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Painter Of Mana's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Visuals | #10 | 3.758 | 3.758 |
| Special Object Implementation | #12 | 4.061 | 4.061 |
| Overall | #13 | 3.359 | 3.359 |
| Audio | #17 | 3.152 | 3.152 |
| Gameplay | #21 | 2.970 | 2.970 |
| Fun Factor | #23 | 3.061 | 3.061 |
| Theme Implementation | #24 | 3.152 | 3.152 |
Ranked from 33 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How is your game related to the Theme and Special Object?
You are a painter using your brush to eliminate inkt monsters.
Don't use to much paint mana, or strange things will happen, because of the overflow
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Comments
Fun game, was surprised by the difference between intro and gameplay, but fun though
Wow, this pixel art looks really good. I'm surprised you're a beginner.
I like the different ways the abilities click. I found myself wanting to try them out. They're very satisfying to use.
I found the game a bit difficult in places. I feel like the normal attacks aren't too effective at taking out the monsters, compared to the cooldowns. And no invincibility frames means you die easily. I like that you can pick up the hearts off the ground though.
The music is nice, but I found it a bit loud and needed to turn it down during the game.
Aw thanks! Your comment made my day!
You're right that the battle system in the game can be a bit complex at times. We definitely wanted to fine-tune it further.
It is intended that the skills are much stronger than the regular attack, since using a skill also costs mana and contributes to the overflow mechanic — but we agree that the difference between them could be more balanced!
We also agree with you about the music. While implementing it, we weren’t sure if it was just us thinking it was too loud, but during testing, others said it wasn’t that bad…
In the end, we should’ve just added an option to control the music volume yourself :)
That’s definitely one of the first things we’ll add once we have time again!
Thanks so much for your comment. That was really kind of you!
After your comment, we did a few more playtests and discovered that when you replay the game, one of the monster types doesn’t die anymore.
That might explain why it sometimes feels like no damage is being dealt.
So thanks again for your comment — without it, we probably wouldn’t have found that out! :)
I really liked the art
Thank you! I liked the art of your game a lot as well!
The visuals were great - the intro was perfectly done, that would be a very cool style to take further in some way. The main menu looks fantastic too actually. The level was a little more roughly put together I think, but I the see the potential there.
Great gameplay idea, I found it a bit difficult to tell when I was taking damage, and I seemed to die for no reason - but that would be easily sorted with a little bit of tuning I think. I also got the invincible bug, I was trying to see if I could survive for 5 minutes. There was also the bug with the enemies getting stuck inside the large bottom wall obstacle.
I know you played our game, and we actually had some quit similar ideas for implementing this! We both made a twin stick shooter, with a push/pull mechanic on shooting/recovery, where if you're too gung ho you get a negative effect. I did like how your implementation wasn't just straight damage, but had weird effects that happened instead. I think for our game, the straight damage worked better for us in context, but wouldn't have been the right move here. It also tied in to the games theming as well.
Really good crack at it guys!
Thanks for your comment and honest review! I agree with you — if we continue working on the game, we definitely want to bring more of the intro’s style into the rest of the game.
Since I had to do all the art by myself, I ended up rushing the pixel art for the level a bit more than the rest, so you’re totally right that it looks a bit rough.
Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to add visible damage feedback, but we’ll definitely keep that in mind! Thanks for pointing out that it affects the gameplay experience. The monsters walking through walls was also a result of time constraints, haha! We all just needed more time ; o ;
I also thought it was cool that we ended up with a similar concept, but yours still feels totally different and has its own unique mechanics — which are really cool!
It is interesting to see how such similar takes still have so much nuance between them. And hey, we literally have the same issue with not really seeing when you take damage - and, even buggier, because you can't even die 😅
You guys did fantastic, even if you don't continue this game, I'd definitely look into the intro style. Thinking about it more in retrospect, was it in anyway influenced by either Stardew Valley or Undertale; or perhaps even both?
I did not know brushes could be this intense, damn.
This was a creative idea and premise. I found the game a little hard but I am on my laptop's mousepad so it's probably easier with a mouse
Damn, you played with a trackpad? We already thought the game was pretty challenging, but that’s like playing on hard mode, haha!
Respect! Thanks for your comment! We really appreciate it.
Nice idea, great implementation. Love the art.
