ski11az

Sky Island Express by AfroAnt 2023-05-05T16:49:46Z

I was seriously surprised by how much I ended up enjoying this game. I'm a huge fan of physics based games and games with in world controls (tablets for map and camera, line for sail) and for how short and simple it was, you've managed to create a game with mechanics that are truly fun to play around with. Felt a little reminiscent of Overcooked (without coop) having to juggle many different tasks at the same time: adjust the sails, prepare a package for the hatch, shoot a package with the slingshot, check the map and side camera, open the hatch, prepare next package etc. There was always something urgent that needed doing and never enough hands to accomplish them all :smile:

The slingshots looked a little too much like oarlocks and I thought they were just there for detail. Took me a little while to understand they were slingshots so I was confused as to how I was supposed to throw the packages far enough to reach the islands. Would probably be a good idea to make them a bit more eye-catching to avoid any confusion.

Using the captain as a sort of tutorial or guide was also pretty clever instead of just showing a literal tutorial screen for how to play.

Really well done! I found the game fun enough to keep playing until I could deliver all packages without slowing down so I feel like that's pretty telling on my level of enjoyment. :smiley: Would have absolutely kept playing if there were more levels or mechanics.

Pizza Cat by DeadByDeath 2023-05-05T18:09:31Z

This town really does seem to have a cat problem :smile:

Interesting mechanic to let the player sacrifice some rewards in order to make it easier to move, or try to hold onto all pizza slices but instead risk losing even more. As others have said before me the collision boxes need some work to make getting stuck on corners less common as well as adding something to make the game more difficult as time progresses.

Other than that the music was pleasing to listen to and the pixel art was pretty neat. (those cats were adorable :blush:)

Car-Go Space by Demuss 2023-05-02T13:39:52Z

Quite fun car mechanics, crashing into other cars never gets old XD. Maybe having a drifting mechanic could have improved it even more. Playing this reminded me of the Burnout series. Was cool to see the rocket get progressively built as you delivered the parts. Could take it one step further by having the rocket get built one part at a time instead of kind of fading in, but of course this would be harder to implement. Some weird behavior with the boost: if you boosted after being pushed backwards (like after a collision) the the boost applies in the wrong direction. The ending cutscenes both for failing and succeeding were a nice addition and made me chuckle :smile:

Mars Delivery Program by Erlioniel 2023-05-05T18:50:59Z

Was impressed by how cohesive the entire experience was. All parts felt like they fit very well together and created a great atmosphere that had me eager to explore the entire colony. The music sold the setting of being on a mostly dead planet while still having a hint of comfort fitting well with the relative safety of the colony. The art style is very pleasant and the animations are absolutely adorable.

As for the gameplay, this definitely feels like one of those games where you'll get really frustrated over your own clumsiness and I love it. :smile: Several times I managed to launch every single box right off the buggy as if a bomb had hit them. I think I have to be more careful with how many boxes I try to cram on there. I did manage to launch a box like a rocket, landing out of bounds which made it impossible to reach. Luckily though it seemed like the boxes got restocked which was very good design to avoid any softlock frustrations.

The design of the colony was also really cool and I loved seeing the other parts of it in the background as I was exploring, especially while climbing the hill for the red delivery.

Really well done, especially for a game jam! I had a great, relaxing time playing.

Unconventional Delivery by Mistafixxa069 2023-05-05T15:58:39Z

First thing with this game that I really liked was the "show, don't tell" unintrusive tutorial. Without having windows of text you clearly managed to convey how the game worked and what the functionality of each piece was. This was done in an especially clever way with the introduction of the bounce pad where, unlike the previous levels, there were no graphics giving a simple showcase. Now the player instead had to piece it together by the fact that the house was unreachable, meaning the new piece would somehow need to pass packages past walls. Very well done with the design here!

This however did fall apart slightly in the first level where it was easy to mistake the instructions for being an actual part of the level, causing some confusion.

Otherwise the puzzles were fun to solve and once again I really think you did a great job with the bounce pad. The second level they were in is probably my favorite in the game. Another notable mention is the early one where you have to split the packages into three equal stacks. That one took me a little longer to come up with a neat solution for and felt quite satisfying once I got it working.

My only big criticism is that there should really be some way to adjust the volume of the game; the sound of the houses blasting off as well as the packages reaching a house were way to loud and sharp.

Chalkboard Deliveries by Locke8 2023-05-05T17:54:19Z

Would have liked to play more but unfortunately I ran into a bug that made it close to unplayable. It would work fine initially with just one truck but once more trucks became available it was impossible to set up individual routes for them. Whenever I tried issuing orders to one truck they would be applied to all previously selected trucks as well even when I had specifically selected one specific truck. On that note, a very welcome addition would be some indication on which units are selected. Could be done by just changing their colors slightly or outlining them with a small ring.

Otherwise the game seemed like it would be really fun to play. The art was simple but consistent and clear, the music was relaxing and the premise seems promising. Unfortunate that I was unable to play it more.

