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Aurum Artificer's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Audio | #70 | 2.023 | 2.611 |
| Visuals | #72 | 2.539 | 3.278 |
| Overall | #76 | 2.087 | 2.694 |
| Mood | #82 | 2.023 | 2.611 |
| Gameplay | #87 | 1.764 | 2.278 |
Ranked from 18 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Engine
Unity
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Comments
So, the secret is not to bump into the border, but it seemed once I sort of understood the controls it swapped directions and very quickly I was bouncing all over the place and died.
First time I selected gamepad controls and for some reason it never detected when I died. Particles just kept popping up, colliding to join or hit a charge to dissolve again. Only that I was out of the picture and not collecting any points either...
(I played the Linux version with a PS3 controller and then keyboard...)
Also, it seemed the menu didn't work with the controller. It would be useful to have that as well...
I really do love the concept!
ugh. I’m sorry you had all those issues. Unfortunately I don’t have a Linux machine so I couldn’t test on the OS. I’ll see what I can do in the future to make sure this doesn’t happen.
Reading the instructions on the game's web-page again, it seems like I missed a number of input options. Maybe then it's no wonder it was hard to make progress... Like "Left Trigger - Brake"... That's what I kind of missed and slowing down by accelerating into the opposite direction is really tough once thing deteriorate to "twitch reflex speed".
One thing that irritates me is that the right thumbstick is for movement and the left one for aiming. Also, when you let go the direction snaps back to its origin.
The best results I got was when I managed to kind of cage in one atom in the lower right corner and feed it with a stream of protons and neutrons while shielding it against other atoms bumping into it and throwing it out of its position (either into me so I would absorb it and score or whacking it all over the field so I would have to catch it before it bumped into too many other things and possibly be split down or otherwise obliterated.
Sometimes there is some kind of explosion where an atom seems to appear and immediately gets destroyed throwing out a whole bunch of protons around. And at least once I had a sudden spark of energy particles (the yellow tiny ones) going wild.
In one play-through I gott pulled into such an energy spark and the border fields suddenly sort of caged me in, I couldn't move anymore and apparently the game continued although I couldn't see any of it, just get some sound effects and scoring once in a while. In another game I was suddenly teleported (I think it was one of those proton explosion that kind of grabbed me) and then I couldn't move anymore as well...
The biggest things I managed to get were Phosphor, Sulfur, Magnesium, and some more around that range...
Great theme. Amazing visuals. Love the name, Aurum Artificer. Struggled a little to completely grasp the concept, but loved playing it. I don't know if it's high enough or not, but got to a high score of 6800. :D
Also I'd like to say, I get your intention to give the game a futuristic high tech touch, but the SFX / background sound in the Start Menu is a bit too sharp. Distracts you from reading the instructions. The font can also be a little better, it's a little hard to read. And I'll also suggest a darker background for the game scene.
Overall great game. Loved playing it.
Thanks for the comments. Glad you enjoyed the game. I am currently working on refactoring and improving the game for a future full release. I plan of tweaking/changing much of the SFX and graphics to give it a more polished look.
Probably the hardest game for me to rate in the whole jam.
Thank you for adding mouse and keyboard controls.
I was building atoms and them moving over them to score, while reciting in my head hydrogen, helium, lithium beryllium boron, carbon, nitrogen , oxygen , fluorine, neon.. Maybe one or two of those are wrong but hey I'm shocked I remembered so many.
Its kinda like two games at once and there is some dissonance here, and yet I kept playing.
Please keep developing this, I'd like to see where it ends up.
I admit that I am angry :D
Because I know that there is a great idea out there, but I am not able to get to it despite trying.
Please work on the tutorial. Step by step, explain to the player each main mechanism (preferably on some test levels where not everything is activated at once).
I will be following your profile on itch, because I'm really interested in this project and its further development.
A professor of mine once told me "Ideas are easy. Good ideas are what is hard."
To be fair, I have been mulling about making a game about of the table of nuclei, which is basically the periodic table for nuclear physics, ever since I was in grad school back in the 90s. This jam seemed like a great chance to make the idea into a reality. :)
After the voting period for the jam is over I plan on making incremental updates until I get to the point where I feel like I can release the game for $$$.
