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A jam submission

Countdown to SanityView game page

You have 4 minutes and 52 seconds to survive this meeting without losing your mind.
Submitted by ZHIEND — 1 day, 18 hours before the deadline
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Countdown to Sanity's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Narrative#22712.9782.978
Audio#31323.0653.065
Creativity#38753.4133.413
Artwork#53652.8702.870
Enjoyment#53712.7612.761

Ranked from 46 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

How does your game fit the theme?
Every mechanic is a countdown. The 4:52 meeting timer counts down to freedom (or failure). The optimism meter counts down from 85% — hold Q/W/E to push it back up, but release and it drains. The boss radar needle sweeps in a cycle, counting toward exposure. Random interrupts have their own shrinking countdown timers. The combo meter decays when idle. Coffee has a 7s cooldown. Even the difficulty setting scales the speed of every countdown in the game. You're racing three simultaneous clocks, and all of them are trying to hit zero before the meeting ends.

(Optional) What would you like to be called if GMTK features your game?
ZHIEND

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Comments

Viewing comments 35 to 16 of 35 · Next page · Last page
Submitted

NICE GAME BRO !

Submitted

the UI is a bit all over the place and the boss radar is kinda confusing with that debug menu just hanging. other than that it's actually pretty fun to just vibe to the soundtrack and juggle all the tasks. awesome work!

Submitted

Not too sure when the boss gets angry at me from the radar, other than that the game incorporates countdowns quite well !! The music slaps as well :D

Submitted

The concept is very original, I like how you manage multiple things at once. Though the things to kill time felt very interchangable to me, there was not one that I particularly cared about having as long as I got to hold a button down. The boss's mechanics too I really did not understand even after reading the game's page as I could just hold any button down and I would not be penalized much for it even if I got seen. I think if the UI was a tad bit bigger and more readable it would make for a more visually clear experience and make these mechanics more easy to understand

Love the cheat console though, but I wish it was shown after you beat the game once. When I first started playing it confused me quite a lot. Still, very funny idea and the music is a jam

Submitted

Fun concept, though I found it a liiiiittle on the cluttered side with all the things going on, considering I was able to just hold Q, W and E in succession, press whatever button was on the popup, and win without thinking. The rest of it just kinda felt like a bit of noise, and I'd rather there be something more to do, like things I need to click on, or if the alert meter came into play a little more. Still fun and left me feeling pretty frantic by the end

Submitted

Brilliant concept! Surviving an endless corporate meeting while juggling memes and dodging the boss is such a relatable and hilarious spin on the theme. The soundtrack is an absolute bop, and the UI layout perfectly mimics a painful corporate page. It definitely has a steep learning curve with so many concurrent countdowns happening at once, and an in-game tutorial would help clear up the boss radar mechanics or side buttons. However, once you find the flow state and start building up combos, the chaotic plate-spinning gameplay becomes incredibly fun and satisfying. Great work

Submitted

No idea how to Boil the ocean…
The Insane level is truly insane (and pressing the keys harder does not help!)

Loved the soundtrack choice in this one, it fits the employee perfectly 😁

Submitted

Wow! There is a LOT there. Because of how much there is, it's hard to keep track. A tutorial or something may have been nice. I did read the description but there was a lot to remember and my brain leaked out while playing. HOWEVER, it was still super fun! It's funny, because even while I didn't know EXACTLY what to do at the start, I was having a blast throughout the confusion. The memes are great, had me chuckling, and the chaotic plate spinning was engaging!
Also, soundtrack is a bop!

Excellent game!

Submitted

There's something weirdly satisfying about learning to time the QWE pattern in a way that keeps making combos. Loved the little particle effects and messages that would popup, but I had a hard time figuring out how the boss radar was directly affected by my actions, as the boss seemed to get angry after the arrow sung past the detection area. 

Submitted

Great game! It was fun getting into the flow state, consistently keeping my optimism up while also keeping productivity up. There were a few things that didn't make much snese to me, maybe unfinished ideas? Whatever the case, this game is great!

Submitted

Cool idea! Nice use of the jam theme.
...at first, I was a bit lost, but then I got the hang of it. It was fun. :D

Good job! :)

Submitted

Very well made. The gameplay was satisfying. The music is a banger. Good job.

Submitted

Well done! I didnt't really understand the radar mechanic, but other than that I had fun. Also loved the theme of the UI

Submitted

Ahahahah it does feel like that most day... Felt pretty polished and enjoyable :)

A lot was going on, which was a bit tough to follow at times! Introducing them sequentially would definitely help a bit ;)

Congrats on the game!

Submitted

This is so fun and satisfying to play! I love the satisfying text that appears when you try to keep the optimism level high. Such an interesting and new concept I haven't yet seen in this game jam :) 

Submitted

Hey a fellow office type game! Definitely a bit difficult to follow at first, but I appreciate the difficulty levels offering some challenge when you do start to get a hang of it

Submitted

didn't understand what i was doing at first, but after it was pretty fun ^^

Submitted

The UI does remind me of corporate websites and posts, with their emojis, so this was a great choice to me.

At first I thought I could only tap and not hold the buttons, so it was a lot harder than it really was. Like the other commenters, I agree that there's too much on the screen taking away the readability (especially the window on the right that I'm guessing is supposed to be a debug tool?).

But the core gameplay stayed readable with cool feedbacks to indicate which actions were wrong or right, which helps a lot. Well done!

Submitted

Neat idea! I didn't totally understand what I was doing, but everything I clocked felt juicy and nice to interact with. 

Also, just a note: the debug/mechanic testing mode appears when you go into full screen mode. Had some fun with that for a bit haha

Submitted

It definitely took me a moment to grasp all the mechanics and juggle the different timers at once, but once it clicked, it became super fun and engaging. Surviving an endless corporate meeting while scrolling memes and dodging the boss is surely a creative spin on the theme. Great work on this. 

Viewing comments 35 to 16 of 35 · Next page · Last page