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Time's Remorse's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Theme | #23 | 3.810 | 4.667 |
| Fun | #67 | 3.538 | 4.333 |
| Audio | #79 | 3.402 | 4.167 |
| Overall | #84 | 3.402 | 4.167 |
| Visual | #136 | 3.266 | 4.000 |
Ranked from 6 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Are you using any third party assets?
cc0 music and sound effects, everything else I made myself
Are you using any AI generated assets?
no
Did you use BulletFury?
No
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Comments
I had a lot of fun with this! The visuals and controls were awesome.
All the bullets and enemies were cool to face
I enjoyed it - fluid follow-mouse movement, an attack system that's hard to get used to but feels powerful, and a special move which is also hard to use but feels good when you manage to combo it together with the main attack.
The roguelite system of choosing powers/curses was okay, though none of the powers (except time burst charge count increase) felt immediately impactful. I've gotten maybe 20-30 waves in before dying, and didn't notice the movement, time burst duration or bullet time efficiency buffs at all. Maybe write down the % increases for powers/curses in their tooltip? (this would at least add a psychological effect that you're actually getting stronger in that particular area)
The attack system is simple but has some depth, which was fun to explore. For example - if you keep tapping the LMB and killing enemies to replenish your charge, the bullets will essentially stay in slowmo until you run out, and you'll have a brief moment when you can deal damage whenever you let go. It's very, very satisfying to take down many enemies at once while all this happens (either by dodging bullets gracefully or using time burst).
The only real complaint is how long enemies take to become vulnerable upon spawn - I guess it's necessary to prevent cheesy spawnkilling, but it kind of discourages aggressive playstyles. Maybe make them vulnerable a bit sooner?
Overall - really solid effort, considering you only spent 3 days. Shame you didn't spend all 10 though, I think the result would have been glorious. Congrats on finishing the jam!
Thanks for playing the game, I glad you enjoyed it. Overall this is fantastic feedback.
The descriptions could certainly be more informative, the effects themselves are about +10% in most cases, less in others. I'll look into making them a little stronger.
Overall it sounds like you've found and mastered a style of play I hadn't thought of, and I like it. However the down side (or I suppose 'consequence') of staggering the time slow effect the way you did is just as you discovered, increased invulnerability on enemies.
So funny thing about the invulnerability is that it only lasts for 30 milliseconds at normal speed, that's less than a 3rd of a second. But if you are frequently slowing time it can last up to 3 seconds since its affected by time's speed just as with the enemies themselves.
The idea was to both discourage spawn camping but also to encourage players into dropping out of bullet time as enemies spawn, then slow it down again when going for the kill. I'll look into the timings, but can't say I'd reduce it by more than a few milliseconds, 25 milliseconds or 1/4 of a second might be a reasonable compromise, I'll give it some thought.
As for time spent making the game, I didn't learn about the jam until there were only 4 days to go. I'd just reached a milestone on a long term project and was perusing the upcoming jams for some fun when I saw it. Overall I spent the first day deciding if I wanted to join so late in whilst brainstorming some ideas before spending the remaining 3 on actual development. Had I had the extra time, it definitely would have gone towards increasing and balancing the boon/curse pool, more enemy variety would have been at the top of the list of additions too.
Heh, well, that's one way to implement the theme :p I suppose with this playstyle it's necessary to wait until all targeted enemies spawn in fully, meaning they get to make a few shots before you can attack. A fair risk/reward payoff.
I think there's some potential with this design, with more dev time and a deeper boons system it may get really flexible as a roguelite. Will definitely revisit your game if you decide to work on it further.
I cleared 10 waves the most.
I got careful of never ever choosing faster enemy bullets, this seems like the real trap. During this one run where I got the furthest I got tons of hearts (got something like 8 in the end?), although I really like that there are different possible approaches as for example if you choose multiple Time bursts you'll obviously also choose the upgrades which give better Time bursts, which is also my favourite way of playing.
I love the game. It looks and sounds pretty good, controls perfectly, is somewhat unique (ironically the one thing some other people did a similar way is the theme implementation ;) ) and the main mechanics work super well, there're really super pleasant to control, and allow for a game where there're constantly tons of bullets on the screen which is why we're here. There're not tons of different enemies but the ones which are there are cool with interesting different patterns to deal with. The speed of the character and bullets is perfect and the game just as hard from the very beginning which I really like, I tend to much prefer that to progressive difficulty maybe in general but specially in games you'll get to replay from the start several times, here it's satisfying to beat each wave.
There's one thing I don't understand, and now while typing I even wonder if it's a bug : at the beginning of a game I need to press the button to use the bullet time in order to damage enemies (I need to be in bullet time mode) but consistently from a point I only need to touch them (I don't need to be in bullet time mode anymore) for the remaining duration of the run. It does not even matter that much while playing but it's confusing me.
Very cool game, thanks for sharing. Is it endless by the way? If it's not I might try to complete it.
A really good summary of the game, it truly sounds like you enjoyed playing the game which honestly makes me happy.
It's interesting how there's already a few different builds despite the small pool of choices. I for one tend to go for bullet time efficiency and speed increases. But yes a burst heavy build can be fun.
Currently the game is endless, I would like to add a boss or two in the future but currently it just goes on for as long as you can.
Yep the lingering hitbox is a bug and thanks to you I've finally found the source of lag that's been plaguing me since release. So due to a small oversight the hitbox would linger forever if you spammed left click; ever stacking up over the course of a run. To make matters worse each hitbox would still perform their own collision checks gradually slowing the game down. Well that's a fix I'll be dropping after the jam.
Unique attack mechanic, gets kinda unreliable at times tho
Thanks for the feedback, after the jam I'll be adding a small grace period where if you hit an enemy within a few frames of taking damage it will be recovered. Should hopefully make it feel less punishing.
This one was super fun! I found myself playing again and again trying different builds (time burst + speed was my fav). The art style worked really well as it kept everything very clear and legible. The bullet movements are pretty crazy lol
Hi,
The difficulty curve starts off a bit high, which can be challenging.
However, I really like the time mechanic. It's a great feature that allows you to choose a caplet buff and debuff, emphasizing the theme of consequences in your decisions.
To make the game more accessible, I recommend easing the difficulty at the beginning.
A tutorial level would be helpful for learning the game mechanics.
One small suggestion: it would be nice if the gears in the background slowed down when using the time skill.
Overall, I had a lot of fun playing the game; the gameplay is both enjoyable and innovative :)
I'm glad you had fun playing, and thanks for the feedback.
As you say, the early game could do with some easing and possibly some tutorialisation.
I can't believe I didn't think of slowing the gears, well to be honest the background was a last minute addition.
I'll keep your feedback and suggestions in mind for a post-jam update.