Metroidvania Month 30

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A jam submission

UnbrokenArrowView game page

Submitted by pdil — 1 hour, 2 minutes before the deadline

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UnbrokenArrow's itch.io page

Results

Criteria	Rank	Score*	Raw Score
Enjoyment	#53	2.962	3.083
Metroidvania	#61	3.122	3.250
Overall	#71	2.786	2.900
Execution	#72	2.562	2.667
Relevance to the theme	#72	2.802	2.917
Sensory	#77	2.482	2.583

Ranked from 12 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

Theme interpretation and application
The small amount of art I did manage to make is inspired by simple line art. I didn't get in the story content, but the idea was all your skills go away and all you have is a powerful dash. The music is a single note sequence, played in 9 different ways (with sections coming in and out for variety).

Team/Developer
pacorp

Reference info
pacorp

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Comments

laksSubmitted293 days ago

this is insanely good for demo the mechanic is the best and it need you to go back to another place that you have through to get everything

Submitted

DeleveryAdventure

pdilDeveloper291 days ago

Thanks for the kind words! I really tried to have a space that was very open so didn’t require a map but you still backtracked as necessary.

ohno-nonoSubmitted294 days ago

What's here is definitely competent. I like the general layout and mechanics. The towers seem pretty versatile. I like how you used one of them as a boost to help you clear a jump.

Visually everything looks to be placeholder, which is fine. I like how the wheel turns into a thruster when you jump. Some procedural lean could probably make the basic movement feel a lot better with very little effort.

Submitted

cheap subspace housing

pdilDeveloper291 days ago

Thanks for the feedback. I originally was trying to use the character as an excuse to finally spend time learning Blender’s animation tools but that was foolish at best with the time constraints. I wish I would have thought about leaning, you’re totally right. I put springiness on the arms, and that helped a lot from a stiff A-pose so I didn’t think to try more things. Comically I did a lot of procedural environment art tools in Blender but wasn’t able to finish them enough to actually make a lot of the art, whoops! Maybe next time…

Sl1ngShotSubmitted297 days ago

I really liked the controls and the map layout. It was very fun, especially because I was able to find ways to go out of phase. The gym was a nice touch. Well done.

Submitted

pdilDeveloper291 days ago

I love hearing other people going out of phase, thanks for playing!

ZerschnetzloarSubmitted300 days ago

I like the strange atmosphere of the game. I cant describe it but it has something weird to it. I could not really figure out what "the ship" was, but the distribution of items across the map and how backtracking works was reasonable. Also I liked the mechanic of those things pusing you away if you dont actiavte a shield. I thik it is a very interesting game mechanic.

Submitted

Random Rain - MV - Edition

pdilDeveloper291 days ago

Thanks for playing. The ship is the red-ish angled thing at the start. I wanted to have a little intro crash sequence but should have just made an image when I realized I wouldn’t have time. I’m really happy to hear you like the atmosphere, I do a lot of world building that never makes into the game as I intend but I think some of the vibes still manage to come across somehow.

Us 3 GamesSubmitted303 days ago

This was a fun little experience! I liked the pacing of showing the obstacles and gradually giving you more knowledge and tools to avoid them or use them to your advantage. I also enjoyed the little secret interconnected-ness in a couple places.

I couldn't find the way to activate the 3-hit switches, but... I kind of launched myself over a wall with a turret to reach the ending part. Oops.

Would love to see a more finished version of this!

Submitted

Out of Darkness

pdilDeveloper295 days ago

Thanks for playing! I’m glad you liked it and the sequence breaks. As I’m testing and find them myself, I try to leave them in, but you definitely got one I didn’t intend but hey, it just really highlights “minimal”. FWIW, there’s a building you enter on top that gives melee for the 3-hit switches.

