itch.io

Lovely gam! I enjoyed everything about it: the graphics, the audio, the little dialog. Well done!

Thank you so much for your kind words!

Excellent presentation and execution! Although most assets seem to be 3rd party and simple, the integration of everything was very well - each animation and sound effect was perfectly placed, and made everything very enjoyable to play.

The gameplay was more interesting then expected - the stuff you can buy from the shop and the relationship really make these fun. I will say that my strategy for all monsters was to start by hedging, slowly build my relationship, and betray them at the end. I did buy the item that reveal the chances for one monster, which seem to prefer the extremes no matter what I did. I assume the goal was for me to deduce this, but honestly I'm not sure 5 games is enough for this. 

The starting dialog made me lauge, which is always a good thing. Amazing job!

I liked the subdued colors - it really gave everything an authentic military feeling.

The gameplay itself - I'm not sure about it - I ended up mostly reling on comparing the signatures, and I think sometimes a very obious negative message seem to indicate that it's a false message. I realized a bit too late that the losses seem to correlate with me picking the correct thing. I'll be interested to realize how many things can be used to identify false documents, because I assume I just scratched the surface.

Regadless, we won the war, so I guess I did something right. Nice job!

Thank you! I agree that this game really lend itself to be 2.5d. Maybe I'll give it a go after the jam 

Thank you so much for the detailed feedback, it really helps!

Re: the dialog - The dialog progress when you click, but in hindsight I should've made it clearer, and maybe also have a short timer before you can click again so you won't double click

Re: the rules - Several people had issues with it. You catually inspired me to make a little picture on the itch io page to try and explain it better. I tried to model simple medieval battles:

• The side with more infantry pushes the other side, but there are generally small number of casualties
• Archers are mainly used to inflict kills, but can't hold the line
• Cavalry does a bit of both - charge head on the drive the enemy back, or kill routing units etc

I tried to simulate this with 3 attributes:

• Strength - generally the more strength you have, the more you'll "push" the other battle line - which I represented with the meter
• Attack - can you kill other units
• Defence - can you block specific attacks (shield blocks arrows, spears/running away blocks cavalry charges, armor blocked both)

In hindsight again, I should've started with 1 card for each, maybe it would help explain it better

I'm really glad you liked the map and the merge moments, those are my favorites too! Thanks again for your feedback and kind words :)

The visuals are really good! I really like the heist animation - it had a lot of energy in it.

I think it's a me problem, but the game was a bit difficulty. I think if could see in game who went to each robbery and what were the resulty it will help a lot with the deduction. Or at least, don't move the people around. I guess I can write it down and maybe that's the point, but it could be nice to have it on screen.

Ho and I like the portraits too! Really cool

The visuals are really cute, and the idea is prerry clever. 

Like others said, it's very hard to monitor 9...monitors  at once, and I only noticed loitering. Another thing is that sometimes people throw garbage just before going off screen and so the police can't catch them

I think you could start with 1 monitor, 1 type of crime, and gradually increase the difficulty. This can teach the player the idea of the game and the different crimes.

I did like the atmposhpere for the game, the music made everything chill despite the crime spree. Good job!

I was very lost for most of the game, but I'm glad that I read around for the solution because the moment the mirror activated was really cool! Overall nice use of effects for such simple graphics

Like others said, the game is very obtuse.. I think for the first few challenges you should ease players into the game - for example, have some unique shape for the mirror (e.g, elipse like you did later), and have this exact shape at the start so people know to drag it there.

Very creative game, and I see a lot of potential!

Phenomenal audio-visual design! The characters (and parasite) portraits are really well done, the effects are done tastefully, and the music is really good!

I think the thing that confused me a bit at first is that the pattern refered to who is dead, and the symptoms to the person with the parasite, but you can still check symptoms for dead people. Once I figured it out, I got lucky and caught the parasite pretty quickly. It was a bit underwhelming compared to the run when I lost, but it was still very fun idea, and it's nice that you do need some basic deduction skills to succeed

Amazing production values. Great job!

Superb atmosphere! I really like the rain with the combination of the dark background and parallax - gave everything a moody feeling. The art was simple but well executed.

I think some minor improvements can be:

• Progress dialog with keyboard
• Make some things more noticable - I search for the green guy friend for a long time, and almost missed the red flowers
• Maybe have a little more on the book, a picutre and more notes

I did fail to solve the mystery, but I suspect who it is. I appricated the specific text for the people I accuse. Really a gem of a game!

