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How does your game meet GBJam's theme
Gold-Bellied Buckaroos is an intense action game where you use old gold power to slow down time by tossing a gold coin and enter the "golden hour".
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Oh this is go-o-od! Stunning, raw, and full of charm, this was really fun! Special props to the soundtrack for capturing the violent tone quite well.
For what it's worth, the moment the completely undodgeable shotgun attack happened a third time, I immediately suspected there was a parry mechanic I had missed, and then I actually read the manual. Being compelled to master the parry is quite satisfying! I don't think it needs an intro tutorial per se, maybe just an explanation of the parry after dying to the second boss. The parry isn't completely needed for the first boss, so it was very satisfying replaying from the beginning with the new tech!
The construction of the audio is fantastic! I've rarely heard noise channels this crunchy! That said, while the volume option is very appreciated, the default volume is a bit loud, regularly peaking above +0.0 dB unless I turn the master volume down to about 3 bars (I got a peak of +4.0 dB once!).
All-in-all, fantastic entry! Great work! 💚
Really great artwork! It's also a pretty good idea to show the action buttons in-game. I had a lot of fun playing your game!
Beautiful art. the combat system is interesting and well balanced. I also appreciate that the controls are included on the screen. Good job guys :D
Super cool idea and I absolutely love the mechanics! I just wish the game would actually teach them! (Well not like I'm one to talk since my games the same way xd)
I had the same issues mentioned by others about figuring out the mechanics, although Kieran's review did get me to the point where I could figure it out from there.
My biggest issue is the fact that golden hour messes up the sound ques, especially with the second boss. + Stylas felt like he killed a bit too fast if you aren't completely prepared and expecting for him the moment you load in. (I died like 20 times to him and every time was within the first 5ish seconds.)
Put in an actually honest to god tutorial that forces you to understand the mechanics of parrying and crits and this is one of the best games in the jam! Hell I'd pay money for a fuller length version.
Just incredible work from a pure gameplay standpoint. Kudos to your team!
Edit: I got good, and the devs added a heavily expanded how-to-play section to the description. See the reply to the developer below to see my updated opinion on the gameplay feel, plus some comments on how you're actually supposed to play if you are a confused player reading this - everything else I say here still stands.
Caught a glimpse of this one on a stream and put it in my to-play list, and bumped it up a half dozen places when I saw one of the team behind it left a really thoughtful comment on my game. Just managed to beat it, and I'm gonna have to replay it in a few days to get my final thoughts in order. What I can say right now is that
1. This game is really good.
2. This game does not explain itself at all.
The music and sounds are great. The graphics are beautiful. Each enemy is unique, well-animated, with well designed attacks which all ooze personality. The level transitions being wanted posters. Brutally hard arcadey gameplay with limited lives is pure retro. The effects on Golden Hour. We'd be here all day if I had to comment every little thing I liked, and besides some aliasing issues on the font, I only have one gripe.
I beat the game and I still have no idea if I'm doing it right. There's no in-game tutorial, the description has the controls but not a how to play. I had to learn how to parry and how to enter golden hour from a reply on the jam comments, and didn't even figure out what golden hour did until glancing up from this comment box and seeing it in the "How does your game meet GBJam's theme" section under the ratings. It took me a while to realize that you need to hold to dodge - with such a fast attack speed and needing to spend so much time in the side positions to be able to parry side attacks, I expected the control scheme to be tap to dodge, hold to attack, since you only really need to care about timing for the parries, which you can luck your way into timing-wise most of the time regardless. Instead you're mashing the same button constantly to maximize damage, to the point where my finger was getting sore (and this is coming from someone whose game's sole mechanic is quick-time events!), and holding dodge for extended periods of time just to stay in the corner, only to release it in the middle of an attack animation and wonder why I'm not dodging back into the center, or hitting the other direction on impulse and overshooting. The game is also really fast, so fast that there's information that I just couldn't parse, like attack hitboxes on the final boss while trying to read which coin is which (and I'm positive that I didn't even realize the double coin was the thing that killed me the first time facing that boss).
There's definitely something there though, once I had the first couple of bosses' patterns more or less down there was a flow I could kind of get into, dodge, parry, dodge, coin, stagger, repeat, and it felt very satisfying once I got there. I didn't stay there for long usually, and I'm missing something for it to all click - and I don't know if it's a skill issue or a game issue. I managed to reach the final boss with five or six health in my winning run and managed to beat him just by being able to hit him for long enough, I was not fast enough to react to most attacks and the only mechanic I really ended up understanding was the double coin.
