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To The Bottom!'s itch.io pageResults
Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
Game Design | #6 | 3.571 | 3.571 |
Overall | #20 | 2.667 | 2.667 |
Fun | #24 | 2.286 | 2.286 |
Theme | #34 | 2.143 | 2.143 |
Ranked from 14 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
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Comments
You have a really strong base here for a great horror game, but there are a few problems. First, the controls are too complex and introduced too quickly - a more in-depth tutorial or at least a quick reference guide would be super useful. Second, the side radar faces forward and the nose radar faces sideways, which is confusing. Third, there doesn't seem to be much to do? Maybe the sub was just too slow and my patience too thin, but I wandered around the game for a good half hour looking for something interesting. I found some stuff on the x-ray but nothing ever game of it - just some green lines on a new scanner. I certainly didn't feel like I'd accomplished anything - and with no monsters, there's no threat, and thus no scares. Ultimately, the game just feels unfinished - like this is an alpha build or a proof-of-concept.
All that being said, I'd love to see more of this, with the monsters in full swing and a working tutorial. The mechanics, though inscrutable at times, are absolutely fascinating and the sound design and voice acting is absolutely impeccable. The bones of this game are really strong, I just wish there was more meat on them.
(Also, there's no quit button. The REAL horror was being trapped in the game all along!)
Voice acting! Music! Sounds! I will say there’s visible background noise in the voice acting, but that can be passed off as interference. The music also kept tricking us into thinking it was Creature Sounds. Can’t figure out what the accent is supposed to be. I will note also that you did misspell Geiger in the controls. Um, what else… the controls would be easier to understand if the tutorial specified what your friendly guy on the comms was doing as he did it, or perhaps that was true and we weren’t paying attention. I wish there was an indicator on the x-ray scan of from which angle it was viewing the world - we couldn’t tell if it was top down or from the front, or what. It’s also a bit disorienting to have the nose scan oriented a different direction from the wide area scan. We couldn’t find any creatures, nor could we find the goal, so as it is, the game is not really scary because there are no threats. It could be really terrifying, though, with some work. It’s a REALLY strong base. As far as we could tell, it’s a lot of mechanics, but not much meat. Unless we just couldn’t find the meat in the very very slow submarine. That’s also possible. In which case, the meat should be made a bit easier to find, in my opinion.
This probably has my favorite sound of the games in the jam. The voice acting, sound effects, and music were all incredibly good. I'm also a sucker for the UI--I love VCV rack and modular synthesis, so pushing buttons and switches and watching numbers move around is kind of my jam. :) Like other people said, I wasn't able to find anything. The geiger counter was up high, but the Xray didn't show anything and I wasn't sure how to interpret the nose vs side. I thought I had it; then I doubted myself; then I kind of gave up. Maybe one more page with an image of what view each of those was?
I had such a good time trolling around underwater that I actually kinda didn't care that I wasn't finding anything; kind of like Signal Simulator or something. Enjoyable, and impressive! If you make an update after the jam, I'd love to know about it!
This game can be awesome if the mechanics are slowly introduced to the player. Big potential but bad execution.
Complicated, I kinda of understand the sonar, but its cumbersome and not intuitive. I went down to the bottom but didn't know where to go from there. I know theres a cave somewhere but I just felt like I wasn't even moving or something.
Best voice acting of the submissions I've tested so far, really loved it. The settings and underlying game mechanics drew me in, but like the other commentators said, I wasn't able to find much, which was a shame :) Extra points for the unique UI!
Managed to max out the geiger counter, find the bottom of the lake, check the file a few times, then declared myself not fit to ever pilot anything bigger than a car. I've played a game called barotrauma before and while it isn't a game about piloting a submarine one of the main things I did in it was pilot a submarine. I still managed to get into a lot of trouble piloting the submarine in that game even though it was 2D so one could imagine how a 3D environment just added more layers of confusion. So it was fun until the charm wore off.
Unfortunately not for me - I'm not good at spatial imagination. Very pretty menu tho.
I like the idea of this game, but for some reason I just can't seem to progress in it...
I learned the controls of my vessel, I think... But then what? I just drifted around in the sea and nothing happened so idk, maybe I did something wrong.
I went up to 0m and down to like -185m and it was still just the cave walls on the radar, the geiger counter didn't show any activity and the X-Ray just showed a black screen every time I tried it.
Might have to come back to this one.
is it a horror game? no. is it fun? yes it is. has it good gamedisgn? absolutely.
i wouldnt call this a horror game but its definetly a very good game, its relaxing and very interesting, i didnt play it too much since this isnt the style of game i like to play but as far as i can tell good job!