This is amazing. Great artwork, level design and the theme even if it's in its most straight forward interpretation is implemented extremely well. As other have already mentioned the only flaw of this entry is the lack of checkpoints. It's very frustrating and if the rest of the game wasn't so well made I'm afraid most people would have stopped playing after the third room. Anyway, great entry, probably the best so far, although a bit repetitive due to the missing checkpoints.
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The Tutorial's itch.io pageResults
Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
Graphics | #2 | 4.500 | 4.500 |
Overall | #40 | 3.616 | 3.616 |
Audio | #45 | 3.768 | 3.768 |
Theme | #73 | 3.732 | 3.732 |
Game Design | #103 | 3.512 | 3.512 |
Fun | #113 | 3.402 | 3.402 |
Innovation | #330 | 2.780 | 2.780 |
Ranked from 82 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Comments
Thank you very very much for such kind words! I'm really glad you like it! And yes, I agree that the whole restart system is shit and the way it's done right now makes the game really hard and frustrating. Lesson learnt! :D
Anyway, thanks a lot for trying our game and giving your feedback! Really appreciated!
This game started out really fun and interesting! This was until I realised that death sends you permanently back to the start of the game. This fact turns the game from a fun plat-former into a constant chore that I was not able to complete. This is such a shame because apart from that I like everything inside of your game! I hope that the game does well either way and that everybody else isn't as bad at platforming as me :).
Thank you very much! I agree that the way it's done is definitely not the best one. We spent most of the time on art and animations and didn't have enough for proper testing and polish of gameplay and level design.
Anyway thanks a lot for trying our game and hope you had some nice time playing it. :)
I played your game for 40 min, because I really wanted to get to the end. I enjoyed it very much until I got too fustrated from doing the same shit over and over because there are no checkpoint. Looking through the comment I guess you understood that this might not have been the best decision. So I had to lower your rating a little, sorry.
For the rest, the theme is hit 100% I would say and the graphics are just fantastic. The level design is nice and you really don't know what to trust. The sound effects are very fitting, but the music gets a little repetitive because you have to play the game for quite some time to finish it.
The last level was just crazy with following the other tic-tac. You need a solid 1min 30 sec minimum to get there if you hit all jumps perfectly. That's a very long time you hve to play over and over to then fail in that level again, because you forgot which way to take due to having to focus on the other levels. But the checkpoint stuff is the only thing that could be improved.
Btw. I somehow new how the game would end, but the story was good nonetheless.
Thanks a lot! Yeah, I agree that the whole respawn system is shit. I can see that now and would do it differently now. Lesson learnt! :) Also agree that the music could be not so repetitive - we spent like 10 minutes on that just before the end. :D
Anyway, thank you very much for such kind words. Glad you liked it and had some good time playing it. :)
I somehow forgot to tell you how you could solve the checkpoint system. I think it would not be necessary to have a checkpoint for every level. Every second or third level could be sufficient enough to keep the player entertained.
For the music, having a background music for each level would be nice, but too much work for a game jam. Just switching between two music tracks each level should have done the trick. But yeah, we had the same problem with our game.
Maybe you want to stop by and play it ;)
Spoiler: it's also a 2D platformer
Thanks for the tips! Yeah, I don't think the simple checkpoints would solve the problem well. It would ruin the "fear of every button and stuff" experience completely and the game would be boring. If we made a full game from this we would do that differently. :) The same with the music. We just didn't have enough time for that.
And of course, we're gonna check your game asap. ;)
Thanks again
The "fear of every button" experience is exciting and funny the first one or maximum two times you press it. But afterwards it just gets tedious, because you already know what you have to do. I had a similar idea for our game, because I was the programmer and game designer. We have multiple levels and my idea was to only let the player spawn at the start, but during testing we found out that this is not a good idea, especially if people are not good at platforming. I started to put one additional respawn point somewhere in the middle of the level, but ultimately putting many more in there and I think that was good decision which help make the game feel more fun and not to tedious if you have to repeat parts you can perform with closed eyes :D
Just some thoughts from my side ;)
I agree with the comments: Nice graphics, nice world design and nice animations.
It is frustrating the lack of checkpoints.
I like the player movements as well!
Congratulations to the team! With some fixes it could be a great game!
Your graphics are beautiful. The character's animation is really nice and funny. His running looks hilarious to me. I would have preferred though if they were checkpoints. It's really frustrating starting all the way from the beginning. Regardless the game is still really nice ;)
The game feels exceptional to play. I'm extremely impressed by all of the small details; the way it has a small animation when stopping its movement, the small animation for when it transitions from ascending during a jump to descending during a jump, the fact that it can't jump at all when inside a two-tile high space; all of it adds up to make the game feel INCREDIBLE to play!
I'd hate to be a broken record, but I do agree with everyone else that the lack of checkpoints does not compliment the trial-and-error punishment design.
I really like the feel and the movement of the character! The animation was so on point! really enjoyed it! I didn't like the fact that you had to start all the way from the beginning when you died.
I'll echo what others are saying in that there really needed to be a checkpoint system here. Especially since the game aims to actively trick and kill the player.
Hands down the most professional looking art and animation of everything I've seen so far in the jam though. Absolutely stellar work there. And the sound design is great too!
Thank you very much for such a kind words. I’m really glad you like it. To the restarts - yeah, I agree. It could have been done better. Though I don’t agree with using checkpoints for this. IMO It would completely ruin the fear-of-every-button experience. But there definitely has to be some kind of shortcuts or something. Now it’s too punishing.
I love graphics and animations, and the design of the world with colors, very cool.
Really lovely game! The hand drawn art definitely brings its own charm, the little robot has a lot of character because of it. Awesome atmosphere too. The only problem for me though is one that a lot of other people have already said and that's having to restart from the beginning every time you die. Especially for a game that completely relies on a mechanic that often tricks the player nearly every time they first come across a new area, it then becomes a slog to keep on traversing the whole game, so much that I gave up after a few minutes. But apart from that, everything else was great!
Massive graphic work here! Animations are awesome! You must be a big Hollow Knight fan :)
One suggestion: starting everything all over again is maybe too punishing when you reach the final stages
The graphics were amazing, the levels are fun and very polished but we think a checkpoint system is pretty much essential, especially after passing the first two rooms. The audio is good overall and the arrangement is interesting but we think the loop is a little bit short. The sound effects are great though! Overall it reminded some of us of portal. Great work!
Thank you very much! I definitely agree that the restart system could be done better. (didn’t have enough time for that) But I think permadeath is essential for the experience and checkpoints would completely ruin that. Though there could be some kind of permanent shortcuts or something.
Agreed on the music - we could have spent more time on that. It was made in five minutes in this online song maker.
Hey man, nice game. Can you check out mine: https://itch.io/jam/cgj/rate/476877
Great job on the art! A clever game, overall, but I just really liked the aesthetic of it.
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