Really appricaite you played it all the way to the end! I haven't played Reigns but ill check it out. Thanks again for your comment :)

Some people missed this event due to random chance, but I'm glad you noticed. Thanks for playing!

You're right about first turn bias. I wanted the players to respond to the AI in order to learn the mechanics. I agree that in a real game this should be more elaborated.

Glad you enjoyed and thanks for the comment!

I agree that rng can be a bastard in this one . Thanks and glad you liked it!

The thematic idea about the system is that if 2 militia fight 1 archer, the 2 militia "push" the archer back and so you gain an advantage, but you lose one soldier because of the archer fire. I wanted players to balance gaining advantage and not taking too many loses. I agree that it's weird that you can win with just cards in your hands lol. Need more balance for sure

Thanks and glad you liked it!

The graphics are cute, and the idea to fight the previous theme is really brilliant! Both for the theme integration and as a general concept. I think this can be expanded a lot.

There are a few things that can really elevate the game

• So indication for UI hover
• Basic sound effects
• Basic animation (E.g, fade out character on death)

And off course.. let me retry the level and not the game when I lose lol.. The writing was brilliant and I really wanted to know what happens!

Thanks! There is a random event that relates to the theme, especially after you finish the first 5 cities :)

Thanks for the comment! It always fun to discover another strategy games lover :)

And yes I agree about the characters - I totally made cheap tricks to save time

Loved your game and wrote a feedback!

Such a cool game! I loved the portraits of all the kings, and the zoom feature was really impressive. I was a bit lost at first, but I got the hang of it soon enough. I was so expecting the humans to stab me in the back because it's exactly what I had in mind in my game lol

I will say that the text was kind of small on my monitor, and honestly I only found out half of a way through that you can upgrade buildings, set alliances, have different troop types etc.. Also I didn't understand why my troops are not attacking until I saw that they're "rallying", which I guess mean assisting my ally defending it's territory, although they stand in place? Also a "your being attacked" sound could be nice

The diplomacy system was very welcomed in a game like this, but I didn't engade as much with the other systems. Still, any game which I can paint the map in my color is good in my book!

Hi!

Solo dev too (minus music a friend sent me). Wrote you some feedback, you're welcome to try my game - I tried to simulate real medieval combat with cards

/jam/brackeys-16/rate/4947443

Wow the art style here is truly phenomenal! For the green creature to the various designs of the numbers and their little animations were just perfect! And the rest of the UI and background kept the same insane level of polish.

On the gameplay side, it's a clicker which is borderline cliche now, but I did enjoy thw twist you made to the formula - first not actually needing to click is a true blessing, and the snipers and the optimization of circling as many cards as possible really kept me engaged throughout.

I actually think the startup is a little too slow maybe. I get that you need some slow ramp up for the upgrades to feel more rewarding, but before to auto spin the game wasn't super fun. Also, the upgrade UI is probably the area I would improve the most - 2 sections with scroll without indication for new possible upgrades meant I constantly needed to go back and check for new upgrades.

Really really amazing production values for a game jam entry. Great job!

Wrote you some detaield feedback! You're welcome to try my game

/jam/brackeys-16/rate/4947443

The game got me! which is very cool

For a short joke game it's fine, but you mention you want honest and constructive critisism - I think you could have challenged yourself a bit more: the character itself was cute, but the tileset was a bit weird, especially the background.

If we put the graphics aside for a minute, as you used external resources - I think this game main strength was the twist, but than it just kind of over? I think you could have pushed it a bit more and have some more levels that have some actual gameplay and some more aha moments. 

The platforming was actually pretty decent - it just needed a bit more scope to truly shine

Wrote a detailed feedback. You're welcome to try my game too:

/jam/brackeys-16/rate/4947443

The art in this game is really sweet! I liked all the various characters, and it's always fun to have a murder mystery.

I think for me there were several issues with the game:

• You are immediatelly introduced to about 6 characters with densed text, and it was abit overwhelming.
• It was hard to understand what was interactable, and so I had to constantly click around 
• More of a personal thing, but I'm not a fan of investigation with limited time, when you don't know which clue is important

I failed the task, and I would be interested for a tutorial to see your train of thought and see what I missed. I think with a little more clarity about the clues and more gradual introduction of the characters, this can be a really cool deduction game!

Wrote you a detailed feedback. You're welcome to try one, intrigued to hear what you thinl:

/jam/brackeys-16/rate/4947443

The creature designs are wonderfully disgusting, and everything have a great atmosphere of a horrible meat factory - really reminds me of abe's odyssey. I also liked the voice acting for the tutorial.

