I'm aware of all the graphical bugs (such as enlarged search teams and distorted trails) and have made an updated version that I will post after the Game Jam reviewing phase ends.
I can send a link to you directly if you want to try it.
ElevenPaths
33
Posts
1
Topics
1
Followers
A member registered 66 days ago
Creator of
You're an elf that really likes solving puzzles. Solve as many as you can and solve them quickly.
Puzzle
Play in browser
Recent community posts
Feels kind of experimental, similar to Yume Nikki with the whole "entering and waking up from a dream state" vibe the player repeatedly undergoes. It's not a bad idea, but the clunkiness of the controls (i.e. slower/lagging movements when moving diagonally continuously, presence of invisible barriers on paths that seem walkable) as well as the lack of an initial "prod" at the start of the game takes away some of the charm.
My main critique is that the player has to keep waiting for the fallen tree at the start of the path to "reset" before they can start exploring (or reexploring) the map, as indicated by the start of the music cue. I refreshed my game the first time it happened because I thought something went wrong, but once I understood what was happening the wait time sapped my enjoyment considerably upon returning for future explorations because I couldn't gauge how long it would last.
Also, I think you accidentally labelled the "Drop Lantern" control button as "A" (which is already used for Movement), since it turned out to be "Q" after some keyboard mashing. When I got to the "Dock Lantern" section of the map however, I couldn't tell what button to press in order to activate the interaction even after trying the entire letter keyboard.
The narrative alone is enough to sell the concept of this game. It provides a very clear picture of what the player is supposed to be doing, letting them quickly figure out how the gameplay is supposed to go after a couple launches. The gridless, "Tetris"-style of building was a bold choice since it lets the player make some unconventional rocket shapes, although trying to fine-tune the piece-slotting can be a bit frustrating since the pieces move a bit too quickly and seem to automatically detach from the player's control the moment they touch another piece. It might have been better to allow players to continue moving/rotating the pieces up until the center of their base (so not the corners) makes contact.
Shortening the time it takes to weld pieces together would also make building a lot more easier, and less likely to fall apart due to sliding across angled pieces (whether intentional or not).
I do like that the game actually expects the player to discard pieces that won't be good for the rocket (I thought it was a "cheat" until I saw the teasers after playing), although this does create a situation where the player will favor straight, tall pieces over the "S" or "T" shaped pieces.
I originally kept playing under the belief that having a "thick" rocket (i.e. a width equal to the base) would give me more fuel to use for liftoff, but the ratio of thruster-to-piece weight kept making this fail. It might be good to add a display showing the rocket's current "weight" relative to thruster count so that the player can tell when their rocket is becoming too heavy.
I sadly only got to Level 5 before moving on to rate other games, but from what I saw the game is a very well-crafted puzzle game that is a lot harder than the premise suggests. I initially thought that making the pieces self-cannibalize each other would make the game too easy, but in reality the game forces the player to understand how each piece interacts (or will interact) with other pieces on the board. This made Level 5 the roadblock for me because the Knight is arguably the trickiest piece in chess to maneuver around, so having to navigate the entire board eating a Knight every turn (in order to meet the 17 Moves) was what made me raise my hands in surrender (for now at least).
The visuals are fantastic, especially the animations for each piece type when they're eating another piece. It and the black/red chessboard were the details that really sold the "gothic/vampire" aesthetic for me. Maybe I'll come back to this game in the future when I've had more time to think about it.
One of the most brutal platformers I've played for this game jam. Learning how to slide bounce on the red targets took several tries on the first level before I got the hang of it, but managing to pull off a combo (even only partially) made the suffering all the more worth it. It feels like there might be some minor issue regarding how the red targets "bounce" the player, but it doesn't impact the overall experience all too much. The same can't be said however with performing the "slide" action while stuck in tight spaces (like the long crawlspace at the start of Level 2), since Bob keeps clinging to the nearest wall instead of allowing a slide to occur (or maybe that's just my inputs, I don't know).
There is however an issue with the player getting stuck underneath areas such as the destroyable brown blocks, spikes, thin platforms, etc. that forces them to wait out the clock (since there's no pause or reset button that can let them skip the wait time), something that become problematic in a game that encourages rapid button combos. I even managed to cause some sort of "thrown error" (didn't take a screenshot of it though) due to button mashing, which froze up the game and forced me to refresh the browser. Thankfully, these issues don't really pop up in a normal playthrough, with the exception of accidentally clipping through solid objects due to trying to force Bob into a tight space.