Thank you!
Really well done! The sad story in the beginning really adds a lot of character to the game and I enjoyed the gameplay quite a bit. I can definitely see this being more than a simple arcade game if you guys ever plan to expand on it. Music and art is also really good, you guys did a great job with this!
A bit off topic, but I found an odd glitch that makes your character invincible somehow. I spent around 20 mins (I have nothing better to do 💀) trying to figure out why it happens but couldn't... But basically (I think), if you spam the red paint brush's ability over and over again eventually the enemy attacks can't damage the player for some reason. HOWEVER, if you use the blue paint brush's ability a few times eventually you lose the invincibility (for some reason??). I was able to survive for 5 minutes using this glitch until I found out abt the blue paintbrush thing lol. I have no idea what causes this and I'm not even sure if the invincibility is related to the paint brushes at all but I just wanted to comment abt it in case you guys plan on bug fixing or stuff like that, but I digress.
ANYWAYS, you guys did a great job on this game and would love to see more of it! That's all, have a colorful day!
(also sorry for the long post 😭)
Wow Thank you so much for you comment, and playing our game, especially for 20 mins. really appreciate it :)
the invincible glitch I noticed the next day as well. what happened was when I added the heart back I clamped the value between 0 and max, but I had forgotten to lower the max Health, so the max health was at 10, and which you could see, because the gui only had 3, so that was a error and overlooked, but was really funny when others noticed, because I was sure that I clamped it.
Thank you for finding out this and telling us, really appreciate that :)
Thank you, and you as well have a great colorful day!
and no worries, about the post, ;)
Ahh I see, well that explains it lol. Crazy how far off my original theory was to the truth lol, but I'm at least glad you guys know about the glitch!
Really enjoy the visual presentation of this game, the monsters being full black while you fight with colours is rlly fun. Great stuff!
Thank you so much, we came pretty quick with this idea, and were sold ourselves that this would fun :)
The visual style of this game is really cool! The way you managed to blend a cartoonish style with pixel art makes the game really visually appealing. I do wish there was a clearer indicator for how much paint I have, though maybe I just overlooked the visual aide for it. But overall I thought this game was solid!
Thank you so much, and thank you for playing! :)
you we had some difficulty to show the paint that you could do. that was the brush in the bottom of the screen that will up, when you use your paint. we could indeed improve on that. but a good note for next time :)
Super awesome interpretation of the theme! As a fan of bullet hells this was really amazing. The art is beautiful and consistent, the music is soothing and really fits the vibe! Only critique is I was a bit confused by the gameplay, though that might just be because I'm slow! Great job!
Thank you for your kind words, really appreciate it, we have worked very hard on all of it. I do agree that we could have improved on the gameplay explaining it a bit better. but it is a good note for the next time :) thank you for playing
Nice story and assets, hard gameplay.
Thank you so much, it was our intension that it was difficult :)
Awesome story, felt emotional from the start which is really hard to nail. Lovely sprites and animation, super charming overall ! Would have loved a bit more guidance for the gameplay mechanics :)
Aww thank you, truly appreciate your kind words. We agreed that we could have put in some more guidance for gameplay, but with the time we needed to make the decision of what we wanted to be done. but I guess you know that feeling :)
Such a great story and overall really well executed! I'd love to see this expanded more
Thank you so much, We would love to expand this more.
Honestly, a really nice game! I loved the survival mode trying to last as long as possible was fun. The effects were excellent, and the enemies were really well designed. I managed to survive for a bit over two minutes, which felt great! Feel free to check out my game too and let me know your honest opinion
Thank you so much, Truly appreciate it.
you managed to survive for 2 min, that is a long time, my max was 1 min.
I'll surely will check out your game as well.
The music in this is so damned good. Honestly, if you continue with this I'd recommend turning it into a metroidvania or a life sim type thing. I think this will win or at least get top 5 for sure.
Thank you so much for playing our game and thank you for you nice comment!
a metroidvania version of this would be very cool indeed. we even might indeed continue on it.
Hey I had a lot of fun playing the game! Really cool implementation of power and attack/Defense! It was really something you could expand!
A little bit overwhelmed at the end but I guess its from the them. I love the variety of ennemies and attacks. Well done :)
Thank you so much. Really glad you enjoyed it :)