I get that this is sort of a joke game, but I think with a little more work it can actually work really well. It's a variant on papers please with similar ideas, but it somewhat lack some things that made papers please work

• Visual clarity - it really difficulty to tell the organs apart. At some point where there are so many organs with country exceptions it really becomes impossible
• Changing rules - the rules change every create or so it's seem - it would be nice if it will take more time, and that you'll have some indication for rule change
• Controls - the eject button and tubes were a little iffy and didn't work amazing for me

I did appricate that things were a bit gradual at first. I usually think games should be shorter rather than longer, but I feel this one could have been expanded quite a bit - it's really fun to see all the creatures your system can generate. Great job!

Full disclusure - I worked with 2/3 people on previous game jam

...Having said that, it's really fun to see how people you worked in the past have improved! And it's so rewarding to experience the story without knowing what is going to happen.

One of the standouts for me was the indoor areas - the pixel art was very good, and the lighting gave everything a very nice atmosphere. The characters as always were goregous too. I think the outdoor area shows some signs of running out of time, like the square grass tiles, but it was lovely too.

The music as always was very good and fit the tone perfectly. I also liked the sound effects, especially for the gate opening. Giving each character unique blips kept things fresh.

I think the main thing I liked less was the conversation mini game. I get that it's a convention used in some games, but it for me it pulled me out of the experience a bit. It became more a case of hunting for the dialog choices in listen => find the right order in talk - so more mechanical then actually reading.

Still, the story conveyed the feeling of being a pariah perfectly, and the last conversation really made me emotional.

Amazing job!

The game have a lot of style. I really enjoyed the presention and the various animations like entering the corridoer

Gameplay wise, I found myself just following the cursor and spamming left cick, so the concept of diguises didn't play too much part for me. I didn't understand if the people I target also target me - it's seem that I died only if I didn't move or spam left click

Still, I enjoyed my time with it, and good job creating so many characters!

I loved the interpertation of the theme! You can truly not trust these lazy bastards lol

Unfortunetly, it's seem like I couldn't trust myself either, as I didn't understand how to shoot, and at one point the captain got stuck somewhere and I couldn't see it or move

Anyway, I really like the concept of crew members that can automate stuff but are so bad at it you sometimes rather doing stuff on your own. Nice job!

The visuals are really beautiful, especially the hand animations and the particle effects. I like the various challenges and the theme integration was cool

I think the hand collision is not ideal - I kept falling way sooner than the sprite suggest, and I think the game doesn't have cyotee time so you can't really recover

The length was good and the ending was perfect.. Avoda tova!

The dialog UI looks really good! I was a bit lost at first - opened the tablet and didn't see anything - I would start with a dialog explaining what's going on. I eventually figure things out. Nice work!

The game is very intriguing! The instanity effect was very good, and the entire game induced a feeling of paranoia with the confusing paths and untrustworthy people.

I almost gave up on finishing the game honestly, but then I noticed the map on the top right lol. I still think it's a bit confusing that the orientation of the map and the environment is not the same. I got the "good" ending, but honestly I'm not sure how believing and not believing affect things

In my game I also have a trust meter than have a hidden effect, and I'm not wondering if people don't understand what it does either lol

Anyway, great game, and amazing pixel art!

Very chraming little game! I loved the characters (the "bad" one made me laugh) and the goofy walking animation

It was well done, and the only improvement I would make is some color for the speaker so it's easier to know who's speaking now, and saving conversations because it does feel like you're meant to talk with all 3 before picking the person to go to the movies with

Nice work!

Thanks! There is a random event that relates to the theme, especially after you finish the first 5 cities 

Thanks! You're right, added this to the itch page

Very cute game! Left detailed feedback

You're welcome to try mine if you like medieval card games:

/jam/brackeys-16/rate/4947443

Charming little game! The visuals and especially the music gave everything a very nice dreamy atmosphere

It seem like a platformer at first, but I actually liked that this is more of a puzzle game, even if the controls were a bit confusing (s was never used after the tutorialm and you needed the mouse exactly once I think). 

I got stuck on the last level even with the tutorial, couldn't go through the door. But no big deal - I enjoyed the game. Fantastic job!

Enjoyed the art style and gave you detailed feedback!

You're welcome to try my medieval card game if you want:

/jam/brackeys-16/rate/4947443