I absolutely love the concept you did. I dont know a lot about the science but I sure can tell that you do and it shows. I did have a lot of trouble getting the hang of it but the more i tried the better i started to get. Was tricky to get the hang of as it felt like I was always trying to do 3 things at once but I do really like it and was getting a lot better near the end tonight. I played it on my live stream and you can check it out if you want anytime. Great job.
Thanks for playing and streaming the game. I agree that the controls take some practice. That is intentional otherwise I found during testing the game was to easy. If it helps, the movement is velocity based, so the move input adds velocity to the artificer. I have found short bursts of movement combined with braking works well. Also I realized that I forgot to put in the instructions that your energy regenerates slowly over time but you also gain energy by capturing electrons (blue) or by the occasional collision of positrons (pinkish) and electrons.
Also, after watching the stream I want to note you can start building nuclei by colliding protons and neutrons shot from the artificer rather than just waiting for the spawners to shoot nucelli out.
In any case, glad you enjoyed it! (And yes I am a physicist as you guessed :) ).
Nice that makes more sense now, I didnt realize the energy would regen over time as well I thought I had to start moving faster to build it back up. Very awesome take on the theme though I really like the concept a lot and find it to be one of the more creative ones.
Graphics are good and I can kind of tell what I should be doing but was completely confused. It sounds like you already have plans to address this so I do hope you continue on, this seems like a fun game!
Thanks. All the comments have encouraged me to continue to develop the game so that is what I am planning on doing. :)
There is a great idea here but there are a few issues.
I think maybe a clue for those of us who don't know how to create metals from atoms as to what the combinations are?
I could not access the game until I read the comments and saw that you had made this for a control pad, plugged mine in and then I could access the menu (after restarting).
Once I could do this I went to settings, as the Gamepad is default no one can access your game without one, would suggest keyboard as default.
I scored some points, made some metals but was crazy to control and I didn't know why I ran out of protons etc.
A bit more thought about the audience and you could have something great.
Yeah I was worried about that. It was one of things I wanted to add but didn't have enough time for.
If I decide to develop this further (which I am inclined to do) I am planning on added the following:
I don't know what i'm doing! :D
Any keyboard/mouse controls set up for this, or is it via a joystick controler only?
I got WASD working to move around, and that was it. I couldn't fire, and didn't know what i was meant to be trying to achieve.
Help! :D
The controls are gamepad only right now. I didn't have time to get keyboard input fully working before the deadline. Is patching in keyboard controls allowed at this point or would it be considered a new feature?
The goal is basically to try to build up heavier and heavier nuclei then collect them by running into them for a score. As of now the goal is just to get to the highest score as possible. Originally I was going to have goals and puzzle elements, but time ran out. :(
I would say adding in keyboard controls would be fine :), it's not adding to the gameplay, it's enabling it.
Added Keyboard/Mouse controls.
Once I understood the game, it was fun to play. It is original and the dynamics are fantastic. Good work!
thanks! I’ll be checking out your game as well over the next few days. This has been my first jam and it was s fun. I leaned much on some technical aspects with scriptable objects and serialization (I used code of a serializable dictionary to enter all the data).
I felt out of control, I never catch one upgrade before they transformed into some other kind of upgrade.
On the other hand, it was challenging.
I wish that there were more puzzles to solve in the area :)
Good job!
My original intention was as to make it more of a puzzle game with different levels and even introducing effects of electromagnetism between particles. However my ambitions were outstripped by the time allotted. So what I put out there I consider more of a proof of concept.
I understand that time sets a limit on most games here :)
That sounds like a really cool idea. I would love to try the game whenever that puzzle mechanic is done :)
Will do!!! Glad you liked what I developed so far.
I struggled with the controls, it felt like nothing was responding, and everything just kept going out of control.
The premise looks cool, and has a lot of potential.
Thanks. The controls are velocity based. Looks like I forgot to put in the instructions that the left trigger on the gamepad is a brake. I'll fix that as soon as I can.
Now that I think about it, I probably have put in some particle system or the like trailing off from the player as they move. Oh well, something to add to the list of features and gameplay changes I want to do after the rating period.
Edit: Bug with the movement, display of instructions, and a scoring bug for making gold fixed with v1.1.