A permanent bleed state is a very creative way to enforce a literal countdown on the player (acting as both health bar and time limit). There's a sort of "idle game" feel to the game in the sense that you need to increment enough blood points across runs in order to purchase upgrades that will make succeeding runs much easier. I was also initially under the impression that the game would end once you defeated the enemy wizard, so the reveal that there was an entire second level caught me off guard but in a good way, since that meant more gameplay content.
One issue I did notice is that the game starts to lag a bit when too many player projectiles (either from the default magic spell or from the "nail spread" powerup) appear on screen, which can cause the frame rate to get choppy when playing "reckless" (as KingsbladeGames put it). There's also some graphical bugs such as the main character still standing once her health pool reaches 0 or not playing her dash/slide animation while spellcasting (likely because there's no animation for this situation), but the overall game is very solid for its playtime length and replayability.
Had trouble flicking the bugs away, similar to what the other commenters said.
The game is technically beatable, but you really have to flick the bugs the moment they enter the screen, otherwise they will be impossible to get rid of once they converge/remain at the center of the screen (where they will keep multiplying due to crumbs often spawning there).
A larger and much stronger "flick" would probably make the game more playable, akin to Fruit Ninja, but the visuals and music provide a nice "pocket arcade" touch to the overall gameplay.
A lot more nerve-wracking than what the screenshots might initially suggest!
Making the gameplay perspective top-down is a clever way to avoid having to draw people, but it actually ends up making the game even more stressful since the crowded mass of umbrellas appears very chaotic and (literally) faceless, all while seemingly moving in unison to gang up on the player from behind or make the potential openings tighter (really great swarm behavior by the way). The oncoming newspapers are probably the worst since they appear to run up to the player from out of nowhere, sidestepping any manholes to force the player to move carefully or wait for openings.
Recovering from anxiety attacks isn't too hard once the player understands how to do it, but it doesn't make being stuck in the streets any better since there's always the possibility that a horde of umbrellas will barrel through from either direction, forcibly resetting your progress (or even leading to a game over). The fact everyone else is slightly faster than the player is what forces constant movement to avoid being left behind/overwhelmed.
I could see this game having a couple more chapters worth of gameplay, maybe even an entire city with a "free roam" mode where quests must be met (such as meeting up with friends or picking up groceries), all while battling personal anxiety.
A short but hilarious game about office accidents that has a surprising amount of depth in the object interactions/combinations. The pixel art and sound design is charming, and there's lot of room for new furniture and coworker behaviors to be added in future updates/expansions.
What I'd really want to see is a custom sandbox mode where the player can freely place down objects to observe the resulting interactions. Maybe there could even be a custom level editor where players create end states and post them online for other people to solve. I don't why, but I'm reminded a lot about Bad Piggies in terms of the creative potential that this gameplay formula can have.
A fun, highly replayable and very addicting experience!
Once the player understands how the explosions tie into the health bar and blast radius, the game becomes a sort of tactical chess where you need to time your explosions to where enemies will end up being (instead of detonating where they currently are, which will just cause the explosion to miss and waste a life).
The powerups are also interesting, although I feel that they can make movement a lot more difficult/tedious since:
- The "speed boost" forces the player to move two spaces instead of one, which can make navigating through tight spaces difficult (and could cause the player to step out of line with enemy movements).
- The "invincibility boost" forces an explosion every space of movement, which sounds great at first but becomes less useful/more bothersome once the room has been cleared out (slowing down movement significantly until the powerup expires).
- The "fuse reset" is best saved when the fuse starts running low, but the randomness of its appearance means that the player can't easily predict when's the best time to get it (i.e. they'll usually just get it when their fuse is still nearly at full).
The leaderboard however is a great touch since it makes players want to replay the game in order to overturn each other's high scores. I'll probably go back to this game after the Game Jam just to see if I can place even higher!
It starts of easygoing on ROOKIE, but gets a lot more demanding on NORMAL and becomes especially brutal/unforgiving on HARD. The street name and layout randomization makes each playthrough unique (so plus points on having lots of replayability), and the accompanying visuals/SFX (I really like how all the Units have their own "copy that" voice lines, especially the female voice for the Medic Unit) really makes the player feel like they're an emergency dispatcher.
Similar criticism like some of the other commenters in that the Units and emergency sites sometimes end up blocking the street names, which can be critical during NORMAL and HARD boards due to forcing players to memorize street names beforehand or taking longer routes along more "visible" streets. You should also change the pause button to be something other than "ESC", since it keeps tabbing out in itch.io (and temporarily makes keyboard interactions stop working).
I genuinely want to see a full version of this game since there's a lot of potential for added/expanded mechanics such as:
- additional Units of the same type (maybe through an upgrade system as the days progress?)