AriaMakesGamesSubmitted303 days ago

I had some weird audio glitches, and i also found it laggy in the browser. I think it feels very directionless at the start and needs better direction. level designs were clever though

Submitted

pdilDeveloper297 days ago

Thanks for playing. Browser is generally subpar but, for better or worse I generally have it so it’s easy to play, the downloads shouldn’t have any issues. Totally fair on the directionless-ness, I wanted a lot of sequence breaks in this so wanted people to easily play around but it’s easy to just feel lost. I’m glad you liked the level design, one of the few things I spent time on that actually made it in.

a_kimb0303 days ago

This was such a treat to play! I think I've played it about 4 times now and now with the updated build it's clear that a lot of thought was put into this. The mechanics could have been explained slightly better but given your time constraint it was still pretty easy to pick up. I especially liked the puzzle where you needed to use the turret to your advantage to boost you to the generator. I was really surprised at the end of the new build where you showcased the other mechanic you were going for! I'd be excited to see what you plan to do with this later on since this felt really good to play. As always, your level design is extremely clever and engaging. Great work

GabaSubmitted304 days ago

Let's go in the order of things I noticed:

HTML for a 3D was a bold choice, it was too laggy in my browser I had to go with the download (even my 2D games is starting to get to a point of performing poorly in the browser, I am not deducting points for this, but sometimes it's better to not offer the option as some players will just try the browser, see it's not running well and quit)
The music is rough, I had to turn it way down. (I had trouble with that too, I usually use external CC0 music in my projects, and it was a pain to try and make something)
It's a bit aimless at the start, it took some wandering around and trying to interact with things to get the gist, the upgrades looking like a virus did not help
The shield was the first upgrade I got and it was not helpfull? I think I did not use it to actually make progress, it's possible to skip the places you need the shield by going up the ramp and jumping early. The shield stoping the character also felt weird to use, it sometimes felt faster to just hug the wall and jank my way through the turrets.
The attack upgrades felt more like keys than like utility upgrades, as the only place you can use them are in the puzzles to get the upgrades, they don't make traversal easier or more convenient or help you deal with the turrets
I liked using the turrets to get vertical velocity, and liked that you used that in a challenge
I got all the 4 "ship" pieces and went to the next map, I think you got the size of that section of game right, and the puzzles were diverse enough to keep interest even with the game feeling a bit rough
The dash felt good enough that I think with some real level design and goals it could have been a better game, or sticking with what you already had and polishing it and scrapping the dash, as you said somewhere (citation needed?) you "made too games into one" and they did not meet anywhere and end up subtracting from each other by consuming the limited time

Submitted

JUMPNINJA x Dracula Samurai

pdilDeveloper303 days ago(+1)

I really appreciate the detailed and thoughtful feedback! These are very fair points. I made some art updates after you played it (but didn’t get to the virus/upgrade, I had intended the structure by the shield to be statue with broken off pieces that you collected but the virus was better than the grey spheres).

Really though, the end summed it up well, I should have just started with the dash stuff and not bothered with any of this preamble, it was just stuck in my head the idea of getting upgrades, but then losing them for different-but-overall-better upgrades. I love it when any game has you revisit a space with new understanding so the world feels rich and deep but I absolutely should have started with the best part first.

Thanks again for playing and the feedback, I really want to work on this one more, if not simply to actually do the part I meant to do in the first place.

ovoid_ovvieSubmitted305 days ago

Overall, it felt charming but I couldn't really see the relevance to the theme and it was pretty confusing.

Submitted

pdilDeveloper305 days ago

Thanks for playing. You’re not wrong, the intent was to build up the a set of skills but as the game progresses, each skill is lost but enhances the dash until it is the only skill left. Since metroidvanias are normally about a large arsenal of skills, I thought it would be interesting to have a single swiss-army-knife skill. I had real hero’s journey planned out, but since I can’t manage scope, only the demo gym shows some of that at the very end.

ovoid_ovvieSubmitted302 days ago

Ohhhh. That's a really interesting concept! You should definitely develop a full version sometime, I'm sure it would turn out great :3