I'll come back to this in a few days and give it another go, see if there's any more tips in the comments and leave an updated comment with my final thoughts. But regardless of whether it ends up being a major tutorialization issue, or a game that just doesn't click for everyone, that shouldn't detract from the fact that this is a great game with a clear vision that's been very well executed!
Oh hey good to see you here, thanks for playing! So nice of you to put the time in to offer such thorough feedback, we genuinely appreciate it! You're touching on some stuff that we've had long discussions about in the team, believe me, we're very happy with our gamefeel overall but I think we ended up designing the game for ourselves rather than taking into account the learning curve for new players. I was hoping to balance some of those problems out with an updated description, but I've evidently been slacking off a little too much.
Again, really enjoyed your game too!
Okay, so I gave this another go before bed, and I get it now. Oh boy do I get it, this is probably one of my favourite gameplay loops of the jam so far. It's so, so good. You guys absolutely cooked with this one and, if you'll allow me to stretch the food metaphor a little bit here, proceeded to put the food in the damn HVAC system instead of on the table. I'm going to spell out exactly what changed for me from one playthrough to the next, both so the team can take it as feedback if they want, and so any confused player reading the comments like I did can understand how you're supposed to play.
This game is much slower and more methodical than it appears at first glance. Mashing attack and constantly dodge-leaning so you can get more hits in is useless, the correct way to play is to only dodge into attacks you can parry, only attack into attacks you can parry, and only dodge out of attacks you can't parry. This way you always avoid taking damage if you do it correctly, and always get to deal damage because once you activate Golden Hour (by hitting the coin that appears after a parry), you slow down time which lets you get a combo on the enemy. You get a feel for how much time slows down after a while, and getting the follow-up parry to avoid taking damage during your combo becomes second nature. Once you slow down your gameplay, you start only looking for parries and can focus much better on the enemy patterns (including some pretty mean counter-attacks, like the second boss' stab attack that is absolutely impossible to notice if you're focused on landing as many hits as possible) and begin improving at each boss to the point of being able to no-hit the first two bosses somewhat reliably. And when you're able to do it... that's the juice. Dodge, parry, dodge, coin, stagger, gun, repeat... I'd found it before but it didn't click because I was trying to fill in the dead air, those few moments where you need to be ready to parry immediately, with junk damage that was doing nothing to the boss, causing me to get hit, and making the game feel sluggish and unresponsive when it was a playstyle issue. The game does nothing to communicate this, you still look like you're making progress when you play it wrong, and until you play the game right, it feels like the game is wrong and not you.
And for the record, I think designing a game for yourself is a perfectly valid choice. I'm a firm believer in the idea that games are for everyone, but not every game is for everyone, and that both of those statements are equally important. The importance of good tutorialization and player onboarding is is a lesson I've learned myself after many game jams, and it isn't necessarily about making a game easier (though that may be the case), it's about giving players the tools they need to understand how the game works and to be able to engage with it on a level where they can enjoy what the creator has served.
Preferably on the table.
Great Game! I liked the music and how the wanted enemies had good animations that telegraphed their moves. I'll have to come back later to beat it, and y'all did a really good job!
What great gameplay! This is going on my list of games I need to beat but can't right now. Absolutely love how it feels to parry shots
That was fun! Very hard, but also very rewarding after learning how to parry shots.
GG :)
Very cool, the art and animation is so good.
I LOOOOOOVE hardcore games, and this is typically the type of game that could've been in my steam wishlist if I found out it was just a demo. I felt like every fight was really well made and I actually had a fighting chance once I mastered the parrying mechanic. I like that the game sends you back to the start, it's very arcady and it forces you to learn the patterns and perfect the previous fights to learn the new ones, excellent submission ! :)
thank you! it warms my heart to know that someone really enjoyed the combat
I like the gameplay but man it's tough! Couldn't get past the guy with the shotgun. I really like the graphics though!
LOVE the concept of the game. also the music goes well real nice with the gameplay, i also liked the name of the name. really good stuff. a bit too hard for me personally though
I always like to play a godot game ^^ very well made game, the mood is awesome !!
Just one little note: The blue guy with the shotgun is way too powerful: he fires two shots in a row, and the second one is impossible to dodge.
thanks for playing! i'm glad you enjoyed it!
Some attacks in the game are meant to be undodgeable and must be parried instead. To parry an attack, you just have to hit the boss at the same moment they hit you (or close to it)! This will also spawn a gold coin, which you can attack to trigger Golden Hour mode... but be careful: sometimes greed can be punished.
Absolute cinema?! And it is wild that no one else has gone through and rated this yet, Excellent job!
Thanks for being the first one to play! :3