Galactic Roadside Assistance by SpaceyLake 2023-05-02T11:44:52Z

Overall a very fun and simple game that takes only a handful of concepts and executes them well. With intuitive controls it was easy to set up routes and cycles for the ships to take, opening up the door for more complex strategies. Potentially have some indicator for if you are adding a destination or creating a cycle, quickly forgot which of shift and ctrl did what. Other that that the neon art style was solid and the sound effects fit well with the rest of the game.

C.R.A.B. signal by unkilledshadow135_Alex 2023-05-05T17:32:58Z

I'll start with some of the negatives. It was very unclear what you were supposed to be doing. It took a while to figure out where the signal was supposed to go and the buttons to swap buoy really could do with some icons to better show which ones they control. Once figuring all that out the game was pretty fun to play, especially the later levels where there were a few more moving parts. Apart from that the art is really well made with a very pleasing comic style and the story comics at the start and end were quite humorous. Well done!

One question though. I could never figure out what the purpose of the sonar/radar at the bottom was. Is it just there for looks or does it actually show something relevant to the gameplay?

Astacus Mechanicus by DeadlyFugu 2023-05-03T13:06:12Z

Interesting concept for a puzzle game where you continue to build upon the previous level. However, because of the pace at which more pieces were added it quickly got overwhelming and I didn't feel like I could approach the problem in any strategic manner other than trying a bunch of things and seeing what works. Maybe cut down on the number of pieces that have dual purpose in the early levels to let players first get comfortable with the rules and mechanics of the game, then over time introduce them more and more. After a while you also had so many pieces that it was hard to manage them all.

If difficulty is increased more gradually, I can imagine this being a quite fun challenge.

Some minor issues I had: - The sound when placing a piece is quite sharp. Consider lowering it's volume or replacing it with something softer. - It's possible to place pieces outside the grid. Don't know if this is intentional or not. - Picking up a piece made it displace, sometimes quite a lot, which made it tedious to move pieces single steps.

In summary: fun concept that would greatly benefit from a more lenient difficulty curve.

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-02T14:00:52Z

@merrow Yeah, controlling the ship does take some getting used too and it's way too easy to get stuck on objects so that would definitely need some polish. Would have also liked to implement more visual feedback to help with playing, like indicators for where items are. Really appreciate the feedback and thanks for playing!

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-02T14:05:07Z

@cyboi Thanks for the feedback and generous praise! :smiley: Can definitely agree. Would have liked to put a lot more time into refining the controls to make moving around feel better

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-02T14:10:32Z

@aschab Glad you liked it! :smile: It's not that clear but you don't need to click immediately on the anchors. You can hold left mouse button and sweep past them; the hook will shoot out and attach as soon as you pass. But I agree that the area to hit is a bit too small.

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-02T14:16:22Z

@foraland Hmm, will have a look at tweaking it and see if I can find a more appropriate range. Think it would make a significant difference if I added some visual indication too that shows how far the hook can reach. I appreciate the feedback!

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-02T15:02:04Z

@krzyhau Thank you so much for the in depth feedback! A lot of the things you mention are things we actually had planned but just did not have time to implement. Stuff like visual indications for actions, more refined transitions between scenes and particle effects on certain events.

As for not having to backtrack, it's probably a bit of both. We absolutely placed the collectables somewhat intentionally in places that made sense with the flow of the level, but there are still times where you might miss one and have to go look for it. We have already started looking into adding some form of waypoint to guide the player in the right direction.

Awesome that you liked the movement! I did try to balance it so the dash and hook would complement each other without either being dominant and it sounds like I may have done an ok job. Still needs some more feedback to guide the player towards it because it seems many gravitate towards using mostly one or the other which definitely cripples the movement.

I can't take any credit for the graphics, that was all done by Spudsef, but I'll make sure to relay your feedback to him.

As for SFX, that's one of the few things in the game we didn't have the skills to make ourselves and instead used store assets which made it harder to find sounds that fit with the game.

Again, thank you so much for the feedback. Diligently taking notes on what to change as we continue refining the game.

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-05T12:12:47Z

@zapelangelo Visual indicators are definitely something I wanted to add more of but just didn't have time. Both the dash cooldown as well as direction are not as clear as I'd like them. Having the dash default to the direction of the mouse is a great idea, thanks for the suggestion!

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-05T12:19:47Z

@demuss The range is definitely something that could do with more tweaking as well as something to show the player what the range actually is. I've actually had several people say they'd like the dash to be in the same direction as you are facing so that is definitely something I will be adding as an alternative. As for increasing the dash cooldown I don't want to increase it too much since I want the player to have very agile movement but I'll look into if I can make any changes to make it less dominant.

Thanks for the great feedback!

LittleOV by ski11az 2023-05-06T23:26:00Z

@erlioniel Visual feedback is definitely the area we want to improve the most. There's plenty of areas in the game currently where the player gets no indication on what is going on, like the example you gave with burst direction or how there is no clear way of knowing how far the grapple can reach. These are things we will absolutely work on improving.

