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Justicar's Scales (fantasy forest adventure)'s itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Innovation | #148 | 3.161 | 3.161 |
| Theme interpretation | #221 | 3.000 | 3.000 |
| Graphics | #225 | 3.097 | 3.097 |
| Audio | #226 | 2.839 | 2.839 |
| Overall | #236 | 2.935 | 2.935 |
| Gameplay | #263 | 2.645 | 2.645 |
Ranked from 31 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
GitHub repository URL
https://github.com/matt-rule/justicars-scales
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Comments
Amazing game! I love the aesthetic. Great job!
Thank you! I will try your game tomorrow when I am able.
Good looking game mate! We already gave a sneak peek in the Discord of the Game Jam!
There are just some things about the movements of the character and his attack that do not convince us, but in the complex is a very good game.
An advice that we suggest is to use a different font for the tutorial parts and the dialogues. Probably a Sans Serif font will be the best
Thank you for the feedback! And congrats on performing so well in the jam!
Indeed, the font and resolution that were chosen don't work together at all. The font is large and blurry, and fixing one only makes the other worse. One solution is just to use a more suitable font, though it would ideally be serif because of the medieval gothic theme. An alternative is having two resolutions, one for the UI and one for the gameplay, like Celeste does.
There are two things I would change about the attack animation, I would make it a lot faster and also add an arc of light. The running animation seemed OK to me, though it should not play while jumping.
Nice platformer with good-looking aesthetics. Good job!
Thank you! I've played and rated your game too. It's really good!
the art is really good
Thank you! I will play and rate your game when I have time tomorrow.
thanks!
Cool use of the theme! I agree w/ Lanyard on the mechanics bit, takes a little trial & error to pick up what you were throwing down. Not a huge deal, though.
I love those parallax layers back there, but it's easy to lose appreciation for them with the character being fast-paced like that. This is not a negative, just something I noticed because I really like how the lighting effect was done in that background.
Regarding controls, just FYI, it didn't pick up my controller. It's a typical Logitech USB Playstation II-style. Keyboard was fine, I just mention this because the game explicitly mentioned controllers.
Only other thing is I noticed you don't have to press a jump button for each jump, holding it down will repeat the jump. Pretty minor, just slightly counter-intuitive to me.
And my favorite facet of a game, to the point I think it would make a good category--atmosphere =D. Awesome job there, 'nuff said!
Thank you for playing, and giving compliments and feedback!
Interesting to know about the controller. I tested it using an Xbox controller but not Dualshock, Godot seemed to think the key mappings would work fine for Dualshock, but I will need to actually buy one to test games in future.
I will play and rate your game but I have to do it on my laptop, so tomorrow.
Interesting implementation of the theme through the use of the scales. Solid art and good sound! My only nitpick would be that the scale/time mechanics were cool, but it wasn’t really required to use them in most places which led to me simply using the sword for most encounters. Great game, nice work!
Thank you for playing! Yes, it seems that players have found a lot of creative ways to get at enemies with the sword instead of using the abilities. The abilities synergise to let you quickly take down the big demons but not many people have got the knack of this, instead they prefer whittling away at the demons' health from -just- out of range!
I like your approach to pixel art. I thought the sword swing of the protagonist looked especially clean. The other characters were all distinct as well. I think you did well bringing your vision of this mystical forest to the screen.
It took me awhile to understand the mechanics behind the Scales. Some deliberately designed areas that teach exactly how they work in your game and forcing the players to use them there could help ease players into an unusual system. Not that there's anything wrong with an unusual system, it's at the heart of all innovation of course, I just think it needs to be taught with some consideration.
I think the combat needed a few more "Player Verbs" to feel complete. Some kind of dodge, roll, or block would've given me a better fighting chance with these grumpy forest denizens.
Thanks Canoparia! Keep on creating!
Thank you for the kind words and feedback! One of the early tutorials was meant to block progress until the player works out how to use the scales, but you can just skip it by attacking the dryad through the wall, which is not intended. I agree the combat system had a few bits lacking. A dodge or block was initially planned but I didn't have time to fit it in.
I'll check out your entry now :)
Nice submission! It gave me some classic Prince of Persia vibes :)
The dyrad spell is not that "visible," I think that you could make it more clear to the player :)
Good job!
I think that this game has room for improvement, but it's a good submission for a gamejam. The idea behind it is really good!
Thank you for the feedback! (your game is really good btw, everyone should play it!)
The idea could be solid and you already know the problems so I won't state them again. For these mechanics to work as a game your fighting system must be very very good. Like "Dead Cells" good.
I am not sure but I think you also waste a lot of time on key bindings. It is good to give those options but only if they don't take much time like the unity new input system.
