Apparently I really do need that feature!)
Lastly I was actually intending to drop the player's speed a bit at the end, but it slipped my mind. I hope that the undo key can prevent most of the frustration with it, though.
Thanks again folks!
Thanks for all the kind feedback!
@wendel-scardua Ah, sorry to hear you got sick too. Hope you're getting better as well.
On the ice thing, you know, I literally never thought about that! It'd be pretty easy to implement, maybe I'll do that next time I work with the puzzle maker.
The sprite thing I do want to do one of these days, it's just quite a bit of effort. Thank you for the feedback!
Thanks for all of the kind feedback! And yeah, I'll admit, my graphics aren't great. It's something I've wanted to get better at, but I'll also admit I didn't put much love into it this time.
@sokette Huh, I can't imagine what went wrong with higan. I've tested this general codebase across a lot of emulators and flash carts+consoles, but I'll admit I haven't tried Higan. I may look into that at some point.
Also @exevirus the tool I used for the basic puzzle effort is online and free, if you're interested! The water mechanic was added using C, but everything else was done with it: https://puzzle.nes.science. (Disclaimer, I made the tool :sweat_smile:)
@the-great-gallus Thank you so much for the detailed feedback! I always love seeing this kind of detail, both positive and negative.
The water color thing has come up a lot, but I hadn't noticed how bad it was with the ice - that's a really good point and something I'll have to keep in mind!
If you do use the engine, I hope you enjoy it!
Nicely done! I love seeing that end screen, I'm always curious how long it takes someone other than me to win it out.
Thank you all of the kind feedback!
@dot-dev - My first thought is that you have to press start (enter) to dismiss that screen - I should probably have mentioned this, sorry. If that doesn't work, can you share what browser and operating system you're using?
You could also try downloading the [rom](https://cpprograms-nes-games-https.s3.amazonaws.com/ld50/ld50-latest.nes) and run it with either [Mesen](https://mesen.ca) or [fceux](https://fceux.com), if the web emulator isn't working for you. Please reach out if you're still stuck and want to play!
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@blinry The undo limit was actually a system limitation - I really wanted to allow more! The engine allows up to 50 undo steps, but the way I implemented water broke it. Water is very dynamic in how it expands, and it wasn't easy to roll back. I ended up storing the entire state of the map for each step, which worked perfectly but used up a ton of the NES's 2kb of ram. Given more time I could probably fix it.
Don't worry, we've all done things like that! Thanks for coming back and playing it through (and letting me know that it wasn't an emulator issue!) - appreciate the kind words
The graphics and procedural generation were both really impressive here! And yes, I did manage to slay a dragon (two, in fact!)
That said, I did kinda feel like the game lacked something. It felt a bit repetitive, even with the added features in later levels. I don't honestly know what I was hoping for, or if it was even feasible in a weekend game jam honestly. (maybe some story, or explanation around the mystery?) But still an interesting entry.
Wow, this was a really fun entry! One of the highlights of this jam for me, for sure. the idea was simple enough to pick up quickly, but took some thought to master. (I did manage to beat it!) I really like the art here as well- the cards especially were fantastic, and everything felt like it fit together perfectly. If I had to give one piece of critical feedback, it's a tiny bit hard to read the effects on the card in smaller resolutions, or without fullscreening the game. Thanks for a fun game!
This was a pretty interesting one! I managed a final score of 2250. I thought partway through I'd do better to let the two outside areas die so I could focus on the insides, and wow did things go downhill fast from there :sweat_smile:
I really liked the art and playstyle here. There's a lot you did right, and prior posts have already covered it pretty in-depth, so I won't repeat them. Thanks for a fun game!
The visuals of this were great and the idea was pretty solid! Like others said, I had quite a hard time picking up the mechanics. In particular it took me a long time to realize the only way to solve some puzzles was to light the fuse then stub it out. It also didn't seem intuitive to do that, since you'd think the stem couldn't become longer once you'd burned part of it. (Not a huge issue, and with a little instruction about this it might become a positive!)
I did encounter a strange bug in the last level where if I stretched the fuse into the right position toward the bottom, it would actually merge two sections of the fuse with a weird graphic, and the fire would sort of "jump" between the two pieces of the fuse. It's kind of hard to describe; I wish I'd caught a video. It wasn't a game breaking bug; I still managed to finish! It was just odd. Thanks for a fun entry.
Very cool! I always like seeing more retro entries in the compo/jam. I managed to get 119 points, though I may have cheesed it. One piece of constructive feedback, it felt like it took forever to cross the map. I'm not sure if that's because of limitations of the console/your engine/etc but it would have helped to be able to accelerate the cursor a bit. (Maybe have it speed up if you hold b outside a menu?)
Either way, this was a cool idea, and not something you usually saw on the gameboy. Nicely done!
Looks like I got a pretty low score compared to people here, I landed just shy of 7k. I had a lot of fun with this though! I actually get to be the first person to say this, too: it gave me serious audiosurf vibes! It was a fun ride down memory lane in that sense. The music was super fitting too, though the loop was maybe a tiny bit short. Thanks for a fun entry!
Agreed with the person above, who hurt all of the drivers in that town!? :laughing: I think I had more fun with the car physics than I did actually trying to complete my goals. The tilt mechanic was maybe overpowered for the gamestyle, but very fun! Thanks for an interesting entry.
This was a really cool entry! Not 100% sure what I did, but I made $1700 and got 4th place. I loved the graphics and the card humor. Trying a new engine during ludum dare is always an adventure - I'm glad it went well for you! Thanks for a fun entry
Great entry! I really liked the music, it was very fitting. (I'm so glad to see you doing that, too!) I think I've said it before but you've really developed a unique graphical style as well - I know your game before looking at the name at this point. I also really like the mechanic you went with - it's super clever.
I will say though, it is _hard_! I really couldn't get past 3 levels with keyboard controls. I got through a lot more with a controller, but for some reason I really couldn't get the hang of them. (Fair warning: I'm quite sick right now, so take my difficulty complaint with a grain of salt!)
I do appreciate that every level is a checkpoint, so it's not super punishing at least - I have save states so I may pick it back up later. My one minor complaint: please, please give me a way to give up and retry/die! In some of the levels it takes like 20 seconds for the level to kill you if you miss placing a block. (I ended up save-scumming to avoid this :sweat_smile:) That aside, this was a fun entry. Always great to see more retro games in the jam!
This was way more fun than it had any right to be! I got to feel like a child for a few minutes :) I managed to keep 4 balloons alive for a time. This also introduced me to minetest, which looks like an interesting little project. Thanks for a fun entry!
The artwork on this game is fantastic! (As others have mentioned) It was short but sweet, I managed 39 seconds. It would have been really cool if it were a bit longer - if birds respawned or something like that. The controls were very solid though. Thanks for a fun entry!
Managed to survive 4:48! Seth got disappointed in me because I was at the store too long buying things for him. I don't even know what he wanted. Sounds like a cat, alright! Thanks for a fun entry.
Clever use of the theme! I really liked the graphics as well - nicely done!
I had a lot of fun with this one! I feel like you could expand this into something really interesting. Not much more to say that the past few posters haven't covered, but thanks for a fun game.