The reason I chose WASD for dashing is so that you can dash in a different direction to where you are hooking. This helps you get better swings and makes the dash a tool for adjustments rather than just a speed increase. I have however heard from multiple people who, like you, want to dash in the cursors direction so will add an alternative input method that lets you do just that.

Thanks for taking the time to play our game and providing us with valuable feedback on how to improve!

Watching Eyes by AylanJ123 2023-05-04T16:57:44Z

There is something oddly captivating with this calming, yet eerie game. Don't know if it's because of the frequent swooshing of the propellers or the regular announcement from that echoing voice. I did however really struggle to find drones even when taking several laps around the city. I couldn't really figure out if they were even spawning or if I was just bad at searching. Might not be necessary to make them more eye-catching but could at least be worth considering if they should maybe spawn more frequently. Overall, the game really set the mood and the dual camera perspective of the drone was pretty neat. Good job on the game and the really cool cover art!

Space Postal Service by bad_fetus 2023-05-03T17:06:22Z

Yes, the ship is clunky to control. Initially. To me that's the charm with these kinds of games. The game doesn't assist you, you have to play on it's terms. That's part of the fun; to learn how to control a ship that does not want to be controlled :smile: and once you do, the ship controls are actually quite responsive.

Overall I had a really good time, I like this type of game and this one really reminded me of the old retro arcade game Lunar Lander.

A few points of feedback: - Would have been nice if the music played continuously. I liked it while it was there, but once it stopped things got eerily quiet. - A hotkey to restart the level instead of having to open the pause menu each time you fall or crash. For a game like this where failure is frequent, being able to quickly start over is vital and could otherwise be a cause for a lot of frustration. - Some feedback on how fast is too fast. Was hard to know if a crash into a wall would lead to death or if you'd be fine since there was no way of knowing what the speed threshold was.

Even though there were only a few levels, there was still some nice variety in their types. Some had a focus on being tricky to maneuver, others were focused on speed. Keep it up! I would gladly have played more! :thumbsup:

Kings Court by Nabil Shelim 2024-04-18T18:52:05Z

For being made in only 72 hours I'm surprised by how complete the game felt. The music, sound effects, art and writing all come together to form a very cohesive experience that could easily be a demo for a larger game. The only major critique I have would be the lack of variety in engaging requests, which is completely understandable due to the nature of being made in a jam. Really well done!

SquiggleMancer by ski11az 2024-04-18T19:02:09Z

@breadstick, @pigeonescu Thanks for playing and providing feedback!

Magicka was definitely part of the inspiration for the design of the spell casting system so you hit the nail on the head there. In line with that the lack of explanation of what each component does was an intentional choice to make you have to experiment. So while wanting to keep that aspect of the game, it could definitely be worth communicating a little better what the different results are so it's easier to tell what changed.

Glad you liked it!

SquiggleMancer by ski11az 2024-04-18T19:12:35Z

@captainspacecat Hey! Thanks for playing!

The spell crafting was made intentionally unclear with a lack of information in order to emphasize experimentation to find out what everything does. I do however think that the spell menu itself could have been made a lot more intuitive without taking away from that experimentation so that is something I would like to improve.

I also agree that trying to switch spells while in combat is unnecessarily cumbersome so will probably make the game slow down at least a little bit to lessen the stress.

Thanks for the feedback and glad you enjoyed the game!

SquiggleMancer by ski11az 2024-04-18T19:19:54Z

@jhax Thanks for the generous feedback!

Glad you liked the unconventional spell crafting! What you talked about was absolutely the intention, to create some friction in something that is normally very convenient and to reward mastery of the systems. Of course, with the small scale of a jam game there isn't a whole lot to master but figuring out what effect each component has at least takes a little experimentation. Would love to add more unique components to enable and even wider variety in the possible spells but that is for the future.

Wizard Battle by Hylazu 2024-04-18T18:35:53Z

I'm not much for card battlers and came into this game without much prior knowledge so the lack of instructions was extra noticeable. Took a while to understand how the game worked and what all the numbers meant.

Once getting past that though, the game seemed to play fairly well and I didn't notice any bugs. Well done!

Something to focus on for future projects would be to get some sound effects and visual feedback into the game. This is something I often neglect too but can really make a huge difference in making the game feel like a proper game rather than a little demo/prototype.

Good luck on any future projects!

Ascension by Pigeonescu 2024-04-18T18:13:34Z

First of all the art was gorgeous. Really liked the cartoony style and it went especially well with the ambient sound to create quite a relaxing experience.

However, with how much platforming you have to do the chanting when summoning the chain got a little bit repetitive after a while. Maybe just lowering the volume of it a little could help.

Would have also liked the controls to be a little more responsive, in particular the time it takes for the chain to grab you. Felt like it could take a good second before the chain was even visible on screen.

That said, while the game was short I enjoyed my time with it and have been keeping the game open in the background while writing this, listening to the ambient music.