I had many problems with these big guys and could not finish the game if there was not any bug in the game :)
I love this gif. I don't know why but to me it's delightful seeing the variety of creative cheese/exploits people have found, like attacking the first aggressive dryad through the walls instead of using the scales on her, or backtracking infinitely to restore health at the checkpoint.
The big demons are possible by using the scales + hourglass to reset onto the platform or just jumping on their heads after an attack.
Thank you for the feedback, I'll check out your game after work :)
"like attacking the first aggressive dryad"
I thought that was intended :P
enjoyed game , but maybe the key bind for jump and attack little bit hard to me but overall i enjoyed :D
Thank you for the feedback, I'll check out your game after work! :)
Enjoyed it quite a bit! Animations were very well done. Combat is quite difficult, I think some stun or knock back on the enemies might help. Enjoyed the unique gameplay mechanics and balancing the damage taken.
Thank you for playing and for the feedback! Stunning or knockback would have been a great addition.
Nice game, need less explainations and more discovery of levels.
I like the characters and the animations and the retro feel.
I felt like the dryad attack was a bit punishing. All of a sudden I died without knowing exactly why.
It's a great start. Just needs a bit of game-feel refinement.
Thanks for playing and the feedback! How did you know they are called dryads? ( you're correct, by the way! )
Things that could be done to address this: The dyrad spell could be made more visible on the ground, the HP bar could be widened, and the player could be given more feedback (maybe a sound cue) when their health drops below 0. I think all of those things would help without having to reduce the amount of damage the dryad does. It's meant to be a challenge but not uncomfortable.
They look like dryads.
I can see they have a blue flame to indicate an upcoming attack, but you could give them a much, much more exaggerated animation to foretell the attack. Look at Cuphead for a masterclass in anticipatory action. Or check the anticipation rule of animation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8OtE60T8yU
(Not saying I've mastered this principle. Just sharing things I find helpful to think about.)
This game was nice, had to get me to think about combat more than just spamming the attack key and running away. I will say that sometimes the abilities did not activate when I needed them and I just died, are they on a cooldown? The time stop ability worked most of the time but the damage reversal worked sometimes and sometimes it didn't.
Yes, there are cooldowns, unfortunately cooldown indicators didn't quite make it into the final release but it turns out they were sorely needed. The hourglass only works when it has 5 seconds of history to operate on, and the scales work once only, needing a manual reset either by going to a checkpoint or time reversal. Lots of people have found the obscurity of the cooldowns a problem.
Thanks for playing!
Ah I gotcha, thanks for the explanation! I was able to beat it anyways so the cooldowns weren't that much of an issue.
this game is interesting but a little tricky. i think spreading out the introduction of new abilities so the player had time to master them before adding a new one would have been helpful. also i would have appreciated a bit of coyote time; i am so bad at platformers haha -- overall, i had a good time playing it and it looks and sounds great!
Yeah that's not you, that's the poor physics. I swear I had the same issue and I just avoided the area under the long dryad platform because any time I tried to jump over a hole I needed to start the jump far away from the edge. The easier way is jumping past the dryads.
In a future build I would fix the physics along with some other things including the tutorials.
Thank you for playing!
A tricky control scheme that could work if it was a bit more polished.
As said in Discord you could block the players in the tutorial until they have shown mastery of what you are trying to teach them.
I tried speedrunning the game as you can ignore most enemies, but I kept falling into the pit ;P
Great job !
Yeah unfortunately jumping from edges isn't quite as permissive as I'd like it to be and leads to some frustrating falls. I haven't done a timed speedrun of the game myself yet but I reckon it could be done in under 5 minutes.
Nice walking animation and the paralex effect is working really.
The combat could be way more polished, though, because right now you just pretty much spam the attack button. And J is kind of an awkward key for an attack action. But I like this entry, one can see you have spent a lot of time on it!
Thank you for playing! What keybinds would you suggest for movement + attacking and the two abilities? I didn't want to use ZXC because it's right below WASD. but on second thought I should have put that in as an option. I didn't have time to add a keybinds setting.
I would use left click for an attack. For accessibility I guess we could add a key which is usually "V" for melee :)
Cool mechanic. I think it would be amazing if you put a parameter on the UI to show the availability of the scale.
Thanks for playing! That was one of those things I was close to adding but eventually didn't have enough time.
Gives an oldschool Zelda vibe. I couldn't quite figure out what I was supposed to do with the hourglass :(
Thanks for playing! The hourglass sends you back 5 seconds in time, allowing you to recover HP. Also when you use the hourglass, the scales cooldown resets, but the damage done using the scales doesn't, so you can use it to your advantage, for example repeatedly reverse big enemies' attacks against them.