- emergency sites that require multiple Units to resolve (i.e. be present simultaneously)
- secondary/alternate storyline involving the mysterious callers (maybe they want you to go to specific spots on the map to pick up things?)
- Other systems from games such as Papers, Please and Dispatch
Simple, but very elegant in its execution. I agree with the other commenters that this already feels like a solid mobile puzzle game, and that having the option to replay previous levels would be a much-needed improvement.
What I really like is how there are multiple ways to solve each puzzle once the player has two shapes to choose from. You could probably create massive custom grid designs and let people figure out for themselves if they're solvable with the given five shapes (maybe being a daily challenge of sorts, if the game does get officially published).
I also like how the five shapes sort of spell the game's title (even though the "i" shape is more L-shaped). It didn't have to be done, but it just makes the game all the more charming to play through.
One of the more creative games I've seen in this game jam, and a very meta one so to speak!
Some of the words could be discerned via sentence structure and context clues, but others had to make me pause and wait for the auto-typer to fill out a letter because there was no obvious "lead" to go by (like "bees"). It's surprisingly very easy to spam letters when you're not sure what the word is, and this hastiness can let the timer running out before the auto-typer can provide a hint. A tendency to type fast also means that mistakes can quickly pile up even when you know the correct word, especially since the goal is to only fill up the missing letters, not spell out the entire word (a mistake that I kept defaulting back to).
This game definitely has a lot of potential to be expanded further, such as by randomizing which letters are missing so that players can't just memorize all the missing letters from previous playthroughs. Letting the program make its own sentences (or even accept custom words) could make a very fun typing game that others could try out (maybe even creating a code so that custom "sentence challenges" can be shared to other players).
Making the only controls be the arrow keys is one thing, but making a combat system out of it is a whole 'nother level of impressive. I like how killing enough spiders will eventually cause the "battle difficulty" to increase (i.e. more arrows to press), meaning that it's very easy for the difficulty to spiral out of control if the player is too lax while exploring the game map (since they'll keep killing spiders as they appear). Once you're aware of that however, there's this sense of nervous tension that "something" is going to jump out from the forest once enough spiders have been killed, but (like some of the other commenters have stated) I wasn't able to reach far enough to see if there was anything at the very end.
There's mention of an "exciting boss fight and reveal a plot-twisting ending", but it would be nice if there was a way to save progress (even just checkpoint flags or key items collected) because the alternative is restarting all progress from the very beginning, which can be frustrating once battles start consisting of 5 arrows (the point I reached in the game, and I didn't know if there would still be more arrows to come).
The art and atmosphere are both great however, and I would definitely want to see more of the game's story and (expanded) gameplay.
I've never played Blackjack before (although I already knew about the 21 rule), so it took me a couple of tries to figure out what "HIT" and "STAND" meant (i.e. cards can't be given to players that declared "STAND"). Figuring out that the cards in the modifier deck do what their number values represent also took a while, since I didn't know that face cards have a value of 10. Once all that was all figured out however, the game became really enjoyable since I was always betting (or hoping) that players wouldn't receive any "bad cards" from the unmodified deck or declare "STAND" before I could give them better modifier cards.
Making it so that you (the dealer) could see everyone else's cards but couldn't see what one of your own cards was (like in classic blackjack) was the real genius move since it meant you were basically playing against yourself, or in this case the house (making the whole "double agent" narrative even more genius). Actually "winning" the game is surprisingly hard since you basically have to make at least two players win in a single game in order to bankrupt the house in one swoop, otherwise the chips raked in from two players will be enough to keep the night going.
The game as a whole is visually clean and mechanically polished, especially for a first-time submission. It almost reminds me of Balatro, and you could probably make it into a full game by expanding the mechanics and gameplay even further.
The only real problem is that the music audio is scuffed, but I'm not sure if it's just a problem on my end or not.
A game with a simple premise that become a lot more complicated (and surprisingly frustrating) once you understand how the mechanics works. Similar to what the commenter "kk2012001" said, I couldn't get past Day 3 (even after managing to buy two modifier cards) because the RNG of the Count's shifting mood screwed my cards over (i.e. positive mood cards becoming negative). Knowing that each card not played subtracts two (and not one, as initially expected) points to the Count's mood means that having at least two or three unplayed cards by the end of the day can lead to a game over since all the other cards would have likely brought the Count's mood down by a lot.
The game is still a very interesting/challenging premise since the player is effectively always on the disadvantage at the start of each day, trying to raise the count's mood up while earning enough money to (hopefully) afford better cards/modifiers to make succeeding days easier (while also trying to avoid screwing themselves over). I don't know if there's a difficulty spike the longer the player manages to survive, but the game in its current state is already very hard/borderline unwinnable (to the point that a balance/mercy update could help players like me get pass Day 3).
