I had the pleasure to test this game while it was still in development and I have to say I'm really impressed with how it turned out in the end! I like how you made the spikes less punishing in this version, it was a really good decision.

Lovely story panels. The platforming is smooth. The art looks really good, and not only that, but it has a really unique that I don't think I've seen before. I really like the friendly orange bird that I came across.

I love the sprawling metroidvania map design, with the various upgrades. You definitely didn't hold back on scope, and I really respect that. 

Amazing work, Half-Smore. You basically made an entire commercial game for your jam submission haha.

The metroidvania elements with the minimap were super good!  I also really loved the art style and the story.  One thing I would recommend is finding ways to make things a little clearer to make sure the low res pixel style isn't getting in the way.  The two places I think were a little hard for me were enemy hits and the spikes.  At first I thought I had missed the enemies when I dashed, so I think just making the hits really extra obvious would help.  Also, it took dying a few times to realize that I was running into spikes.  I know spikes can be hard in a low pixel style cause you can't get the sharp points that scream "this is a spike," but maybe something with the animation again like a blood spurt or having the spikes light up red when  you hit them so that it's really clear what you ran into that made one of your eggs break.  Overall this is a beautiful game and entry and I'd love to see more!

Wow. This was a great entry. Simple but effective storytelling. The visual style of the game, with the downscaling and the little wobbles looks great. I may had preferred the opening cutscene to follow the same style. The game feels complete very complete. Minor complain is the very first spikes jump, that was a little frustrating until I realized I could hold down space to “jump” further.

Bravo for making a metroidvania and a good one at that too, it's certainly an ambitious thing to do for a game jam. The opening cutscene with that comic book style is done really well and tells the story very clearly. I really like the artwork throughout the game but I think the outline comic artwork is better than the pixel art even though both are absolutely gorgeous by all accounts. I didn't get to explore all of what you created and it's mainly because I am not used to the controls (for me W to jump, space to dash is my norm) and I need to stop to make food so ran out of time. I got 4 health eggs, saw a 5th but couldn't get past the spikes and got the glide ability in the pink area. I enjoyed what I got to see and I appreciate the checkpoints and minimap and at no point did I feel lost. I think marking the nests on the minimap and any powerup that you see but didn't get on there would be a good thing to do if you expand the game. I think it would an improvement if the enemies died in one hit and the general difficulty was lowered at least to begin with. I liked the bees, but I found the bats difficult to defeat and think if they stayed still it would be an easier time and I think an even easier enemy like a snail that crawls around the walls could be cool. I think it was the spikes that I died most on though. There were times when I had a powerup and it said click any button and in my haste to dismiss the prompt I would click my mouse to close the window and end up dashing to my death. There was also a section where I dashed through to the next room and I immediately fell down into spikes as the momentum carried over or maybe it was just me I forget but that section was a tough one to get past but I managed it a number of times and was probably more difficult for me because of jumping, gliding and dashing all at once with controls I'm not familiar with more than anything else. All in all, I think it's a really great game with a lot of great platforming in it, which is exactly the type of game I love and the artwork is stunning and some really great upgrade abilities in there too. Hope my feedback helps in some way. One last suggestion: I think the dash ability would be more rewarding if it were earned rather than available from the start and if that flower above the spikes wasn't there as I was looking at that instead of the spikes

I find it hard to comment on this game. I'm generally not a big fan of platformers if the movement doesn't "fit" for me. So I didn't get very far in this game. I'm gonna dump my thoughts but they might mean nothing to you as I'm definitely not the target audience for this game :D but I'm doing it anyway because it looks like a lot of thought and effort was put into this game and you stated you want to develop it further.

I think the game is too pixelated, it's pretty hard to see what is going on with all the moving pixels on every screen. Is it just flavorful grass or flowers in the wind? Does it actually serve a gameplay purpose? Can I stand on this twig? It's hard to tell and there's not much feedback if it is a gameplay mechanic. Speaking of feedback, it's hard to tell what is dangerous and why it is. I didn't even see the spikes at first and wondered what happened, with a hard reset to the beginning of the screen, and then a hard reset to a few screens back. Audio cues would help a lot, I think.

But even after learning all these things, and learning how the game mechanics work, I couldn't get very far. The enemies respawn which makes it annoying when you die a bit later before you reach a new checkpoint, and the precision platforming in the rooms to the right was quite tedious for me so I didn't make it through that area. I don't feel like spending a lot of time mastering the enemy patterns and platforming mechanics of this game because I don't enjoy these kinds of games. Which is my fault, not yours! But it does mean I dropped it before reaching the good stuff.

I did like the intro cartoon storytelling, I thought that was done very well and it was a perfect start for the game.

All in all, it's probably a great game but it's not for me so I can't tell and you should probably ignore everything I said :D

Too good. Can't believe this was done in two weeks. I'm excited for the full release

This has my favorite story so far. Great job on the storyboarding at the beginning, that set the stage perfectly. You built an interesting world. Full marks from me in that category :) 

The game was pithy. I think it's impressive that you have this much gameplay in such a short period. Your choice of color, animation, and dynamic audio were stunning.

As for feedback, I found both the combat and platforming more frustrating than fun. I wished I had more space to jump and dash before dying. There were a few instances where I'd die immediately without knowing what I did wrong. I found it hard to tell when enemies were going to attack and because the projectiles moved so quickly it was difficult to dodge, so I ended up kinda mashing the dash button and crossing my fingers.

The low pixel count made it hard to visually distinguish some elements, like what I could land on, what was dangerous, etc. 

I don't normally give feedback this thorough, but you've made so much game here that I felt I had a lot to say. You've done a great job and I think this can go places 🤞

Very well made with good room layout. With this being a story round I'm going into the mindset of finishing all games, but I might regret it if every game takes 35 minutes...

The initial dash-jump felt a bit too difficult, was stuck on it for a good minute or two, and accidentally jump right after initial respawn, which made we go into the room above the spawn. Other than that the game felt bug free and polished. The lack of sfx is definitely an issue, but the adaptive music makes up for it, awesome job with that! (I didn't notice it changing dynamically at first, but when I did, I noticed that you even change it depending on the biome, AWESOME!)

I heard about the healing issue, I never understood it and wouldn't even known that it was a thing if I hadn't looked at the comments, might be the last room I didn't get tho. This might partly explain why I felt the game was a bit too hard, but I would've had an even better time if it was just a tad easier.

The non main character animals (enemies) don't feel that important in terms of them "being animals" since they don't behave much like them anyways. The little peeps on the way were cute though.

Overall I really appreciated the game, tho I wish you'd spent more time polishing (sfx) instead of adding more rooms. I know that it's hard making a "tiny" metroidvania I believe a game jam game should never be much longer than 15 minutes as very few people will actually get to the finish and get that satisfaction.



Damn that 99% is annoying me more and more while I write this review.
Also I think this is the longest game jam game review I've ever written, I guess it's fitting though for such a content packed game.

This game is (aside from a couple bugs) absolutely perfect!
I legit got teary eyed while playing. The visuals and music are just *chefs kiss*

Nice game, but i think the eating seed implementation isn't working for pc people. the bird doesn't eat