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TO EM-BARK UPON SPUTNIK II's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Accuracy & Authenticity | #2 | 4.322 | 4.556 |
| Thematic Relevance | #3 | 4.638 | 4.889 |
| Audio | #5 | 3.795 | 4.000 |
| Visuals | #8 | 3.689 | 3.889 |
| Overall | #9 | 3.373 | 3.556 |
| Gameplay | #11 | 2.741 | 2.889 |
Ranked from 9 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Historical Accuracy
We’ve extensively incorporated accuracy by referencing real events, facts, design (art, sound, and gameplay choices) into our game. It is as authentic of an experience that we can surmise Laika had during her training days.
Our full reference list (with links) is on the game page.
Thematic Relevance
On Space Race: Laika, aka Kudryavka, being trained to go to space was a real sequence of events during the Space Race. Her tragic story and the treatment she endured, continues to show its influences today in care and medical ethics.
On Strangeness: From both the dog and the player's experience, this is inherently a perturbing experience.
To train torturously for "a good cause", one inevitably asks, is this really the only way for humans to move forward?
To be tortured, without fully understanding why, only to become more and more confined, ultimately leading to a horrible death, also feels a macabre string of events that Laika had to go through.
We've also made various artistic choices to enhance the ambience in its eccentricities, as little Laika goes through the core loop of the game.
Disclaimers
Other than the plugin, Dialogue Manager 4.1, everything was made from scratch for the purpose of this jam.
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Comments
I found the decision to put the player in the role of the "caretakers" of Laika to be quite effective. Rarely has a game made me feel guilt or remorse, so it was a new experience that made me think about what Laika went through more deeply.
It wasn't clear if tracking her stress spikes actually did anything for the gameplay, or if it was meant to solely be a psychological thing.
Everything about this made me feel like a bad guy, the music, the animations -- heart-wrenching! Good job!
Amazing narrative design. Putting us in the shoes of a scientist, managing her stress after subjecting her to all these training sessions by petting her. I think hiding her stress is actually also a great mechanic because the we have to pay active attention to it by checking it out. Music, graphics, and writing are all top notch!
Best animations in the jam, hands down. Just a good entry, not much to say. Only thing was that, as others have mentions as well, it was a bit hard to figure out exactly what I was meant to do exactly, especially during the tests.
Visually cohesive with a smart colour palette and evocative, distinct tests.
With kudos to the tutorial, I still had some difficulty reading the stress metre due to the fast movement of the centrifuge, but multiple play-throughs brought out the artful relief quotes at the end of game.
The range in audio showed a lot of polish. I think you could push this even further to even out the experience. On one side, (no shade to Alex) the vibrations test score was unnervingly catchy and seemed very modern, while the end game music vocals were a good way to keep the player’s mind engaged.
Personally, I am not the target audience. I’d welcome the addition of retrospective context in the intro (e.g. the PETA notes or a framing device to ‘learn more about Kudryavka’).
You definitely capture the player’s baseline distance from the scientists, and the strategy of having to pet her less and pick your task by order of when you overwhelm her. The darkness is apt, but it needs some tonal pacing.
The art is consistent throughout - great work!
The sound, especially the last song is pleasant and uplifting.
However the end image is the same regardless of whether the training was a success or failure. Different feedback would be better as it would deliver a better payoff (sense of accomplishment).
About the exercices - starting at 0 is a bit misleading as I think the animation plays but the logic of the game does not count it as being active? So this creates some confusion. Maybe it's better to start at 1.
I didn't understand what the incremented numbers for stress spikes are for... At one point I just clicked as much as I can - reached 50+ but it didn't result immediately in max stress. After this experiment I only used +1 and that seemed to be sufficient. It seemed to me that the spike levels are kind of irrelevant.
It would be nice to include some time progression for each individual exercise. It was not clear how long it would take and I was thinking that maybe I needed to click something else. That maybe I missed something...
It seems there is a bug where checking the report increases her stress as well as use up the time slots for doing the exercices. So it's possible to end the game by repeatedly clicking on the report - it's kind of weird.
By the way - when they were preparing the stray dogs I think the main goal was to examine the effects of outer space travel on the physiology (astrobiology). The goal wasn't so much to beat the USA as the doctor states.
By the way - if "XAXAXA" was used instead of "HAHAHA" because in Cyrillic X===H then nice detail there!
Thank you for this game! A unique entry to the jam. Good luck!
Really nice visuals in this and the interface is very polished. A tad confusing to play though - there is no full screen option. I had to keep referring to the instructions below, I found it difficult to find the actual game when scrolling back up.
I didn't see any reason to have the stress indicator hidden - this caught me out on the first play - the poor little doggie went to 100% without me noticing.
The dialogue with the scientist is done very well and does suck you in emotionally and I do want to give this another try.
I played some more this morning. I see there is a full screen option now - maybe I missed it the last time.
This time I kept the stress window open permanently.
I failed after the cage section as the dog went to 100% stress according to the doctor. However, the display showed 10% the entire time:
I lost the screenshot so tried the same again and it gave same behaviour the second time too.
The other thing I wanted to point out was something I had a similar problem with in my entry:
This screenshot was my first time actually seeing the centrifugal animation!!
When playing, the eyes have to focus where the arrows are pointing and for me my brain shuts out the 'noise' of the rotating dog. When I did the screenshot I actually went - oh that's what it looks like! On top of that each time I started this part, I automatically tried to click the chart instead of the button - maybe swap the button position with the counter. Would be good to have some feedback on whether my click was successful or not - I thought I did okay so was surprised when the doctor said the dog had failed.
(In my entry I had a lunar landing sequence and I had to move the metrics (altitude etc) from the top left of the screen to above the lander so that people could see the lander while trying to manoevre it.)
I hope this helps!
Man, I really enjoyed it. Instead of putting the player in the role of a hero of the Space Race, the game casts them as the trainer of Kudryavka (Laika), responsible for preparing her for the Sputnik 2 mission, one of the most controversial stories in the history of space exploration. It's a great piece of work with a powerful premise and strong thematic impact. However, it loses some of its momentum due to its limited depth and the repetitive nature of its gameplay loop.