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Neptune's Children's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Overall fun and playability | #24 | 3.486 | 3.486 |
Ranked from 35 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Theme incorporation
Solitude - Player is the only living human encountered in the game
Cosmic Horror - The enemies are creatures serving an unseen but powerful deity, the game takes place entirely underwater as well.
Ancient Ruins (somewhat) - There are ancient ruins the player later explores
Endless/Infinity - Referenced as part of the enemies ultimate goal
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Comments
Neat game!
The style and the atmosphere are so good!
I lost my rifle after leaving the first zone, don't know if it's intended but I didn't have the chance to try it out :(
The music and sound are very good and help with the immersion.
The combat is a bit tricky sometimes, and those monsters scared the hell out of me!
The splash image of the game gives me Bioshock's vibes.
I like the credits too, very cool!
Nice game, good job!
Thanks for playing and providing the feedback!
I built almost every aspect of the game to enhance the atmosphere so I’m really happy you liked it!
I wasn’t able to implement progress carrying over between scenes properly, so the sort of internal logic (which isn’t stated in-game) is that you just left the rifle on the boat when you redeployed. That’s partly why I didn’t add any enemies in the final area, besides not having enough time to place them properly and also I thought having janky enemies would ruin the atmosphere of the second zone.
Out of curiosity did you find the ammo for the rifle and just decide to save the ammo for later? Or did you not find any ammo and so were unable to use it at all?
Admittedly some of the sound I was worried would be too annoying or stupid, it’s good to hear players love it though.
I agree regarding the combat, it’s something I knew was an issue the last couple days of the jam. But I decided having janky combat with everything else being good was better than good combat in an otherwise boring game lol. It’s good the poor AI and feedback didn’t take away from the spooky enemies though!
Admittedly Bioshock didn’t play much into my inspiration for the game, but I take that as a complement! It was actually more inspired by the poster art for The Thing if anything lol.
And tbh I thought players would fine the credits to be too annoying or cheesy. I love doing them because I like having that time where the player can sit back for a moment at the end of the game. I’m happy someone else enjoyed it too!
Thanks again for playing and all the feedback!
I did find the ammo for the rifle but I kept it for the next area, but as you described I couldn't use it.
I agree with the decision to keep the combat and other stuff junky besides don't have them. In the end it's not a big deal, just something you can upgrade later.
Thanks for the exhaustive reply!
Very well implemented Playstation 1 look and thick atmosphere. The texts from the dead were frightening and helped the creepy atmosphere. Well done all around.
Thanks for playing, and the feedback! This was my first attempt at a PS1 graphics game and I focused a lot on building the atmosphere, so I'm glad you liked both!
The dead body dialogues were an idea I got from Bungie's old FPS Pathways Into Darkness. Partly because I liked how it could provide multiple perspectives, and how creepy I could make them.
Hey thats a pretty cool game, nice theme and environment.
I started with a youtube channel and I featured you game with a mini-review: Playing GameJam's games - Dungeon Crawlers - YouTube
The PS1 graphics and slower movement reminded me of King's Field, which was awesome. Usually I'd say the movement was too slow, but I think the context of being underwater supports it. The combat feedback was a bit lacking, sometimes I wasn't actually sure if I was doing damage or not. Overall I really enjoyed this one! Great entry.
I really like the look of King's Field, so maybe there was some unconcious influence there and I'm glad you liked it. But for the most part this was actually more inspired by Space Hulk: Vengeance of the Blood Angels. It just ended up looking more like Kings Field I guess lol The movement was intentionally made a bit slower, both because the player is underwater, and I thought it helped the horror-like feel.
Yeah the comabt is definitely lacking though, the only feedback that currently exists is a blood sprite particle effect, and a stabbing sound when a hit lands. I'll definitely be looking into improving that post-jam.
Thanks for playing, and the feedback!
