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A jam submission

SubstituteView game page

Proof-read as many papers as possible - your pay depends on it!
Submitted by Toriat — 8 hours, 1 minute before the deadline
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Substitute's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Innovation#3413.2693.269
Gameplay#4413.0003.000
Enjoyment#4753.1543.154
Audio#6392.7692.769
Visuals#6493.0773.077
Overall#6572.8912.891
Theme#11182.0772.077

Ranked from 26 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

How does the game fit the theme?
You play as a substitute teacher grading children's essays. Each essay dives into a different place, perceived by the wonderful and strange imagination of a child. Your main task is to identify words that have letters in a strange place - in other words, spelling mistakes!

What code and assets did you not make from scratch during the jam (if any)?
I did not make any of the music or sound effects from scratch.
1) Music: https://tallbeard.itch.io/music-loop-bundle
2) Clicking sound: https://hoveaudio.itch.io/free-click-sound-effects-pack
3) Whoosh sound: https://sound-digitator.itch.io/whoosh-a-free-sound-library
4) Ringer: https://pixabay.com/sound-effects/search/ringer/

How many people worked on the game?
1

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Comments

Viewing comments 23 to 4 of 23 · Next page · Last page
Submitted

I liked the sticker/icons that popped up on different papers! Fun game, thanks!!

Developer

Thank you! I'm really happy to hear it!

Submitted(+1)

This was great, especially for your first time! Its also nice to see another Dialogic user :)

Developer(+1)

Haha yes - I noticed your game was using Dialogic as well! It definitely beats manually coding text boxes. Godot for the win!

Submitted(+1)

HaHa--never thought I'd enjoy doing my job as a game! I only got to 97% though, and that irks me. lol. 

Developer

Haha and I’m glad you enjoyed it! If it helps - papers you don’t submit on time won’t be scored.

Submitted(+1)

i like the interpretation of theme - instead of being in a strange place, you are proof-reading strange essays with strange spelling mistakes. i also like the pixel art and the icons that popup which emphasise the theme (i assume its hallucinations-). overall, really nice concept that has a lot of potential!

Developer

Thank you! After I submitted and started finding other games interpret the theme differently I was worried people might not get my game!

Submitted (1 edit)

Cute game! And funny! I don't think picking out spelling mistakes is inherently fun, so adding the pixel art and timer to give it more interest was a great idea. I wonder if a more tactile player action would add to the fun? (like circling or underlining the words with a nice big red pen instead of simply clicking).  

Love the pixel art (the teacher and the little sprites)! I was confused at first by the Eiffel Tower which shows up first - I thought it was an "A", as if it were the grade for the paper. But became immediately clear when the next paper showed up.

For future projects, spending some time on customising the button / UI themes instead of using the default adds an extra layer of polish (but I get it's also the type of thing that one can run out of time for in the end.)

Overall really charming game, nice work!  

Developer(+1)

Thank you for leaving such a thoughtful review! If I had more time, I definitely would have revamped all of the UI elements. In hindsight I agree that there could have been a little bit more juice around clicking on the mistakes. I'm happy you thought it was cute and funny! - I'm the best artist in the world but I figured a little humor could help add charm. Thank you!

Submitted(+1)

Nice little game. The idea is funny and there is some polish. Great job for a week !

Developer

Thank you!

Submitted(+1)

I really like the timer running down but i wish that it would jump back up a little bit if you did well on one. Well maybe it does i didn't notice if it did or not it just felt like it didn't. Gave me typing of the dead energy!

Developer

Oh that's a really cool idea! I hadn't thought about rewarding the player for correct answers. And thank you for the kind words!

Submitted(+1)

sumtimmes when i ptype reviews i hae a lot of spellinhg errs. thjios game was rite up mi alllye ann i njooy it a nugbh. i will be shring this game with a few of my frennz and poeple hoo like inglish und wen too skool four itt. 

Loved the game, gratz on your first game jam. Keep up the work

Submitted(+1)

Also, these are the settings I use in my project to keep the scaling constant (Godot 3):

  • Project Settings > General > Display > Window > Stretch
    • Mode = 2d
    • Aspect = keep

May not be the best settings ever, but hope it helps!

Developer

Woah - thank you! I'll give that a go. And I'm glad you enjoyed it! I had a friend playtest (their native language is English) and even they didn't find all the mistakes!