Also, being forced to watch the Jester get his head cut off because the "Menu" button is barred is a very cruel jab at the player. I like it (even if it always/completely upsets me).
I might just not be the right audience for these types of games, but I feel that the dialogue and choices are a bit "too minimalistic", in the sense that it's easily to click through each option and cycle through all of the dialogue after around three playthroughs. The lack of sound effects (like a "bit sound effect" to mimic someone talking) and the quick text speed also makes the narrative feel "weightless" if the player doesn't take the time to stop and read what's being said (which goes against the 60 second timer).
The accompanying picture is a nice touche to the story, however. It feels like a conversation that any couple could have in their kitchen. Maybe the gameplay could be extended further into different rooms so that players will have to play the game several times in order to explore every possible route that the conversation could take.
The maze premise is interesting, and I especially like your use of prime decomposition to determine room rewards (which I've never heard before for making simple loot tables). The idea of getting ingots not to raise your own stats but to lower the stats of your opponents is intriguing, but the fact that the player is always fighting the exact same three types of enemies can make exploring/fighting the rooms tedious/repetitive. It could have been better to make around five unique enemy types (with some having higher spawn counts, higher spawn rates, unique/recolored variants, etc.) but let the dungeon randomly decide which types would be present in each room.
The hitbox of the sword swing also doesn't seem that polished since enemies can still hit the player even if the player manages to hit them. Making it larger (as well as have a visual indicator of the swing range) could make fighting much easier on the player's end, especially if it's the only weapon that the player can wield during the game.
The very last fireworks show ever jam comments · Posted in The very last fireworks show ever jam comments
Being able to see your own drawing appear on the night sky is a really great touch.
Feels like a Warioware-style microgame with the "roughness" of the visuals and exaggerated applause (both the old man and the people on the live tv).
No penalty for crossing over lines (or even following the set lines) does mean that the player can effectively just "scribble" from one point to another.
The 3D dice rolling is addictive, and the countdown encourages the player to strategize their purchases/investments each turn. The only problem is that the rewards are not immediately clear at the start (ex. dice upgrades), meaning the player has to play the game a couple of times before they can (sort of) intuit how certain dice lead to other dice.
The UI could use an overhaul, but it's still an interesting game worth revisiting.
Simple, but surprisingly enjoyable once you get into the rhythm (and understand how the forward movement works, I was floundering helplessly for the first two attempts). I found that rapidly alternating between the A and D keys with both of my index fingers and using my right thumb for the space bar makes for a pretty good sustaining run. The "bounciness" of the shadow moles (the enemies) makes them infuriating but in a very good way, since it encourages the player to avoid making a single mistake otherwise their rhythm will be permanently off-balance for the remainder of the run.
Overall very reminiscent of mobile games like Flappy Bird and Stick Ninja. I could even be expanded further to have elevated surfaces and ramps, potentially allowing for airtime combos.
One of the most creative interpretations for the theme "COUNT DOWN" I've seen so far! The visuals and storytelling are both very polished, and the "reverse" puzzle concept makes for an interesting brain teaser. I can imagine future levels relying on unique "reverse interactions" like the falling box, requiring the player to visualize where multiple objects will be at the start of a cause-and-effect chain.
Probably the only real issue is that it's sometimes difficult to "stop interacting" (or should I say "start interacting") with objects like levers and boxes once the reversal is in effect, which can sometimes cause the seconds to tick down despite no changes having occurred.
I like idle games with interesting/compelling premises, so the concept of a really stubborn king who's trying to brute force his way towards the ocean is hilarious. Just like one of the commenters already said however, the jump from having to grind 1,000 coins to 10,000 coins just to build the third floor of the castle is too steep for the early game, especially since there's no way to move units around (either to move them into empty slots or return back to the inventory). There's also no penalty/effect for when the countdown runs out, so it can make having to repeatedly press the "fight" button to continue the grind very tedious.
The visuals are solid, and there's a lot of potential for an idle game whose main mechanic is a combination of grid-based inventory management and tower defense. Having the walls "fight back" or do other effects to slow down progress could also be a good starting point for further prestige and ascension mechanics.
I really enjoyed the rhythm/multitasking aspect. The premise sounds simple at first, but the gameplay is tricky to master. I reached around 50,000 on Classic Difficulty, but quickly called it quits on Expert Difficulty.
One criticism I have is that my eyes tend to always be focused on the croissant timers, so I couldn't properly read the text that appeared below.