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Machinaria's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Audio | #4 | 3.970 | 3.970 |
| Graphics | #13 | 4.212 | 4.212 |
| Innovation | #19 | 3.667 | 3.667 |
| Overall | #24 | 3.545 | 3.545 |
| Gameplay | #88 | 2.848 | 2.848 |
| Theme interpretation | #118 | 2.848 | 2.848 |
Ranked from 33 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
GitHub repository
https://github.com/blackmambastudio/machinaria
Theme interpretation
You operate a physical machine in a digital game.
We also build a physical machine based on the digital representation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDhcMvdIoBc
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Comments
This is a pretty cool game. It took me a little bit to understand it but once I did I enjoyed it quite a bit!
I love the Orwell and Papers Please feeling! great visuals. The youtube video of the physical machine looks good :)
Thanks. We're glad you liked it. You're the first one who compares the game with Orwell, and that's pretty good.
Its a great game and quite interesting to play...reminded me of Papers Please. The music is great and the controls are smooth. It seems like a game made by professional developers. Also maybe you are sending this game to GDC 2019 so goodluck for that :)
"Made by professional developers"... thanks for that. We're glad you liked it. And regarding the GDC 2019 submission, we were accepted: https://gdconf.com/news/play-these-20-unique-games-gdc-2019s-altctrlgdc-showcase
Well congratulation then for being selected. And as I said the game indeed looks like a professional work or atleast by very experienced people.. very clean, subtle and appealing. I look forward to see more amazing games from you. Goodluck at the GDC :)
Visual and sounds are awesome
Well done guys, good luck :)
Thanks!
Very original idea! :-)
I likes the visual style and music.
Thanks. We're glad you think it is original and that liked the aesthetics.
Wow... VERY atmospheric!
Great Artstyle and totaly unique.
Love the 80s vibe.
Awesome Job! :O
Thanks for you comment. We're glad you liked it and what you think of the art style.
I can see a lot of improvement after the update. But even before the update it was great.
Thanks! feedback from other players was very useful to know what things had to be improved.
It took a while to figure out I was suppose to form words with tapes, silly me.
I quite like the whole mechanic and political setting. It's very polished and full-featured game, considering it was a jam entry.
Thanks. We're happy to know you liked the mechanics and the theme.
Great visuals and very original idea! You did a great job guys, with lots of details :)
Check our game if you have time! :)
Thanks for your comment, Jake the dog. We're glad you liked it.
Someone in the team (could be me, who knows) will play your game later, I promise.
Simply great, awesome visuals and audio work! Definitely one of the most original and polished ideas so far.
Check my game if you have time, I would love to know your opinion =)
I absolutely loved the subject of this game, It was so interesting! I really liked the music, the sounds were well implemented and really felt like a political-divertion machine. Although I didn't really understand what the interpretation of the main theme was, I think it's one of the best entries.
It would be great if you check out our game!
https://itch.io/jam/game-off-2018/rate/338156?fbclid=IwAR2q3vZk7Zid04A8sZdnkR_l0...
Amazing atmosphere and UI. I could go on but every comment on there pretty much nails it, so, definitely one of the best entries I've seen. Kudos!
Thanks. We're glad you liked it.
Wow! Incredible artwork and UI design. I am sincerely jealous of this games presentation. Easily the best I've seen in this jam so far. Congrats on that!
Someone already mentioned this below, so I won't belabor the point, but I do think the second level needs some work to make clear what we're supposed to do. It goes from being very simple and straightforward at the start to being a complete mystery the next day. I started randomly putting tapes into each slot just hoping something random might click. (It didn't.) I only say this because this is absolutely a game I would pay money for if it was polished a bit more on the puzzle end of things. I'll be looking forward to updates!
Thanks for your words. We're glad you liked the visuals.
We're working on improving the puzzle design, a lot of players complaint about it. It was hard to get to the current puzzle mechanic, and that explains why it has loose ends (we didn't have the time to test it before release).
Updates will keep coming until we're ready to launch on stores with much more content and gameplay mechanics.
Absolutely love the graphics, sound and setting. Definitely has a Papers Please vibe in the best possible way. The gameplay of having to make words from the tapes is quite clever, though the second level doesn't make it obvious enough (for me) what to do when you have two letters per tape. I had to look at the comment below for it to make sense. Sometimes it can be surprisingly hard to make a word. A subtle hint, such as wording in the text, could help with that.
There's a bug on I think the second puzzle on Nov 30 - It's possible to make the correct word with an alternate arrangement of tapes but it doesn't count. If this isn't a bug it's not clear to me why this is invalid. One other thing I'd suggest is that dragging a tape over another should swap their places. It would save a few wasted moves of dragging them around to swap them.
Finally, I absolutely love that you can choose positive or negative messages to influence the election. Even in the tutorial you can go against the words it tells you to use. Brilliant.
Overall I'm extremely impressed by this game. Certainly one of the best games of this jam. This could definitely go on to become the next Papers Please-esque hit
Thanks for the long comment. We're glad you liked both the aesthetics and mechanics of the game. We want to keep the game as mechanical as possible, and that's why we decided to leave the cartridge switching in that way.
Other players are commenting about the words, so we're are improving its design. It is good to know that the game has a Papers, Please atmosphere because that game inspired a couple of things while we were throwing ideas.
We wanted to give players freedom about which path to take, so it is good to know you think it was a brilliant decision.
I loved the art concept & music, well done!
Thanks. Our artists are jumping thanks to your comment. :D
The game immerses the player in a very special atmosphere. Good idea and I just love the color palette choice. Seriously good!
Thanks! You're game has an interesting concept.
Great game. Reminds me of the visual novel Va-11 Hall-A!
That's a great compliment! thank you!
It's just a cool weird concept, love it!
Thanks!!!
I played your entry also. I really like the puzzles in your game!
Love the Graphics & Audio. Reminds me a lot Paper please (which is a compliment). Great work !
Thanks for play it!
I play your game also, great entry as well!
This is a really great jam game! The atmosphere and art are well done (props to whoever did the background audio) and the game mechanic is unique, love the slightly dystopian world mashed with the UI.
Only problem I ran into is I can't get past the second day, as I don't see any words in this set of video tapes?
Thanks! 🙌
All audio is made by @quietGecko 😀
All emotions are composed by 4 or 3 letters, so only one letter for each cartridge will be used.
In this case you can try to match the cartridges to write one of the previous discovered emotions.
Ah! I thought so but couldn't seem to get it to detect, I'll give it another go after trying some more games.