Submitted(+1)

Nicely polished and easy to understand! Also I enjoyed the setting and the audio fit in nicely! A small potential improvement (from my perspective, of course!) would be to include some more detail about the final score. Did the percentage include papers I hadn't completed yet? How many papers did I get of the total? That would help me understand how well I did a bit more.

Overall a really solid entry--great job!

Developer(+1)

Thank you! I’m really glad it was easy to understand. I like your suggestion about adding more to the score.

Submitted(+1)

Very cool game, I liked the pixel art and how pops up over the page you're reading. It's a very short and solid experience, great work!

Developer

Thank you!! I figured polish was more important than length so I’m happy you were satisfied with that!

Submitted(+1)

Cool game!
is this an ADHD simulator? getting so distracted from the chmimken nugies you can't even read the text anymore xD

Developer

Haha thank you! The sprites are definitely meant to add a bit of challenge as you get more and more papers done.

Submitted(+1)

A pretty cool game, especially for a first time. Altough im not sure how it relates to the theme. Either way feedback wise I'd try to focus on player feel and graphics improvements. You have lots to learn, but this is a really solid start.

6.5/10 :)

Developer

Thank you! Some of the other comments seem to say the same thing about player feel. I’ll be sure to focus on that for the next project :)

Submitted(+1)

Overall, fun unique concept for your first game! The art was very fun and the vibe in general felt really stylized and a small thing, but I loved the planets haha. 

It seems like the UI is smaller than intended? I think my biggest issue was this pretty much. It was a bit hard to read. It was kinda good for grading the student's papers since I didn't have to move my mouse much but everything felt a little small. 

It also may have been nice to add a bit more information at the end like how many student's papers I graded so that instead of just the accuracy so that I could know how fast I went or try and beat my record from last time. 

Developer

Thank you! Yeah I noticed the UI seemed to shrink after I exported it to itch.io. It’s the first game i’ve ever uploaded here so admittedly I didn’t really know how to fix it haha. I like your suggestion for adding the number of papers scored! I wanted to do that as well but ran out of time… Thanks for playing!

Submitted(+1)

I see you made it in Godot but in Unity, it's basically that your UI lives on what is called a "Canvas." You have to anchor the UI elements and tell them to resize based on the screen size. Once again, not sure how that works in Godot but it shouldn't be too bad!

Submitted(+1)

Great work on your first game jam game! I had fun playing the game and also really enjoyed the little sprites/drawings of the topic I was reading about pop up. Some more feedback while playing would be a good addition, e.g. a SFX when you select a spelling mistake

Developer

Thank you! In hindsight I do think a sound effect when you click a work would have added a lot - sounds aren’t my strong suit so I’ll have to work on improving that! 

Submitted(+1)

Nice, unique idea for a first jam. I had fun reading through the essays and spotting the mistakes. Some of the stuff the kids wrote genuinely made me laugh. “They would eat the gold!?” lol. That kind of humor really carried it.

I also liked the addition of the little sprites related to the topic, interfering with your proofreading. It added some pressure and kept it from just being static text on a screen.

Creative concept and well executed for a first jam. Nice job!

Developer(+1)

Thank you! I definitely wanted to dive into the concept of kids essays cause they just have the wildest thoughts sometimes. I appreciate your feedback!

Submitted(+1)

Great idea!

Developer

Thank you!

Submitted(+1)

Cool game fr, the sprites related to the paper appearing gradually is a nice detail to add some difficulty to it, peakest 👀

Developer

Thank you! The sprites are my favorite part as well and doing all the drawings was really fun!

Submitted(+1)

Fun game with a creative central idea!  I enjoyed the little sprites that showed up when I clicked on the mispellings.  Equal parts adorable and challenging when they start covering the paper.  Nice job!

Developer

Yes! The sprites popping up was meant to add a challenge - I’m glad you noticed! They get faster the more papers you do, so if you click through a bunch it can get really crazy!

(+1)

Felt a bit like I was at work. Cute idea nicely done though, but not relaxing enough for me.

Developer

Thank you! I definitely think I could’ve done a bit more to game-ify it, but I’m happy to hear you thought it was nicely done!

Submitted(+1)

I enjoyed playing this game. It was fun. Reminds me of Bully from Rockstar.

Developer

thank you! I can’t tell you how happy it makes me that someone had fun playing my game :)

Viewing comments 23 to 4 of 23 · Next page · Last page