I really enjoyed this. Loved the PS1 aesthetics your went for, I could definitely imagine this being a horror classic if it was released back in the 90s! Reminds me of exploring the shipwreck levels in Tomb Raider 2. The audio logs were a nice touch too.
My only complaint is that the combat feels quite unresponsive, especially against the sharks who just keep coming at you. A short stun, or impact effect would make a big difference.
The underwater settings is really unique and suits the limited grid based movement. I wonder if you could add 90 degree turning up and down too to really disorient the player and add to the sense of unease and claustrophobia.
Overall, a really cool little horror game.
I'm glad you liked the aesthetics, this was my first time trying a PS1 style. It was actualy more based on Space Hulk: Vengeance of the Blood Angels, what with the cramped corridors, (space)ship wreck exploration and eerie atmosphere. And I'm glad you liked the talking corpses, I actually cribbed that idea from Bungie's old FPS Pathways Into Darkness, albeit in a more stripped down fashion.
You're absolutely right about the combat. I didn't have time to make hit reaction animations, so the only damage cues are the blood puffs (which are hard to see because the enemies just keep moving forward and block the view of them), and a small flesh stab sound effect. That's why the Children just disappear when killed.
Yeah as I mentioned in another comment I don't know of many other underwater dungeon crawlers. Only one I knew of was certain sections in Legend of Grimrock 2. It was actually more inspired by the diving sections of a game called Northern Journey, which for a non-horror game was about 10x creepier than mine lol. I had thought of adding the six degrees of movement, but having had the past experience of not finishing a game for this jam I decided to scope down.
Thanks for playing, and the feedback!
Really enjoyed this one, although the friends I was streaming it to that aren’t huge fans of deep ocean might not have :D
There were moments of panic, ‘nope’, and chaotic attempts to attack, love it.
Thanks for playing! I was hoping the thalassophobia feeling would come across lol. Actually was this a twitch stream? If so I'd love to see the VOD!
And that's good to hear, because "nope" moments were something I focused on quite a bit.
Oh no my days of trying to pretend Im a Twitch streamer are long gone 😂. This was just on discord with some friends.
Ah ok, figured I should at least ask lol. Glad your friends got some enjoyment/misery out of it!
Yep, nice. I liked the underwater setting and the graphics.
Thank you! Yeah I thought the underwater setting would be unique, I honestly couldn't think of many dungeon crawlers set underwater beyond parts of Legend of Grimrock 2. Glad you liked it!
Nice job! great presentation and atmosphere! great ps1 asthetics
Thanks for playing, glad you enjoyed it!
Hey! First of all: great vibe!
Here are my thoughts:
Theme:
What I like:
What I wished for:
That's it! Thank you again for participating and uploading and congrats for making an actual playable game that really transported a worthy horror vibe!
Thanks you so much for playing, and the detailed feedback!
I'm so happy the intended atmosphere came through, while I was making the game I kept thinking "yeah this feels nice and eerie but will people just think it's dumb?" The tutorial integration is actually something I've been doing since 2022, in my opinion it's a very brute force method, but it works. The low number of enemies is a bit of a holdover from the Waxworks influence, but also partly became forced by the technical issues the AI suffers from. But hey, who am I to turn away a complement!
I agree with all your points, originally the game was going to be multiple levels of the ship, and was going to play similar to the Kshatriya DLC in Metro Last Light where you repeatedly dive into the ship to pick up artifacts and restock on supplies. I think it was good I didn't stretch myself trying that idea though. The lack of feedback is also a sore thumb, there is little blood spurts that pop out when you hit an enemy, but since they move quickly and the heavy fog effect it can be hard to see. There is also a separate sound effect that palys when you hit an enemy, like a little stabbing sound, but it probably blended into the background too much.
There was going to be enemies in that area, specifically some that would ambush the player from the edges. But as you can imagine, just ran out of time to do it in a way that wouldn't have ruined the atmosphere.
Thanks again for playing!