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Pogo Boy Saves The Day!'s itch.io pageJudge feedback
Judge feedback is anonymous.
- Playability - Easy to pick up, fun to master. Good tutorial. Polished, I did not encounter any bugs. Satisfying air control, it's nice that you have a bit of leeway in landing angle. - A little bit difficult to get stars on certain levels despite pretty good execution due to the time metric (give a bit of padding for accessibility, even below average gamers want that shiny star!). I would try a 3 star system, one for each metric you track at the end, as well as implementing a bonus star system where you can introduce level specific challenges, such as perhaps doing a 1080 on level 3, or not landing on your head, or not breaking any boxes, etc. You could also add a leaderboard in the future if speedrunning is a direction you want to take with this game. - Some controls features I'd recommend: make controller triggers and right joystick also spin, make spinning axis based instead of on/off so that you can slowly or quickly spin (on keyboard you could introduce a mod key such as shift to slow down spinning) Theme Implementation - Being a superhero certainly embodies the theme. Cleverness - Great platformer innovation. Feels similar to how I might feel playing 2D Sonic games. - Add some powerups! Maybe one that turbo boosts your spin rate, makes you invulnerable, maybe allowing multiple air jumps, etc. Gives players something to aim at high in the sky. - Add some environmental obstacles/enemy variety! So far the enemies can't hurt you and simply walk around. Maybe there are pedestrians/bystanders that you have to avoid, pitfall traps, tar/concrete pits in construction zones that slow you down, etc. Artistic Style - Charming pixel style, though there may be some pixel perfect inconsistency/stretching issues. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/FCJWPYqV0TI?feature=share - 360, 720, etc popping up is a great detail! - "Poop" graffiti is a bit crass, I'd recommend a poo emoji, etc, to keep it more kid friendly. - Great color choices, love gradients in pixel games, though a trick you can do: although your game is a pixel art focused, you can use vector graphics for BGs and skyboxes and it'll still look nice, if you want. Same for on screen text, see Celeste as an example. Rife with potential, I can easily see the finished product after some polish and gameplay work. Great job! Thank you for participating!
Link to your Game Design Doc on Google Drive.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bQ_ZRIL3GSzJaYJefC897qXOVQgkoBVPs2ufaegfhu8/edit?tab=t.0#heading=h.lr899156xjnx
Have you checked that your GDD is publicly accessible ?
Yes
Is your game set to public on itch.io so we can see it?
Yes
Summarise your game!
Pogo Boy Saves The Day is a side-scrolling platformer where you play as a pogo-stick riding hero, bouncing off the streets and the heads of criminals as fast as you can.
Using several different bouncing mechanics, the player will navigate through levels and bounce on enemies before reaching the goal. For a full score, players must bounce on all enemies and reach the goal within a specific amount of time. In a series of 6 increasingly difficult platforming stages, players must play and replay, learning how and where to use the bouncing mechanics to achieve the fastest time they can.
Controller recommended but not required. Thanks and have fun!
Please explain how your game fits the theme:
Our interpretation of the theme “You Are The Weapon” is that the player character itself is the projectile, launching, bouncing, and dropping onto foes. A pogo-stick riding, bouncing, flipping character, hurtling themselves through levels, became the vision upon which our game was made.
Is there anything you'd like the judges to pay particular attention to?
The game can be played and finished without using all the mechanics, but the game shines when using all the mechanics to improve your score. After finishing the levels, you can pause to select a previous stage.
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Comments
The mechanics felt really nice to use, and the polish is insane for the amount of time. I'm really impressed!
Thanks! I had a little time off work, so dumped a good amount of hours into it!
The level design here was fantastic! Really love how the controls were introduced. The bounce of the pogo stick felt very satisfying and I loved looking for all the silly graffiti!
oh my goodness i had so much fun playing this! the controls are super smooth and i loved the feeling of having to rotate to gain access to the abilities. made me think of laika and doing flips on her bike to reload the gun c: amazing job!
I'm glad you liked it :) Thanks for playing!
Genuinely strong entry. The controls were pretty fluid, though I sometimes noticed myself missing the extra high bounce for reasons I couldn't determine. Not sure if it was too early or too late. But the level design was fantastic, gave me something to test my skills against and I had to push myself to get level 4 and 6 in particular. Great vibe
Thanks so much!
Pretty fun and cute game! The game's presentation is superb too, art style, sfx and music blend together really well.
Very cute game, consistent artstyle and the stomp feels nice and impactful. Reminds me of some games I used to play on Nitrome. Good luck with the jam!
That game was pretty fun! Loved the pixel art it was very cute. Timing the jumps kept me invested in the gameplay while pursuing the objectives. Getting all the enemies was simple enough but getting them quickly seemed like a whole other challenge, I'll have to give it another go and see if I can get a gold star for every level... Although... do the graffiti artists really deserve it? Isn't jumping on their heads from extreme heights with a pogo stick a bit extreme? (Only joking! This game was heaps of fun!)
Thanks for the feedback!
Love the pogo mechanics, and the level design is fantastic! Loved the idea of 'beat the developer's best time' aswell. Great job to all involved!
Love the gameplay mechanics. Would appreciate something to tell me if I press space at a right moment but apart of that I think you did a great job. Very creative mechanics and nice experience
Our intention was that the changing color of the particle trail would let you know if your timing is right, along with the changing sound of the jump. Thanks for the feedback!
The game is pretty fun! But I was confused on when you could "dive" from a jump. Otherwise the level quantity is pretty high, so good job on that!
Such a fun game! Everything feels really polished. I like the power orb mechanic and how it adds to the difficulty by you not just having to jump around and time jumping to get a boosted jump. I fell on my head often times... 10/10
Very fun ! So polished !
That was fun to complete. Everything was so well made I don't have much to give for feedback. My only nitpick would be that I couldn't use a powerup as soon as I did the 360 but rather when I landed. That could be intended and gives it a mechanic to learn, but it slows down movement and end time.
I really liked the controls and the idea! I think the theme implementation was a bit shallow but the game itself was really fun, I was a bit sad it didn't go on for too long. I also think it could have benefited from a bit more challenging levels. Overall a really good job!
Awesome game! I really like the idea. The music and SFX fits good with the art style and player movement! THe movement itself could be a bit smoother sometimes, but I also played via keyboard (other than recommended). Very good work and I hope you keep going! :)Nice art, every level seems bit chalenging than previous it has nice curve to it, power jump feels great.
Really fun game here! Level design was nice, art is great, and the pogo controls felt very smooth. Loved being able to flip around in the air for the power ups as well. My only suggestion would be to make the correctly timed jumps feel a little better (maybe have the player stick to the ground just a little bit longer to give that feeling of charging up a big jump?). Regardless, great game, nice work!
the art is really cute and i love the music and sound effects a lot well done ! I was really struggling with the moving platforms haha I am just really bad at platformers (and i was on mnk instead of controller) but i think it will be very cool to see people speedrun these kinds of games!
Really fun to jump around and the mid air trick is a good way to have power-up!
Nice graphic and cute animation Love it!
Pogo Boy to the rescue against random racoon sprayers! Cool game, loved the spinning mechanic. Took me also a bit until I found the right key on a keyboard. (I know it is controller recommended but I was too lazy :P)
Well done guys!
Glad you had fun, thanks for playing our game!